Fairy Morels

“Furlough isn’t all bad,” a broad-shouldered lad said to his lady as they hiked through the woods. She responded: “It is better than data entry!”  

Brunette hair waved in the fresh air. Her chocolate locks were constrained only slightly by her camouflage purple ball-cap. “It doesn’t pay quite as well though,” she quipped. “No, it does not.” His answer was pensive, and they continued their walk.

A few minutes later they came to a T in the trail. From a distance, they saw another couple. “What are they doing?” The girl asked. Tom handed Sam his binoculars. She looked through as he joked: “stalker.” Sam rolled the magnification dial until she could see well enough. “They’re picking things up, rocks maybe, and putting them into a mesh bag. Here, you look.”

“Mushroom hunters. Ha! I didn’t know people still did that. I work… well, worked with a lady who used to do that. She always said to ‘just fry em in butter. They are the best things you’ll ever eat.’ Come on, let’s get out of here.”

Tom and Sam hiked a mile or so further. The forest was transforming from dead brown of winter to the living green that spring brought. In some of the sunniest spots, buds popped up by the trail. A few had flowered already. In small sections, just a few steps wide, broad-leafed trillium plants started their growth. The North face of hills, however, still held mostly oak leaves in different shades of brown. Walking along ridges and ravines shown a diversity of scenery you could only get in this time between the seasons.

“Oh look at these little fairy houses!” Sam had an active imagination. She hunched down, pointing at emerald green plants that looked like umbrellas. “Don’t you think they could have a nice little home under those?”

“I think they could,” Tom humored her. He thought they honestly were very nice looking plants. “I’ve never seen these before.” His phone was out in an instant to snap a picture with his PictureThis App. The app told him it was “Mayapple, also known as Mandrake.”

They walked around them, looking but not stepping on the dozens of mandrakes. They grew right in the center of the trail at the top of this ridge. “You know, some of these that haven’t spread their umbrella-leaves yet look like little elf fingers sticking up out of the dirt.” Sam was not impressed: “Ew, gross. Why would you say that?” He defended himself by putting his hand on the ground, pinky finger in the air and comparing: “See? But green, like an elf’s.” Her eyes said she thought he was crazy.

Sam thought to herself that it was time to change the subject… back to fairy houses! “If I clap my hands a fairy should get her wings!” Tom looked up at her, puzzled. He got to his feet and asked: “What?” She told him about a movie she had seen with that fae magic.

Sam clapped her hands, three times in rapid succession. A smile of joy lit across her face. Those pretty cheekbones of hers pushed her eyes into squints. She looked like a child again, full of excitement.  

Looking up from the fairy houses to Tom, she disappeared.

Tom’s mouth opened. His eyebrows furrowed and his gaze slowly scanned left, right, up and down.

* * *

Previously, the mandrake grove was on high alert. The rival fae from the morel troop wanted to expand through what was considered neutral territory and build more morel mushroom houses. The fairies already had several mandrake umbrella houses in the neutral trillium grounds. Their territories met up on the north-east side of the trillium sprouts. Nearly all the fairies were at the boundary line, staging a protest against the advancing mushroom fae.  

Sam didn’t really disappear. She shrank and found herself alone at the opposite side of the mandrake village. Only one young fairy saw her.

“Hello there!” The fast-flying fairy swooped over to Sam. “How did you do that?” She said, unabashedly. “One minute you’re a million wings tall and now look at you, down here with us!”

Sam fainted. “Oh, bother. I wonder how heavy this girl is?” The fairy grabbed Sam’s feet and found her lighter than a thimble of water, so she flew Sam back to her fairy house.

* * *

Tom replayed the last several minutes in his mind as he retraced his steps. “OK, we were here, walking towards those umbrella things. We stopped, looked at them; I made a joke about elves.” He got down on his knees and touched the plants he was nearest to.  

Unbeknownst to Tom, this rattled the home of the kind fairy that took Sam in. She looked between leaves of her umbrella-shaped mandrake and yelled: “Stop that, you!” But Tom didn’t believe in fairies and so could not hear.

Tom was freaking out. He stomped through the mandrakes, through the trillium and sat down on the North face of the ridge, looking out at the dead leaves, unable to think any more. He put his elbows on his knees and his head on his hands. “What else happened?”

“Oh! She clapped. What was that part of the movie about? It was basically a belief in fairies.” He made a disbelieving face, curling the right side of his mouth up in something like disgust.

Shocked he was considering this, he thought: “Well there’s no harm in it.” He clapped. Nothing happened. “Stupid,” he said.

He got up and paced. Tom stepped on something mushy. Looking down he found a morel mushroom under his foot. He looked around and saw an entire troop of morel mushrooms camouflaged by the leaves. He never would have seen them if he wasn’t looking right at them. “Like little brains on stems.” He said. Tom picked one up, pinching it at the stem. He held it up and noticed the tubular shaft in the center was hollow.  

A roly-poly climbed down and jumped out of the bottom of the morel. The gray, pill-shaped bug was no bigger than Tom’s smallest fingernail and posed no threat to him. He ignored it and tossed the mushroom down the hill. Watching it tumble down the ravine distracted him. He enjoyed that.  

The moment passed and he was back to thinking about Sam. “Fairies!” He yelled. “Give me back my Sam!” Tom lowered his head in shame. Nevertheless, he closed his eyes, clapped his hands three times in rapid succession and suddenly heard voices.

It was a mob. A crowd of men gathered around him and more were coming. More men were streaming out of giant morel shaped structures to gather around. They were yelling at him. Tom stood and backed up, hands raised in peace.

One of the men, their leader perhaps, approached out of the mob. He walked at first, then started running, dove into the air and transformed into a giant gray ball. The man had curled in mid-air and rolled up to Tom. It would have rolled through Tom, but he leaped out of the way. The ball uncurled to reveal 7 pairs of legs. Those horrors propelled the creature at Tom again, leaped again into its fighting ball-form and rolled into Tom at full force.  

Their enemy was unconscious. The wrecking ball transformed back into a man. That man ordered his mob to pick Tom up and follow.

* * *

Back in the mandrake grove, the fast-flying fairy nursed Sam back to consciousness. “There you are. Wake up now. Hello! I’m Sephunie.”

Sam smiled as her eyes regained their focus. She looked around and noticed she was in a sort of treehouse. Sephunie turned, making Sam shout and scoot back into the fairy bed. She had seen the wings. “What are you?” Sam asked.

“Why, I’m a fairy, of course. I heard you talking about us while you were giant. You must know.”  

Sam thought about this, remembering what the fairy said outside: “‘One minute you’re a million wings tall… and now look at you!’” Sam’s smile slowly returned to her face. She was happy to hear this even if she didn’t comprehend it. “Well, I see you are a fairy but why are we the same size?”

“I’m not real sure, I’ve never seen anything like this before,” Sephunie answered. “But I bet I know who can help you! Queen Vinjian! She’s over with most of the kingdom standing against the invaders. Oh, it’s nothing dangerous for you, dear. She’s leading the fight against some shapeshifters. We can handle them. Come on then, let’s go ask her!”

* * *

Wrecking balls sped through alleyways of trillium below flying fairies. There were nearly equal numbers but the bugs were losing ground. Every time a squadron would advance, fairies flew down, picked some up and threw them down the ravine. Some of the bugs held what looked like axles at their centers. A fairy picked up one of these, immediately regretting it. The ball transformed and torqued their spear-of-an-axle into the fairy's wings. The fairy dropped the bug and fluttered out of control back to the ground, far from the action.

Tom’s captors brought him to the front line. “Make way, move it!” the commander shouted. “King Morchella!” The largest bug rolled through the crowd and transformed into a bearded warrior. The king was armed for battle, carrying a spear. His helmet was a dark blue-gray color like steel.

“What beast is this?” Morchella asked of his commander, eyes alight with battle-lust.

“Must be a wingless spy from fairyland, my lord.”  

“Vinjian! Show yourself!” The king shouted, and with that authority, the masses of roly-polies stopped their attack. 

Sam and Sephunie had also made it near the dividing line between mandrake fairies and morel troops. They heard the request from the other ruler. “Oh, Thank goodness!” Stephanie exclaimed. In her youthfulness, she thought the only possible explanation for this could be a call for peace. Sam didn’t understand, so she helped explain: “Wars between fae follow certain rules. If parlay is requested, then battles stop. If your human leaders called for a peace treaty, your armies would momentarily cease-fire, correct?” They ran closer.

A beautiful queen, clad in flower petals, it seemed, flew gracefully to the ground. Hundreds of fairies flew in formation down just behind her.

“Vinjian, we have your spy!” The king proudly pointed his spear into Tom’s back.

“Let him go!” Sam screamed.  

The queen looked only at King Morchella. “You have nothing of interest to us. Clearly, that is a human.” All the fae shrunk back in fear. Gasps escaped from even the bravest spear-carrying pill-bugs. Even the king flexed at the idea of humans.

Being a smart girl, Sam saw an opportunity. She saw their fear. “That’s right, and there are two more of us in the woods. I could call them here in an instant if you don’t let him go right now.”

“Then why haven’t you done it already, girl,” Morchella replied in a hiss.

A million thoughts raced through Sam’s head in an instant. “Unbelievable; he called my bluff. I wonder where those mushroom hunters are now, anyway. Tom looks in bad shape. I wonder what they did to Tom! What do they do in the movies to get away from fairies?”

She knew what she had to do. Closing her eyes, she tried to erase her memories of Sephunie and blank out thoughts of the mandrake treehouse. “There’s no such thing as fairies. There’s no such thing as fairies. There is no such thing as fairies!” And when she opened her eyes, she was full-sized Samantha again. 

Sam bent down, and to her surprise, she could still see tiny Tom.

Tom heard the ultra-low pitch voice of giant Sam say to him “hold your ears.” He didn’t get it, but as Sam sucked in oxygen and started what could only be a scream, he put his fingers into his ears and closed his eyes tightly. Samantha screamed and it shook every mandrake, every morel, every trillium leaf around Tom.

She knelt down right beside him and swept her hand at what she hoped must be hundreds of fighters. Mid swipe, she saw roly-poly pill-bugs materialize out of thin air. She flung them away. Picking up Tom, she retreated. Sam yelled over her shoulder “Thank you Sephunie!” She quietly asked Tom “I didn’t hurt any fairies, did I?”  

Tom replied in what Sam heard as an ultra-fast, high pitched ramble: “No. They all flew away! That was amazing! All those fighters got the beat down of their lives today! Hahahahaha!” It was like listening to a book on Audible at 2x speed.

She ran back to Tom’s truck, which was parked at the trailhead. Seeing the mushroom hunters also in the lot, she pocketed Tom and walked up calmly. Sam told them where she had seen a lot of morels. “A whole troop of them, right on the North face past some mandrakes and trillium.”

“Thanks!” The woman said. Reaching into her bag, the woman asked Sam: “would you like to take a couple home to fry up for dinner?”

Sam said: “No, thank you!” with a little more enthusiasm than she intended.  

The woman was taken aback. “No problem, mushrooms aren’t for everyone. I know that. Hey, by the way, where’s your man?”

Sam made up a story on the spot. “He’s in his turkey blind, doing some scouting for the season. Still hasn’t gotten one but he tries every year! I’ll come pick him up later.”

The couple went back into the woods, hopefully, to finish what Tom started: destroying those little monster’s homes.

Sam got into the passenger seat of Tom’s truck. She took him out of her pocket, placed him on the driver’s seat and gave him the instructions. His squeaky voice said quickly “There’s no such thing as fairies” and poof, he was his broad-shouldered, six-foot-tall self again!

They looked at each other. Tom started the truck and drove off down the dirt road, away from the setting sun. Turning for home he said: “you were amazing!”

She answered, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”