An All Hallow's Love (A Tale)
Page number fifty-seven. Wonderful, wonderful, glorious page number fifty-seven.
The stress lines upon the side of the small, thinly leather-bound pocket size book spine told the tale of how many generations of fraggle females had been taken in by the unbridled lust of that page more than any storyteller ever could.
Not that the current storyteller, who was at page number fifty six and giggling loudly , would not have been happy to try if asked.
But of course, like many unspoken parts of fraggle culture, the juicer plot points of the ending from Furlined Passions was hardly thought of as silly or serious enough to be talked about in polite company.
The storyteller wiggled her feet happily where she lay on her stomach, still in bed in her living cave adjoining the main storytelling chamber at half pass lunch time.
Her breath caught in her throat as she leaded in with an intense gaze, turning the page quickly to the fabled paragraphs when...
"Harriet! Harriet! Are you home? I've come concerning a matter of great importance to fraggle kind!"
The strong resounding tones of a young male fraggles voice mixed with the words she had just been reading made her pale yellow form nearly jump two feet in the air and melt at the same time, a sudden ability that ended with Harriet laying sprawled among the piles of books on her bedside floor.
"Yes, I am! Just a moment!" She called to the voice and knock beyond her door.
She tucked the moon and star embossed cover with the shadows of a windswept princess and dashing prince under a dusty respectable looking copy of Cavemoss and You: A Match Made In Dampness and made her way to the main cave.
It looked smaller than it truly was, barely big enough for a shell-less hermit. Harriet tisk-tisked herself silently for not making her place of work more respectable looking lately.
Most of all, of course, when it was about to be seen by HIM.
She ran a hand though her wild frizzy mop of pink hair self consciously, opening the door with much flair a moment later.
"Come in, come in! So sorry to keep you waiting! I was just...um...researching valued lore for the Eternal Anthologies..."
"Ah, well then, I won't take up too much of your time." The sandy colored fraggle said, walking into the cave with a wide well practiced stride.
"Oh, you're more welcome to all my time if you need anything, anything at all Matt..."
Harriet laughed, shadowing him silently as soon as she closed the door behind him.
The barely middle aged fraggle that had entered was dressed in the everyday outfit of the rocks' resident explorer. His handsome mustache that was the trademark of his family tree was just starting to fill out, it's yellow color laced with strands of white.
"Well, you see Harriet, I, the rocks' famous Traveling Matt was hoping that you as the storyteller could give me some most valuable information from some of those books you're always looking at..."
All and all he was the very picture of male fragglness to the young storyteller, a fragglness she had been trying to get her baloobius on for quite some time now.
All her previous hinting and flirting had been for nothing...
But oh, not today...Today she had a plan...
"Of course, of course, Mattykins..." She nodded forcing herself away from were she had put her head upon his shoulder all the while he had been talking without even being noticed.
"I have a few new places in mind for my next expedition, if you could just fill some tiny spots in my great wealth of wisdom about their present safety for mere mortal fraggles."
He rattled on, standing like a hero about to get his picture painted by an invisible master.
The storyteller nodded, picking up the first book within reach from a pile near her reading stool, and quickly hiding the real title (The Care and Keeping of Your Spiderfly) from Traveling Matt's view.
"Here we are, the most up to date volume on all the caves of fraggle rock." She said with a winning smile.
"My, that was quick." Matt remarked, turning from his pose in bewilderment.
"I've gotten good at my job lately...But I'm still nowhere near as good as you are at yours, Matt of My Heart." She cooed sweetly.
"Certainly not, why it takes years and years to get to my sheer level of..."
Matt swelled his chest outward a bit as he fished around in his jacket, coming back with a small piece of parchment.
"Ah, here we are...Now, lets see...Wonder Mountain?"
Harriet winced a bit at the question. Here it was the perfect opportunity to make her plan work...
But the storyteller code to always tell the truth to any listener who asked for answers was already beginning to nag at the back of her mind.
"The Avalanche Monster is hibernating on the road again." She spoke clearly and surely.
That was the truth after all.
"Why that lazy oaf...Well then, the Snareroot Valley?
Stick to the plan, just remember the plan...
Her eyes darted down the pages that told her nothing as she flipped to a random chapter.
"F...flooded I'm afraid."
That wasn't exactly lying, there was a leak in the cavern ceiling after all.
"Oh dear, it must have been a terrible downpour in upper rock for us to have never heard it here."
"The silent storms are the very worst."
She agreed, bracing herself against looking into his warm trusting eyes as he glanced up from the last item on the list.
"The Trail of Autumn Enlightenment?"
Here it was the moment of...em...truth.
If she could just get the words out, any words, then she would be able to be the one doing the asking...
Her mouth felt like sandpaper as she blurted out the first full blown lie that came to mind.
"Out of season!"
Traveling Matt turned his head to the side ever so slightly, looking at the glasses framed bookish fraggles' head as if she had just caught an instant case of the pebble pox.
"Out of season, in autumn?"
Harriet laughed, her words edged with a nervous twitch.
"In autumn? No of course it is not out of season in autumn. How silly, did I say that? I meant it was in season in the other autumn, the autumn one based on the calendar of the Elder Clan we modern fraggles don't use anymore. So their and the trails' autumn is actually our spring."
She took a deep breath, the weight of the tall tale suddenly pushing down on her lungs.
"You understand don't you?"
Matt stood, looking glassy eyed for a moment, his mouth slightly agape before he regained his ever present composer.
" Certainly...why I knew that ages ago! I was just..um, testing your know how on the matter. You have to be sharp to keep such a important title as storyteller after all..."
"Nothing makes me feel more important than getting to help you Matt."
The yellow fraggle replied, cleaning her glasses as if to wipe off the dirtiness of what she had just done and replace it with the clean, honest part of her plan.
"But I know a place that will be nice and romantic...I mean, great to explore on your expedition tomorrow instead..."
"Really? Where?" The tan fraggle asked with interest, leaning closer as the storyteller batted her purple shadowed eyes.
"The Gorg's garden at the annual Pumpkin Festival." She whispered near his unseen ear.
"Hmph, what sort of exploring would that be? Why, everyone will be there!" He huffed.
"Exploring the time honored tradition of dating! What do you think? Isn't there something you'd like to ask me? Just for once Mattykins?"
She cuddled up to his clay colored fur as close as she dared and played with a lock of it that lay over his collar.
"Yes, Harriet, now that you mention it there is..."
"Yes...?" She asked heavily, leaning in just a breath away from pressing his muzzle to her own.
"Are you sure the Snareroot Valley is flooded that badly? If I wore boots maybe I..."
"Why...why..You!" The young fraggle exploded as if a bucket of ice water had just been dumped over her head.
"Out! OUT!" She screamed, forcing the tall lean fraggle in all his imagined splendor though her doorway and right into a halfway dried up mud puddle. "And take this with you... you... chad!"
The great Traveling Matt blinked in shock as his equally great trademark pit helmet was jettisoned into the muck near his knees.
"Hello? Hello? Harriet?" He called in a small sounding voice at the shadow of the slammed door.
"I do have some very tall boots for just such an..."
The Storyteller slammed down her window shutter and heard no more.
The three other fraggles that had joined the storyteller around her small circular dining table sipped from their small daisy carved cups wordlessly in a moment of silent reflection, eyeing the bent over barely propped up heap that was their host.
The short heavy set light blue fraggle with white hair in the middle of the group was the first to speak, her voice high pitched and a bit tone deaf.
"Well, what can I say... I told you so."
The tall lilac fraggle with blue hair beside her nearly gagged on her drink, patting Harriet on the shoulder, her own voice with a rich highborn accent.
"Indigo, can't you see the poor thing is in pain?"
The talkative fraggle did not seem to notice.
"My philosophy has always been..."
"Oh dear, not that silly philosophy of yours again..." The lilac fraggle groaned, taking another sip from her cup to hide the face of the small fraggle who was at the moment trying her best to be viewed by her taller neighbor.
"My philosophy has always been to tell the truth, Merri. And in this case the truth is as clear as doozer sticks:"
She walked around the other side of the table, putting a hand on the storytellers other shoulder.
"Harriet got dumped."
"Just leave me alone everyone." Harriet spoke in a tearful whisper, shrugging off Indigo and Merri's hands and throwing herself headlong into the pillows on her small sofa.
"Now, you see Harriet dear, that is your whole trouble." Merri began with a wise waving of her finger.
Indigo rolled her eyes, whispering to herself.
"Here we go, and she gets at me for my philosophy..."
"You want what you don't have and when you actually get an opportunity for love you don't do any of the work."
Merri shook her head with a knowing expression, talking out a gold painted wooden locket that was around her neck on a piece of twine. She opened it to reveal a tiny painting of a stately looking pink fraggle with a curled yellow goatee.
"Males have to be caught, trained, and molded to do things you want. You can't expect them to bring themselves of their own free will gift warped. It just isn't done, not anymore..."
"Unless, you believe that new story..." The small sunny voice of the third fraggle of the group that had been silent this whole time chimed in carefully.
"New story?" The storyteller asked the skinny looking yellow fraggle hopefully.
"Constance, you really shouldn't be talking, here, drink some more tea." Indigo spoke softly, handing another cup in her friends direction.
"I've had enough tea..." The medium sized fraggle fumed with a loud cough as she turned her head away, making the long ponytail of her light yellow hair whip around her face.
"The story about the new ghost the magic of the rock has finally drawn back to the surface..."
She made spooky motions for added effect in the line of storyteller's face from a distance.
"The knight of true love, locked sleeping in a rock..."
"The one all the young fraggle girls have been trying to wake up with enhanced incense" Merri let out an over the top flat laugh. "Oh come now, Constance, you can't actually believe that!"
"I'm not saying I believe it, but it is a lovely romantic story, don't you think?" Constance muffled a cough with her hand, her eyes glazing over behind her short muzzle. "A dashing white knight..."
"The only place you're seeing dashing is the dashing you're doing right back to bed!" Indigo said with a business like glare that her friend returned with a sheepish grin, hiding behind the rim of her tea cup.
"Oh, I think it is a wonderful story..." Harriet squealed, clapping her hands together. "Have any of you tried to...?"
Two arms and one tail wearing bracelets woven with gold thread were presented to her eyes at the same time.
"Lifemated." Came the chorus of voices.
"Wha...When did..." The storyteller gapped in shock, as if the world beyond books had suddenly began to spin much too fast.
"Five years ago." Merri spoke in her usual formal tone, wrinkling her muzzle ever so slightly. "Didn't I tell you about the matter some time ago?"
"Last year." Indigo added, moving her wrist so the golden silk caught the light. "For some reason he couldn't stop crying..."
"Two months ago, you came to the ceremony remember?" Constance said softly, tucking her tail back underneath her chair for safekeeping.
"I guess I just don't think about it very often..." Harriet said, looking downward in unspoken apology.
"In any account we are all much too happily mated to put any stock in silly school-fraggle ghost stories..." Merri said, lowering her voice as if worried the walls themselves would overhear the issue.
"Really Harriet you should be to, it's not healthy for someone of your age..."
The storyteller lay back farer upon the sofa, as if her visitors words had struck an invisible blow, one that could not in anyway imaginable get worst than she was feeling...
"At the rate your going my little baby Red will have a date before you do." Indigo nodded in helpful agreement.
It was worst.
Harriet half buried her head in pillows, still able to hear muffled words.
"We should really be going..." The muffled Merri said, fading into the distance.
"I believe you'll find a husband Harriet.." A small voice spoke weakly beside her one partially exposed ear. "I'm sure Matt will turn around someday, he's a good fraggle."
"Thank you Constance but I'm not so sure anymore..." She said with a sob into the pillow feathers. "At least it's nice to know I still have friends who care."
"Of course, friends are suppose to care, not make fun of you..." The fraggles words were cut short by a fit of wet sounding coughs.
The storyteller's eye peeped out of her safe pillow cocoon in concern, only to see the short form of Indigo half carrying, half dragging the much taller yellow fraggle toward the door.
" Constance I swear, if I have to tie you into bed to make you rest and get better I will!"
"But I am feeling better Indigo..." Constance replied, now hanging onto the storyteller caves door frame for dear life with all eight fingers and a couple toes.
"Really I..." Her voice was broken by sharp coughing. "Oh drat!"
"Such language!" The unseen Merri gasped in disapproval from outside.
"Nooo! Freedom, fresh air, please don't make me go back..."
Constance yelled overdramaicly as the combined might of her two friends together wrenched her slipping fingers from the frame slowly in the direction of her bed, and another cup of gooseberry tea...