Once Upon A Time...

A tale of an unlikely adventure.

Once upon a time in the land of Carasia there was a beautiful kingdom called Gwejan. And in that kingdom there lived a princess. But this story doesn’t take place there. And it’s not about the princess. It’s about a fairy named Kristina who lives in the forest just outside of the city. Her life was simple; each day she woke up, tended to the flowers, cared for the animals, and when she finished she had just enough time to fly to the top of her oak tree on the edge of the woods and watch the sun set behind the tall buildings of the town beyond.

To an outsider this life might seem nice, never having to do much difficult work and not to mention the added bonus of being a fairy, but to Kristina it was dull. Fairies live a rather sheltered life, always in fear of being seen. She was never allowed to go into Gwejan, no matter how much she promised to be careful. When they were young the fairies were frightened with stories of others of their kind who had slipped out to visit the city and ended up captured and used for people’s amusement, but those tales had never scared Kristina. Instead they left her dreaming of a world just beyond her reach. In fact that was exactly what she was doing when her luck began to change.

It started out a normal day. Kristina had just finished caring for a litter of new born rabbits when the trees began to turn orange with the light of the setting sun. Realizing the time, she rushed off to the old oak tree where she spent her evenings. She had never missed a sunset and she wasn’t planning on starting that night. She managed to settle down on her favorite branch just in time to watch the sky behind the distant kingdom of Gwejan turn purple.

She lay there as the sun disappeared behind the buildings and slowly began to drift off. Before she knew it she was sound asleep. Her slumber was interrupted though by the noise of rustling leaves. She woke up gradually, looking around confused. When she realized that what she was hearing was caused by footsteps she darted behind the leaves out of instinct. As the shock wore off she cautiously peeked her head out from her hiding spot. There was a man standing at the edge of the forest looking out at the valley. Kristina gasped in surprise. For the most part men stayed away from this part of the forest.

This man turned around upon hearing her exclamation. “Who’s there?” He called. Kristina remained hidden. When it sounded like he had turned around she began to crawl out again. As she shifted her weight the branch began to give out. She paused for a moment and tested the strength of the tree. When she believed it to be safe she began moving again…

…right as the branch fell from beneath her.

She cried out in fear and tried to straighten herself out. When she couldn’t get herself to a position where she was able to fly, she braced herself for the crash. Only it didn’t happen. When she realized she wasn’t falling any more she slowly opened her eyes and found herself in the hands of the strange man. Startled she leaped up and flew down to duck under the roots of the tree.

“It’s ok,” the man said as he knelt down to where she was hidden. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Slowly Kristina came out. The man was relatively tall and rather thin. He had messy brown hair and a rather wiry look about him.

“What is your name?” He asked.

“Kristina,” she replied timidly.

“Nice to meet you,” he said. “My name’s Alexander.”

Kristina flew into the air and circled Alexander, examining him. “I’ve never seen a man before she said at last when she came to eye level with him.

“Well I’ve never met a fairy,” he responded.

“What are you doing here anyway?”

“I’m looking for something,” he said. “My neighbors duck. I was in charge of looking after it while they were away and I seem to have um… misplaced it.”

“Did it have a patch of brown feathers on its head?” Kristina asked.

“Yes. Have you seen it?”

“I saw it run by here around noontime yesterday. But you’ll never find it.”

“And why not?” Alexander questioned getting defensive.

“Because you walk too loudly. Every time you get close to it it will just hear you coming and run off.”

“Well what do you propose I do about that?”

“You can’t do anything. But perhaps I can.”

“Oooh no, no, no,” Alexander said. “I see where this is going and I’m afraid I don’t have any money to give you. I’ll figure it out on my own, thanks.”

He turned to walk away but Kristina dashed in front of him and said, “Don’t be ridiculous, I don’t have any use for money. I simply want to go with you. It gets so boring around here, I could use an adventure.”

“This isn’t exactly what I would call an adventure.”

“It is to me. Please just let me help you.”

Alexander sighed but decided he could probably use the help. His neighbor was getting back from Gwejan tomorrow and he’d already been out here for several hours. “Fine,” he said. “What’s the plan?”

Kristina beamed at him excitedly. “You wait here while I go ahead and see it I can find him.”

“Wait what…” Alexander called but she was already gone. Exasperated, he plopped down on the ground to wait.

About 30 minutes later Kristina came reappearing from the woods to find Alexander sound asleep against a tree. She poked and prodded him until he woke up.

“What’s going on?” He asked, only half-awake and confused.

“Good, you’re up,” she said. “Ok, so, I have good news and bad news. The good news is I found your duck.”

“That’s great! Where is he?”

“That’s the bad news. He’s currently being prepared as a troll’s lunch.”

“Well is he alive?” He asked.

“For now.”

“Then we have to go get him.”

“Are you crazy?” Kristina exclaimed. “Have you ever seen a troll? They’re big, and scary, and don’t even get me started on their hygiene.”

“Kristina, my neighbor will kill me if they find out I lost their duck. You’re the one who said you wanted an adventure, well now you’ve got one. So are you going to help me or not?”

“Fine,” Kristina moaned. “But first take off your shoes.”

“Why?” Alexander asked.

“We don’t need the whole forest to hear us coming,” she said.

“Oh, right.” And with that they set off.

After walking for a while the two of them came to the edge of a small clearing. Kristina motioned for Alexander to get down. He crawled over behind some bushes and peered between them. In the middle of the clearing there were two trolls. One of them was trying to start a fire while the other was attempting to get the duck to hold still so he could remove its feathers. They had dark green, wrinkled skin and wore tattered clothes. But most importantly they were only…

…about 3 feet tall.

Alexander turned to Kristina. “Those are your big, scary trolls?”

Kristina shrugged. “They’re big to me. And they can be vicious.”

“So what should we do?” He asked.

“Don’t ask me,” she said. “You’re the one who insisted we go after the duck.”

“Argh, right. You distract them while I get the duck.”

“Why don’t you distract them and I’ll get the duck?”

“Because I’m the only one able to lift the duck.”

Kristina rolled her eyes but agreed anyway.

Alexander then began to creep along the outskirts of the glade to where the duck was. He wasn’t very careful of his footing though and after a few steps there was a loud snap as he stepped on a twig. He stopped, paralyzed as the trolls stopped what they were doing and turned in his direction.

“Well look what we have here,” one of them said, his voice a low croak. “It appears we just found our dessert.”

Alexander glanced around frantically, searching for Kristina. He spotted her on the other side of the clearing with a rock in her hand.

“Hey trolls! Catch!” She shouted as she threw the rock at them and hit one of them right in the nose.

“You little nuisance!” He cried. “You’re going to be the appetizer!”

“You’ll have to get me first!” Kristina laughed as she flew just out of his reach. The trolls began to chase her around the clearing, temporarily forgetting about Alexander and the duck. Alexander used this to his advantage, grabbing the duck and running out of the glade. Kristina followed him, as did the trolls until they became too winded to pursue them any longer.

Kristina and Alexander stopped running after a while, laughing in the glory of their victory.

“That was quite the adventure,” Kristina said smiling.

“It doesn’t have to be over yet,” Alexander replied. “My village isn’t that far from here and we still have to return the duck. Would you care to accompany me?”

“Of course.”

When the two of them arrived at Alexander’s home they were greeted by a petite brunette girl.

“Alexander, there you are,” she said. “I was starting to get worried when I got home and didn’t see you here.”

“My apologies. I was just taking him on a, um… walk.” Alexander said as he held up the bird in his arms.

“Thank you,” the girl replied as she took the duck from him. “And who is this?” She asked looking at Kristina.

“Elizabeth, this is Kristina. Kristina, this is my neighbor Elizabeth.”

Kristina raised her eyebrows at Alexander but otherwise said nothing. As the sky began to darken she realized that the day was almost over.

“I should probably get going,” she said. “It was nice meeting you Elizabeth. Alexander, you know where to find me if you need to take any more ducks for a ‘walk’.” And with that she flew off to her oak tree to watch the sun set over Gwejan like always. Only this time it didn’t seem so far away. And though the day was ending, Kristina could only imagine what adventures the future might hold.

Author's Note

Just a cute little story I wrote for a class when given the prompt "Once upon a time..."

Reviews

[Arrinae]

This is cute!

[Jack...]

Hannah, how many words is this. We are having a contest on Authorstand.com and the prompt is "Once upon a time", word max is 1300. It might be fun for you to participate in, your story is very good and would probably fit in well. Not trying to promote the site, just the contest. It is free.

Besides that, I really liked your story. I like stories in this genre and yours was beautifully written. Good job.

[Hannah E. M.]

I'm afraid the story is about 1700 words:( But thank you anyway

[Amaya Sullivan]

You are right, it is a very cute story! I can hear Kristina's voice being, cheerful and high-pitched with excitement as I was reading. I really enjoyed reading this light and fun little adventure.

Good luck! Keep writing!

[Hannah E. M.]

Thank you :)