2024 Orick, California
Harmony sighed as she finished unboxing the last of the dishes. Now all she had left to unpack was the winter clothing, which would be needed quite soon if the cooler temperatures were any indication.
"Aunt Harmony, can we go exploring after dinner?" her ten-year-old niece asked excitedly. Aurora hadn't started sprouting yet, her head barely coming to Harmony's chest. Her long black hair was tied back in a ponytail that reached the middle of her back. She had long dark eyelashes that should have been illegal. Her dark brown eyes were sparkling with eagerness as she waited for Harmony's response.
"Sure, Aurora," Harmony replied with an indulgent smile as she observed her dark-eyed niece. "Just make sure and get your jackets from the winter box."
"Grandma Norella said there's a giant wall in the forest that nobody's ever been inside of," Aurora's eleven-year-old sister said with a determined grin. "I'll bet we can find a way in!"
Serenity had definitely sprouted. She was only a few inches shorter than Harmony's unusual height, just under six feet. Aside from her height, she could have been Aurora's twin.
"I'm sure we can, Serenity," Harmony laughed, getting caught up in their excitement. It never ceased to amaze her how fascinating the world was to young minds. "We'll just walk around it."
"You can't walk around it, silly," Serenity said reproachfully. "It's a big circle. Grandma Norella says it goes on for miles and miles."
"Ooooh…" Harmony gasped in mock amazement, her hazel eyes shining. "I'll bet there's all kinds of treasure hiding inside of it!"
"That's what we think too!" Aurora nodded eagerly. "I'll bet there is a whole bunch of Spanish gold inside of it."
"Well of course it would have to be Spanish gold," Harmony said dryly.
Aurora squinted at her suspiciously for a moment as she tried to figure out if Harmony was teasing her. She finally settled for agreement, spinning around and running for the last of the moving boxes.
"Were you just being sarcastic, Aunt Harmony?" Serenity asked disapprovingly. "Our teacher told us sarcasm is the refuge of a bitter mind."
"Well, I definitely have a better mind, so I guess I was being sarcastic," Harmony replied with a straight face.
"Bitter not better, silly!" Serenity corrected her, stamping her foot for emphasis.
"Why would I have a butter mind?" Harmony asked in mock confusion. "Oh, I see; you're saying people who are sarcastic have fat brains."
"Bitter!" Serenity shouted, stamping her other foot. "Bitter, bitter, bitter!"
Aurora came running back into the kitchen with two jackets, throwing one of them to Serenity as she climbed onto one of the bar stools. "Who's bitter?"
"Serenity said she wants some lemons to go with her dinner," Harmony told Aurora with a shrug. "She's got an even more bizarre appetite than a pregnant woman."
"She's lying!" Serenity gasped in amazement. "I can't believe you just lied, Aunt Harmony!"
"I'm an author," Harmony told her with a wink. "We're given artistic license when it comes to telling the truth."
"What does that even mean?" Serenity demanded indignantly.
"It means that while in this universe you may have meant something else, I was pretending that we were in another universe where you meant you wanted lemons with your dinner," Harmony explained innocently.
"But there's only one universe," Serenity declared. "Otherwise, it would be called an omniverse."
"Who told you that?" Harmony asked curiously.
"It was on YouTube," Serenity replied.
"Well, if it was on YouTube, it has to be true," Harmony nodded sagely.
"You're being sarcastic again!" Serenity said accusingly.
"That's because I have a butter mind," Harmony replied with a wink. "And with a brain as fat as mine, I can be as sarcastic as I want."
"You can be so infuriating, Aunt Harmony!" Serenity complained crossly.
"So, I've been told," Harmony replied agreeably. "If you take notes, you'll be pros before you know it."
"Why would we want to be pros at infuriating people?" Serenity demanded in exasperation.
"Because it's a lot of fun," Harmony replied with a smirk. "Can't you see how much fun I'm having?"
"I'm telling Grandma that you lied," Serenity threatened.
"Who do you think taught me how to do it so well?" Harmony asked with a raised eyebrow.
Serenity stood spluttering for several seconds, and then folded her arms and narrowed her eyes in a manner that would have been stern, if she were a decade older. Instead, it just looked adorable.
"I'm telling Grandma that you called her a liar," Serenity stated huffily.
"Okay," Harmony replied amicably. "I'll make sure and tell her you called her an old bag."
"But I didn't!" Serenity objected in confusion. When Harmony just kept smirking at her, her eyes grew wide in sudden understanding. "You're going to lie!"
"Don't forget, we call it artistic license around here," Harmony corrected her with a wide grin.
"You're unbelievable!" Serenity shrieked, glaring at her sister as Aurora started giggling.
"Now you're getting the hang of it," Harmony nodded in satisfaction. "All liars are unbelievable by default."
Serenity glared at her for a moment before settling for an affronted silence. Harmony shook her head in amusement as she started preparing dinner. She had only gained custody of her nieces a couple of days ago, and it was proving more fun than she had imagined. It was the only silver lining to her sister's untimely death several months ago. Her nieces had been living with their grandmother while Harmony tried to decide if she could handle being their guardian. At twenty-three years old, she felt woefully inadequate to take care of two girls on the verge of becoming teenagers. Leaving them with her ill mother weighed on her conscience enough that she eventually gave in and shouldered the responsibility.
Her deceased sister had been a decade older and a no-nonsense person with little patience for humor. She had even less patience for lying and had raised her daughters with a strict moral code where everything was seen as black or white. Harmony felt that it was her duty to broaden her nieces' horizons before they were taken advantage of by the many jackals in human form throughout the world.
If I have a little fun at their expense, well, that's just a burden I'll have to shoulder, Harmony thought with a martyr's resolve.
By the time they finished eating and were preparing to go exploring, Serenity had forgotten that she was giving Harmony the silent treatment. The two girls were running into the forest behind their two-story house with reckless abandon before Harmony could even get off the back porch. With a grin, Harmony ran after them. Her long legs ate up the ground quickly and she easily caught up to them. Long blonde hair flew behind her as she sprinted around the sparse underbrush. Enormous redwood trees were mixed in with the smaller pine trees.
After fifteen minutes of zipping through the trees, the girls were finally slowing down to a more acceptable pace. The giant redwoods were becoming more prevalent as the smaller trees disappeared. She noticed the large redwoods had branches that started at the base of the tree. She had only seen redwoods where the branches grew higher up the trunk. The low branching redwoods appeared more frequently as they moved deeper into the forest.
Harmony glanced at what she could see of the horizon calculatingly as the sun sank behind some clouds. They probably only had another half hour of good light left. She looked at her iPhone's GPS app, making sure it was marking their progress with breadcrumbs so that they could find their way back to the house.
"Wow!" Serenity exclaimed in amazement. "It's humungous!"
Harmony put her phone away and looked up to see what they were so excited about. Then she saw the wall and gasped. It must have been four hundred feet tall! Most of the enormous redwood trees around it were at least a couple dozen feet shorter. In a state of bemusement, Harmony slowly approached the giant wall. Who in the world would build something so massive in the middle of nowhere like this?
When she reached the base of the colossal structure, she reached a hand out to feel the surface. It was as smooth as glass. It had flecks peppering it that almost looked like granite. She pulled out her small pocketknife and experimentally tried to score some of the surface loose. The steel blade didn't even scratch the hard material. With a frown, she picked up a rock and tried pounding the butt of her knife against the surface of the wall. After a few taps, the blade of her knife snapped in half. Curiouser and curiouser.
She pulled out her iPhone to take a few close-up pictures. As she slid the unlock button on her iPhone's touchscreen, the screen suddenly flickered, then winked out. Just bloody great. Now I have to find my way back without breadcrumbs.
"Aunt Harmony, I can almost see over the top of the wall!" Aurora shouted excitedly from somewhere up high.
Harmony felt a sudden chill as she looked up and spotted Aurora several hundred feet high in the branches of one of the taller redwoods.
"Aurora, get back down here before you break your neck!" Harmony shouted urgently. She could tell the branches Aurora was on were getting extremely thin.
"It's okay, I climb trees all of the time," Aurora shouted back down reassuringly.
"I think you should come back down," Serenity called up to her sister from where she was perched about halfway up the tree.
"Listen to your sister, Aurora!" Harmony shouted insistently. "We are in a very bad place for a medical emergency."
"Fine!" Aurora sighed dramatically. "You guys are being babies though. I could climb this thing blindfolded- "
She cut off with a startled yell as a loud cracking noise reached Harmony's ears.
"Aurora!" Harmony shouted in alarm, hurriedly scaling the lower branches.
"I'm okay…" Aurora shouted in a much less confident tone. "Um…I think I might be stuck though."
Harmony felt her heart skip several beats as dozens of horrible outcomes flashed through her over-active imagination. "Hold on honey, I'm coming up."
"I think you better hurry," Aurora called back down. "I don't know how much longer I can hold on."
Harmony panted as she quickened her pace. She wasn't sure if her heart was beating so fast from exertion, or fear. The bark on the trees was so enormous that she was able to easily use it like a rock-climbing wall. She passed Serenity and kept moving as fast as she could. It only took her a few minutes to reach a point where she had a clear view of the situation. Aurora was hanging from a branch that looked way too small to support her weight, with one arm hooked around the branch while her other hand grasped another small branch.
"My arm is starting to slip, Aunt Harmony," Aurora quavered, her voice tight with anxiety.
"You look like you could use a hand," a melodic voice noted cheerfully from several branches below Harmony.
Harmony looked down in surprise as a young woman quickly zipped past her like a squirrel up the tree. It was now dark enough that she couldn't make out any of the girl's features, aside from a mass of brilliant long red hair. Harmony watched in amazement as the girl scaled the last fifty feet separating her from Aurora like an Olympic gymnast. A faint smell of flowers had appeared as the girl passed her.
The girl calmly walked out onto a small limb just below Aurora and reached up to grab her niece around the waist.
"You can let go now," the girl told Aurora confidently. "I've got you."
"There is no way that branch will support both of you," Harmony said nervously.
"Nonsense," the girl replied dismissively. "I need you to trust me, Aurora. Now let go."
"Okay," Aurora took a deep breath and released the branch she was holding.
Harmony cringed as the small branch the girl was standing on bowed slightly as she lowered Aurora down. Somehow, the branch remained unbroken as it supported their combined weight.
"Now just wrap your arms and legs around me and we'll head back down," the girl instructed Aurora calmly.
Harmony watched in astonishment as the girl somehow balanced perfectly on the small branch while Aurora complied. She must be part squirrel!
"All right, let's blow this popsicle stand," the girl said with a grin in her voice.
As Harmony watched open-mouthed, the girl began hopping down the branches like she was walking down a stairway. She finally snapped out of her astonishment when the girl passed her in a blur of gravity-defying leaps down the tree. The girl was only slightly larger than the tightly clinging Aurora.
Harmony hurriedly began descending the large tree, shaking her head in disbelief at the impossibility of the situation.
"Who is that?" Serenity asked in bafflement when Harmony caught up to her. "And where did she come from?"
"Didn't she pass you on her way up?" Harmony asked in surprise.
"I didn't see anyone," Serenity replied blankly.
Harmony frowned as she looked down at the ground that was still a good seventy feet below them. The girl and Aurora were chatting at the base of the tree.
"Come on, let's get back down," Harmony said after taking another deep breath. She could still feel adrenaline coursing through her system from the intense fear that had filled her heart just moments ago. Her arms and legs felt like jelly when she finally neared the bottom, due to a mixture of fatigue and spent adrenaline.
The girl had her head tilted upward as she watched them descend the last dozen feet. As soon as Harmony reached the ground, she pulled Aurora into a tight embrace.
"Don't ever scare me like that again!" Harmony gasped as she felt tears of relief spill down her cheeks.
"I promise," Aurora said contritely as she patted Harmony's back comfortingly. "I'm sorry, aunt Harmony."
Harmony took a deep, shuddering breath and turned to thank their rescuer. With a frown, she did a full three-sixty turn as her eyes failed to locate their heroine.
"Where did she go?" Harmony asked in confusion.
"She's right here-" Aurora broke off as she realized their mysterious rescuer was nowhere to be found.
"Hello?" Harmony called out uncertainly into the darkening landscape.
Silence.
"Where is she?" Serenity asked as she jumped down the remaining few feet from the lowest branch.
"She just vanished," Harmony replied in puzzlement. "I saw her two seconds ago, then she was gone."
"Maybe she flew away," Aurora suggested, looking into the sky.
"What do you mean?" Serenity asked curiously.
"I thought fairies could fly," Aurora answered uncertainly.
"What makes you think she was a fairy?" Serenity asked doubtfully.
"She had pointy ears like a fairy," Aurora replied with a shrug. "Who else has pointy ears?"
Harmony frowned, remembering the strange points that were sticking up through the sides of the girl's hair. It had been too dark to see clearly, so she had just assumed it was unruly hair. There's no such thing as fairies. Might as well bring elves and Santa Clause into the picture while we're at it.
"Come on, let's get home," Harmony said briskly.
Aurora and Serenity grudgingly gave up their search of the darkening skies and followed her back toward the house. Holding her breath for luck, Harmony pulled out her iPhone and held the power button down for a few seconds. A small apple appeared on the screen as the phone came back to life. Thank goodness for small mercies.
Her nieces remained unusually quiet as she used the flashlight on her phone to help light the way back to the house. The breadcrumbs on her phone's map were still present, or they would never have found their way back in the dark woods.
"I think this calls for some ice-cream," Harmony declared as they walked through the back door.
"You mean rice-cream," Serenity corrected with a roll of her eyes.
"It tastes just as good as the real thing," Harmony said with a shrug. "And you don't have to feel bad about torturing cute cuddly cows when you eat it."
"I wouldn't mind torturing a cow if it meant real ice cream," Serentiy muttered just loud enough for Harmony to hear.
Harmony shook her head but didn't say anything.
As they sat under the dim light at the kitchen bar eating rice-cream, Aurora kept absently looking out the window. The full moon was cresting the trees, giving the forest a magical appearance as moonlight cast shadows beneath the branches.
"What are you looking at, honey?" Harmony asked curiously.
"I was just hoping to see the fairy flying around," Aurora replied vaguely.
"Sweetie, fairies don't really exist, except in movies and books," Harmony said gently.
"What if she lives inside of that big ring?" Aurora murmured, as if she hadn't heard Harmony. "What if it's a fairy ring?"
Harmony just sighed and let it pass. She'll get over it in a few days.
"How did she know Aurora's name?" Serenity asked suddenly.
"She probably heard us shouting it," Harmony shrugged.
Serenity didn't look convinced.
"Come on, let's get you girls ready for bed," Harmony said as they finished their dessert. "School night."
That was all it took to get their minds off of fairies. After several half-hearted objections, the two girls reluctantly began the nightly bedtime routine.
After both girls were securely deposited into their bedroom, Harmony sat down at the desk in her bedroom and opened her laptop. Time to see what we can find out about that crazy wall.
It took almost five minutes of narrowing her search queries to even find any references to the enormous structure. Very few people even knew of its existence, with most of the information supplied from local Native American legends. Most of the legends were spawned by the Kalapuya tribe and passed on by neighboring tribes after the majority of the Kalapuya were wiped out from European plagues. Significant language barriers between the Kalapuya and the other tribes in the region made the legends even more difficult to interpret and understand.
According to the legends, a Chepi, which was the Native American equivalent of a fairy, was the caretaker of magical creatures that once inhabited the Americas. After eons of coexisting peacefully with humans, the Elders of the largest tribe in North America betrayed the Chepi and began using the magical creatures they protected in rituals to steal their magic. The only way a Chepi could reproduce was to bind herself to a mortal man and bear his offspring. The first child always inherited the mother's powers and was given the charge to protect the magical creatures in the land from evil spirits. The evil spirits longed to steal their magic so they could take on mortal form. Once in mortal form, the evil spirits would deceive the human tribes and initiate rites of human sacrifice to feed their twisted spirits and gain more power over the spirit realm.
The Kalapuya claimed one of the eldest of the Chepi found humans repugnant and refused to bond with them. Since Chepi only became mortal after bonding with humans, this Chepi remained in a state of perpetual youth. When all the other Chepi in the land were deceived and their first-born children sacrificed to evil spirits, only the Chepi known as the Eldest remained. She gathered all the remaining magical creatures in the land and kept them safe from the Elders in her circle of dominion. All the other circles of dominion in the land had decayed and been destroyed when their Chepi died. Only one circle of dominion remained, proof that at least one Chepi still lived.
Rubbing her tired eyes, Harmony closed her laptop and flopped down onto her bed with a sigh. I can't believe even these natives believe in fairies. I guess some superstitions are just too good to keep on one side of the world.