Knights and Maids by Victoria Fairy (early reader chapter books txt) 📕

you? Who are you?’ Trajan wasn’t that fond of the idea to follow a totally strange woman. He did it once and found himself in this position.
‘I know what you’re looking for.’ she replied. ‘Now take my hand. So we can go on and don’t waste time anymore.’ Gemma hesitated a moment. Could it be that the Balish were the danger in the hills and they wanted to bring the knight and her away, so that they can go on with whatever they have done? Trajan watched her closely. He had exactly the same thought. His other question was if they really knew the danger and if they might know a way to beat it.
Another look into the Balish’s eyes and the blonde girl took her hand. She looked at the knight then who was still hesitating. But he had no chance to contradict. So he took the other hand of the Balish. Together they slowly became light and vanished in mid-air.

Not a second later they became visible again. But the hills were nowhere in sign any more. ‘Where are we?’ Gemma heard Trajan breathing next to her. She answered with a silent gasp as she saw some people coming out the light. The knight looked up too. They were standing in a forest. So much light was not normal in between the trees.
‘Welcome in our colony.’ Klara announced proudly. ‘We are the Balish.’
‘Why are we here now?’ The young man placed himself before Gemma, ready to protect her.
‘Your people and mine need your help.’ the green dressed woman started talking again. She seemed to be some kind of queen to her folk. None of the others came to her or to the two visitors. ‘Your king sends you two because of the danger in the hills. He sent so many before. But all of them were knights. They couldn’t do anything. And now a woman is sent to end all trouble. But tell me why sent the king now you after all this time?’ While she was talking Klara didn’t look at neither of them but the last question she directly addressed to Gemma. The blonde girl blushed and looked to the floor.
‘Actually the king didn’t send me.’ she started talking quietly and looked up to the knight who looked worried back but smiled at her. ‘I decided to go out of the town. And he didn’t want to go. He was the one who was send by the king to beat the danger.’ While she said that she pointed at the knight with one finger.
‘When did you decide to run away even without knowing what will happen outside here?’
‘I decided it when Trajan was on the way to go back into the town. I mean someone had to go.’ Gemma explained. Her decision was all of a sudden but that was something she had to live with now.
Some of the Balish mumbled. ‘Who is Trajan?’ some of them asked. But none was willing to answer that question.
‘Why are we here now?’ the knight asked. His patience was at an end.
‘You are here because of the girl. Why did you follow her even though you wanted to return to the town?’ Klara’s voice became sharp and a lot higher. The banshee inside was all what Gemma thought. She was a little worried. The Balish queen didn’t seem to like knights.
‘Nobody knows what’s outside the town. And I couldn’t let her walk through the hills without a weapon.’ he explained. Klara began to smile again.
‘You’re noble.’ she said. Trajan smiled back at her, not knowing what to do else.
‘Larine!’ she shouted. A young woman – somewhere around Gemma’s age – found her way though the crowd of Balish up to Klara. ‘May I introduce Larine to you? She is the one who is responsible for the fight against the danger.’ The green dressed woman spoke directly to Gemma and Trajan. The young woman next to her grinned at both of them.
‘You couldn’t arrive to a better time. We are standing before another visit of the fairies. Now you can join it.’ Larinne told them with a happy sounding voice and a big grin on her face.
Gemma took a step back. She was a little afraid of Larine. That grin didn’t promise any good. Trajan felt the same way but didn’t show it the way the blonde girl did.

An hour later the knight, the blonde girl, Larine and some others of the Balish were standing in the hills again. Gemma starred around, expecting something to happen in any second. But nothing happened. The hills lied in silence as always. The only way the blonde one knew them.
Suddenly a fire was there. Everywhere on the green grass were flames. Gemma stepped back. This was a little too dangerous in her eyes. Trajan followed her. Only Larine and her people were standing motionless where they were. They seemed to know this scene. The fairies had appeared. They were just three but to the blonde girl they looked terrifying.
‘Like I see you have another knight out of the town.’ the one in the middle said. Those fairies didn’t look like the two humans expected a fairy to look like. They were just a little smaller than any of the other standing in the circle and they were dressed in red. The short dark brown hair seemed to be dark red in the sunlight. All of them faced Trajan who didn’t feel good at all.
‘He’s just the protector. This is the girl we want to introduce today.’ Larine explained in a cold voice. Her eyes were focused on the middle one. But she paid her attention to the other two as well. She pushed Gemma a little to the front so that the fairies could see her properly.
‘She looks beautiful. And you think with her you can stop us attacking your people?’ the one on the right side asked the Balish. The question made the knight thinking. ‘What do you mean with that?’ he asked. Not sure if he would get an answer. And he didn’t get one. The fairies and everyone else seemed to ignore him – except for Gemma.
‘What do you mean with that?’ she repeated what he said.
‘We will show you!’ The fairy on the left grabbed Gemmas arm and vanished in mid-air. Trajan stopped breathing for a second. ‘Get her back!’ he shouted at Larine when he realised what had happened.

The blonde girl found her feet on the ground again. She felt a little dizzy. She also felt the three fairies next to her but couldn’t see them. Then she looked up and found them suspended above her head. They were looking like fairies to that point. Tiny little women with great wings.
‘What did you do with me? Where are the others?’ Gemma asked. She had a little panic attack.
‘Your protector isn’t very good, is he?’ the fairy in the middle asked. She didn’t expect an answer to that question because she went on to answer the girl’s questions. ‘The others are still in the hills where we left them. And we brought you to our home to tell you what all this is about.’
‘You did WHAT?’
‘We brought you to the place where we live.’ the left one repeated.
‘I heard that. But why can’t you tell me the reason for all this in the hills? And why is Trajan not allowed to come with us?’
‘He’s a knight. We don’t trust knights.’ the right one answered her. That she only answered the last question didn’t matter to her. Gemma nodded. She understood the position of the fairies but she had the feeling that they didn’t understand her position.
‘Centuries ago the Balish wanted to have the hills for themselves. There they have a lot of light what the folk needs. The fairies lived in the hills and of cause the town you’re living in was there too.’ the fairy in the middle explained. Gemma had the feeling that she was the leader of them. ‘They fought our folk but weren’t strong enough to beat us. But the Balish didn’t give up. Klara addressed the king of your town himself. She wanted him to send out some knights. The king on the other hand wasn’t that fond of the idea to take part in our war.’
‘But he finally did. Klara wouldn’t be the queen when she couldn’t find a way to get her interests through. The king sent out some knights and as you know they never came back.’ The fairy on the right took over the story.
‘But where did they go?’ On one hand Gemma was confused and on the other she began to understand what was going on in the hills. It wasn’t a danger to the town at all. There was a war between two nations and the town is unfortunately in the middle of all that.
‘We fought everyone and are now holding them in a dimension between the worlds.’ The one in the middle explained proudly. ‘But some already died. We don’t know why.’
‘For how long did you have them in the dimension?’
‘They are there for centuries now. From the first knight the king sent to the one before you and your protector came. As we said before we are afraid of the knights and this is our way to handle things we are afraid of.’ Gemma watched the left fairy, who just spoke, closely. Now she understood completely.
‘Can you get those knights out of the dimension again?’
‘Of cause we can do that. But why should we?’ All three fairies looked confused at the blonde girl who could hardly avoid rolling with her eyes.
‘They could go back to the town. There they have families which miss them. And the king would be grateful if he gets back his best knights.’ she started talking. Now it was her turn to talk. ‘And some of them died because that’s what humans do when they are too old. We don’t get centuries old when we are lucky we can live one century.’ The fairies looked at her with huge eyes. They never believed it when the knights told that story about human’s life but now that someone told it, they trust, they had to believe it. There was no other chance.
‘What about your king?’ The leader of the three found her words at first.
‘He too doesn’t live for more than a century but in most cases less than that.’
‘Why did every king send knights then? The Balish didn’t come to the town for more than one time.’
‘In the town everyone talks about a danger in the hills. That was what the king always said. None of the knights ever returned. So everyone thinks the danger is still there.’ Gemma told them exactly what her father told her and her sisters years before. That was all she knew. She never met the king.
‘But when we free the knights to send them back to the town, the Balish will go to the king to make him send the knights back on us. They still want us out of the hills. So what are you suggest for that problem?’ All three fairies looked sceptically at the blonde girl.
Gemma thought of that for a moment. She couldn’t promise that the Balish would stop the war and of cause she couldn’t promise that the king wouldn’t send the knights back. ‘I could talk to the Balish. This way they may see that this is an unnecessary war. The hills are wide enough to not meet each other.’ she finally announced, not wanting anyone to comment on that statement.
‘And what will happen to the town then?’
‘The inhabitants would live in peace and don’t have to be afraid anymore.