The Girl Who Went To The Woods

Once upon a time, there was a little town, called Harpur. The little town was quiet, built on the edge of a great forest. Living in the village was a little girl, named Summer. Summer was very naughty.

One day, Summer went into the woods. Her mother had told her not to - "No Summer!" she had said, "There's terrible fairies in the woods!"

Summer didn't listen. She went anyway, and wandered through the undergrowth for what seemed like miles. Whenever she turned to go back home, however, the undergrowth and trees had changed! Summer was lost!

Eventually, Summer found a fairy. It was slimy and bug-eyed and short. She assumed it must be a Boggart or a Pixie. They were always playing tricks, or so mother had said.

"I want to go home!" said Summer to the fairy. She knew she shouldn't talk to fairies - the only good fairy is a dead fairy, that's what father always said. But, she was very lost and lonely, and the ugly little fairy was the only thing she could talk to.

The fairy blinked and licked its eyeball, as ugly fairies often do, before standing on its hind-legs and tilting its head.

"Eh?" it said.

"I want to go home, I'm lost." said Summer.

The fairy just licked its eyeball again, then sniffed and wiped its nose with its arm.

"Eh, nun me bees knees! Sully human cubble."

Summer was not impressed by the fairy's bizarre speech, but she knew that it was the only thing that could lead her home. So she decided to stick with it.

"But you're a fairy of the woods! If I do what you say, will you show me how to get home?"

The fairy scratched its bald, flat, frog like head with a single claw, before shrugging.

“S’pose so. Fetch me a shrubber, then! For me tea!”

And so, Summer set off to find a shrubbery worthy of the fairy’s likely insatiable and disgusting appetite. She scrounged and searched and scrounged, and eventually found a shrubbery.

She gave it to the fairy, who had been busy sleeping on the tree stump, out in the sun.

“Here it is! Now can I go home?”

“Aha, exlent! Thank you very much, sully human cubble! Now follow me, lez us go back to your villagey thing!”

And so, the ugly fairy led Summer back to her village. It had become evening now, and it was a long walk, but Summer was glad to finally get back home.

She waved good-bye to the ugly fairy, who gave a silly grin and waved back. Maybe fairies weren’t so bad after all!

Her mother and father were worried sick. When she got back, she told them everything that had happened.

They were shocked and disgusted, as was only right - fairies were bad, after all. Telling the village council about it, they had Summer sacrificed to appease the forest, and everything was fine. The ugly, evil fairy, meanwhile, drank its fresh shrubber tea in its hole in the ground, and decided it felt good helping lost human cubbers get back to their homes.