by:  Frances Marshall

A Disclaimer for Neopets? Of course!
     All pets (Eyries, Kougras, Kaus, and Chias) along with faeries (You'll see them named throughout this story) are courtesy of neopets.com.   Some characters do belong to me, but Frances was given the okay to use them in this story.

     MagicForceFlare, the electric Eyrie, opened yellow eyes and tried moving. It hurt too much. He wondered where he was. Last thing he recalled was—was, ah, yes, leaping after Balthazar, who had captured the Light Faerie to whom the Eyrie had been conversing. He had raced after, of course, like a stupid idiot, instead of telling his sibs or human owner where he was going or anything.
     “Bad misstake,” he hissed to himself. “But I got the Light Faerie away from him.”  That was some consolation, at least. But a tree limb pinned him down and it was excruciating to move anything…
     Maybe my wing is broken? he thought.
     The situation wasn’t helped by the realization that he didn’t know where he was precisely. He had been in the Haunted Woods, but this place was even darker than there, the only light from the Faerie in the bottle just out of his reach.
He put his head down and tried to relax. Panic would not help him now.
     Somewhere else in Neopia, three worried pets and a human were talking.
     “I can’t find him, Mom!” growled the red Kougra to her frantic owner magicianfanatic. “Last time I saw him was when he was talking with that Elemental Light Faerie.”
     Magicianfanatic closed her eyes and took several deep breaths.  Once she had known her Eyrie was missing, she and her three other pets had searched everywhere in Neopia for him, even the Haunted Woods, the Space Station and Krawk Island.
He had been nowhere. He could have been taken by someone…That was her fear.  A friend of hers had warned her that such a thing could happen.
     You don’t have proof! she chided herself, glancing at her pets: the yellow Chia LittleMIssShortness who looked more like a stuffed rag doll than anything, a Kau with a beautiful non-traditional hide color, a red Kougra (who looked more like a tiger) and down at herself in scruffy jeans, a T-Shirt, and tried to quell the uncertainty about her fourth pet—a gryphon-like creature with four lion paws, painted electric blue with pale blue lightning bolts, named MagicForceFlare.
     “Where else do we look?” she asked. “I don’t want to accuse anyone—and the Chia Police will misinterpret my concern and put out an all point bulletin for kidnappers or something!”
     “The Faerie Queen, Fyora,” GotMilk247 responded, quelling the human’s hysterics with his reasoned suggestion. “She’ll either know or help us find him.”
     “The Queen?! Oh, no, I couldn’t do that!”
     “And why not?” demanded LittleMIssShortness, the chia child. “She’s not going to be mad at us.”
     “But she has royal duties!” came the protest.
     “One of which is helping Neopians,” GotMilk247 pointed out. “All we have to do is get there and explain ourselves clearly.”
     “Mom, please? If anyone can find a Faerie-loving Eyrie, it’d be the ruler of the Faeries…What do we have to lose?” pleaded magicoddball26, trying not to pounce her red self onto her owner.
     Magicianfanatic finally agreed, but only if GotMilk247 and LittleMIssShortness stayed in Neopia Central in case MagicForceFlare showed up there at the bookstore or the Rainbow Pool.
     After extracting those promises, the distraught owner and the Kougra headed to the teleporter to Faerieland, the cloud city.

     “Why’d she ask for us if she hates your guts?” demanded Isaac_Bronze, the yellow Eyrie, as he, his sister, his brothers and their owner headed into the Haunted Woods, heeding the summons of the UberDarkness Faerie Maelstra.
     “Because, Bronze, I happen to have earned her respect as well as the Light Faerie’s, and the present can only be borne by a messenger whom they both tolerate.”
     Phoenix_Hawk, an owner, was not in human form at the moment, but a silver Eyrie. She was a shifter with magic and her pets were also mage-gifted. Bronze, for example, had telepathy and telekinetic ability.
     “Well, after our last performance, I’m surprised Her Majesty permitted us to rejoin society,” RhionTsunami chuckled, blue feathers giving off sparkles as the gloom manifested.
     “Me, too. Hey, Phoenix_boy! A little light here or we’ll miss the entrance to the Realm!”
     “Radiant Globe,” snapped the red Eyrie in front of them all. A pop! and a spinning globe of energy appeared, showing the entrance to the Dark Faerie’s Realm. It was his newest learned spell. Phoenix_Heartsong was a  budding fire-mage.
     “Fun,” SageMoon clicked to her brothers and owner/wingmate as they entered the Dark Realm. “Last time we were here was unpleasant.”
     “Be grateful we didn’t deal with Jhudora,” Bronze stated, shivering.
     “Miss Deputy Lady scares me, but Maelstra ready to kill is about six times worse,” muttered the owner, morphing out into her human semblance, adjusting her spectacles, but not cleaning them.
     A few minutes into their walk down the lane of sentry trees, Rhion stopped.
     “Listen!” he hissed, paw raised midstep.
     Phoenix_Heartsong, already four paws ahead, raced forward, coming back very quickly.
     “There’s an Electric Eyrie under that tree branch near the old twisted yew that tried eating us last visit.  Wing break for sure and bruised ribs…he’s unconscious but breathing.”
     The five between them approached the scene cautiously, Sage noting to Rhion, “Bronze and I can move the tree branch if he’s awakened and kept calm.”
     “Right,” Phoenix_Hawk said, kneeling and touching the Eyrie on the beak. The eyes snapped open, blazing with pain and fear. “Soon as it’s moved, I want you and Rhion to get him to the Healing Springs from here. There’s enough power here for you to create the scry portal easily enough for three. Bronze, Phoenix_boy and I will go on and give your excuses and apologies to the Lady for not accompanying us further.”
     “What’s your name?” asked Phoenix_Heartsong of the eyrie before the other could think of how to respond to the creature, who was attempting to free himself.
     “MagicForceFlare,” the lightning-blue Eyrie wheezed.
     “Then, I know your owner outside of Neopia,” the human said evenly. “I want you to hold still…okay, Sage!”
     The green Eyrie began to shimmer with emerald energy along every feather and hair. MagicForceFlare felt the branch growing lighter. The weight was suddenly gone.
     “Don’t move yet,” counseled the blue Eyrie who had ghosted up beside him. “I’m RhionTsunami. My brothers are Phoenix_Heartsong and Isaac-Bronze. SageMoon, our sister, only made it weigh less, but its still there… well, it used to be. Good job, Bronze! And the human beside you is our human wingmate, Phoenix_Hawk. “
     “Thank you, thank you. I’ve been practicing for weeks,” chuckled the yellow Eyrie delightedly. “You two better go and get him well again, Rhion, or he’ll be grounded for life.”
     Phoenix_Hawk gave a grim smile at the rather bad humor, shook her head, and said only, “We’ll meet you in Faerieland, you three” before she and the yellow and red Eyries slipped deeper into the gloom.
     “Welcome—and soon goodbye—to the Dark Faerie’s personal realm,” SageMoon told the injured pet, clicking her beak in worry as she noted his condition. RhionTsunami, her brother, cast Cure.
     “That’ll stabilize it some,” he declared before noticing the glowing bottle. “After a Light Faerie?”
     “Balthazar trapped…” spat MagicForceFlare.
     “Well, that’s good that we have one,” Sage pointed out, snagging the bottle in her left forepaw and uncorking it with a quick bite and twist of her beak. “She’ll get us there faster than Rhion’s portal scry, and speed is critical.”
     The radiance was brilliant, if firefly size.
     *what do you wish of me?* asked the Light Faerie numbly.
     “Can you get all of us to Faerieland? Without collapsing?” asked Rhion. “MagicForceFlare needed Myrtil Water Faerie at least an hour ago.”
     *of course.*
     The blaze of white dazzled and the three Eyries were lying at the Healing Springs in Faerieland, utterly limp with relief.
     Myrtil, the UberFaerie of Water espied them and quickly took charge of the trio, taking MagicForceFlare in her arms and diving far below the surface of the Springs where her magic was strongest.
     RhionTsunami and SageMoon watched as a red Kougra and a distraught human passed by the Springs several minutes later, the cat-like Neopet murmuring reassurances that “We’ll find him, Mom, I promise.”
     The Eyrie pair shared a glance between them, but neither had the strength to call out and ask what the matter was. The sun was warm and both fell asleep, the Spring’s song in their ears.

     Magicianfanatic, even through her growing panic, was always impressed by Faerie architecture and Faerie magic and now glanced down at the road she and the Kougra trod. She stared.
     “Are we walking on a rainbow?”
     “You are,” came a response from a stunning Fire Faerie who is just coming from the Quests building inside the city wearing a new scarf. “It’s called the Spectrum Way. Leads directly to the palace.”
     Magicoddball thanked the UberFaerie since his owner was speechless and took his owner’s hand in her mouth, gently pulling her along the rainbow road. Magicianfanatic had never been in here further than the Employment Agency and was getting more nervous the closer the pair got to the palace.
     The Kougra sighed and stopped just outside the gates.  “Mom, you really need to calm down. Getting uptight now won’t help ForceFlare.”
     “But…”
     “What are you afraid of, Mom?”
     “Of making a fool of myself,” came the shamed response.
     “That again? Your world outside here has to be pretty miserable if it can shove into your brain that asking for help is somehow wrong or weak…”
     “You’re starting to sound like a friend I know,” muttered the owner ruefully.
     “Good. Now, do you think we can possibly enter? The faster we ask, the faster we know the answer.”
     “Frances,” noted magicianfanatic under her breath, “would say you sound like Cosmo.”
     She entered the palace after her Kougra, step by wary step.
     They passed through many gardens both of plants and cloud shapes, following the rainbow road still until they came to a huge courtyard absolutely filled with Faeries, all celebrating.
     “What’s the party?” queried the Kougra of a Spell Faerie of Air who was darting past on an assigned task.
     “It’s the UberLight Faerie’s anniversary of ascension,” came the swirling response. “She’s with Her Majesty if you need her. Just go straight in…She’s had petitioners and well-wishers all day.”
     Before magicianfanatic could protest, magicoddball had bounded ahead. The human followed a bit more slowly, nervous anxiety growing in her mind, but her worry for her lost Eyrie was stronger than her fear and she entered the palace proper.
She was directed by a Battle Faerie to what the Faeries called the “forum” but actually served as the Queen’s throne room. If the outside of the building was purple, this room was white, both gathering and radiating light. The owner paused in the doorway with a suddenly shy magicoddball upon seeing the two Faeries.
     The Uber Light Faerie was more beautiful than her subjects and the radiance around her could easily blind. But she almost paled in comparison to Fyora, who shimmered with power just like her purple robes shimmered with silver and gold flecks.
     “You may enter, children,” the Queen said, noticing them wavering uncertainly in the doorway. Her voice was low and pitched so as not to alarm.
     Neopet and human obeyed the suggestion, magicianfanatic feeling miserable in her now scruffy clothes with such a singularly selfish request in her heart.
     Fyora seemed to understand the discomfort and waited a few moments before requesting why they had come.
     “Please…can you help find my pet?” magicianfanatic blurted.  “He was talking with a spell Faerie and when we looked again he was gone. We’ve searched everywhere—”  The human stopped, dropped her head, unable to continue.
     “Certainly we will help you, magicianfanatic,” the Uber Light Faerie responded for her Queen. “You have heard this before, but let me repeat—there is no shame in asking for help if you know you require it.”
     “Trust an Eyrie to wander off,” chuckled Fyora. “Yes, I know which one is missing from your family, my dear, and where he is now.”
     “Where?”
     “The Healing Springs…It seems he found his way into one of the Faerie Realms, which is why you couldn’t find him, specifically the Dark Realm. According to the Light Faerie who brought the news five minutes ago, your Eyrie was found by another owner who set two of her pets to tend yours and get him to the Springs.”
     “I passed there and didn’t see him,” the owner responded.
     “Considering the injuries he sustained, namely a broken wing and bruised ribs, Myrtil probably had to take him underwater,” Uber Light Faerie replied. “My sister’s magic is greatest there. Would you like for us to send for them?”
     “You would? Oh, thank you!”
     A few minutes later, the human was reunited with her pet, who was attempting to preen her hair in comfort while she hugged him, tears of relief running down her face. Magicoddball rolled her eyes at the display, but purred nonetheless, in pleasure.
     Magicianfanatic at last collected herself enough to greet and thank the two other Eyries in the room, one a large blue male and the other a slightly larger female, whose green feathers and fur glowed with health.
     “You’re welcome,” SageMoon replied, ear tufts twitching. “Our owner doesn’t like to see anyone else suffering, though the amount of trouble we find kind of defeats most of her attempts at mercy.”
     “I don’t suppose we shall see your owner today?” the Queen asked, glancing at the green female with piercing violet eyes.
     “Would she be willing to miss the party for her favorite UberFaerie?” Rhion snaps back good-humoredly. “Last we knew, she, Phoenix_boy, and Bronze were going to see my lady of shadows.”
     “A present,” Sage clarified, making herself comfortable on the cool floor. A screeching squawk rang into the forum from outside. “And that should be them now.”
     Magicianfanatic saw a crimson blur thud into the Queen, a yellow Eyrie following a bit more sedately in a controlled glide, followed by a magnificent silver Eyrie wearing a bag around its neck.
     “Young man,” Fyora chided the red Eyrie as she steadied him, “this is not an ice skating rink!”
     “Sorry, Majesty,” the Eyrie responded, ear tufts flattening against his head in dejection.
     “Go sit between your brother and sister,” commanded the Faerie monarch somewhat sternly, before turning to the silver Eyrie.
     “I expected better of you both, child.”
     The silver Eyrie’s reaction is undeniably more contrite than the younger red’s.
     “You might want to get your fireworker a bit of help on social graces, or get him interested in wearing out most of his energy,” came the suggestion. “Now, what have you brought from Maelstra?”
     “A gift to her sister Uber Faerie in celebration of her ascension,” the creature replied.
     Magicianfanatic was very confused.  Where is the owner?  Her mind raced, attempting to puzzle it out.  The maximum pet number was four, but…
     The Uber Faerie of Light graciously took the bag from the Eyrie and opened it to reveal a thing of exquisite beauty—a creation of mirrors that, though dark, could show one’s face clearly. A hum arose from the creation and everyone watched, horrified, as the Uber Light Faerie collapsed to the floor in a heap, radiance utterly gone from her.
     “Wh-what happened?” choked magicianfanatic, icy fear gripping her heart.
     “Life Drain,” the Queen replied, voice cold. “While Maelstra cannot kill her sister, the amount of energy stripped from the Light Faerie ruler can be used against her. I can do little in this matter, either to stop Maelstra or heal my subject.”
     “Then, there’s nothing anyone else can do either?” pressed the human.
     Fyora shook her head in negation.  “Not usually, but—”
     “NO! I refuse to believe that!” The silver Eyrie’s voice was a cry of fury and remorse. It bounded forward, wings spread. The form was swiftly changing, glowing, gathering itself…There was a cry in the light, barely heard, :Phoenix Echo!:
     Echo, Echo, Echo…The walls whispered the word, gathering force the softer the word became.
     The room shook slightly. Light, silver and raw, poured into the Uber Light Faerie’s body, channeled by a figure whose seeming resolved into a shadowy silver Phoenix for a few heart-stopping minutes, then blurred to a human shape, still glowing silver all the way through. At last, the torrent of energy stopped as the second human gave a strangled cry, rose and departed the forum. No one halted her, since all their attention was fixed on the Uber Light Faerie.
     The Faerie, filled with light energy from the whatever it was the other had done, glittered silver all the way through for a few seconds before there was a great flash of white light too bright for pets and an owner to bear. When they opened their eyes and cleared their vision of prism lights, the Uber Light Faerie was as she had been before the present, whole and utterly radiant.
     “Well, it’s nice to know my sister Maelstra hasn’t changed,” chuckled the Light Faerie. “I wonder if she suspected Phoenix_Hawk would do that?”
     “Quite possibly, yes,” Fyora said. “I’m certain Maelstra reckoned what the child would manifest, but I doubt she expected  the strength which she got…which reminds me…SageMoon, bring your owner here as soon as you find her. I desire to speak with Phoenix_Hawk about this.”
     The Queen waved her hand around the room, which was now not white but shining silver, almost too bright to look at.
     “Yes, Majesty.”
     The green Eyrie shook her head, twitched her tail and turned to leave.
     A half hour later, the Eyrie returned, supporting a young human woman wearing green glasses (dirty), a grey sweater, well-worn jeans, tennis shoes and a crooked smile. The owner bowed, silently waiting.
     “While your aid to the Light Realm is appreciated immeasurably by all here present, Phoenix_Hawk, I doubt few would willing enter my court unless they wished to be almost blind for life.”
     “I am sorry, Majesty…I don’t control the Phoenix magic or what it does…”
     “I know this. Every Faerie in Neopia knows this. However, the ‘damage’ is done and you must pay a forfeit accordingly.”
     Phoenix_Hawk nodded in acceptance, grateful that Sage was supporting her both physically and magically through her earth channel abilities.
     “You may not, after sunset today, be in this palace for any reason except my personal summons for the next five full days. You and your wingmates are permitted everywhere else. In consideration also of your growing need for personal education, before you leave this or Light Faerie’s Realm, you will be given some of my personal volumes to read in the interim.”
     Fyora’s eyes danced with humor, as though she were enjoying this; Phoenix_Hawk herself did not seem too upset by the punishment, either, though she was most definitely shaken by the precipitant, which had been the Phoenix Echo.
     “Thank you, Majesty.”
     “Now, all of you are dismissed. I will attempt to make repairs to the redecoration.”
     The Uber Light Faerie laughed outright, bowed to her Queen and swept from the room, trailed by a pair of owners and six pets. Other Faeries gave way before the entourage, and only when the group was within the Light Realm did the joyful acclaim lessen. At last, they stopped and sat comfortably beneath a spreading tree: the UberFaerie, the pets and the owners.
     “Fyora was more amused than angry, wasn’t she?” Phoenix_Hawk half stated.
     “I must agree, yes. Would any of you like the chocolate cake Gaia and Valoria baked for me? They are the Uber Earth and Fire Faeries, respectively.”
     Several heads nodded in agreement.
     Finally, magicianfanatic asked the other human, “What happened to the silver Eyrie?”
     “I’m the Eyrie,” came the reply. “It’s a true-form that was imposed by the Queen herself for a lesson I required a while back, the only Neopet true-shape I may take. It’s a very long story that would require most of the week to explain properly, and while I have time, you probably don’t.”
     The owner grinned, licking her fork.
     “Besides, I’m pretty sure you and I left a certain female magician halfway down a mountain once again.”
     Magicianfanatic dropped the fork she was using to eat the cake provided and stared.
     “Frances?!”
     “At your service. I’m Phoenix_Hawk in Neopia, by the way…and if you thought I got into trouble in Electro City, it’s minor compared to here. I swear trouble just finds me…like Zina.”
     “You know her, Mom?” magicoddball queried, whiskers twitching. MagicForceFlare gave a lopsided grin, before starting to preen feathers back into a semblance of flight order and readiness. The four other Eyries joined in the grooming, finally resorting to helping each other.
     “Yes, yes I do!” laughed magicianfanatic. “She introduced me to Neopia and helped name MagicForceFlare, and is a very good friend of mine outside this world.”
     Neither owner noticed when the Uber Light Faerie left them or when night fell, velvet blue, even over the Light Realm, but each at last remembered her pets and said goodbye to the other.
     Magicianfanatic shook her head as she walked to the teleporter that headed back to Neopia Central. The chances had been very small that MagicForceFlare would have been found, much less by a kindly owner. The odds of the owner being someone she knew were even slimmer. To find that the one who had helped out was not only a friend but the one who had named the pet lost…She stopped attempting to think about it, accepting the improbable feat with as much grace as possible. What a story to tell her other two pets!
     Phoenix_Hawk curled up with her pets and a book in the Faerieland Library, mind halfway to Neopia Central with magicianfanatic. The shifter chuckled to herself as she watched Rhion’s portalscry fade as magicianfanatic reunited her family. Who cared about odds? Miracles happened. This time, she had helped bring one about—she didn’t count the Light Faerie incident, though most would have—and it was enough for today.

Just when someone thinks that help could not be found, it was found.  It is amazing where help can come from, even in a place like Neopia.

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