The Tea Leaf Fairy, page 1
The Tea Leaf Fairy
A Short Story
Kelly Hashway
Copyright © 2018 Kelly Hashway
All rights reserved.
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This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual places or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. No part of this book may be reproduced, copied, or recorded without written permission from the author.
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The author acknowledges the trademark status and trademark ownership of all trademarks mentioned in this book. Trademarks are not sponsored or endorsed by the trademark owners.
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Cover photo ©
To Ayla with love
Contents
The Tea Leaf Fairy
Also by Kelly Hashway
About the Author
The Tea Leaf Fairy
Marina hid behind the tea leaf, listening to the rants of the other faeries. The entire kingdom was in an uproar over the humans discovering magic. Not fake magician magic. Real faerie magic.
“There has to be some mistake.”
“No way is it faerie magic.”
“Maybe it’s a faerie doing it and pretending to act as a human.”
“Could the humans have captured a faerie? They might be making him or her do the magic for them!”
Marina shook her head, wishing she could make the worried cries stop. She knew what was happening in the human world. She knew no faeries had been kidnapped. And there had been no mistake about it being faerie magic.
The faeries stopped throwing out ideas. A hush fell over the crowd. None of them had an answer. They stared at one another and someone said, “How did this happen?”
Marina swallowed hard. She knew she should come out from her hiding place and tell everyone the truth. She’d given a human magic. After all, it had been an accident. She hadn’t meant to do it. Not really at least.
She ran her finger along the tea leaf, and a tiny line lit up in shimmering gold. “No, not again,” she whispered to the leaf. “Now I’m going to have to keep you hidden from the humans, too. I can’t let any more of my tea leaves get into human hands. They’re too powerful, and sooner or later, the other faeries will figure out it’s me.”
Marina didn’t want to be the one to expose her world to humans, but how long would the humans go on believing that they could really be psychic? Reading tea leaves! It was absurd. They never would have thought to read any other kind of leaf. But Marina had made the mistake of touching the old woman’s tea leaves, and now everyone thought she could see the future.
“If this doesn’t end, we’ll be forced to leave. To find new homes somewhere the humans won’t find us,” the other faeries decided.
Marina couldn’t let that happen. She wouldn’t be the reason the faeires were forced to go into hiding. She had to fix this.
She took one last look at the panicked faces of her friends and family and fluttered off to the old woman’s house. She needed to put an end to what she’d started.
The old woman lived in a small cottage near the edge of the woods. She’d been living on her own for years and very rarely had visitors—at least that was before Marina had given her some faerie magic. Now people came from all over to have their futures foretold by the old woman.
Marina flew to the open window and stood on the sill. The old woman was making a pot of tea. Not a good sign. She must have been expecting visitors. Marina wondered who it would be. A young couple trying to find out if they were soul mates? A greedy businessman looking to invest in stocks? A starving actor trying to find his big break?
The old woman was humming as she set the teakettle on the stove. Marina had never seen the woman look so happy. The only visitors she’d ever had were her children, who had moved out a long time ago and rarely visited. Marina hated to take the magic away from the woman and condemn her to a life of loneliness. But if she didn’t, the faeries would suffer.
“What have I done?” Marina asked. “Why did I touch the tea leaves? Why did I come to this cottage in the first place?”
A knock on door startled Marina from her thoughts. She peered inside the cottage. A man and a young boy, no more than five, walked in. The boy looked sad, and Marina wondered why. She studied the man’s face. It looked tired and stressed and somewhat familiar. It was the eyes. The man had the old woman’s eyes.
“Thomas, I’m so glad you’ve come to visit. I’ve put on a pot of tea,” the old woman said.
“Thank you, Mother,” Thomas said, but his tone wasn’t the least bit warm.
The old woman bent down to touch the young boy’s cheek. “How is my favorite grandson doing?”
“Andrew is fine,” Thomas said.
Andrew smiled and looked down at his shoes.
“Mother, I need to speak with you about this fortune telling madness.”
The old woman stiffened. “Madness?”
“You know very well that’s what this is.” Thomas walked past his mother and sat at the kitchen table.
Marina stumbled backward in surprise. All the humans had been happy about the old woman’s new gift. So why was her own son so angry? Marina dropped down off the windowsill and hid behind a canister on the counter. She felt protective of the old woman and responsible for whatever was about to happen between her and her son.
“Now, Thomas, that is no way to talk to your mother. I may be getting older, but I’m still as sane as ever.” She checked on the teakettle, and Marina wondered if it was just to avoid sitting at the table and facing the harsh, judgmental stares of her son.
“Sane?” Thomas pounded his fist on the table, and Andrew jumped. “You call seeing the future in a bunch of tea leaves sane?” He shook his head. “I hate to do this, Mother, but I think it’s time you talked to a doctor. You need help.”
The old woman crossed the kitchen to the canisters Marina was hiding behind. “I’m sorry you feel that way, Thomas. And I can’t say that your words don’t hurt. I never imagined you to be so close-minded.”
Marina reached out as the old woman’s hand touched the canister. For an instant, their hands met. Marina felt a shimmer of magic flow through her to the old woman. She pulled back in fear and saw tiny flecks of gold on the old woman’s finger.
Oh no! Marina thought. In a moment of compassion, she’d transferred some of her magic to the old woman. This is ten times worse than the tea leaves! Who knows what kind of magic the old woman will be able to do now?
Marina was vaguely aware of Thomas ranting in the background, but her focus remained on the old woman, who was now staring at her hand. The wind whistled across the open window making the sun catcher dangle and cast a rainbow onto the counter. The old woman shrugged and opened the canister of tea leaves.
That was too close! Marina panicked. If not for the wind, the old woman would have suspected something. She’d been saved by the rainbow, which the old woman must have assumed had caused the shimmering light on her hand. Marina had to do something quickly before she accidentally gave the old woman any more faerie magic.
“Mother, are you even listening to me?” Thomas yelled.
The teakettle whistled, and the old woman placed the tea leaves into the cups. She left the cups on the counter as she went to retrieve the kettle.
Marina stared at the tea leaves. She could tell they weren’t the ones she’d touched. These were ordinary leaves, with no faerie magic at all. Marina smiled. Maybe she didn’t need to worry after all. The woman had run out of magic tea leaves. This whole mess would all go away once the old woman realized she could no longer read the leaves.
Marina fluttered her wings and breathed a sigh of relief. There was still the problem of the old woman’s finger since Marina had touched it, too. But Marina had a feeling the magic would be erased down the drain as soon as the old woman washed the teacups.
All Marina had to do was fly back out the window and never return to the old woman’s cottage. The faeries would be safe and the old woman would go back to her old life. But is that what Marina wanted? The old woman to live alone in her cottage? Her son thought she was crazy. He wanted to send her to a doctor. Marina couldn’t let the old woman suffer for her mistake.
The old woman picked up the kettle and turned to face her son. “I am listening to you, Thomas. And let me remind you that your son can hear every word you say. Perhaps you should lighten your tone for his sake, if not for mine.”
Andrew smiled at the old woman. Marina could tell the boy loved his grandmother, and she worried that Thomas wouldn’t allow Andrew to see her anymore if the old woman lost her gift.
Marina took a deep breath, realizing what she needed to do. She reached inside the teacups and ran her fingers over the tea leaves. They speckled with golden magic. Marina hurried back behind the canister, hoping that she’d made the right decision.
The old woman poured the water into the cups and brought them to the table. “All I ask is that you let me show you how I read the leaves before you decide whether or not you want me to see a doctor.”
Andrew sat down next to his grandmother and held her hand. Thomas sighed and eyed his teacup.
“Please, Thomas,” the old woman said.
Thomas blew on his tea and drank it down in one gulp. He coughed as he set the cup back on the table.
The old woman chuckled. “You want to talk about crazy? No one told you to drink hot tea in one big gulp!”
Andrew laughed and squeezed his grandmother’s hand.
The old woman reached for Thomas’s
“What?” Thomas leaned forward, unable to conceal his curiosity.
“According to the leaves you will have a change of heart in the near future,” the old woman said. She sipped her own tea.
“Come on, Mother. You’ll have to do better than that,” Thomas said.
The old woman finished her tea and gazed into her own cup. “Oh, my.” Her eyes filled with tears.
“Mother? What is it?” Thomas asked, looking concerned.
“The tea leaves. They say I will lose my gift. That it was never meant to be mine.” She put the cup down on the table, and sadness washed over her face.
Marina’s shoulders slumped. She knew she had to take the magic away from the old woman, but this was even harder than she’d imagined. Still, she needed to make sure the old woman understood that it was never really supposed to be hers in the first place. It was the only way Marina could think of to say she was sorry. But maybe the humans wouldn’t be able to figure that out. Maybe she’d just made things worse.
Thomas reached out his hand and placed it on the old woman’s shoulder. “You know, I liked it better when you used to make hot cocoa. Remember, you used to make me some every night after dinner.”
The old woman raised her head to meet her son’s gentle stare. “Yes, I remember.”
“Well, I bet Andrew would love some hot cocoa. I know I would.” Thomas smiled.
Marina wondered if Thomas still thought the old woman had made it all up. That she’d never really had any magic at all. But it didn’t really matter. He wasn’t angry with her anymore, and Marina had a feeling Thomas and Andrew would be visiting the old woman more often from now on.
Marina flew up to the windowsill and took one last look at the family sitting at the kitchen table. They were smiling and discussing how many marshmallows made the perfect cup of hot cocoa. The old woman would be fine without faerie magic. She had another kind of magic all together—the magic of family.
Marina turned and flew off to tell her own family what she’d done. She hoped they’d forgive her now that the human world and the faerie world were safe once again.
If you enjoyed reading this, please consider leaving a review. And be sure to check out other middle grade stories by Kelly Hashway.
Also by Kelly Hashway
The Imaginary Friend
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Curse of the Granville Fortune series:
Curse of the Granville Fortune
Mystery of Majestic Cave
Visions of Mockingbird Point
About the Author
Kelly Hashway fully admits to being one of the most accident-prone people on the planet, but that didn’t stop her from jumping out of an airplane at ten thousand feet one Halloween. Maybe it was growing up reading R.L. Stine’s Fear Street books that instilled a love of all things scary and a desire to live in a world filled with supernatural creatures, but she spends her days writing speculative fiction and is a USA Today bestselling author. Kelly is also USA Today bestselling romance author Ashelyn Drake. When she’s not writing, Kelly works as an editor and also as Mom, which she believes is a job title that deserves to be capitalized.
Kelly Hashway, The Tea Leaf Fairy
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