Her sensitive ears picked up the movement of a small mammal immediately to her right under the aged planks worn smooth by the years of being trod upon by many feet. This place was an endless haven for those creatures in duress, whether they were human, four-footed, or somewhere in between. The cabin had a voice of its own, the wooden floor spoke of long revels till the morning and the curtains still held the scent of magic in their folds. It shimmered in the weak morning light, as if suspended between two planes of existence.
Moving like the breeze incarnate she knelt next to the faery ring, her breath softly puffing out and stirring the leaves from under which the mushrooms had sprung. Cupping her hands around the cap of one of the bright toadstools she breathed the words of Awakening to the sleeping sprite contained within. Her voice echoed many times over in a whispering reverie and a faint roseate mist coalesced between her hands, obscuring the mushroom for a moment.
When she removed her hands the mushroom tipped its cap back as if it were on hinges and a tiny winged creature no bigger than her thumbnail stirred in the stalk of the toadstool. It seemed composed of nothing more than hair thin strands of light surmounted by a petite and sharp-featured face and crowned in a wave of elegant green wisps. A smile came to the woman�s face as the delicate creature stretched and fluttered its way out of its home. Once more she whispered something nearly inaudible and other toadstools opened their caps to admit more of the tiny winged things into the open air.
She stood and moved around the cabin�s far side, her fingers brushing the ancient bricks and breaking loose tiny flakes of antiquated mortar from the wall. The breeze blew around her face, pushing back the hood of her cloak onto her shoulders and carrying with it hundreds of thousands of soft trilling voices. We come. We come. To your call, to your grave, to your heart�s desire. Sing and we come we come. Speak and we come we come. To you who can hear us. To you who can answer we come we come.
Her eyes closed as the voices chased each other through her long dark curls leaving behind glowing trails of blue and gold, which streaked her hair in the colors of the sky.
A firefly flickered her way through the woods clad in a coat of red vixen�s fur and spider silk. Behind her in the undergrowth came a humble green clad pixie carrying his acorn hat in hands resembling the gnarled roots of a great tree. He was short and slender and his leathery skin gave the impression of the bark of an ancient birch. In his eyes were all the secrets of life, some dark and brooding, others open and soft. But his eyes were strange, they were sad and dim as if his heart was one hair thin fracture from breaking and her heart squeezed for love of him.
The woman stopped, her cloak falling soundlessly to the forest floor behind her. She stood motionless, tears in her soft eyes as she studied the pixie. Whatever it was that brought him to her at this time was dire indeed. The pixie wrung his hands and blushed a dark rosy brown under her scrutiny before prostrating himself at her feet. His voice crackled and groaned like an oak in high wind as he spoke in her mind.
We need you Divine One. Gaea, the Faery need you�