Disclaimer: Blah blah blah I don't own Tinker Bell!

I want that card deck.

Thanks for the comments so far, guys! :3 I likes comments~ and if it weren't for those, I'd probably stop posting, hah!

PS: I've edited Chapter 5, but not a big enough change to make y'all go back and read it over. Gemma is now sixteen instead of fourteen. A-yup, that's it.

The rest of Bobble's day was spent helping Gemma get comfortable with flying, while Tumble and Amber-Maize spent their time with Nettle, as they normally would. They ignored the fact that the two didn't come back, just as long as they showed themselves by nightfall.

The three fairies were huddled around a small table, looking up suspiciously from little cards cut from leaves. Tumble glared at Nettle. Nettle glared at Amber-Maize. Amber-Maize glared at her cards- she had a lot more than her friends; that wasn't good.

"Hey, Amby. Got a three?" Tumble smirked. Amber-Maize let out a soundless sigh, dropping the card- a Three of Acorns- on the table. Sure, she'd lost a card, but so had Tumble. She was horrible at this game. Why had Nettle taught them this, again? As if sensing Amber's agitation, Nettle raised an eyebrow at her before looking toward Tumble.

"You know, if it weren't for that Clumsy, you'd stay at least until tomorrow night," she mumbled, waving one of her cards at Amber and setting it in front of her. Amber's frown deepened as she dropped her matching card, this time a Six of Mushrooms. "What are you really planning, Tumble? Haven't you noticed something? She's a bit old to be seeing us."

"Planning? I'm not planning anything- Bobble's in charge of her, remember?" Tumble replied, holding up a card to Amber. Amber looked her hand over, eyebrows raised, and tapped her knuckles on the table twice with a smirk. She didn't have that card. Not skipping a beat, not even looking at her, Tumble proceeded to pick up a new card from the pile to add to her hand. Nettle eyed her suspiciously.

"That bothers me, too," she said, lowering her hand. "You know how easily fairies fall in love, be they another fae, animal, or Clumsy. We've all heard of Tinker Bell."

"Since when are you worried about someone else getting their heart broken?" Tumble pretended to pout, lowering her hand as well. Amber, noticing that Nettle wasn't going to play yet, put her hand into a neat little stack in front of her and folded her arms neatly on the table.

"Tinker Bell made a dangerous decision, taking that child," Nettle said. "Sure, that was at least a hundred and fifty years ago on the Mainland, but time actually means something for the Clumsies. They've changed. What if they discover us?"

"Fewer and fewer Clumsies believe in fairies every year," Tumble replied, waving off the suggestion. "No one would investigate claims of fairies taking a child. There are many other possibilities that they would consider first." Nettle considered this. She wasn't as naïve as most other fairies, she knew Clumsies better than some might even know themselves. That was what she claimed, at least. Tumble believed very little of what she had to say on the matter.

"They're coming," Nettle said. Tumble had been waiting for the start of that.

"Not again, Nettle," she rolled her eyes, leaning back in her chair.

"They are," the Mainland fairy insisted. "There's a bunch of 'em that come through here sometimes. They've got their Seeing Stones and little notebooks and they sit near my log and they wait. They're on to me, Tumble. I may have to move to another part of the wood, or leave entirely, otherwise I may be caught..."

"They're adults," Tumble arched an eyebrow. "They can't see us... unless they step in a ring of our mushrooms, apparently." Nettle rubbed her forehead, exasperated. She knew Tumble's claims seemed fair enough on their own, but she knew better. She knew.

"If the adult Clumsies find us, they're going to dissect us. Disbelief will no longer be a worry, but belief could be the end of us." At Tumble's incredulous look, she continued. "Think about it. They'll catch us, and they'll put us to science-" fairies often didn't believe in this thing called science; magic explained everything a lot easier, "-cut open our chests and find out what makes us tick. They'll take magic from us by explaining it!" Nettle was now standing, hands flat on the table as she leaned in towards Tumble. "By finding the magical properties of our Dust, they'll try to harvest it for their own purposes, and we'll be left with nothing."

"Okay, okay!" Tumble choked, sinking deep in the chair under Nettle's wild eyes. "Look, we'll give her a break in Neverland for a couple of days, then we'll come back, bring her back to normal size, and take her home."

"No," Nettle spat, lowering her body so that her nose was level with Tumble's. "She's too old. The girl might... tell someone, they might even believe her. No, we can't take any risks. She knows too much now. You go ahead and take her to Neverland, but she can't come back."

Tumble tossed around this in her head. Nettle did have a little bit of a point. Allowing her friend's paranoia to transfer into her, she slowly pulled herself upright in the chair.

"Alright," she said, staring down at her cards on the table. "She'll stay in Neverland."

To this, Nettle sat back down in her chair. The silence was awkward, but Nettle picked her cards back up off the table. She only had two left. Tossing down the Queen of Daisies and looking to the forgotten third fairy in the room, Amber scrambled to pick up her stack to search through it. She dropped a Queen of Mushrooms on top of it, and Nettle took the pair and set it on her own stack of matched cards.

"Last card, I go again," she grunted, then turned it to the other fairies, but mainly at Amber. It was an Ace of Acorns. Letting out another soundless sigh, Amber dropped her Ace of Leaves, and then the rest of her stack of mis-matched cards. Nettle had won again.

Once under the cover of night, Tumble and Amber-Maize, as well as Bobble and Gemma bid farewell to Nettle, who stayed cold and stoic for the whole thing. Gemma wondered, was she always like that? Or was she still angry about her mushrooms? But once she was up in the air with the fairies, the question was gone. She held Bobble's hand tightly- despite the flying she'd done earlier, this was a lot higher than the mid-branches of a tree- this was several feet above all those trees. She did her best to not look down, but found the stars not all that reassuring. In fact, it made her feel even more dizzy. And so, she fixated her gaze upon Bobble, the closest and steadiest thing she could focus on. The Tinker didn't seem to notice, concentrating on following Tumble and Amber.

Gemma had only lived in England for a short number of years, having moved from the west side of America when she was nine when her father remarried to a British woman. While she wasn't entirely thrilled about moving so far and so suddenly, she did enjoy the country. Hearing Bobble's charming Scottish accent filled her with a silly kind of glee she hadn't previously been acquainted with. He was very intelligent, a brilliant mind she wouldn't have expected to find in any of her fairytales. However, he was a bit scrawny and seemed delicate, like she could easily crush him if she wasn't careful, and that made her nervous, like a child holding a butterfly in her palms. She didn't want to hurt him.

They flew higher and higher, over greenery and villages as they drew closer to London. Bobble glanced over his shoulder, catching her dreamy gaze- she'd been lagging behind, and though he didn't want to say it, his shoulder was starting to ache.

"Ye alright back there, Miss Gemma?" he asked, the pale moon above them outlining his features.

"Ah, y-yes," she replied, closing her eyes shortly before looking at Bobble with new focus. "I can't look anywhere without getting scared, though... and I'm starting to feel heavy." Bobble frowned a little at Gemma's concerns, gently pulling her arm to bring her closer.

"Hold on to me, lass," he said, lowering his voice. She bit her lip, carefully putting her arms over his shoulders as to not disturb his wings. Facing one another, he held onto her waist. He tried not to think about how close they suddenly were. "O-okay, now, just keep that happy thought," he instructed, "concentrate on going up, not backward, otherwise ye might drop."

Gemma stared at him, wide-eyed and even shaking a little. She then tucked her face in between her arm and his head, closing her eyes to keep from seeing the world blurring past her. That was when she noticed the smell. Well, she'd noticed it before, but it was stronger than ever now. Cinnamon. It had been said that fairies smelled of cinnamon, or cookies, sweet baked goods. This was definitely cinnamon- cinnamon with just a touch of something undeniably male. It was subtle, and not at all unpleasant.

She suddenly had a new happy thought.