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Chapter 3: Home

When Towy woke up, he found himself in a different house. He was lying on a
large sofa, under a quilt blanket, in a beautiful mansion.
He threw off the quilt and got up to explore the house.
He noticed his shoes and socks were off. He felt relieved because he wasn't
sure if humans wore their shoes at all times. He was hoping he would be able
to take them off, at least while he was indoors. He knew most human customs,
but there were a few facts like that he had never come across.
He saw for the first time many of the things he knew human beings had but
had never seen before: television, radio, telephone. He was curious and
wanted to see them working, but he thought he'd better wait. He knew they
were valuable, and he didn't want to break them.
It wasn't long before Trisha woke up and came downstairs.
"Good morning, Towy," she said to him, using his real name. "How are you
feeling?"
"I feel much stronger," Towy told her. He did feel better. He felt as well
as he had felt before his wings were removed and he had lost some of his
yellow liquid out his back.
For the next few hours, Trisha showed him around the house. She
demonstrated all the things he wanted to see working. He found television
very interesting. He asked her why they don't just use the bark of a magic
maple tree like fairies do when they need to see something far away, but she
didn't seem to understand what he was talking about.
When they went into the kitchen they found Trisha's mother there, making
breakfast for everyone.
"So, you're the fairy," she said to Towy when she saw them. Towy nodded,
and they sat down to breakfast.
While they were eating, Towy asked them to tell him if they knew any more
about the witch.
Trisha's mother told Towy about a friend she used to have. Her friend got
into an argument with a neighbor over a new fence, which the neighbor claimed
was on his property. She had the house surveyed to make sure it was right,
but the neighbor continued to cause trouble. Once she got so mad she slammed
the door on him. From outside the house, he yelled that she would never get
away with it, and she would suffer for it. The next day, she was in the
hospital, suffering from frostbite. It was the middle of summer! The neighbor
had been seen going to see the witch outside of town.
Then Trisha told him about a bully who used to live in the neighborhood. He
used to demand a dollar from any kid he met. Anybody who refused to give him
a dollar when he asked would wake up the next morning with a terrible
toothache from an enormous cavity. Everybody knew he split the money with the
witch.
Towy could see he was dealing with an evil, dangerous girl. If she would do
things like that to total strangers, he wondered what she might do to
somebody who was sent to spy on her! Simply being eaten was the least of his
worries. But he knew he was going to have to go through with it. He would
have to start soon, before she ate any more fairies.
Trisha said she'd take him to the witch's house the next morning.
That night, the bed in the guest room was fixed for him, so he would have
his own bedroom that night. Trisha told him that he could keep that for his
bedroom for as long as he wanted to stay with them. He was very glad about
that, since he knew the witch would probably want to know where he lived.
Trisha's mother said she would get him some pajamas the next day. He hoped
they would be more comfortable to wear.
That night, he took off his shoes and loosened his shirt and went to sleep.
He found he enjoyed sleeping in a bed.
Trisha was up early the next morning, before Towy woke up. She went into
his room to see if he was up.
Towy was still sound asleep. His shirt was pushed up, enough that Trisha
could see the thick bandages over the spots where his wings were cut off.
Trisha knew they were bandages, though they looked strange since they were
fairy bandages. She wondered what was wrong with his back. She went over to
try to get a closer look. She touched the edge of the bandage. That made the
bandage move just enough to let a little of the yellow liquid seep out from
under it. The yellow liquid touched Trisha's finger.
Trisha screamed when it touched her finger. It burned and stung and
tingled, and was making her finger glow.
Then Towy woke up. He knew right away what happened, because of the pain in
his back from the loss of some yellow liquid. He felt weak and dizzy even
though he only lost a couple drops.
Trisha's finger finally stopped hurting so much, but it was a strange deep
red color and still seemed to glow a little.
"You touched my back!" Towy said, fixing his shirt. "What did you do that
for?"
"What happened?" was all Trisha could say, showing him her finger.
"You made my back leak," Towy told her. "The bandages cover where my wings
were cut off. You must have gotten some of it on your finger. I don't know
what's going to happen to you."
Trisha remembered what Towy had been able to do with the plant at Jenny and
Ben's house. She decided to see what would happen if she touched a plant. She
went and touched the nearest plant. It grew a couple inches right before her
eyes! But it hurt her.
Trisha told Towy what happened. He understood what had happened: it must
have soaked into her finger and it gave her some fairy powers, but put a
terrible strain on her whole body to use them. The witch was eating fairies
to get magic powers. It made sense that it would be the yellow liquid inside
fairies' bodies that gave her those powers. He wondered how she was able to
use those powers without damaging her health. Perhaps, he thought, that's why
she needs to eat whole fairies and not just squeeze out some of the yellow
liquid.
At breakfast that morning, Trisha asked him if he felt strong enough to go
see the witch that day, after what she had accidentally done to him.
"I think I'll feel better after noon," Towy told her. He would rather wait
a couple days, until he was fully recovered from the loss of the yellow
liquid and at his full strength. But every day he waited could mean the death
of one or more of his fairy friends from Dawnhill, perhaps even Bax or Oca,
or his dear friend Wev.
When afternoon came, Towy was ready to go with Trisha to meet the witch.
Then he would know if his human disguise would work.