Chapter 2 – Side Effects

For days, the heat continued.

Marianne had more than enough but what can you do against weather?

Eventually, the king and Dawn released the final wing designs. There was one for every rank. Marianne proved absolutely unable to show interest in seeing them.

To her surprise, though, the soldiers' reaction was very tame. They even looked like they were actually looking forward to the treatment. A few resigned; others, who were opposed to the idea, didn't do anything to make their voices heard. The king had everything to believe his idea would meet no resistance at all.

To top it off, there was a slight surge in the recruitment, as he had expected.

The fairy army, Marianne thought, was so tolerant of their leader's flamboyant state of mind, she wouldn't be surprised if anyone managed to stage a coup. The entire army would be gullible enough to follow blindly.

A slash of her sword to her imaginary enemy helped dissipate that cloud of smoke in her mind.

"When I'm queen," she told her sprites, "I'll go to the Dark Forest and talk to the king myself. I'll make peace a reality. We won't need an army anymore. There will be no borders."

She put a blindfold back on her eyes, using it at the same time to sponge some sweat from her brow. "And nobody will be forced to cover their colours to keep their job. Gosh, I can't believe they don't see how ridiculous that is."

She kept training for a while, unsuccessfully ignoring the way even the air felt heavy to lift.

After a while, though, she heard the voices of fairies in flight approaching. Intrigued, she pulled her blindfold, only to see fairy men and women as sweaty as she was, carrying large leaves in teams and acorns full of bottles at the end of their arms like it weighed a pound.

"Err… hello? What's going on?" she asked, dumbfounded, to the first visitors of this isolated part of the castle's grounds since last spring.

A man halfway planted his acorn to the ground and used his shirt to wipe his forehead. "Your Highness. We apologize for disturbing you. We were told by Sir Roland that we could use this space for the colouration of the 5th regiment."

"Oh. When… are you scheduled to start?"

Just from his expression, Marianne could hear his unsaid "How, exactly, are you not aware?" right before "Err, tomorrow morning."

"I see. Well, can't wait to see the results…"

Feeling the looks in her back, she headed to her room, sprites behind her head.

Things were happening fast. It made her want to avoid the event even more. There was going to be flirting everywhere in town for days…

Two days later, the colouration was done. The heat, not so much.

Marianne watched the regiments' parade from her room's window, fanning her face with a sheet of paper. The elves and some neighbour creatures from the Pond, like the turtles and some insects, had assembled around the central fountain to cheer. Okay, she thought, maybe all these matching colours flying together were cool, but…

"I knew you'd be here!"

She jumped and turned around to find Dawn gliding through the door. Marianne placed a hand on her chest in tragedy, making her sister snicker.

"Why do you have to glide inside the castle? I never hear you when you arrive!"

The young fairy landed close to the window, next to her. "I wanted to see what it looked like from here. Your window has a much better view than mine."

"Well, your window faces the Pond."

"Yeah."

Dawn sighed and slumped over the windowsill, looking tired, her wings still straight over them.

"It was so much work but finally, it's done! What do you think?"

"It's… beautiful. The designs are… original. You drew them yourself?"

"Yup. All of them. Dad has really bad taste in general, so I had to compensate, you know."

"And… how do I know it's not the other way around?"

They both chuckled (Dawn was more mock-laughing) but neither added anything for a moment, just watching the regiments fly in unison, shiny lines of colours over the buildings. Dawn's monarch-like wings kept hovering over their heads.

"I hope it's going to rain tomorrow…" Dawn said, mostly to herself.

"I know, right? Like, it's so humid."

"I don't even want to walk anymore."

"Oh, is that why you're not folding your wings?"

"No, I'm just fanning us."

The last regiment elevated itself into shiny grey and blue lines. The people applauded.

Dawn was the one to break the silence: "Ugh, I can't wait for the Pumpkin Festival! Hopefully it won't be cold like last year."

"Yeah, warm is nice but hot is not."

By adjusting her posture, Dawn accidentally pushed a bottle from Marianne's dressing table. Its glass body ringed against the rock but stayed in one piece. "Sorry! Thank goodness that didn't break," she said as she turned around to pick it up.

What really caught Marianne's attention was her sister's frown when her wings pulled on the curtains.

"Hey, you okay?"

"Yeah, it's just… My wings are kind of dry." She put the bottle on the desk. "It must be because of the sun."

"That's weird."

"Or maybe I didn't put the petals long enough on the first day."

Marianne didn't say anything. Fairies had been colouring their wings since before she was born and they had never had any major problems. Maybe the heat just warmed her wings more than usual, and the powder got slightly dry.

As soon as the parade was over, Dawn flew out of the window (to meet some soldiers with her friends, Marianne guessed). Her flight seemed as distracted and slow as always.

Oh well. Marianne was probably reading too much into this.

Finally, on the following day, dark clouds covered the sky from the morning on. At noon, the first droplets gave the plants their well-deserved hydration. The whole kingdom sighed at once, relieved.

Rain, however, meant danger for the fairies. On those days, the winged humanoids stayed indoors, waiting for the signal from the frogs.

This included a satisfied Marianne, sipping tea in the hall, watching the fairies as they watched the rain fall with gasps. She should probably be gasping as well seeing the force of it, but somehow, she couldn't find it in herself not to appreciate the cool air first.

"Sir Roland!" someone called from the crowd. A soldier, slightly wet and his shiny beige wings neatly folded behind his back, ran to greet him. When she noticed he was sitting just a table away, Marianne lowered her cup and her sprites hissed.

"Yes?"

"We just received a report about the 1st regiment, at the border," she heard the soldier say. "They'll be back as soon as the rain subsides."

"Oh, is that all? Alright, message taken, thank you."

"Minus two. They have fallen into the Dark Forest and are unable to come back."

Roland almost choked in his sudden amusement.

"You mean, they can't fly under the trees because of the rain? That's ridiculous. You know what? Serves them right. You're dismissed, soldier."

The soldier saluted him quickly and went back into the crowd.

"Wait, what?" Marianne directed loudly at him. "You're not going to look for them?"

Oddly enough, or not oddly at all, Roland didn't seem surprised to see her sitting nearby. He smothered a condescending laugh and twisted his hair over his brow.

"Believe me, sweetheart, I would… but with this weather? I don't know about you, but I don't feel like swimming right now."

"Oh. Do my ears deceive me? Is Sir Roland scared of a little rain?" Her sprites laughed in a low tinkle.

His head flew in her direction.

"Of course not! Rain is, err… magnificent. The problem is, if I go get them, they'll be sure to spoil the beautiful colours on their wings. Which, by the way…"

He got up from his chair to show a bit of his wings in a slow motion that made her uncomfortable, for some reason.

"…were not coloured on me. You know why, Buttercup?"

An indifferent sip of tea acted as her reply.

"Because there's only one person in my rank. My colours are," he twisted a lock of hair over his brow, "out of reach, for most."

Marianne rolled her eyes with as much annoyance as she could muster and got up as well, preparing to leave. "Good for you, Roland. But you know what other colours are out of reach? Those of a king. Yeah, especially for you."

For once, he looked like he was looking for an answer. Before he could react with an "Oh, Marianne," she swiftly exited the hall and headed to her room again.

Hell, if no one was going to look for them, she certainly couldn't miss the opportunity of a little action. All she needed was her sword and a hydrangea leaf large enough for one.

She thought of telling Dawn she had to leave and not to look for her, but her sister wasn't in her room. It was unlikely for her to be outside on a day like this…Marianne shrugged and left with what she needed for the trip.

Although dangerous, flying under the rain was not unpleasant. Marianne had a large umbrella but the force of the rain alone was difficult to handle and she was loving the challenge. The wind was strong enough sometimes to make her deviate from her path, and once, she was briefly blown over her leaf. Feeling invincible, she laughed it off until she arrived at the border. The border itself, its enormous plants, the cool gusts that escaped from it, was what brought her back to reality.

She stood frozen for a moment, asking herself how convinced she was that this was the right thing to do. Thinking of the soldiers, who were probably not expecting any help to come their way, filled her with pity, and second by second, her strength returned. She finally found the courage to drop the hydrangea and dive into the darkness, where rain only floated as mist.

Flying in this wild land was as shocking and confusing as she had imagined. Everywhere she went, she kept her body straight and close to her wings, careful not to touch the branches and webs suspended here and there, all the while keeping her eyes down to the forest floor, low underneath the Fairy Kingdom's level. She suspected they'd be resting on the very ground, as far away from the pouring sky as possible.

There was no noise around her but the trees' faint movements to the wind, no voice and no creature that she could see. Was anyone living here at all? Or did they also have a habit of hiding from the rain?

Behind her, after she had passed a dense bush of thorns, a message crossed the kingdom in a whisper: "A third fairy has entered the Dark Forest."

An hour later, she was shivering and growing restless, but she finally spotted the shiny armours of two fairies on the ground, sitting miserably against a trunk, their wings unfurled around them. Relieved, she lowered herself to them, making a large circle around plants that looked like open mouths with fangs.

"Princess Marianne!"

As soon as they saw her, their wings slipped behind them and they kneeled respectfully. Their visors were in the mud, next to them.

"Stand," she said immediately. "I'm glad I was able to find you. Are you both alright?"

They both shared an uncomfortable look, then went back to her.

"We are, your Highness, but…" said the one on her left. "We got our wings wet and…"

Seeing his comrade's hesitation, the one to her right continued in a low voice, like he was afraid he'd be scolded: "Something's wrong with the colouration, your Highness."

"What? What's wrong?" So her prediction was true?

"Our wings were stiff," he explained, "so we tried to soften them with a little bit of water. Now, we can't fly anymore."

She let her head fall back in frustration, cursing her father, but quickly returned to the situation at hand.

"So we have to wait until they're dry? Will you be able to fly then?"

"Well, err…"

They both spread their wings slightly to show her. She froze at the sight of them, her eyes wide.

There were black spots around the edges and over their surface, like rotten fruit.

"It… kind of hurts," said the one to her left. "And the scales have started to fall…"

"Me too," said the other one, lowering his head.

"This is a nightmare," Marianne whispered while taking a closer look. The infected parts looked disgustingly oozy. "It's going to take an eternity for the scales to grow back…"

"That's what we fear. And… as much as we want to get out of here, it's way too slippery for us to climb. Fortunately, I don't think anyone has seen us so far…"

As if on cue, they looked around with a worried gaze. There was nothing but plants: ferns, a few flowers, and a large, white mushroom, about a centimetre away.

"Princess," said the one on her left, "does this mean everyone who had their wings coloured will have the same… problem? Do you think it's something in the rain?"

"No, it's definitely the powder," Marianne responded, taking a step back. "There has to be something dry around here that we could use to absorb, err, whatever's coming out of your wings…"

They looked around, but everything was wet.

"Never mind, I'll go find something. You two stay here, and try not to move too much. I'll be right back."

She didn't have time to fly very far: a tall creature with long limbs, dragonfly-like wings, a thick, brown carapace, a staff in his clawed hands and a furious expression on his face immobilized himself right in front of her.

"Well, well," he said in an amused, scratchy voice. "So there really was a Fairy in the Dark Forest."

Without thinking, Marianne unsheathed her sword.

～As always, if you spot something weird in the text, I'd appreciate if you took a second and let me know. Thanks for reading!