Birdie's Book - Andrea Burden [29]
“Read, Birdie,” Queen Patchouli said.
And I did.
My heart ached for the girl who was now my mother. I actually understood what she’d been feeling. “What did she decide?” I asked in a whisper. “What did she do?”
The queen shook her head sadly at me and then rang the glass bell. The shimmering mist melted away. The fairies opened their eyes, nodding to each other as if they knew something now.
I looked at Kerka. She was blinking dreamily.
“I saw a page from The Book of Dreams in my head,” Kerka said. “A girl named Emma wrote it.”
“That’s my mother,” I said.
“Each girl who comes to Aventurine has the opportunity to make a difference here … and in what you call the real world,” said Queen Patchouli as she gently closed the book. “Now, Birdie, you have come on your own quest.”
“What exactly am I supposed to do?” I asked.
“You must find the other half of the Singing Stone, Birdie,” said the fairy queen.
“Okay, I guess I can do that. Do you know where the other half of the stone is?” I asked. “The flowers said that a flying shadow took it. And what does it have to do with my mother?”
“Fairies cannot follow shadows,” said Patchouli. “All we know is that the stone piece is somewhere in Aventurine. Your mother’s dream shows part of why this quest falls to you—it is your quest to find the other half of the stone and reclaim it for your family.”
“And if I find it, what will happen?” I asked.
All the fairies whispered excitedly as Queen Patchouli answered, “Harmony will be restored to a part of Aventurine that has been suffering, and harmony will be restored to your family.”
“And if I don’t find it?” I asked.
All the fairies went quiet. Then Queen Patchouli said, “Then you will not have fulfilled your destiny or your family’s, and it will mean terrible things for a special part of Aventurine. Terrible things for your grandmother’s garden, as well. And the bonds of your family will slowly wither away.”
“What?” I cried.
The fairy queen nodded, her eyes grave. “What has begun will be finished.” She shook the glass bell once more.
My eyes closed heavily. Images rushed before me: the rotted spot on the Glimmer Tree, the notes dancing around on Mo’s sheet music and floors and walls, my mother’s journal entry.
“How did the stone break?” I asked, my eyes still closed, hoping for a glimpse of the stone’s past. I knew exactly where in Aventurine it had been broken, from the Agminiums’ story, but I didn’t know if someone had thrown it, or dropped it, or … ?
“How does not matter,” said the queen. “What matters is that you are the only hope for the healing of the Singing Stone, the gardens, the Glimmer Tree, and your family.”
“I’m the only hope?” I asked, pulling my velvet cloak tight.
“It is time now for you to sleep and dream,” said the fairy queen. “The dreaming may help you. Or it may not. You do have some power to choose your dream as you add it to the Book.”
My eyes shot open. Had I been sleeping? I sat up, pushing back light cotton sheets. I was wearing a spring green nightgown embroidered with daisies. This wasn’t mine! I looked at the bed: It was carved with leaves and flowers and the same old woman’s face that had been on the wardrobe. She smiled at me and nodded from out of the bed frame.
Clearly, I was still in Aventurine but maybe sleeping or dreaming? The fairies must have put me to bed and made bedroom walls from white curtains that hung from nothing that I could see. Above, the sky was dark as midnight, and the moon had a ring around it.
I was alone.
But something bright was flitting around my head. A firefly. It reminded me of the firefly in Dora’s journal entry.
“Hello,” I said. “Is this a dream now?”
The firefly stopped circling and hovered in front of my face. I gently cupped it in my hands. Its wings glistened with silvery flecks, and its little light was a phosphorescent gold.
“How am I supposed to find the other half of the stone?” I whispered. “Why am I the only hope for the Arbor Lineage to heal the green world?”
I looked