Chicory Up: The Pixie Chronicles (21 page)

“Well, Snapdragon has other ideas. And he’s going to be really mad. He may throw my brothers into the cellar if I don’t show up on time.” The yellow Pixie shivered all over.

“Cellars are not good for Pixies.” Chase shared Dandelion’s chill. “But how can he throw you anywhere you don’t want to go?” Chase remembered Alder throwing Thistle out of Pixie altogether. But that was different.

“He’s bigger’n any Pixie I’ve ever heard about in legend and lore. And he’s mean. Mean as a ground wasp. And he’s not from around here, but he’s in charge somehow.”

“What’s your tribe, Dandelion? I’ll fix it so you can go home, safely.”

“I used to sort of belong to Mabel. At least she sent me places to listen to you humans blather on and on and on about nothing. Mabel thought it was important, so I listened. But Mabel isn’t around anymore. Maybe not coming home ever. And this guy Snapdragon saunters in, cozies up to our Queen Rosie, and now he’s fighting this war against anything that goes into or comes out of The Ten Acre Wood.”

“I thought Rosie was betrothed to Hay, from the valley tribes.” Chase tried to puzzle through the complex relationships Thistle had explained to him. He got lost about the time Alder signed a marriage treaty with Milkweed, Hay’s sister. Only Alder had taken Thistle on a mating flight the day before the wedding. Only…

He shook his head in bewilderment.

“Thistle says that the first rule of Pixie is that you don’t play tricks on other Pixies. That’s what humans are for.”

“This war is not about pranks. Snapdragon threw Chicory into the cellar two nights ago and no one’s seen him since. Daisy cried herself to sleep. Pixies don’t cry.”

“Chicory? The sarcastic blue guy who helped me fix Dusty’s music box last summer? Chicory, the guy who helped Thistle’s friends tickle the clouds and bring us much needed rain to fight the fire in The Ten Acre Wood?”

“Yeah, that Chicory. He was a good guy. We all liked him. Wish he could kick Rosie off her pink rose and become king.”

“Somehow I don’t think that will get rid of Snapdragon. What does he look like?”

“Like a snapdragon. Big, bloated, yellow with ugly red spots that look like they’re eating his wings. Only they can’t ’cause he can fly faster and farther than any of us. Gotta have whole wings to gather that much air. He makes us practice with our hawthorn swords by stabbing at his wings. I’m terrible at it. He moves so fast I can’t see where to strike.”

“I haven’t heard about this Pixie before. How come?” But it sounded a lot like the description of a huge dragonfly witnesses said caused the big accident on the freeway.

“Dunno. Let me go, please. Before he gets even madder
than he already is.” Dandelion opened his eyes wide and turned on a winsome expression that tugged at Chase’s heart.

“I don’t think I should let you help this guy.”

“But… but… but my brothers?”

“What are your brothers’ names?”

“Dandelion. We’re all named Dandelion. Every tribe has a least a dozen of us hanging around the edges, getting in the way. So many of us you can’t walk without tripping over us. We’re hardy and good breeders. In winter we’re the ones sent out of the nest for food, ’cause the cold doesn’t hurt us until it’s cold enough to snow.” He puffed out his chest with pride.

“Ah.” Chase smiled. That described dandelions perfectly. “If there are so many of you, then Snapdragon isn’t likely to miss just one.” And if they bred like weeds, two more would pop up for every one that got pulled.

“Um… hadn’t thought about that.”

“Do you know where Dusty lives?” Chase asked, an idea brightening his mind.

“Yeah, big pretty pink house with a porch that wraps nearly all the way around it?”

“That’s the one, only I wouldn’t call the pink pretty. It’s a bit garish for my taste.” Harem pink with purple-and-green trim that was supposed to complement each other and look Victorian but somehow clashed. Juliet Carrick missed the boat on color combinations.

Dandelion giggled. “That’s what I think, but I’m not supposed to say so. Rosie likes those colors.”

Chase opened his hand, letting the Pixie stand on his palm, no longer restrained.

“Well, I want you to gather your brothers and as many of the others as you can and go hide at Dusty’s house. I don’t think there are any Pixies living there and the family could use some help with the garden.”

“You mean it? Our own place?”

“Yeah. But you have to continue spying on the town and report back to me. I need to know what’s going on before people get hurt.”

“You mean like them?” Dandelion pointed toward three
boys in the twelve-to-fifteen-year-old range sauntering down the gravel road toward the museum from The Ten Acre Wood. Each had a cigarette dangling from his mouth, and they all flicked disposable lighters on and off with their thumbs.

As Chase watched, they angled their steps toward the carriage barn, open on the south side and filled with antique wagons and carriages, all made of old, dry, and very flammable wood.

Chase didn’t recognize any of the boys from the local school.

“Yeah. Like them. Now go weaken Snapdragon’s army and take refuge at Dusty’s.” Chase watched the Pixie flap his wings with strength and energy as he rose up and took flight on an arrow-straight path toward the forest.

Chase followed at an oblique angle to intercept the hoodlums. They all had a strange dust clinging to their wet hair and shoulders. He’d noticed a similar dust coating the first car in line at the multi vehicle pileup. It looked like rusted gold. Only gold did not rust.

A
FLICKER OF MOVEMENT OUTSIDE caught Dusty’s attention. She used her pioneer costume apron (the afternoon had filled the museum with groups of older tourists and she’d changed to accommodate them) to clear her glasses of dust specks. Glasses repositioned on her nose, she squinted to look out the upstairs bedroom window that faced north, toward the carriage barn and the wall of trees behind it that marked The Ten Acre Wood. Three boys in their early teens marched toward the barn from the gravel road. Each held a disposable cigarette lighter in front of him with a straight arm. Their stance reminded her of the flag bearers in the Olympic Parade of Nations.

None of them looked right or left as they flicked their lighters. In the dull, overcast light of the early afternoon, Dusty saw tiny flames flare and retract with each flick. Panic sent her heart racing. She dropped the specially treated dusting cloth, and dashed through the maze of furniture, cradles, and antique toys for the stairs.

“Call nine-one-one!” she yelled to the volunteer about to start a tour in the front parlor. “Call the police! Call the fire department.”

Dusty swung around the last banister on the ball of her foot, changing her trajectory for the front door.

“Dusty? What should I tell them?” Mrs. Sanderson called after her fleeing back.

“Vandals with lighters,” Dusty panted, not pausing.

Then she was on the front porch, visitors and volunteer crowding behind her. Her training to put the safety of visitors
first stopped her in her tracks. “Please, go back inside and call the authorities,” she begged Mrs. Sanderson and the two couples in their early sixties.

“There’s Sergeant Norton coming up behind the boys,” Mrs. Sanderson pointed out.

Dusty’s heart did a little flip of gratitude and love for the man. “Chase will take care of this. But you should call for backup in any case,” Dusty insisted, ushering them back into the parlor.

The moment she closed the door behind them, she took off across the grass, leaping over the herb garden and skirting rhododendrons.

“Stop right where you are,” Chase called to the three boys.

They kept on marching toward the carriage barn as if they hadn’t heard the voice of authority behind them.

“Stop, or I’ll shoot!” Chase drew his weapon with one hand, gesturing for Dusty to move out of the line of fire with the other.

She darted to the side, the third point of a triangle with the boys at the top she and Chase on opposite corners.

The boys trod forward, no longer flicking the lighters on and off. The flames held steady even in the slight wind created by their movement.

Anger at the audacity of these children threatened to overwhelm her.

Then a grinding buzz caught her attention. Keeping one eye on the boys, she searched for the source. No mistaking it for anything but a Pixie on a rampage. From the volume, it must be near. Her eye tracked a blur of yellow movement circling the boys’ heads.

Ding dang chug shplach.
A discordant blast of noise accompanied the buzz from the big Pixie. The biggest Pixie she could imagine. It must be at least six inches long, instead of the usual four.

Mouth agape, she stared for half a heartbeat that felt like an eternity. Time seemed to slow down, images coming to her in pixilated slideshow images. Chase raised his gun. The boys took one more step closer to the barn.

The Pixie taunted them all, leaving a trail of dull yellow dust tinged with flaking rust. Pixie dust?

Shouldn’t it sparkle? This was not an ordinary Pixie by any stretch of the imagination.

The lead boy pulled his right arm back, ready to cast the lighter into the rattletrap flatbed farm wagon that sagged and warped in all the wrong places.

Ding dang chug shplach.

Dusty almost caught words along with the awful discord. Something about watching flames climb higher and higher. The words “obey me” repeated over and over.

She knew that voice. Where did she know it from?

The jerky rhythm in the almost singing told her that even if Chase managed to shoot the boy, the lighter would still fly forward.

“No!” she yelled, launching herself in a flying tackle.

Neither Chase nor Dick had been able to bring down an opponent outside the end zone with that move. Dusty drew on memories of early ballet classes, cut short by leukemia, and connected with the boy at waist level, dropping them both to the grass.

He still held the lighter in his hand. The flame floundered in the damp grass.

A shot cracked through the tense air.

She braced herself for pain. She heard a dull thud of a bullet impacting wood and dared breathe.

A quick glance showed the boys looking around in bewilderment, staring at their lighters as if they’d never seen them before.

The big Pixie with red boils on its wings had disappeared in silence.

Chase’s heart nearly stopped as he watched Dusty fall simultaneously with his gunshot. He holstered the weapon as he dashed to her side. Hands and knees shaking, he knelt beside her.

“Dusty? Oh, my God. You can’t be hurt. Tell me I didn’t hurt you!” No blood. That was a good sign. What about the kid beneath her?

She shook her head as she roused, bracing herself on stiff arms. “I can’t see.”

“Where are you hurt?” Chase demanded. “Oh, God. Oh, God. What have I done to you!”

“N… nothing. I don’t think anything’s wrong other than a bullet hole either in my barn or the wagon. And I can’t find my glasses to find out what you did hit.” She shook her head again as if ridding her ears of an annoying sound. “Damn, that gun is loud. Louder than that horribly diseased Pixie.”

Chase searched frantically about until he spotted the wire frames about three feet away. That was some tackle to send her glasses flying that far. With a touch of admiration he picked them up and handed them to Dusty. She wiped the lenses with the hem of her apron before seating them firmly on the bridge of her nose.

“Huh?” the boy on the ground muttered. “Wha… what happened?”

“Good question, boy.” Chase checked the other two boys. They stood rock solid, still staring at their lighters as if they held alien weapons. Not exactly alien, but the weapon of choice of a deranged Pixie. “I need to know why you and your buddies were so intent on setting fire to antique exhibits within the bounds of a city park,” Chase replied. He pulled Dusty to her feet, checking again for visible signs of injury. His hands lingered on her waist while his fingers clenched in relief. And guilt for endangering her. He never should have unholstered his weapon.

“I dunno,” the boy replied. “We was sneaking into The Ten Acre Wood for a smoke during lunch break. Next thing I know I’m on the ground, pinned by a ninety-pound girl. Damn, she packs a wallop. I think she broke my ribs.” He coughed shallowly, holding his middle. “Can I sue?” He looked up at his partners in crime. They stared in bewilderment at him. One flame guttered from lack of fuel, and the boy closed the lighter, pocketing it swiftly.