I sag with relief.
Then glance at the broken lava lamp that’s still oozing... something. Heck, from what I can tell, real lava is hissing and burning through my dresser drawers all the way down to the floor. Okay, wow. Do not mess with the royal fairy sisters!
“Mom’s gonna kill me,” I moan, and lay down on my pillow next to Tinkerbell.
7.
Sunlight spills through my bedroom window, warm and golden and soft. It washes over the battle scars... burned carpet, cracked closet door, the lingering smell of bubblegum and ozone.
The silence is no longer ominous.
Just calm.
My limbs ache, but it’s the good kind of ache, like after a long hike or a big magical showdown with a corrupted dark fairy. I stretch under the covers and glance at the clock. 9:17 a.m. My first thought?
I survived.
My second thought?
I’m starving, and late for work!
I sit up, look around. No sign of the fairy sisters. Just my messy room, my singed nightstand, and one very confused goldfish in its bowl, blinking up at me like,what the hell happened?
I swing my legs over the edge of the bed and freeze. There’s something sticking out from under my pillow. I reach for it, slowly. Carefully. It’s small, cool to the touch.
When I pull it out, my breath catches.
It’s a single white crystal, no bigger than a gumdrop, carved into the perfect shape of a molar. It glows faintly like moonlight caught in sugar. A silver filament is tied around its base, looped through a hole in a tiny card. Handwritten on the card, in delicate looping script, is:
Dear Tammy,
Protector of Dreams, Champion of Light.
With love and gratitude to my fairy niece!
Sweet Root.
I smile so hard it hurts.
If Maple is my Mother-Queen, Then the tooth Fairy is my aunt. And so is Tinkerbell. There’s a knock on my door. Paxton peeks in, her hair wild, a spoon hangs from her mouth. “You alive, sis?” she asks, mumbling around the spoon.
“Yup. Made it.”
“You want toast?”
“Please.”
She disappears again as I clutch the crystal tooth in both hands, then set it gently on my windowsill. There, it catches the morning light and glitters softly, watching over my room like a tiny sentry.
The Tooth Fairy is free, and I’ve never felt more alive, or more like myself. Even if I do still look twelve in the mirror; luckily, the magic is beginning to fade.
Mom screams in the kitchen when she sees me. Anthony looks at me twice... and chuckles.
Chapter Thirteen
It’s morning, and I’m sitting at the dining room table, half asleep over the laptop, when I hear Tammy’s bedroom door creak open.
Five days of waiting and watching, and still nothing. I’m starting to wonder if he knows I’m out here. How, I have no clue. Maybe he has some kind of super-sense. Dino-awareness or something. Whatever.
