The Tale of Karolina and The Fairy Queen’s Chest

By Valentino Incanto Profferi

The story told here is utterly, fictitious and any resemblance between the characters herein or the events depicted and any true incident depicted by the Fairy tale is completely coincidental and unintentional.

Once upon a time in a time long before the many invasions of the British Isles, when the little people had no hindrances, there came into being a little magic harp. For it and with it was made a small wooden chest of a wood more ancient than the harp itself. Its maker was unknown and its magic was undeniable yet it remained unnamed despite many who tried and failed to find its proper name. In time, it was simply referred to by its chest, The Fairy Queen’s Chest. The gifts it bestowed upon those fortunate enough to play it were a living legend that was forgotten, as the waves of invaders came and settled down where the little people still live to this day, unseen and undiscovered but by a few who earn the right. As the legends of old were forgotten, The Fairy Queen’s Chest was put into the guardianship of human women who had sufficient faith, by the faeries.

Many centuries passed and the Chest’s guardians dispersed and were forgotten. In every age the Fairy Queen’s Chest resurfaced and the harp’s magic gave aid to one, or many, and bestowed a fortune upon one woman before it vanished back into obscurity. Its guardian for the last century was nearing the end of her life in the foothills of the Pyrenees Mountains. La Dame Vieux de Gnorr, as she was known, was visited by a gnome from the Tellurian Realm of North America as that was the harp’s next destination. With her instructions for passing the harp on to Karolina, a young and gifted musician, the old lady is also informed of its healing destiny for this age. She is told that the seeker will find Karolina Dawn and that for a time the harp must go to a youthful seeker. When The Fairy Queen’s Chest has been passed on to its next guardian, La Dame Vieux de Gnorr discovers she will have the choice to depart to Faerieland if she so chooses.

Meantime, Julie is born to her rigid and unfortunate parents in Lovelock Nevada at the hands of the local obstetrician, bald Dr. Summers. Her father is a clerk at the courthouse, and her mother is a librarian at the high school. Julie is like her friends, an ordinary girl with simple expectations and reasonable hopes. Julie likes to dance, plays the clarinet in band, likes icecapades and hopes that maybe she can get a scholarship and go on a foreign exchange before settling down and having kids.

Julie’s parents both are diagnosed with chronic neurological diseases when she is a freshman in high school. Having been sideswiped by life in this way, Julie never again wholly lets off thinking about her parent’s painful and aggravating future. Having been raised to be a faithful believing young woman, Julie prays daily for her parent’s welfare. As the years pass Julie witnesses the gradual onset of the myriad of symptoms. Numerous medical tests reveal little and the doctors pronounce a doomed life. There is nothing they can do until the illness develops into cancer or another treatable ailment according to the specialists.

Desperate at the news, Julie sits beneath an old spruce tree at the park and prays again as she watches the birds nibbling on a pile of bread crumbs. A young gnome comes out from the trees roots and listens to Julie as she recites her prayer with her eyes fixed upon the feathered creatures. Having pity on the young woman of nearly eighteen, he sits upon her knee and waits for Julie to finish. “There is a cure for your parents,” he begins as Julie opens her eyes to an expression of startled surprise. “To find the magic harp and play it for them for nine turns of the large hand of the grandmother clock in the hallway of your home.” Julie listened intently not daring to miss a word lest the gnome refuse to repeat the cure. “However,” he continued after taking breath, “to find the magic harp you must leave immediately on your quest.” The gnome took her left hand in his and kissed it. “The seeking will be a trial for you that will increase your consciousness and awake the magic within you that has lain dormant within, in this life you have led.” “To find the magic harp in the Fairy Queen’s Chest you must depart tomorrow, your eighteenth birthday, and you will be known to those who ask, as the seeker.” The gnome kissed her hand once more. “All I know is that for you to find it you must go north and that you must trust he who has magic in his hands.” “There are many forms of magic, but for you it must be in the hands.”

For the third time the gnome kissed her left hand held in his and then he slipped down onto the grass. With an amusing formality, the gnome took off his hat, stood up very straight between her knees and bowed to Julie.” “If at any time you are in need of guidance, close your eyes and wish to speak with Nettles and soon I will be with you, but trust your senses and not your feelings.” Julie blinked and the gnome was gone. Where he had been standing there was a very small velvet purse in a remarkable shade of intense purple that made Julie burst out laughing as it contrasted with the green grass. Inside the impossibly small purse she found one solid gold coin, a bone pin, and a pine nut.