Off to Seek a Wizard... -13- Teller of Tales by Erin Halfelven

Chuck's furry face didn't have much expression and Ken's plastic likeness had an eternal dimpled smile, but their body language communicated their unhappiness at my hilarity. Besides, when I fell into the pond I inhaled a gob of water and thought I was going to drown.

The water behaved oddly, as if it came in little easily torn plastic balloons. Imagine getting a water balloon stuck in your windpipe and you know how I felt. Terrorized is not an understatement. Both Ken and Chuck rushed to help me but I waved them back, being too close to Chuck's claws or Ken's speargun did not appeal to me.

Fortunately, one hard cough dislodged the obstruction and another dozen reflex coughs after I came up for air kept my breathing free. The behavior of the water would have fascinated me if I hadn't been scared so bad by it.

I stood up and grabbed for my bra and panties; they were slipping off only in my mind though. I glared at the two men in my life, well, if Ken counts as male and if either of them counted as men.

"You have to watch out for Maggie, she's a thief," said Ken. He still had the speargun which I now saw was just a solid piece, not a working item at all, despite being green and silver and black. "I brought this," he waved the fake weapon, "to trade for you with her if we had to."

That distracted me for a moment then it took me a moment more to remember that he must mean the bird that had grabbed my wooden stick then abandoned it.

"Maggie?" I said. Okay, I sounded stupid but I really am blond.

"The bird," said Chuck. "Margaret Pyewacket, she's a magpie."

"No, I'm not," came a voice from high above. "It's just paint. I'm a dove, I am."

"She's a liar, too," said Ken, shaking his head with a swiveling motion that made him look like bad clay animation. He brandished the fake speargun, again, too, in a spastic move that made me glad it was only plastic.

"Oh, that's a fib, it is," said the voice of the bird. "I'm a simple teller of tall tales, not a liar."

"What's the difference?" asked Ken, finally turning his head at an impossible angle to look up. I swallowed hard and looked up also just so I couldn't see Ken's apparently broken neck. I couldn't spot Maggie at all, though, she must have been lost in the greenery above, her parti-colored feathers blending with light and shadow.

"A liar expects and needs to be believed," said Maggie the bird. "A teller of tall tales is just doing it for the pleasure of the thing, she is. World of difference."

"Whatever," said Ken. "She didn't hurt you, did she, Princess?" Ken asked.

I took it that he was asking me, so I shook my head.

"I never," said Maggie from above. "What am I? An owl? A hawk? I never hurt a living thing. Well, bugs, I suppose."

I tried to imagine an owl or a hawk in proportion to Ken, who if he was like other Ken dolls was about a foot tall -- that would make a bird bigger than Maggie but with talons and a scimitar beak. I nearly fainted. I've got a good imagination.

Panicked, I snatched up the pointed piece of wood Maggie had tried to trade with me, and I held it close in such a way that it would have been no use at all against an attacker, just then noticing that it had something written on it: Haagen-Dazs. I was preparing to stab a giant owl with an ice cream stick.

"Why is she making those squeaking noises," asked Chuck.

"I think it may be she's saying something in the Fair Tongue," said Ken. There was something about his voice, too, something I kept noticing but had no time to think about, especially not right then.

I forced myself to be calm. I had to keep the respect of these two if I were ever going to get out of this mess I was in. How I would do that, I had no idea at the moment but something might come up. Turning into a quivering, whimpering mess at the idea of a bird more than twice as big as me would not do my reputation as a fairy princess any good.

I knelt in the water to keep from falling down, this made it about chest deep. "You guys..." I began but I had to start over. "You guys turn your backs, I'm going to take a bath."

I waved the stick like a scepter. But son-of-a-gun, they both turned their backs.