Chapter 4
In the silver light of the moon on the snow, the Pixie Dust Well was a pool of gold.
Periwinkle could see it in the distance as she followed Weaver through trees, over snowdrifts, across a frozen pond. The well was fed by the Winter Woods’ Pixie Dust Root, which ran all the way from the Pixie Dust Tree at the heart of all four seasons.
Periwinkle was there every morning for her daily supply of pixie dust. But as she moved toward the well’s edge then, trying not to stare at how the gold light played over Weaver’s face, she gasped.
There was a large black stain on the rock face near the Pixie Dust Root. When Weaver moved to study it, Legs skittered up his shoulder to hide behind his waistcoat’s high collar.
“Is it ash?” Periwinkle fluttered up behind the dream-talent, close but not too close. “A burn mark?”
The suggestion didn’t make sense, though, and she knew it as soon as she asked. The stain on the rock was a big dark smudge, yes, but it looked nothing like ash, and there was nothing to burn there in the snow, anyway. Most important, it didn’t feel right.
Looking at the stain, Periwinkle felt a tightness in her chest, a lurch in her stomach. An unpleasant heat that sent panic skittering over her skin.
It wasn’t a familiar feeling. Or—it had been unfamiliar, several months ago.
Weaver gestured at the mark. “This is what I was looking at when I heard you cry out. This is why I’m out here.” Then he hesitated. “And I wonder if this isn’t why your dream brought you out here, too.”
“But what is it?” Periwinkle pushed. Impulsive, she threw a little frost at the awful-looking mark, but it only cast a translucent layer over the stain.
Weaver slid off his gloves and tucked them back in his pocket, twisting his fingers together and cracking his knuckles.
“There’s an old legend that says the dreams of human children used to come to Pixie Hollow from the Mainland, and dream-talent fairies spun and threaded them through the branches of the Pixie Dust Tree.
Their dreams protected the tree, made it strong.
” A muscle in Weaver’s jaw flexed. “But it wasn’t only good dreams that crossed the Never Sea. ”
“What are you saying?” A tremor ran up Periwinkle’s spine. “Are you talking about—”
“Nightmares.” Weaver’s gaze was direct as an arrow. Periwinkle’s heart dropped. “I’m saying that nightmare magic has somehow found its way to the Pixie Dust Root.”
“How?” she asked.
“I don’t know. But if nothing stops the nightmare rot from spreading through the rest of the root system, the tree will decay from the inside out.
And with the damage happening inside the tree, even Queen Clarion’s magic might not be able to fix it till it’s too late.
” Weaver’s voice was somber. “I’m saying that the tree is in danger.
There’s a storm coming, and a weak, rotted Pixie Dust Tree won’t survive it.
So if you can dream, too, I need your help. ”
The Pixie Dust Tree—in danger?
No. Impossible. Periwinkle whirled away, wings and hands fluttering dismissively even as panic began to rise inside her.
“Of course the Pixie Dust Root isn’t rotting.
That’s ridiculous. Look, it’s fine!” She gestured at the root, still dripping tiny grains of gold dust into the well like always.
“Anyway, shouldn’t the Autumn Revelry have been enough to protect against something like this?
This is exactly what the blue pixie dust it makes is for—to keep the tree strong. ”
“Who cares about should have?” he demanded. “Look at the mark.”
“It’s one mark,” she argued. “Everyone would know if something was wrong.”
“Sparkles, I’m going to ask you one last time.” His voice wasn’t harsh, but it was needle-sharp. “What were you dreaming about when you sleepwalked out here?”
Flurries swirled in Periwinkle’s stomach as she thought of it again.
She’d been flying over the Mainland, until she hadn’t been. Until suddenly she’d been home, knowing she’d never seen such a furious blizzard, knowing something was wrong.
Weaver cut into her thoughts. “Let me tell you about my dream tonight,” he said, stepping nearer to her, dipping his chin just a little.
Periwinkle’s stomach flipped. “At first, I was working, dealing with an order. It was a normal day. And then suddenly the sky went hazy, and clouds blew up, and far away, I could see a—”
“Storm,” she whispered. “There was a huge storm, near the Pixie Dust Tree.”
Weaver nodded. His eyes on hers were magnetic. Periwinkle felt faint.
Because all her nightmares had been like the one he was describing.
Even with that spark that never left her—that sense that always let her know she wasn’t alone—there was always wood snapping and creaking, roots tearing, furious gusts of wind and snow.
Always that same violet haze, and the sickening sense of bottomless dread and decay she felt echoed in the Pixie Dust Root even now.
They were having the same nightmare. And their nightmares were a warning.
“Is it us?” Periwinkle asked. Guilt and panic swept over her. “Is it our nightmares creating the rot? Or did it come from somewhere else?”
“I don’t know,” Weaver said grimly. But Periwinkle immediately knew that the question of whose fault this was mattered less than what had to come next.
“We have to find Lord Milori,” she said, taking off and pointing herself toward Snowlight Square. “This can’t wait until morning. We—”
“He knows,” Weaver said.
Periwinkle stopped short. She turned. “What?”
But Weaver didn’t answer. He just looked at her, dark eyes significant.
She’d worried he might argue. She hadn’t expected him to say—that.
“Of course he doesn’t know,” she said. “If he knew, we would all know.”
“Would we?” Weaver cocked his head. Something about his voice needled her.
Lord Milori was not the most forthright fairy in the Winter Woods.
I have much on my mind, he’d said to Dougal. Could he have meant this? This—this rot in the Pixie Dust Root?
“I told you about the legend I found,” Weaver said.
“About the dreams and the nightmares crossing the Never Sea. Lord Milori’s mentioned in the notes of that legend.
He’s aware of this type of magic. Besides, do you think there are any secrets from him in the Winter Woods?
” he asked. “Why he wouldn’t want to warn everyone about this now, I don’t know, but trust me, he knows it’s here. ” Periwinkle wrung her hands.
Lord Milori had a good heart. But there was a reason she hadn’t opened up to him about her dreams.
She’d heard how stern he’d been with Dougal. She knew how strict he was about the winter fairies keeping away from the borders. Though never cruel, Lord Milori was decisive, and he wasn’t in the habit of explaining himself.
Periwinkle couldn’t deny that if they were in danger, he might not share that fact with the whole Winter Woods, especially given how focused everyone had been on preparing to take winter to the Mainland.
Winter. Jingles! “Weaver, I’m going to the Mainland tomorrow,” she said, flittering back down to the ground.
“But you can’t.” Weaver reached for her elbow, distressed. Periwinkle’s breath hitched at the brush of his callused fingertips, and he pulled away quickly. “You and I are the only ones who can do anything to help. And it has to happen soon—before it’s too late.”
“How?” Periwinkle had never felt more helpless in her life. But Weaver looked certain.
“The legend says that the dream-talents in Pixie Hollow had special tools that let them spin dreams to protect the tree,” he began.
“Magic spinning wheels that let them turn dreams into dream-thread. But as far as I know, they’re lost. I need you to help me find them so I can spin your dreams into thread like the dream-talents used to do. We can use it to heal the root.”
“You want to spin my dreams?” Periwinkle’s head was spinning.
Weaver nodded. “You’re the only other fairy in Pixie Hollow who dreams. And I can collect these”—he gestured to his pockets, where he’d put the pouches holding her dreams—“but I can’t spin them without the magic tools.
I tried a regular knitting needle on my own dream once, when I managed to catch one before it disappeared, and the needle just slid through it.
And anyway, you said it yourself. You find things.
” Weaver hesitated, searching her face intently. “Maybe things find you, too.”
He’d said it. What Periwinkle had been thinking all along.
The dreaming had found her. This was why.
She thought of the golden thread she’d clung to in her dream that night and wondered if it had led her right here. To Weaver, to the well. To save the Pixie Dust Root and the tree itself.
Still. “Can’t you do all this with your own dreams?”
Weaver grimaced, holding up his hands. His fingers were long and expressive, with large knuckles and short, clean nails.
“Believe me, I’ve tried to collect them.
But by the time I wake up, they’re usually too far away, or too misty for me to lay hands on.
” He swallowed. “Please, Periwinkle. I can’t do this without you. ”
There was a request in his voice. But there was more.
Promise.
Possibility.
Her wings fluttered, agitated, quick as a hummingbird’s.
The truth was, Periwinkle loved traveling to the Mainland. She wanted to use her talent, to help bring winter to the human world.
“I’ve already looked through the Hall of Winter for information on dreams,” she said quietly. “I haven’t found much of anything. But…”
But this was essential. Urgent. Pixie Hollow needed them. Because if the Pixie Dust Tree died, there would be no more pixie dust. Life in Pixie Hollow would never be the same.
“I’ll help you,” she said. “I don’t know how, but I’ll find a way to stay. And then—we’ll find the tools you talked about, and find a way to stop the nightmares.”
“Good,” Weaver said, heaving out a breath. “Good. We’ll save the tree, and everything will be the way it should be.” He studied the rot on the wall one last time, brushing a little snow over it to cover it up. “I’ll find you tomorrow.”
“How?” Periwinkle asked. “When? My house is just above the Frost Forest, but—”
“Don’t worry, Sparkles. You’re easy to find.” Weaver laughed dryly. “It’s everything else in the Winter Woods that’s a mystery.”
She gave an irritated huff at this. But Weaver was already gone.
It was just the moon, and Periwinkle, and the Pixie Dust Well.