Vesper, Froke and Eon continued their journey through the forest, the ruckus caravan of mottonballies was swallowed by the trees, and the sounds of the Noominian creatures returned.

    Eon led Finn along the paths, and as they picked up speed, Vesper held tightly to Finn's fur.

    Froke chuckled.

    “What’s so funny, Froke?” said Vesper.

    “Froke liked your squeaky stuffed animal retort. Froke prefers words—even fighting ones—but for Froke, fighting is a last resort. Fannybath, or whatever his name was, spoke too many bad words—they boiled my blood, like pecking birds. Some were just plain rude, and others like turds,” said Froke as he laughed again.

    “You were pretty impressive, Vesper, I must say. You weren’t afraid to speak up, even when Finn was flashing his teeth. That’s some courage,” said Eon.

    “I guess so. I got angry, too,” said Vesper. “He was totally rude. Like, what was all that about killer giants? What a ridiculous thing to say. Why would he even say that?”

    Eon looked over at Froke.

    “Long story. Ancient history,” said Froke with a sigh.

    “You—a killer? I don’t believe it,” said Vesper.

    “Not Froke, no siree. But, yes, Froke’s family tree,” said Froke.

    “So your great-great-grandfather killed a mottonballie. So what?” Vesper said dismissively.

    “Should I tell her, or do you want to,” offered Eon.

    “Froke will confess, that is best,” said Froke with a sigh. “No, not a mottonballie. Much worse—it's really not Froke’s favorite verse. Long ago, Froke’s brothers three. . . killed. . . the fairy queen.”

    “What are you saying? Your brothers killed the fairy queen of Noominia?” A wave of anger and hurt washed over Vesper.

    “Not the now-queen, but yes, her family. Mother, brothers, sisters, and all her misters. Just one survived. Just the now-queen is still alive.”

    “So, let me get this straight. Your family killed everyone in her family—all of her ancestors—except the current, the now, fairy queen?” Vesper paused to try to take in what Froke was saying. “The little turd bucket was right. western hill giants do kill.”

    “Froke doesn’t kill, at least. Those giants are from the east. Froke lives in the west—the west is best.”

    “Oh yeah? Isn’t that great! You live in the west! How many hill giants live in the west, Froke?” said Vesper.

    “One. . .”

    “One,” Vesper echoed.

    Eon cleared his throat.

    “Before Froke, none,” he finished.

    “You’re telling me that your brothers killed Noominian royalty, and you ran away to the west because you didn’t like them? You didn’t fit in? Or what?”

    “Froke wanted to do good, to protect the queen, like Froke should. The best place for that is with the Silence Keepers. So Froke joined up, passed the initiations, practiced incantations, silent meditations. One year later, not that long, then came the dream, but everyone thought I was wrong. Froke didn’t listen to what they said, and just couldn’t put the vision to bed. So Froke got what Froke asked for, a far-away job, a forgotten post, to sit and watch, and wait the most.”

    “You were waiting for me? You were waiting for a unicorn?”

    “To fall from the stars. . .”

    “How long were you waiting? You know they sent you there to get rid of you, right?” Vesper asked.

    “She has a point,” said Eon.

    “Froke waited nine years, and when you came Froke cheered.”

    “Nine years! You waited nine years for me to show up, and all you had to go on was a stupid dream?” said Vesper.

    Froke shrugged.

    “Two things Froke is good at,” he counted on his giant fingers, “one is rhyme, and one is sleeping for a very long time. Froke left his home to follow his questions. Froke wonders many things and wants to know many things. This is why Froke apprenticed in the Order of the Silence Keepers. They know what they know, and they have seen what they have seen. And the old way is an art, just like poetry. It is heart art. They are heart smart.”

    Froke let out a nervous laugh.

    “There’s been a few changes since you left, my mossy friend,” said Eon. “The Guards have been all but disbanded, and the Keep is, how should I say it, under new management. Just as all the towers are, I presume.”

    “Yes, yes, but this is before Froke found the evening star. They will be jaw-dropped when Froke completes his quest. Froke found Vesper, by looking through dreaming eyes. Froke saw the Evening Star shoot down from the sky, and land at the old Horn of Dauntless. There will be parades, and festivals for days,” said Froke.

    “So, you saw into the future?” asked Vesper.

    “Yes, the future. Or the maybe-future. So Froke spent the first few months camping at the Horn, and waiting. But no unicorn. The nights got longer and longer, and Froke did not think the evening star would come, so Froke started to hibernate, for that is what most hill giants do in the moon season. Sleeping and dreaming. . . .”

    Vesper calmed down. She closed her eyes and felt her breath go in. Her lungs filled with the sweet fragrance of the Noominian forest at dusk. There, walking beside her, was the biggest, strongest creature she had ever seen. And somehow, underneath the moss and rock, he had a soft heart. There was no way she could pin the murders committed by his brothers on him. She knew that not all hill giants would be the same, just like no two people are the same. All Froke seemed to want was to protect her. She saw how he acted when the dragon came, and the mottonballies. He was kind, brave and friendly. Most importantly he was on her side, and nothing could convince him otherwise. Only Sadie had been such a friend to Vesper.

She felt that safe feeling again, like a campfire burning in her chest.

    “You’re glowing,” Froke said.

    “Huh?”

    Vesper looked down at her body and saw that the light from the illumees, which had faded over the past hour, had begun to glow again.

    “Yeah. Weird. And I’m totally caked in mud,” said Vesper.

    “Froke likes mud. . . .”

    Vesper shot Froke a glare. That was just the kind of thing Froke would say that made it impossible to be mad at him.

    “Why don’t we set up camp,” offered Eon. “I’m getting a little chafed riding this beast, and I could use a few winks of sleep.”

    “We’ll find a stream, and you can clean,” said Froke.

    They walked for another hour into the long twilight, listening to the symphony of buzzing and chirping insects and birds. They reached a small clearing near a brook which tumbled happily along the rocky banks.

Vesper climbed off Finn’s back and down to the edge of the brook. Finn lapped up the fresh gurgling water as Vesper cleaned off the mud she had caked onto her skin when she was hiding from the shadow dragon. Her clothes were also quite a mess, so she removed her cloak and dress and waded into the cool stream.

    Froke and Eon began to set up camp.

    On his own, Froke didn’t need a fire for himself, yet he collected some fallen branches and crushed them into a pile of broken sticks. Then he reached for his wand and lit them with a short incantation:

    “Hiljaisuudesta—pile of sticks and fire mix,” and a wave of his wand.

    Vesper climbed up from the brook carrying her cloak and wearing her damp, hand-wrung clothes. She shivered violently.

    “Thanks, oh yes, fire!” she said. She stood close to the flames and circled on the spot, trying to dry off.

    “We will stay here for the moon; it will be too dark to continue soon,” Froke said.

    “Didn’t the day just begin a few hours ago?” wondered Vesper.

    “The nights can get long in Noominia,” answered Eon. “We’re in the moon season, and there will be a day soon when the sun does not rise. The only light will be the fairy moon.”

    “What is the fairy moon, exactly?” Vesper asked.

    “This is when all of the fairies gather together in a great display of their light, on The Day That Is Night,” Froke said excitedly. “Noominians in the west have a festival to celebrate all that is light and good—we call it the unicorn festival, as we should. We eat special food, tell stories, play games, clash horns, all to honour the sacrifice of Dauntless the unicorn. We make offerings to the stars, asking them to come to Noominia from afar, to restore the light of our swirling world.”

    “Not everyone is as excited about the Unicorn Festival as Froke here,” said Eon. “Some Noominians don’t really believe in unicorns anymore. But don't take it personally.”

    Vesper’s heart sank. For a moment she had almost convinced herself that she was that unicorn.

    “Well, what do you think about unicorns?” Vesper asked Eon.

    “I don’t exactly worry myself about prophecies, and I certainly don’t like to dress up, so the festival is not something I usually attend. We went as guards—when there were guards. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s been over thirty years since I went to the unicorn festival,” replied Eon. “I’m not trying to dishearten you—I’m sure you have a great quest ahead of you, Vesper. A true adventure. But I don’t think you’re the unicorn that will stop the shadow dragon—I think those sayings are more symbolic than literal. It’s like, there’s a unicorn within each of us. And there’s also a dark shadow dragon. They clash and fight inside us all the time.”

    Vesper didn’t respond right away. What Eon said made sense to her. She let the smoke from the fire wash over her as she stared into the calming flames.

“The unicorn festival,” said Vesper finally. “I’ve heard of that before. My grandpa mentioned it to me when he saw my mask,” said Vesper, half to herself.

    Froke paused, cleared his throat, and began to recite in a sing-songy voice:

    “Until the Evening Star appears, the way to salvation remains unclear, for on the star, our future rides, to return the light, and turn the tide.”

    Froke switched back to his normal, grumbly voice:

    “Eon may not like it, but Froke will recite for you another favourite: from stardust which rose so far, comes the one called Evening Star.” His giant hand slowly moved in a great arc across the starry sky and ended it, gesturing toward Vesper.

    “One thing you may not know, Vesper,” said Eon, “is that Noominian prophecies have a tendency to change over time. Doesn’t even matter if they’re written down—even the ink will shift and change on the paper when it needs to. So I wouldn't get too concerned about Froke’s favourite verses.”

    Vesper stayed quiet, thinking, and as she soaked in the warmth of the fire, the shivering slowed, then finally stopped.

    Froke passed her a piece of bread from his cloak shell.

    “Froke is sorry, no more illumees,” he said.

    Vesper smiled, pulled it in half and bit off a piece to chew. She passed the rest to Eon.

    The emotion in Froke’s voice made her feel how passionate he was about the prophecy. Despite Eon’s warning, the words he recited left their impression on Vesper's thoughts. She let questions float around inside her, unanswered.

    Could she be the hope of this world? The salvation? The descendant of a unicorn? Or just a lost human girl?

    Froke’s small fire was beginning to grow and the heat made Vesper sleepy. She wrapped herself in her cloak, found a soft patch of earth near the warm glow and lay down, wondering about this new place, about her friends, and how she would get home.

    Vesper fell asleep and soon began to dream.

    Vesper saw herself standing in the middle of a forest. From out of nowhere, a tree appeared in a clearing not far off from where she stood. The roots were buried in a sea of illumees, and the branches were alive with fairies.

In a hollow at the base of the giant tree, a bright light shone out. Vesper could not see clearly what was in the hollow so she stepped forward toward the tree. Soon, Vesper was wading into the pool of illumees around the trunk of the tree. She felt her shoes fill with liquid and the glowing orbs, and it became difficult to move.

The tree reached down and with branch-like arms, lifted Vesper up. As she got close enough to the light, she heard her mother singing in a language she didn’t recognize, then she saw her mother sitting in the hollow of the tree, cradling a baby. Vesper knew the infant was her. Suddenly, the baby transformed and became a unicorn fawn, and then the tree closed and they disappeared into the tree.

All around her, the ground began to swirl into a great whirlpool of water and sand. Vesper saw her father in the vortex, being dragged into the darkness. He reached out his hand, calling to Vesper for help. She grabbed his hand but the pull of the vortex was too powerful. Her father was lost, swallowed into the whirlpool.

    Vesper woke up with a start. The feeling of her father’s hand grasping hers and then slipping lingered for a moment in her fingers.

    The light of her dream was swallowed by the night forest. She realized she had been sleep-walking and she was still standing up. Vesper tried to move her feet but they would not move—she was stuck in mud up to her knees. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, Vesper saw she was in a wet, boggy part of the forest where the trees were no longer lush and green, but reached out like thorny, gray fingers.

    “Froke, are you there? Eon? Finn?”

    Vesper realized her sleepwalking must have taken her far away from the camp, and far away from Froke and Eon. How long she had been walking through the forest, she could only guess—hours maybe. Vesper was far away from the safety of the camp, and her guides had not noticed her leave. She could see nothing but the stars above through a light fog, and the strange trees and vines which grew around her were home to even stranger creatures—insects and swamp birds, and who-knows-what, chirping, croaking, knocking, howling. Calling out to each other through the dark night air.

    “Froke!” Vesper yelled as she sank further into the mud. The watery sludge soaked her up to her waist. It stank of rotting plants, algae and clay, and as it creeped further up toward her head, the smell grew stronger.

    “Froke! . . . Why do you have to sleep so soundly, you big rock,” she complained to herself as she struggled to free her legs. "Eon! Finn!" With each sound and movement she slid deeper into the mud. Soon, Vesper would be totally swallowed by the boggy ground. The mud reached her waist, and her white dress, no longer white, was now officially a mess. The cape Froke had given her was also submerged, but since it was water-proof, it repelled the water and mud. She lay back onto the cape to buy herself some time. She kept sliding under, but now it was imperceptibly slow. Vesper wondered what Sadie would say if she could only see her now.

    “Help! Help, is anyone there?” Her voice echoed in the mist.

    If the dragon found her here, this would be the end of her.

    Vesper searched around desperately for a branch to grab, a root, a vine, anything, but there was nothing within reach.

    Many long minutes passed. No one came to help. No Froke. No friends, not even Sadie. She felt truly alone.

    Vesper cried. Not for herself, but for Noominia—for the fairies, and all the good fairy-folk she was letting down—for Froke and the prophecies—for her mother.

    Through her tears she caught the first signs of daybreak. The stars faded and the black night sky turned to indigo dawn. Vesper felt herself slowly but surely sinking deeper into the boggy earth beneath her, and soon, she thought, she would see nothing.