Woodsprite

by JunoMagic
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives-ShareAlike license

Woodsprite

Treeling has been watching people.

Two-legs like her, but with soft pink skin that they like to cover up with pliable bark in bright colours, colours she has never seen before, a deeper blue than the sky, a brighter yellow than the buttercups, and reds, oh, reds that put all maple trees in autumn to shame. But they are stupid, those two-legs. Their movements are clumsy and noisy. She thinks they must be blind and deaf, the way the stomp past gnomes and wights, treasures and traps. And they stink, too.

But still, what they do with that colourful bark of theirs, the multi-hued leaves they wear in their eternal autumn, they fascinate treeling.

So she hides, and she watches.

And one day, she gets lucky.

A very small two-legs, with bright red root-feet and bark like rainbows bright is playing at the water’s edge. It creates a dell in the sand, then squeals when water wells up. It repeats the process over and over again.

Treeling thinks it must be very stupid indeed.

But it does where the most beautiful soft red bark-leaf-two-leg-thing around its neck.

Better yet: it pulls the bright red bark off (they can do that at will, those two-legs, Treeling knows, and without hurting their core, too – she’s watched it, time and again) … and forgets to put it back on again.

Not surprising, Treeling muses, given how stupid pink-skinned two-legs are. Still, it’s never happened before while she was watching.

Someone calls.

The little two-legs looks up, grimaces. Treeling giggles. Little two-legs runs off, her bright red bark, her crown of brilliant two-leg-leaves lying on the shore of the lake.

Treeling creeps down to the water’s edge, inhales the soft-sweet air above the lake, and – gasps – snags – jumps –

Oh!

So soft!
So warm!
So red!

Treeling dances, Treeling twirls.

Now she’ll be the prettiest wood sprite at the forest-king’s ball!

Song of the day:

Link(s) of the day:

Woodsprite Organic Body Things | “The Woodsprite” by Vladimir Nabokov—a story | A wood-turned woodsprite by an artist called Fred | Woodsprite Sculpture by Linda Preble McVay

…and my wish for you today is:

I wish you serendipitous treasures and unlooked for blessings to brighten each of your days!

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