Hallows
The seed made (was making) her nervous.
She'd caught it out over the ocean, practicing her talent safely away from people and things that could be damaged from strong winds. She'd been excited to find it at first. Her talent wasn't as strong as some - especially, say, Vidia - and so she often didn't 'hear' a new seed until after another wind fairy had already found it and taken over guiding it in.
She wished she hadn't heard this one.
Normal seeds caught the first laugh of a child, increasing its chances of traveling safely through the skies instead of fading into the world and becoming just a bright patch of joy or colour. Those seeds radiated the happiness of the child who had laughed, the soft content that made the core of all fairies pure if not incorruptible.
This seed radiated loss, like contentment had been given up, not gained. There was no echo of laughter, only the last quiet sigh of a resolute soul.
Guiding it wasn't exactly easy either. It was a maple seed and they usually spun in a clever little circle to slow their fall. She'd guided them before and so long as they had a stiff wind beneath them, they flew straight and true - but this was a double-seed, still connected in the middle and that threw everything off. She had to put her all into keeping it aloft, catching every flip and tumble that would see it streak downwards and shifting the winds to compensate.
Her hands were shaking and sweat poured from her forehead by the time she approached the Pixie Dust Tree. Relieved to almost be done, she didn't see the Queen approach until she was right in front of her.
"Don't let that seed touch the tree!"
Tizzywing shrieked a little and fumbled the seed, another fast-flying fairy thankfully darting in and flurrying it up again.
"Thank you." The Queen thanked them both, calming slightly but still with an edge of tension. "It is absolutely vital that you do not let it touch anything in Pixie Hollow. Follow me, quickly."
So saying the Queen flew off at speed, a sight almost unseen for the fairy who could manifest herself anywhere in the Hollow by will alone. For the wind fairies following her, it was necessary.
Tizzywing sighed and smiled a quick thanks to Elwood - the other fairy who had darted in to help. Working together, they rerouted the seed and guided it after the Queen.
They flew and flew, over the Summer Glen and out to sea. The sun, already setting, was a glimmer of red light on the misty horizon and the ocean stretched below them, dark and foreboding.
"Here, bring it here."
The Queen descended. The two fast-flying fairies followed her. The mist parted to reveal a looming, ugly shape against a frothing sea.
Skull Rock.
They entered through one of the eyes and made a beeline towards the spare Pixie Dust tree, barely a sapling but already strong as it wrapped itself around a stone outcropping at the very centre of the massive skull-shaped cavern. Zarina had nurtured it well in the year she'd been gone and since returning home, various Dustkeeper fairies made regular journeys to tend to and guide its growth. Their lights shone in the dark now as they noticed the three incoming fairies and flittered up inquiringly.
Then they heard the seed, and shivered.
"Stand back." The Queen warned them, then to the two fast-fliers: "A moment, please."
She glided to the centre of the tree where branches had been gently coaxed away from Zarina's configuration and into something curled and flattened - an Arrival point-to-be, some time in the future.
It seemed that time would be now.
The Queen touched down and began to glow. Power radiated from her, surging into the tree and directing it to grow here and there and just so. Not even she could accelerate its growth to that of the ancient pixie dust tree on the island, but it would be just enough.
In fact, for the fairy it was about to receive… it was perfect.
She fluttered up and gestured for the two fast-fliers to allow the seed to land. There was something deeply sad in her eyes even as her expression returned to something more familiar and welcoming.
The seed touched down in the centre of the spiral. The sigh it had carried was briefly amplified, spreading through the tree which shivered beneath it.
Nervous, the attending dustkeeper fairies took wing.
Queen Clarion cupped her hands and poured pixie dust down onto the seed. It glowed and shifted - then dimmed and smoldered.
The watching fairies gasped and looked to their Queen, whose calm serenity didn't waver. They looked back just in time to see golden dust become green, not like a richly living leaf but sickly and flickering like the spectral fire found on ships caught in the wildest of storms. A kneeling body straightened up, skin paler than any fairy before before him and hair blacker than night. The seed that had carried him now clothed him, veiny light-brown cladding that covered him from the waist down.
And his wings… They unfurled without the aid of the Queen's touch. They weren't normal, weren't slender pixie wings made of moonlight, but tattered skeletal monarch wings - like a nightmarish parody of the Queen's - that arched in inky black lines and jagged patterns, not an elegant curve or swirl to be seen. As he stood, they fanned to keep him balanced - surprising him. Green eyes, deep and dark, stared - at the hovering fairies, the tree that still trembled faintly beneath him and the woman clothed in gold and crowned with winter-bare .
"This is… not what I was expecting." The new fairy spoke first, confused and wary, lacking the wide-eyed awe of the newly-born. He looked young, as all fairies did, but the weariness in his eyes and posture made him seem older - like the Lords and Ladies of the Queen.
As though his voice was a tipping point, the tree's continuing trembles settled… and the trickle of golden pixie dust it had been steadily producing shifted to an eerie green before every single leaf upon the desperately young tree abruptly withered and fell away. None would ever grow again.
"Very few of us were expecting this." The Queen smiled, even as all other attending fairies recoiled in horror. "Though I am one of them. Welcome. I am Queen Clarion and my domain is that of the cycle of life and the turn of the seasons. You are my counterpart, your domain is is that of final death, of peace and justice and the clearing of old so that new may arise. You come to us now at the turn of ages, like Summer turning to Fall - but do not be concerned. There is time yet, to steady your wings and find your place. This," She lifted her arms and shone brighter, illuminating the massive cave briefly. "Is your realm, to shape as you see fit and prepare for your duties to come. The tree beneath you will grow as you do, the dust it produces will strengthen you and any future fairies who Arrive here. Those fairies will be yours to guide and teach and to assist you in turn when your Age comes and mine has passed."
The new fairy just stared back at her, comprehending yet not, a life half-forgotten and a purpose deep within whispering in the back of his mind that this was right, this was his and though this woman was his Queen…
Like the sun ruled the sky, it would only be for a time. The sun always set, resigning its authority until the next day dawned. The completion of that thought, the logical conclusion, evaded him for now. Too distracting was the hum of not-life beneath his bare feet, the blinding shine of life in the fairies before him and a nagging sensation in the back of his mind that he had things to be doing.
Without even meaning to, he drew power from the tree beneath him and his wings glowed yellow-green with its strength. He lifted up to hover by his regal counterpart, who observed him with steady eyes that had already seen Age upon Age go by.
"I… can't go with you, can I?" He asked, putting words to the instinct that warded him off following these bright little lights, despite his desire to not be left alone here in this dark, cold, wet place. The Queen shook her head, eyes understanding but equally unflinching.
"Your place is here, as mine is in Pixie Hollow. Neither you nor I may touch upon each other's realm now, at risk of unbalancing the world. But take heart: You are home. You need only shape it to your liking. Now, as I once named myself, so now must you."
The dark fairy gingerly plucked a wing from behind him, stretching it out to inspect it and the faint shadow of a symbol that repeated along the jagged tips.
"…Hallows." He named himself, snatches of a life once lived all but gone, only this remaining. "My name… is Hallows."
"Welcome, Hallows, Lord of Death and King-in-Waiting, to Neverland."
Hallows
This might get continued one day but for now it's complete. I had an alternate version where Hallows didn't get new fairies but was required to conscript from Clarion's when the end of the world was near. They'd become his new court and take over the shutting down/protection of Pixie Hollow to wait out whatever nuclear winter or asteroid or whatever had broken the seasonal rhythm and killed billions. I hope to one day write even just a short oneshot following that idea.
If you feel like expanding on this fic, please do! And drop me a line, I'd love to read it. :)