The Boy and the Elephant
There was once a little boy whose name was
Nathan and more than anything in the world he loved to dance. If they
had let him, he would have danced until dawn every night—but, of course, they said he had to go to bed.
One day Nathan was walking through
the forest, a jig springing from his feet with each step, a whistle on his lips,
and his greatest desire to dance until dawn on his mind, when he found that he
had jigged into the center of a circle of mushrooms. Too late he remembered that such a ring is
not what it appears, and before he could blink, his body was no longer in the mortal
world.
And so it was that Nathan found
himself a prisoner in Fairyland.
The fairies had been wickedly clever—the
boy’s capture had not been by chance.
For there is nothing the fairies like better than to be entertained in
their nightly revels by dancing.
The boy was not their only prisoner. An elephant had stepped wrongly while on tour
with a traveling circus. And thus it
was that the boy and the elephant found themselves dancing by night before the
fairies and their lords—and by day, locked in a cage.
Night after night they catered to
the whim of the fairies, dancing separately and together, both exhausted from
the demands put upon them, and talking far into the day about how it once had
been to dance. Thus, agreeing that it is
a sad thing to be forced to do what one loves, the elephant and
the boy became fast friends.
There came a night when the elephant
stumbled for the first time. It happened
just before dawn, and was so slight a slip that none but his dancing partner
took note. The next night, he stumbled,
too. It did not take even until the third
night for Nathan to realize that his friend was far too weary, and growing
wearier. And so he decided enough was
enough—Nathan and his friend would escape.
But how?
He began by observing the nightly
rituals of the fairies. He watched them
come and go, disappearing through circles like the one he had stepped
through. Nathan especially noticed the
reverence the fairies had for the fire flowers they picked under the shining of a full moon, and the special powers such flowers seemed to have in brightening and
renewing the fairies. He noticed that no
fairy could be seen after the break of day, and that they did not return until night
when their revels would begin anew. And
then he studied the lock that held him and the elephant fast. All this he let swirl about his mind until he
came up with a plan.
On a night that he danced under the full
moon, he picked a fire flower, and hid it in his pocket. The next night he pressed the flower into the
lock of his cage as he and the elephant were let out to dance. And when daylight fell, and they were alone,
he found that the flower had worked its magic.
The cage swung open, and Nathan helped
the elephant to his feet. Together they
stepped through the closest fairy ring, and found that they were back in the
mortal realm.
Nathan clicked his heels, and the elephant
trumpeted. Many years had passed in the
short time they had gone to Fairyland, and no one was left who each could call they.
But the boy and the elephant were not alone; they had each other, and
they were free—and it felt like more than enough.