So, you've all been reading these fairy-stories for a bit now, and have met quite a few of the "gang": Elida, Faylinn, Flora, Sparkle, Magic, Sebby, Lilly, Tats, plus Lady Charlotte, Sir Donald, and Lady Zia. And mustn't forget Queen Tinkerbell.

There's a lovely gallery of fairy pictures at https://dereferer.me/?https://www.deviantart.com/wildguardianangel31/favourites/81868179/i-love-fairies .... I'd love you to take a look, and see which pictures match, in your imagination, any of the above characters. (don't panic, there's no naughty pictures on that page! Although some fairies do show a bit of ankle or knee!)

Day <whatever, we're out of the loop now!>:

"Good morning, Elida,” said Zia. It's a couple of days later, just before lunchtime, and Zia had just called Elida. "Sir Donald has just told me quite an amazing story!"

"Zia, you're back at last!" said Elida happily, "Yes, I've had a very hectic few weeks..."

"And all in one day, it seems! I was wondering if you'd let me take you to lunch? I have a lot I'd like to discuss with you, including letting you tell me about how you managed to invent teleporting!"

"I'd love to! Where are you at the moment?"

"I'm currently in reception at FI5, about to leave..."

"Ok, umm... humour me... go outside will you? Make sure there's noone else around. Then tell me EXACTLY where you're standing." Zia walked out of the building, and a little down the path in front of the building.

"Ok, so I'm standing just in front of that big tree, on the left of the path, in front of the building"

Elida knew exactly where she was standing. "... and noone else near you, I hope?"

"No"

"Ok, half a second..." said Elida, as she quickly loaded up the 15 spells she needed. "Hello Zia" said Elida, arriving a couple of metres away from Zia, "it's so good to see you again!".

"Very impressive, Elida! VERY impressive!". Zia had a big smile on her face: she was so proud of what Elida had achieved.

"From you, Zia, that is great praise, which I'm VERY happy to accept! Now, you said something about lunch?"

"Indeed I did, and as I reckon this is a 'working lunch' - so FI5 will be paying - I say we go somewhere nice, where we can talk without worrying about anyone listening in.". Zia took Elida to a VERY nice place for lunch: it definitely beat the fairy canteen!

Over lunch, Elida told Zia all about what had happened, and how it was her, Zia, that had originally suggested asking Sparkle for help, and that was how she had found her.

"So, how many times did you call me then?" asked Zia.

"Well, it was about 3 weeks ago that I started working on the teleporting, take off the couple of 'days off' that we had, so it must be something like 15 to 20 times. A couple of days we spoke more than once. And I'm guessing you don't remember any of them, do you?"

"Well, that's the strange thing, when I think about it, I have a very vague reminiscence, like it happened in a dream. So, I was thinking about your ability to teleport: as a Protector, I can see that's going to be very useful to you."

"Yes, I think it will be. But I need to do some more work on it."

"Oh, why?"

"Well, at the moment, I'm only going somewhere that I know is clear space, which is why I asked you if it was clear earlier on... I need to work out how to do some sort of remote probing spell...."

"That makes a lot of sense, I might be able to help with that."

"That would be very useful, thank you. The next one, which I suspect might be harder, is to pre-project an 'allow magic' space into our protected buildings, so I can teleport into them. I'm thinking that if, say, the palace got intruded, it might be rather essential!"

"You've thought this out, Elida, haven't you - good on you. Again, I'll do anything to help"

"The last one, and I have no idea if I'll even be able to do it, is to take a second person with me"

"Yes, I could see THAT could be VERY useful...."

Chapter "A"

"Are you free to meet this afternoon, say 2pm?" said the message from Zia that popped up on Elida's phone. It was several days after Elida and Zia had lunch together, and Elida was currently at a dentist's with Flora, helping to calm a rather nervous young boy as he had a couple of baby teeth removed.

"That's fine, where?" replied Elida

"Meet in practice room #2 at your office - Zia,” said the reply.

"Someone loves you!" said Flora.

"Sadly, it's not Puck. I need to meet someone, to organise some new training" explained Elida, "So you'll be on your own this afternoon... but I'm sure you have enough experience by now to cope by yourself!" added Elida, cheekily.

Flora smiled back. "That's fine by me...".

So, at just before 2, Elida went to the practice room: Zia was there waiting for her. Almost without thinking, Elida threw out 2 locking spells, to give them some privacy.

(The more astute of you may be thinking 'but surely the building has magic dampening spells?' Yes, that is right, but in the practice rooms magic is allowed - and indeed encouraged - but the magic is generally slightly restricted to stop anyone getting too badly hurt. And the walls have some very strong spells on them, to stop them being damaged!)

"Someone paid good attention.... good spells! Can you do a 'confidentiality bubble' yet?" said Zia.

"I've seen it, but not got around to trying it out yet" Elida replied

"Well, why not give it a go?". Elida used her wand to try and cast the spell, but nothing happened.

"Close, but you mispronounced that second word... it's a soft 's' sound rather than a hard 'c'. Want to try again?". Elida tried the spell again, this time saying that second word correctly, and with a slight shimmer, a confidentiality bubble enclosed the two of them.

"Nicely done!" said Zia.

"So why the secrecy?" asked Elida.

"Because what I'm about to tell you is, for the moment, for your ears only. No-one else must know for the moment. It's actually so important that I'd like you to let me put a spell on you, to stop you accidentally telling anyone. You going to be ok with that?"

"You mean I can't even tell Puck? Or Sparkle?"

"When I've finished telling you, I think you'll agree that you can't even tell them just yet"

"Oh, ok, THAT important...".

Elida, like most fairies, was generally a bit usure about having magic done on them. But Elida was getting to know Zia pretty well: she had trained with her, had spoken with her when she was in her time loop many times, and then had lunch with her. So not a huge amount of time, but she felt good about Zia.

"Yes, ok....". Zia opened up her tablet, and referred to some notes: clearly this was not a spell she used very often. With a wave of her wand, and some silently said magic words, the spell was cast.

"So, a week or two ago, when we met in the Archive, I explained that I worked with Sir Donald and Lady Charlotte, and that we ran FI5. The thing is, we are all getting to that point in our lives that we're looking to retire. We were very young when we took on the task of running FI5, and feel it's time to 'pass the baton on' to someone rather younger."

"Ok... but who's going to take over?"

"That's where YOU come in..."

"Pardon?"

"We've been looking for a couple of good fairy operatives to take over the running of FI5, and we have two VERY able fairies lined up - not that they know a thing about this yet - but our stumbling block has always been 'the safeguard'"

"The safeguard?"

"Yes, someone to replace me. Someone to stop those other two fairies from 'crossing the line'."

"You're looking right at me, aren't you?". Elida had just realised what this was all about. She, little and not particularly experienced Elida, was being lined up to be one of the three fairies running FI5.

GULP!

No pressure.

Only 'the safeguard'.

The Protector - that's the word that Zia had used the other day. Or was it 'the other week'?

And yeah, definitely NOT for anyone else to know just yet!

"Don't worry, Elida: I was actually slightly younger than you when I became 'one of the three', and Donald and Charlotte were only a little older. So, yesterday evening we all chatted: I told them what you told me over lunch, about what had happened to you when you were in the time loop, and how, in a relatively short time, you worked out what you needed to do. Our decision didn't take long to reach."

"And who are the other two fairies then? The two that will take over from Sir Donald and Lady Charlotte?"

"Lilly and Tats, of course!"

Elida was silent, letting this new information gently seep into her brain. They wanted... Lilly.... and Tats... and her...... to take over running FI5? Zia didn't interrupt this process: she knew very well it was a LOT to take in.... it was something that had happened to her several years previous.

"You guys think that Lilly, Tats and I are all suitable and ready to run FI5?"

"Suitable? Absolutely! Ready? No! Not yet. You all have a lot of training and learning to do, but we think you'll be ok in maybe 3 or 4 months..."

More silence, as Elida's brain processed the implications of what was about to happen to her. Her life was about to change. Drastically. And dramatically.

"So, I'm guessing that I'll have to give up my Tooth Fairy work, and working down in the Dark Archive?"

"No, not at all. Being a protector is something probably best done quietly. In the past, I read that some protector fairies were quite public about who they were, and what they could do, and as a result were constantly challenged by fairies and others. They could never win - you know, damned if you don't, and damned if you do, but that still never stopped them. But what a waste of time! I hardly changed what I did when I first took on the job. Of course, as time went on, certain new doors became open to me, that's how I ended up at the university. So, you can absolutely keep on being a tooth fairy for the moment, if that's what you want. And working in the Dark Archive is going to be essential for you, especially in the short term. You have a lot of learning to do, but something tells me you won't mind that."

"This is all happening very quickly...."

"I know. We've been waiting to find 'you' for quite a while. Your skills are essential to let us pass our jobs onto younger fairies. And there is no doubt about your skills after your being caught in that time loop, and working out how to teleport. One thing we had been worrying about was whether you'd be able to actually stand up against Lilly and Tats, if they 'crossed that line', but a couple of weeks ago you proved that we didn't need to worry".

Elida thought back. That night at The Golden Cup! Yes, it was probably only 2 weeks ago, just the time loop made it feel more like 3 months ago! "Did you set that up?" she asked.

"No, it was simply quite fortuitous. If it hadn't happened, then, yes, we would have had to set up something similar. I must admit, when we watched the video footage back, we were most impressed! You handled yourself very well! And made Lilly realise that you weren't to be messed with. I assume you'd be able to handle Tats just as effectively, if needed?"

Elida was smiling. Elida got on well with both Lilly and Tats, but yes, that night, she had put the powerful Lilly into her place. "Yes, with a bit more practice, I think so! Hey, do Lilly and Tats know anything about all this?"

"No, not yet. But they will do soon. I'd like to take you over to FI5 this afternoon, to meet with Donald and Charlotte. Don't worry, Posy knows that you'll be 'unavailable' for the rest of the day".

Chapter "C"

"You can TELEPORT?" asked Lilly. Lilly, Tats and Elida were still at FI5, in that nice meeting room. Donald, Charlotte and Zia had left, so they could chat amongst themselves.

"Yes, I can, but currently a little limited. For example, I can't get into any of the official buildings yet, due to the magic dampening spells. And I need to improve the way I do it....".

"I've never heard of a fairy managing to teleport before" said Tats.

"I guess that's either because no one has ever done it before, or if they had, they never wrote it down. I will admit, Tats, you were a GREAT help to me in working out how to do it..."

"Uh?" said Tats.

"Ah, yes, that's the other thing - I was stuck in a time loop for 6 weeks.... some ugly Elves were after Sparkle's and Lilly's magic braces, and the only way I could stop them - and get out of our time loop - was to be able to teleport over to Sparkle's place, and stop them. Took me about 3 weeks to work out how to teleport, with help from Tats here, Zia, Sebby and a few others. Yeah, need a word with you guys about Sebby at some point."

"So how DO you actually teleport then?"

"A combination of 15 spells, pretty much all at once."

"FIFTEEN?" said Tats. "You can do fifteen spells all at the same time?.... that's pretty impressive!"

"Yeah, and I'm thinking it maybe up to 20 or so by the time I'm finished, but I guess it's the sort of thing I need to be able to do, to protect mankind and fairy-kind against untoward attacks by fairies or others." She went on to explain more about what was going on in the time loop.

"So... the elephant in the room.... running FI5. How do you guys feel about it? Got over the shock yet?" asked Elida.

"Question: do you think we get a choice in the matter?" asked Lilly.

"Technically, probably yes, but in practice... probably not" replied Tats. "But how do I feel about it? Yes, a bit of a shocker. Are we up to it? I think so. We two seem to get on with everyone here, and I'm rather assuming that you'll be relatively 'invisible', Elida, rather like... er, Zia wasn't it?"

"Yeah, that was my plan, but Tats, you have to understand that I won't hesitate to stop either of you, if you overstep that line. Whilst that time loop was a right pain in the butt, one thing it did do was to massively improve my self confidence: I mean, if I can work out how to teleport, I should be able to do pretty much anything else I need to, including 'controlling' you two!"

"I understand, but what happens if YOU overstep that line?" asked Tats.

"I can't, it's as simple as that..." and she explained about little Tommy. "Doesn't stop me doing bad THINGS, but there's no way I can do bad magic. Tell you what though Lilly: I don't see you as being a good figurehead, if you still have braces!"

"Good point, Elida!" said Lilly, starting to laugh. "You made any progress on being able to remove them yet?"

"Actually, yes. I was doing some research with Sebby down in the Dark Archive, and we think we've found something that we can work with. Still got a bit more to do on it, but it looks hopeful. Sparkle has decided that maybe it's time to get hers off too: I guess having your braces ripped off - and some teeth too - every day for six weeks makes them a lot less attractive."

"She ok now?" asked Lilly.

"I'd say 'ok-ish', I think she'll be a lot better when I've removed them. Which leads me on to Sebby..."

"What about her?"

"I'd like all restriction on her lifted. Look, guys, I worked with her so many times when I was in my time loop, and she's not a threat to anyone, there's not a hint of darkness left in her, not even in her little finger. We need to let her 'get on with her life': I think means she want to be a fully qualified tooth fairy, but I'm also rather hoping she will continue to be willing to work with me - she's surprisingly good. Tats, you live in the palace, spend a bit more time with her, talk to her, ask her awkward questions. Lilly, you should try and get to know her too...."

For whatever reason, I couldn't leave the story there. There were 2 things missing: (1) Elida needed to find out the technical stuff about how the Palace / Offices were built (with the magic dampening spells), plus find out WHERE the Dark Archive actually was; (2) she had promised to work out how to remove Lilly's & Sparkles braces.

-------------------------------------------------

Follow-up #1

"Good afternoon, your Majesty!" said Elida, curtsying as she came in front of the Queen. Elida had gone with Tats to visit the Queen, as she needed to ask about certain 'information' that she needed, in order to develop her magic, and thus enable her to carry out her duties of being 'The Protector'.

"Hello, Elida, it is good to finally meet you, Zia has told me a lot about you! And Tatianna, you know that it's always nice to see you. Elida, this is my eldest daughter, Princess Rosemary. Anything you wish to say to me today needs to also be said to her: like Zia, I have decided that it's time I started to hand some of my duties over to Rosemary. Do please sit down..."

Tats and Elida sat down in two sumptuous chairs, opposite Queen Tinkerbell and Princess Rosemary. As they did so, Elida looked around. The room was quite big, and tall too. Very airy, and lots of light streaming in through the large windows. Lovely (and no doubt expensive) wallpaper, and lots of very nice furniture. And those curtains - so many, and so big! Yes, it was most definitely what you'd expect to find in a Palace.

In front of Elida and Tats was a low table, on which there was a lovely polished silver tray, with a silver tea service on it, along with 4 cups and saucers, sugar bowl, and milk jug. The teaspoons shone brightly. And not forgetting the cream cake, of course.

Queen Tinkerbell was quite an old lady - similar sort of age to Flora, Zia and so on. A bit wrinkly, but otherwise apparently in good health. Princess Rosemary, the queen's eldest daughter (and thus first-in-line), was middle-aged, and whilst dressed reasonably formally, there was a certain informality to her style.

"Tats, would you care to do the honours..." said the Queen, indicating the teapot. "So, what can we do for you, Elida?"

"Well, your majesty, first of all Flora asked me to err... send you her love".

"Oh, how nice of her! We got together briefly after Sebby joined us here at the place, how is she? Still working hard, no doubt?"

"She is very well, but has finally decided to spend a bit more time with her family: we work together just a couple of days a week now, but I'm hoping to persuade her to retire soon too. She tells me you went to school together."

"Yes, we did, and whilst we kept in touch for a while, when I became Queen we sadly lost touch. Maybe I need to invite her over to the palace again sometime."

"I'm sure she would enjoy that!" replied Elida. "So, the reason I am here.... as you are aware, like Zia, I seem to be a Protector, although I know I still have a lot to learn. Recently though, I did have an opportunity to learn a lot of magic in a short time..."

"Yes, Zia explained that you were in a time loop for... six weeks wasn't it? That must have been interesting, but probably very annoying too?"

"Yes, to both! The time loop was caused by the actions of some elves, who were trying to steal Sparkle's braces: prima face, that may not seem that important, but the braces were made by Santa, and contains a lot of magic. So do the braces that Sebby gave to Lilly. In the wrong hands, they would have allowed the elves to carry out fairy magic - not good!"

"Definitely not good. Do go on..."

"You have probably heard that, to stop the elves actions - and get us out of the time loop - I had to work out how to teleport. Along the way, I learnt a lot of other magic too. I realise that, being able to teleport will help me greatly in my task of being Protector to Fairykind.... but.... at the moment, there are certain limitations. Already I'm working on being able to take extra things with me as I teleport: my aim is to be able to take another fairy with me. I also need to be able to 'probe' where I'm hoping to go, so, for example, I don't end up in a wall. But more importantly, and part the reason that I'm here, is that I am currently unable to teleport anywhere there are magic dampening spells... so in our offices, and here at the palace, for example. My worry is that, if anything is going to happen - something maybe as unthinkable as an eleven attack on the Palace - then I need to be able to access those places."

"Yes, I see. What you say makes a LOT of sense. So how can I help?"

"The Dark Archive contains many old and important documents, but one area that is completely missing is information on the creation of our important buildings, and the magic spells used to protect them. Clearly they must exist somewhere, so I am guessing that there is a special library, probably here at the palace, with that information. There is actually a second reason for needing that information, but I'll come on to that in a moment. So, am I correct in my assumption? I've asked Tats, and while she knows a lot about the Palace, she is aware that there are certain things that she doesn't know about."

The Queen smiled. "I'm guessing Tats told you the story about our 'Royal Snug', didn't she! So, yes, Elida, you are quite correct: we do have a small special library hidden away, and I suspect it probably does contain the information that you need. Access is highly restricted, for obvious reasons, but in your new role, you clearly need to have access. I've only ever been there twice myself, to be honest. You know, I think that this is something that I should be asking Princess Rosemary to work with you on, if you don't mind?".

Rosemary smiled upon hearing that she was being delegated a new bit of work.

"You said there was a second reason?"

"Yes... The Dark Archive. I need to understand more about The Dark Archive. Where it actually is, what magic protects it. As it's new Librarian, I need to extend it and update it, and I'm going to need to understand how to do that."

"Elida..." said Tats, "what do mean 'where it is'? It's under Lilly's mum's office, surely?"

"No, it's definitely not there! If you plot it out, the main library actually goes under her office - took me a while to work that one out! Her office only has an on-demand protal to the Dark Archive. In fact, one of the things I need to do is to create a second portal to it - if anything happens at the office, we need backup access. Plus, I need to know exactly where it is so I can teleport there in emergency"

As they talked, they drank their royal tea - and jolly nice it was too. And as for the cream cake - just yummy!


"Elida, it has been interesting to meet you," said Princess Rosemary as they left the Queen's drawing room. "and I'm looking forward to working with you. Whilst I can see you are very young, it's clear that you are actually very wise for your years. I need to go away and find out exactly how we access this special library - today is the first time I've heard about it. In the meantime, are you in a rush? If not, I'd like to introduce you to my eldest daughter, Princess Celeste: she's your sort of age, and I'm thinking that, as time goes on, you're going to want to interact with her more".

Elida instantly understood what she was saying: Celeste was second-in-line to the throne, and would herself be queen one day.


----

Several days later, Elida received a call from Princess Rosemary, inviting her and Tats to join her at the palace, in order to access the Special Library.

Access to the library wasn't easy: it needed 3 separate fairies, each of whom needed to 'persuade' the palace that they were 'worthy' of entry: luckily Tats, Elida and Rosemary all seemed to fit the bill. It required a combination of magic, dexterity, many doors and time delays, and finally, after almost 20 minutes, the door to the the special library opened for them. The room was small, and rather dark, but Elida was able to create a 'magic bubble', in which she ran several light spells. It wasn't particularly old - as old as the new palace - and certainly nowhere near as old as the archive.

"Good afternoon, books!" said Elida very cheerfully. "My name is Elida, and I am both the Librarian of the Dark Archive, as well as being The Protector. It is my pleasure to meet you!". Her words had the desired effect, and the 'mood' of the room massively improved.

Elida had brought one book with her, her 'own' book, her 'protector's book', and she put it onto the reading table: she had brough it as there were a couple of spells in it that she felt might be relevant. Elida went over to the books on the shelves, and started to touch their spines: not only could she feel things about the books, she had no doubt that the books would pick up her feelings too.

"As Librarian and Protector, I need to understand about the building of The Dark Archive, as well as our other fairy buildings. I need to understand how the protection magic in all those places work. I have two reasons for doing this: I need to be able to remotely teleport into those magically protected spaces to provide protection, plus I am wanting to extend and upgrade the Dark Archive. So, if any of you think you can help me, do pop your noses out of the shelves!"

Several books volunteered themselves.

"Ok, not too many of you: would you all like to come and stack yourselves on the table here... no rush, take your time." The books came over. "Top 3 books, could you lift up, and let number 4 out please?". Clearly the books liked the way that Elida was treating them, and did as she asked. That 4th book was, without any doubt, a lot older than the others. Elida carefully opened it, and started to read. It clearly came from the previous Palace, as it contained many drawings of a building that Elida did not recognise.

"I think this must be the old Palace! I bet Sebby would like to have a look at this sometime. Look, I need to persuade you and Princess Rosemary to let me take some of these books with me. I realise that we don't want to risk the contents of the books being known, that's why I brought my 'Protector's' spell book with me, it has some very relevant spells to protect the books. I'll only ever want to read them when I'm in the Archive anyway."

"Well, if you can show me that they are secure, and I'm with you as we go back to the Archive, then it's fine with me." replied Tats. As they continued to read, they chatted.

In the third book she looked at, Elida started to find the details she needed. It turns out that she was quite right about the Dark Archive not being under Posy's office: it was actually located under the Palace!

"Hey, the Dark Archive is actually down here somewhere...." said Elida. She kept reading, and suddenly a big smile came to her face.

"What you smiling about?" asked Tats.

"I just worked out where the Dark Archive is. It's through a door over there...." said Elida, pointing to the far end of the small library, where there was bare wall.

"What door?" asked Tats. "I'm not seeing any door over there!"

Elida walked over to where she thought the door should be. "It should be hiding just here....." said Elida. She cast one of her 'allow magic bubbles', then cast a 'reveal hidden things' spell inside that bubble: there was now a door in the wall.

"How did you do that?" asked Princess Rosemary, who was clearly quite impressed. "I thought you couldn't do any magic inside the palace, except in the practice rooms?"

"Most fairies can't: they can't cast the number of simultaneous spells needed to do it. There's probably only Zia and me, and maybe one or two others who can". Elida opened the door. She recognised exactly where she was: at the top of the stairs that led down to the Dark Archive, in fact exactly where the portal from Posy's office led to.

"Well, this is going to make it easier to move those books to the Archive, isn't it! Princess Rosemary, do come and visit the Dark Archive with me!". After showing the princess around, they returned to the small Palace library, leaving the door open for the moment.

After a little more searching, she found the details about the magic used to protect the buildings, and the magic used to protect the Dark Archive, as well as the library they were in - exactly what she need to know. She cast a couple of spells on the books that she wanted to leave in the Dark Archive - one made the pages appear blank to anyone else, the other 'locked' the book, so that it would only open for her - and took them into the Archive.

"Ok, everyone" said Elida to the books in the 'Dark Magic' room, "I've brought some guest books with me, which I'll be leaving in here: please make them welcome!". She then returned, closing the door behind herself, and removing her spells.

"Princess Rosemary, Tats, thank you both so much for today: it's been a most successful day. I'll sort out returning those books when I'm done with them, which shouldn't be too long: they really DO need to live here, at the Palace, for their own safety."

------------------
 

Follow-up #2

It's a few weeks later. Elida now has a small office at FI5 HQ: she doesn't plan to particularly use it, but it is a convenient place from which to create a second portal down to the Dark Archive, which means that she's no longer needing to use the entrance in Posy's office. As far as any of the girls in the office are concerned, Elida is currently on 'extended leave', for a reason that no one is saying. The reality is that she's been working from her FI5 office in the Dark Archive, with the added bonus that she gets to see Puck at lunchtimes.

Elida has spent quite a bit of time reading the books she borrowed from the Palace library. Having sorted out the new portal, she has been "adjusting" her teleporting, and can now 'probe ahead' to check that the space she will go to is safe, but she's still working on the several other aspects, which are a bit more complex.

A couple of days ago, she and Sebby finally found a combination of spells which Elida could potentially use to give other fairies braces: Sebby is currently sporting a very nice set of large shiny metal brackets!

"Hey, Elida, I think I may have found something...". Sebby and Elida were, once again, down in the Dark Archive, doing research. One of the things that Elida has been helping Sebby with is trying to do multiple spells together: Sebby seems to better than average at that, and can now just about manage a total of 5 spells at the same... which is useful, as with 4 spells she can create a small sized 'allow magic' bubble, allowing Elida to test out her braces spells on Sebby a bit more easily whilst still down in the Archive - and that's how Sebby ended up with braces!

"Oooh, yes, interesting..." Elida read the spell description carefully: one thing she had soon learnt was that the information in most of the books in the Archive was quite precise: whoever had written these books wanted to make it both clear as well as easy to select and use the relevant spells. In fact, Elida was in the middle of working out how to describe the many steps needed to teleport, so she could add it to her 'Protector's' book, but she wanted to make sure it was suitably precise and easy to understand.

"You know, I think this could be the last bit of the puzzle: want to be my test victim again?"

Sebby smiled: if this let Elida succeed in removing Sebby's braces, then there was no reason it wouldn't also work for Lilly and Sparkle. And over the weeks that Sebby had been working with Elida, her trust in her had grown. "Yes, go on, let me do the bubble for you....".

With the 'allow magic' bubble covering Sebby's mouth, Elida referred to her notes, and started casting and holding the spells needed: in fact, there were only 7 spells needed, the problem had been finding the correct 7! Sebby put her hand up to her mouth: the braces were loose, and she was able to remove them!

"It worked" said Sebby, "Well done, Elida! Hey, looks like you can now have a nice side-line selling other fairies braces, and also removing them!" added Sebby with a smile - a braceless smile of course. It goes without saying that, as a tooth fairy, Sebby's teeth were beautiful.

"Yeah, a nice idea I know, but I don't really want to be advertising my 'special skill set'. I need to have a word with Lilly, to work out how we publicly explain how she and Sparkle get their braces removed.


----


"Hey, Lilly, good news: it looks like I can remove your braces at last: I'm assuming you DO want to get rid of them?".

Lilly ran her tongue over her braces. The shiny metal brackets that Sebby had given her when she was the Dark Fairy. The funny thing is that whilst she had found the braces to be a bit embarrassing at first, she had actually become quite used to them, and they didn't annoy her any more. But yes, when meeting people, her braces did seem to distract them, so maybe it was time to get them removed. I mean, being head of FI5 whilst having braces... the image didn't feel right!

"Yes, I do. But how? We don't want to make your skills public...."

"Well, people know I can do multiple spells, just not quite how many I can actually do. It's only 7 spells to remove the braces, so too many for pretty much all fairies to do, but at the same time not too many for me to appear too powerful. And they are all vaguely tooth-related. We could 'dumb it down a bit' and say I'm only using 5 spells... By the way, if you're interested, it's 8 spells to put the braces on!"

"Oh, that's not too bad then. Sparkle still wants hers removing I'm assuming?"

"Yes, she does."

"And you tested this how?"

"Oh, I gave Sebby some braces - which was actually pretty easy - then worked out how to remove them again!"

"So, it worked for Sebby, how sure are you that this WILL actually work for Sparkle and me?"

"I'd say 98%...."

"Ok, so how about we get a few friends together, record it, and post it online. I don't think we can hide it happening, too many people know about them, and would spot that we no longer have them."

"Yeah, a 'braces removal party'!"


----


A group of fairy friends gathered in the park for a fairy picnic.

"Thank you all for coming along" said Lilly, "there is actually an important reason for getting you all together - apart from having a great time with friends.". Magic was recording all of this on her phone.

"You'll all remember that Sebby here, when she was not herself, but was our Dark Fairy, she gave me a nice set of braces. In fact, she also gave me some wired-in headgear, but we managed to get her to remove that already. But it's time for me to finally say goodbye to my metal-looking mouth." There were 'booos' and cries of 'shame' and other similar comments - we all know how much fairies like shiny things! "Elida has been working with Sebby, and they have finally worked out how to remove my braces - and I believe you're getting yours off too, Sparkle?"

"Yes, I am! Santa gave these to me a while ago, and it has been really fun having them, but like Lilly, I think it's time to say goodbye to them! Yes, I'll miss them, but it's the right thing to do!". Of course, many of the fairies there knew nothing about Sparkle's 6 weeks of torture at the hands of a certain pair of elves, which was the main driver behind her wanting her braces removing. After Lilly and Sparkle got their braces removed, they would be passed to FI5 for secure keeping.

"Ok, so who is going first then?" asked Elida, looking at both Lilly and Sparkle. "Lilly, you are the more senior, I think you need to show a good example...." added Elida, with a big smile.

"Oh, ok... so what do you want me to do?" asked Lilly.

Elida magicked up a suitable chair. "Take a seat....". Magic continued recording as Lilly sat down, then moved in closer to Lilly's mouth. "Ok, let me concentrate.....". For effect, she made her wand appear, then silently she cast the 7 spells, finally giving Lilly 3 gentle taps of her wand on her head for effect. "If I got it right, your braces should be loose....".

Lilly put her hand up to her mouth: indeed they were loose! She gently pulled the brackets, still on the archwires, from her mouth, then popped the 4 molar bands off her molars. Then she spent a moment running her tongue over her once more smooth teeth.

"Smile for the camera!" said Magic.

"All ok?" asked Elida.

"Yes, I'm feeling good". Lilly took a last look at her braces, her lovely sets of large shiny metal brackets attached to a couple of archwires, along with the equally shiny molar bands, then passed them to Tats for safe keeping.

"Whilst it was fun having them, it's going to be nice seeing my teeth again. Oh, and so much easier to brush and floss! Ok, Sparkle, your turn!".

Lilly stood up, and let Sparkle sit down in the chair. "You 100% certain you want to do this, Sparkle?" asked Magic.

"Yes, absolutely!" replied Sparkle, smiling wide so Magic could get a good view of her lovely white teeth covered in large shiny metal brackets. "It's been a while since I've seen my teeth too!". Unlike Lilly, Sparkle didn't have any molar bands, just brackets. Once more Elida loaded up the 7 spells, which she then cast, then tapped her wand on Sparkle's head for effect...

"No, they're still firmly attached!" said Sparkle.

Elida tried again, but again nothing happened.

"Elida, did you take into account the extra wish that we made for Sparkle, to allow her to keep the braces that Santa gave her?" suggested Magic.

"Ah, yes, you're right, I didn't....". Elida pulled out her tablet: she had been digitising a load of the stuff that she and Sebby had been looking at, and she hoped she'd be able to find what she needed. "Ok, I think I have something that should work..."

For a third time Elida loaded up the multiple spells - 8 this time - and tapped Sparkle gently on her head with her wand. "Any luck?" asked Elida.

Sparkle put her hand to her mouth, removed her braces and took a final look at them before passing them over to Tats for safe keeping. Then, like Lilly had, she ran her tongue over her once-more braces free teeth. Finally she stood up, and went to Elida, giving her a large hug.

"Thank you Elida, you know why this is so important to me!".

=====================


And that is it! Ok, I have a feeling that we may get another fairy story at some point, but not got anything planned.

THE END!

So, at the moment, apart from "Bracing Miss Daisy", I don't have any specific story ideas in mind for the fairies. There's many possibilities... follow Elida' s story.... how about Sebby? I'm sure I could invent some fun for Lilly and Tats. Then there's the possibility to go back and follow magic / sparkle / Emily / Wendy

So, for those of you who like my Fairy stories, who should I write about?

 

I think you already know that I have a thing for Sparkle, Elida and Sebby. Sparkle still hasn't done anything with the video that she took of Sebby during 'The Cam-show'. 

Yes, I guess that video needs mentioning in "Bracing Miss Daisy". So, it sounds like at some point I need to finish that off.... that story, time-wise, comes before and at the same time as the start of this story.

(I'm also trying to work out a story for Carol (one of the girls from CJDL)... I have some ideas, but still trying to "design the story"....)