Faire Exchange: Chapter 4

Halley impresses the new girl.

New to the story?

---

---

Today was already the best day ever. First Daddy said he'd take Halley to her favorite fried chicken place for dinner. Then it turned out to be Erin Burnett's birthday, and she brought cupcakes for the entire third-grade class—the kind with colored dots inside, just the way Halley liked them. And now there was an actual elf princess at school.

The fifth graders all avoided her at lunch, and the third-graders all stared. When the elf ate the roach, of course everybody was grossed out, but Halley figured maybe it was just a delicacy wherever she was from. The elf must be really important for the bigger kids to be so afraid of her. Obviously she wouldn't bother with commoners like Halley.

That just meant Halley had to try extra hard to be the elf princess's friend.

Halley followed her out to recess. The elf girl seemed to keep to herself, with the other big kids slinking away from her. Halley started running across the blacktop to catch up. "Excuse meEEYIEEE—"

She stepped on her own shoelace and fell. Her knees struck the pavement. Pain screeched through her legs. She rolled over and sat up to find the jeans torn and her knees scraped and bleeding.

Halley began to cry. It hurt so much!

"Are you all right?"

It was the elf girl! Sunlight gleamed off her violet-colored hair. She saw the blood and winced. "I see it, stop crying."

She knelt beside Halley as kids began to circle around her. Halley could only hear a few murmurs, but they all sounded concerned—not about Halley, but about the elf. You'd think the elf was going to hurt her.

The elf's hand glowed like a neon light. She waved it over Halley's knees. The pain stopped. Halley checked, and the scrape, blood and all, was gone. The elf waved over the knees again, and the threads of Halley's jeans knit themselves back together. It was like she never fell in the first place.

"Thank you." Halley wiped her nose on her hand. She didn't feel like crying anymore. "That was amazing. I've never seen real magic before."

"You haven't even begun to see real magic." The elf shot a hateful look at the fifth graders. "What?"

The big kids scattered.

Halley hopped to her feet. "My name's Halley Pennington. What's yours?"

"Call me"—the elf girl stood up—"Lady Rina."

"Wow, Lady Rina." Halley curtsied. "Are you a princess?"

"I'm more of a duchess. Princess Oneira wouldn't be caught dead in this world."

"Still, that's really cool. I've never met a duchess before." Halley tried to think of something else to say before Rina went away. "Anyway, Lady Rina, I'm really glad you helped me."

"Please, 'Your Ladyship' is also fine." Lady Rina thought a moment. "You say you're grateful?"

"Uh huh."

"How grateful are you?"

"So grateful! More grateful than for anything else in my life! I'll do anything, I swear! I just can't believe I'm actually talking to a real live magical elf prin—duchess!"

"In that case, here." Lady Rina's hand glowed again, and a small, shining marble formed in her palm. "Take this." She pressed it into Halley's hand, and it sank inside. A weird energy surged beneath her skin. "You see those girls over there?"

"Uh huh." They were the three fifth grade girls who always hogged the monkey bars. At the moment, they were practicing cartwheels together. "What do you want me to do?"

"Simply walk up to one of them and tap her on the back with that hand."

"Okay!"

Halley ran over. She kept her distance at first. The energy still burned in her hand. She had a feeling this would be really big, so which one should she pick?

The long-nosed one?

The puffy-cheeked one?

The freckly one?

The puffy-cheeked one did a cartwheel, and the freckled one stepped backwards, closer to Halley. None of them noticed her. None of them ever did.

She tapped the freckly one on the back.

The energy shot out through her fingers.

The freckly girl shook and went rigid. Halley had felt the electrical current in her own arm, just like a joy buzzer.

A little laughter spilled out of Halley. Magic! Real magic!

The freckly one turned and growled. Just like a joy buzzer, it only made her mad.

Halley ran back to Rina, who was waiting and laughing. When Halley reached her, she checked behind, and the freckly one and her friends never even tried to chase her. They saw Rina, and stayed where they were.

"Yeah, that's right!" Halley yelled. "Now you know who's boss around here! Right, Lady Rina?"

"Ha ha, exactly right," Rina said.

"That was great!" Halley said. "You really are the coolest!"

"Your name's Halley? This could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

Halley's heart burst aflame with pride. To think, she had made friends with actual elf nobility! To think, magic had actually flowed through her hands! To think, little Halley Pennington had struck fear into the hearts of fifth graders!

Today really was the best day ever.