NIGHTMARES

The forest was damp and desolate; a sharp, fearful loneliness shot through the boy as he realized that he was alone. His limbs began to shake as the sky darkened, casting long shadows over everything, transforming the land – it seemed as if things suddenly sprang from the earth: shards of bones, puddles of blood, the remains of poor creatures, fairy, human and beast alike, and strands of delicate, shining silk hanging from every elevated surface. Lucas cried out, turning in a wide circle, hoping for someone to find him. He wanted his mum and dad, he wished that he had listened to them, when he was told to avoid the black woods, the most dangerous parts ofFairyLand. His heart hammered in his chest, spinning back around as an odd rustling came from the brush.

It moved out of the shadows, and Lucas gasped in shock and fright. It looked not unlike the common Tarantula – eight legs, beady eyes and mandible pinchers set at its jaw; its segmented body covered in a coarse brown fur. It moved in much the same way as an ordinary Tarantula, and the only perceivable difference between the two was its size. This spider was approximately the size of a dinner table and much, much larger than him.

He tried to shuffle backwards, away from the approaching spider, but his legs didn't want to work. He was rooted to the spot by some odd force, to watch in terror as it approached him, haws clicking together. It reached out one rough leg and placed it on the boy's shoulder, bearing all of its weight on him as it opened its jaws, hissing in his face—

Lucas woke up, bolted to a sitting position in bed, drenched in a cold sweat and unable to catch his breath. He lay back down, burying himself under the covers and cowering, squeezing his eyes shut. Just go back to sleep…

His skin crawled, feeling as if a hundred little spiders were scuttling under his covers and he jumped from the bed, hovering for a moment and unsure of what to do.

Rae woke with a start, eyes adjusting to the dark. "Lucas?" she grunted in a whisper. "Sweetie, what's wrong?" she shifted in bed, careful not to wake her husband.

"The Spiders," he whispered back, taking his hand from his mother's arm as she sat up.

Rae knew immediately and took her son into her arms, lifting him onto the bed and letting him lie with her. She held him close, whispering to him that The Spiders couldn't hurt him, they were so far away and he would always be protected. She sang the fairy lullaby, the one that Tracy had taught her to sing to Michelle. Once, her husband stirred, shifting next to her and she paused, ceasing her movement until he fell back into a deep sleep.

She hushed her son, calming him back to sleep, closing her eyes once he, too, fell asleep.

PRIDE

It was Lucas's fourth term of classes. Michelle was no longer there to look after him, and this worried their mother, as she stood outside the Garden Gates, waiting for her son. Her heart sank when she saw that he was accompanied by one of the instructors. She apologized profusely to the woman and took her son from her grasp, picking him up and he latched onto her shoulder.

She brought him home and cleaned the one, long cut that ran up his arm. Neither Lucas nor Rae were willing to talk, not just yet. When the wound was cleaned and wrapped, she told him to go change out of his dirt-smeared uniform.

She sighed; Tracy wouldn't be home until much later that night, and she didn't quite know what she was going to do with Lucas – he wasn't a bad child, she knew that, and she wished she could say that she didn't know why he'd gotten into a fight in the middle of his classes, but the answer was all too obvious – she'd noticed, picking him up for classes, the dozens of young fairies with new, pastel gossamer wings, while Lucas was, and would remain, bare-backed. She hadn't a doubt in her mind that the tussle in the garden was a result of the way the younger fairies treated him. Oh, she'd seen it. Their parents were wonderful people, and if any of them held a wing prejudice, they certainly kept it to themselves, but the children weren't as kind or understanding. By their standards, being wingless meant being a victim, and she and Tracy had tried so hard, gone to great measures to ensure that their son knew that there was nothing wrong with him, that the children were wrong to say that he was 'disabled' of any of the other nasty nicknames given to wingless fairies in The Academy.

Lucas took comfort in the fact that his father, also a wingless fairy, the first and only wingless Tooth Fairy, led his team, despite any 'disability.' Lucas knew that being wingless was nothing of the sort, but he also knew that it was no walk in the park, and so did his mother.

She sat him down in his bedroom, smoothing down his hair. He sat there with her, unmoving. "I'm sorry I lost my temper," he said quietly.

"I know, sweetie. But you need to know that no matter what they—"

"But I'm not sorry I hit him." He finished.

This took Rae by surprise, stopping her mid sentence. A beat passed as she adjusted. "You're… not sorry you hit him?" She asked; he shook his head. "Why not?"

"Because he was being mean" Lucas answered. He took hold of his mother's hand, setting it in his lap. "He told me that he hoped we start doing actual sacrifices for Guld Fethel again, so that they'll throw you into – into the magic, and…" he stopped, frowning.

"So you hit him," she said, thoughtfully. He nodded. She ducked down and hugged her son. "Just because we're treated differently, that doesn't mean we can hurt people like they hurt us. Thank you," she said, "for standing up for me, but I'd rather have them say bad things about us than for you to get in trouble." She lifted him onto her lap. "They can't hurt us. But please, please try to stay out of trouble, Lucas."

His voice became softer. "Are you mad?" he asked.

She let him down, thinking as she stood. "No," she answered at length. "But I don't expect it to happen again, no matter what they say. Understood?"

"Yes, ma'am," he answered, solemnly.

She kissed his forehead. "Good."

GRADUATION

Lucas sat in one of the stiff fold out chairs, fidgeting. The tiny garden where they held ceremonies and classes was stifling in the heat today, and the heavy velvet robes that they had to wear weren't helping matters. The ceremonies would take hours, as fairies weren't exactly known to be short and to the point in ordeals like this.

The young man leaned back and stretched his legs out in front of him; it felt good to not keep himself cramped up in the immediate vicinity of his own folding chair, but even then his knees were still bent uncomfortably, due to his rather unusual height. At the age of seventeen, he was already nearing six feet, and had to look down at almost anyone he was talking to. He scoffed in dry amusement at the thought and removed his glasses to wipe the sweat from the bridge of his nose as the music started.

Their trainer descended from the balcony behind the audience, and took her place at the podium to conduct the ceremony. She was all smiles and seemed impervious to the maddening heat. "Good morning everyone!" she spoke, her voice carrying in an unnatural manner, influenced by magic. "And welcome to the graduation of Tooth Fairy Training class 717!"

The boy let his head fall back and groaned quietly. After a moment, he picked his head up and looked out into the crowd, squinted against the harsh sunlight. It was high noon when the ceremony started, and the light was blinding. Still, he was able to make out his father's figure, towering above everyone else, and next to him, his mum. The unpleasant feeling in his chest, the constant roar of discomfort, of alienation in such a winged class, ebbed when he saw his parents. His whole life, he'd been told that he was at a disadvantage, that his parents had cursed him to be a wingless fairy in a bi-species family. He was told, even by them, that his life wasn't going to be easy, that others would treat him differently because of his genetics, because of his parents, and he accepted it.

But for the most part, being a wingless fairy had never been of much consequence. Yes, he was bullied in his youth, his family had been made fun of by the other children, but all it took was a quiet correction, a reminder that his father was the only wingless tooth fairy, that his mother was the first human in nearly five hundred years to live in Fairy Land. Not since his childhood was he so offended by their poorly-reasoned insults. Many people still looked down at him as if he were at a disadvantage, but he was indifferent. As it happened, he was actually at quite and advantage, being of a multi-cultured family – by his adolescence, he knew more about human culture than any one in several tiers of work, an aspect of knowledge that was imperative when being a Tooth Fairy.

He was an incredibly gifted child, and everyone knew – classmates, instructors, but most importantly, his parents. Lucas would be graduating at the top of his class.

If he were graduating.

Despite his top marks in his academic classes, his wide knowledge of The Human Plane, his expertise with the equipment, he was still a wingless fairy. In order to graduate, you had to have passed a general flight course. In order to graduate, you had to have wings.

It'd been difficult, at first, when he'd learned he wouldn't be graduating. He'd wanted to drop from The Academy, not seeing the point in pursuing an education that would be – decidedly, for him – a fruitless experience. His mum had reasoned with him, all but begged him, but of course that was years ago. And now, there he was, sitting with thirty-odd winged fairies, watching them all receive their licenses and turning their tassels from one side to the other.

At long last, the last name was called, and the last of the graduating class returned to her seat, as Miss Vivian went on with her speech.

He took it all silently, with a wry smile. He knew his instructor meant well – it was all just a matter of perspective, really. She was congratulating those of the class that had spent the last century leading up to this moment, those who were graduating the class and he'd admit, they deserved it. Each and every one of the kids he was sitting with had worked hard to get through the class. Still, that didn't change the fact that that's what the ceremony was for – them. The winged fairies.

Lucas wasn't a bitter child. He hadn't been raised that way – his father had been, and he'd gone out of his way to make sure his son wasn't, because he knew how unpleasant it made life, resentment and wing-jealousy.

The class was released to go take seat with their parents, or whomever had come to congratulate them. When he reached his folks, he sat between them, and Tracy gave him a pat on the back, apologizing for Miss Vivian's oblivious ignorance, telling him that she had been the same way at his class's graduation. Rae leaned over and pecked the young, lanky boy on the cheek.

He heaved a sigh, settling back into his chair. He wasn't upset – hardly! He'd resigned to this a long time ago; it was more contented than anything, a sigh of relief that the dreadful ceremony was over.

He was to be enrolled as a caseworker in the morning.