A fairy story

Illustration by Margaret Tarrant

The Queen and her tiny daughter watched the fairies dancing with delight around the crib. They had heard the good news of such a wondrous birth and travelled on swirls of magic to see the beautiful child and grant their blessings. The baby gurgled with new found joy and reached a soft and chubby hand out to the soft gossamer winged creatures who crowded around her and chattered with excitement - for not only was a royal birth a truly special occasion, but a royal birth to this particular Mother promised magical times ahead indeed.

When the King and the other courtiers returned to the room, they smiled at the child seemingly playing with the shafts of sunlight that streaked in from the half-shuttered windows and the Mother entranced in the joy of her first born.

As the months turned into years the fairies kept up their visits, always greeting the Queen and her daughter with gifts of fairy jewellery woven from gossamer and strung with shells and scales gifted by mermaids. The young Princess was the envy of her friends who never could fully understand quite what made these necklaces and adornments sparkle so purely. The Princess told them that the fairies brought them, but the other girls laughed and mocked her belief in such nonsense, teasing her until she told them instead that suitors dropped them off in the dead of night in an attempt to woo the teenage beauty. Besides, thought the young lady, it had been some time since she'd actually seen a fairy. She was beginning to think she had imagined them. What had once been a special secret between mother and daughter was becoming, to the younger woman, nothing more than... well... fairy tale.

Finally the day came when once again the sound of a baby's newborn cry echoed through the stone walls of the castle. The Princess, cradling the tiny child in her arms took her to visit her own Mother, now in the Winter of her years. The old lady took the baby and kissed her gently before resting back on her cushions.

The baby smiled at its Grandmother and his eyes widened in wonder at the tiny creatures fluttering around her. "Ah," said the old lady, seeing the direction his eyes took. "You've spotted our friends". She carefully introduced her dainty companions to the innocent child while her grown daughter looked on amused.

"I used to love those stories you'd tell me about the fairies," she remembered fondly. "Thanks for sharing them with William too."

The old lady turned to her daughter and asked "Why did you stop believing? I never did". A soft caress rubbed against the younger woman's cheeks unsettling her and she instinctively fingered the delicate necklace lying at her neck while she considered the question.

"Close your eyes and remember" begged her Mother.

The caresses become more insistent and were joined by soft whispers and the echos of long forgotten songs. The Princess smiled and remembered the stories, remembered the adventures, the friends and ... the magic. Opening her eyes, she saw the wings that tangled in her hair and the faces of the long forgotten.

She unclasped the intricately woven silver locket around her neck and read once again the inscription that had puzzled her more as she grew older.

Believe and you will see..

She remembered, yes she remembered...

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Something a little different today - a written challenge for Monday's Child - to write a children's story based on the image given. What do you think?