Page 51 of Wings of Reverie

What would it take to break the very heart of Pixie Hollow?

She didn’t want to think about any of it. She wanted to think about Weaver’s face in the workshop before he’d pulled away from her, and the shimmering aurora of the spiders before they’d dispersed. But her worry must have shown on her face.

Weaver nudged her, frowning. “What is it?”

“Nothing,” she said.

He shook his head at her, mouth growing thin. “Remember what you told me,” he said. “Be honest with yourself. And be honest with me.”

It was true. She’d told him last night she wouldn’t pretend to be happy when she didn’t feel it. Periwinkle paused, squinting up at the sky, at the dusk that looked uncomfortably like storm clouds as it gathered around them.

“Have you ever—” Her throat felt dry; she had to swallow and start over to get the words out. “Have you ever seen a storm like the one in our dreams?” she asked.

Thinking of how open Weaver’s face had been earlier, she felt a strange ache as she watched him now, completely unreadable again.

“Not the storm,” he said. “Just the aftermath.”

Found in the Bobbin Wood Workshop:

Rhyme, Written by Orion

Stuffed inside Morpheus’s desk.

Not yet read by Weaver and Periwinkle.

The little dreaming spider

That Morpheus had dreamed

Sat on his shoulder till

He woke up with a scream

Next night the spider

Spun a little web, he

Left the nicest dreams

And caught the bad ones from his head

Only you would write a song about this, Orion.

Very clever. —Stella

i did not scream. —morpheus

13

They left the Bobbin Wood together, parting ways over Snowcap Glade.

“I’ll see you soon,” Weaver said as he left for Floss’s workshop. But he wouldn’t quite meet her eye.

Periwinkle flew home more slowly than she usually did, after that. But the Frost Forest—that, she found, was unusually full.

All around her, fairies hurried through the dim evening, their arms full of snow and sticks and other tools, the forest floor strewn with little lights. As Periwinkle landed and took in the dozens of glowing sculptures that filled the Frost Forest, made of snow and litfrom inside by lightcatchers, she couldn’t help the smile that spread over her face.

A few of the fairies were clearly relaxing, building simple domes of snowballs over their lightcatchers while they laughed and sipped tea. But most of them were shaping more elaborate projects, some even referring to art or architecture books from the Hall of Winter. There were lanterns shaped like fir trees, lanterns shaped like owls, lanterns shaped like many-pointed stars, each of them glowing from within.