Fool Me Twice

It was the afternoon when I woke up. The animals had already cleaned up the camp and were prepared to head out. I apologized for waking up late, but they told me it was not a bother for they enjoyed the extra time they got to sleep. That day I learned the animals were a travelling circus called 'the fairy caravan' and they were on their way to perform for the gnomes. Their previous stop had been at a forest nymph village.

“Have you ever travelled very far north of here?” I asked the shrew.

“Hmm.” He thought for several minutes before responding. “No, my travels have never taken me there. Why?”

“Well, that invisible barrier I mentioned in my story last night was there in the far north. If you had been there, I would have asked if you knew anything about it.”

“We only travel where spirits live and where we can earn a living. Our travels would never take us to such a desolate place.”

“I see. You haven’t heard of the name Wode before, have you?”

“Wode? Wode? Hmm. No, I cannot say that I have...” his voice trailed off as his eyes spotted a spirit.

In the distance ahead of us, next to the forest, stood a small creature. I could see that it was a forest nymph, with the same golden hair as the first one I had met.

“A forest nymph? What’s it doing here?” the animals asked amongst each other.

“It’s the forest nymph chief. The chief has come to see us,” said the hamster.

I relaxed when the animals said that they knew who it was. They swarmed around the forest nymph, chattering away. He was surprised when he saw me and eyed me suspiciously. A feeling of unease grew within me.

“Chief, what are you doing here?”

“Hello, Shrew, I heard that you had picked up a strange elemental being and I felt compelled to inspect the fellow for myself. And this is him?”

“Yes, this is Ferdinand. He’s on his way to the gnome realm, same as us.”

I nodded my head.

“Shrew, if you don’t mind, would you please join me aside as there is a personal matter I must speak with you about.”

They walked off out of ear shot, so I went back to the caravan and sat down on it. I didn’t pay attention to the other animals, I still had my eyes fixed on the chief. When they were done talking, the old shrew walked back, beckoning me over to him.

“The chief just disclosed to me the whereabouts of a magical item...”

Whatever the shrew said, I didn't hear as I stopped listening to him. I locked eyes with the smiling monster and drew my sword. This got everyone’s attention. The alp dropped its smile.

“Ferdinand, what are you doing?”

The rooster and dog came to the creature’s defence, standing between me and the alp, but I didn’t have time to explain my reasoning. The alp saw this wasn’t going to deter me and dropped all pretense. The flesh it wore dissolved into a sickening puddle at its feet. Spiky jet-black fur with short, stubby arms, and razor-sharp claws stood in its place. The innocent smile was replaced with one far more malicious. The alp blinked and leered back with yellow eyes.

“That’s not the forest nymph chief! What did you do with him?”

The sheep was the first to act, charging recklessly at the alp which planted its legs, grabbed the sheep’s horns and flung it away. I lunged forward and took a swipe at the creature but it dodged my telegraphed attack. The donkey kicked its hind legs at the alp but missed. I hopped back to put some distance between us and avoid the chaos of the animals’ confusion. The rooster hovered in the air, clawing at the alp, and the dog tried to bite the alp’s neck. But just as easily as it had dealt with the sheep, it dealt with those two. It used its powerful arm to wrestle the dog and pin it while using its free hand to snatch the rooster and lob it into the forest. The pig charged the alp and struck it in the back, freeing the dog.

This was my chance. In a flash I was on top of the alp, driving the divine sword deep into its chest. The creature thrashed and flailed but my sword kept it pinned to the ground. I held down on the sword until the creature was no more.

“Ferdinand, that was incredible! Ferdinand, you saved us! Ferdinand the hero!” The animals showered me with cheers.

“Shrew, we need to prepare a fire to burn the body,” I said.

I withdrew my sword from the dead alp’s torso, wiped the blood off, and sheathed the sword. We had the fire prepared and burned the corpse. When the purification ceremony was over, I dragged my feet over to the caravan and sat down once more. I told the shrew it was okay to continue and he gave the command for us to move out.

“Ferdinand, how did you know the chief was a—how it was that creature?” asked the shrew.

“An alp. And one of them tricked me with the same promise of finding a magical item. That’s how I ended up at the bottom of the ravine.”

“Ah! So you did not simply just fall but were pushed,” he said.

“Ha, yeah, I might have left out that detail,” I said, scratching my head.

“On behalf of all of us here, thank you for saving us.”

“Don’t mention it. Do things like this normally happen?”

“In all my eight hundred years of life, never have I seen a wicked demon attack defenceless animals like us. It was only in my great-grandfather’s time that I had heard stories about wild beasts roaming the lands and terrorizing the spirits. A most unusual turn this world has undergone.”

“I see.”

The shrew took out the compass, repeated Luna and Marisa’s names, and course-corrected the caravan. I pondered his words as we crossed the open country.