“Milk! We’re going to the village today, there is something off, everyone has caught a cold apparently. Would you bring me my bag and my feather please? The one for flying.”

With this, a new day was starting. Clarissa always knew what to do when the village needed help. I brought her what she asked, then patiently waited for a whole 3 minutes for her to finally give me a well-deserved pat on the head. With that done, we went outside of her small yet pretty cottage and she took the flying feather in her left hand. As she whispered some nonsensical words and made weird gestures with her right hand over it, the feather grew and grew until it was big enough for both of us to jump on it. A steering wheel appeared in front of Clarissa, as well as a stick that she instantly pulled to get us off the ground.

I will never get used to flying. Seeing the floor get smaller and smaller, the clouds closer, having wind in my nose made me sneeze, which kept throwing us off balance… The flights were never comfortable. But, I have to admit, it is the fastest way to reach the village, and that’s all that really mattered to Clarissa. She was a good enough feather pilot to reach her destination no matter how many times I sneezed. And indeed, we reached the village after only 20 minutes of sneezing, and landed almost graciously in front of that big building in which people drank and talked loudly. It was the best spot to start investigating.

Clarissa kicked the door open with her big leather boots while the feather shrank and flew into her arm brace with the others. She had feathers for a lot of things, like writing, cleaning, tickling, and obviously flying. The big stinky room fell silent at the sight of the big pointy hat. Everybody loved Clarissa, but the fear of witches is strong in the countryside, and they all still had very rude reflexes.

“Hello, folks! A little bird told me you were all sneezing?”

I was the one to catch that bird and it was one of the best informants we had. Its name was Bob. “Do any of you know who got sick first?” Ah yes, to know what was going on, we had to find the source of the sickness. Clarissa was a very smart one, and she had a hunch that this was no ordinary cold. I sniffed the air around the villagers and indeed, there was something odd. I looked at my witch and nodded, indicating she was right. I could smell magic that was not hers.

The bartender, a really nice fellow named Thod, took us to the Smith cottage. “This is where it started, Smith’s wife is expecting and she’s the first to have caught it. I don’t know any more than this. Should I bring some milk for your cat, Clarissa?” The Smiths had 3 young children who loved my fluffy counterpart, hence milk would be useful to keep them out of the way. I got my bowl of milk, the children already running at me in anticipation, and Clarissa went to see their mother to get some explanations.

I barely had time to transform before I was swept off my paws by 3 giggling monsters who started tickling me. The witch could get to work.

“So, tell me, what happened? You are too far in your pregnancy to be working outside, and even a common cold is not that contagious. Who did you bother this time, girl?” The woman blushed and asked her husband to leave the room. That smelled of trouble all right… “I went to see a fay, to know if my child would be healthy. I lost the previous 2, I couldn’t stand to lose another one, Clarissa!”

Children were fragile, and life in the village was tough. We did our best, but we couldn’t save everyone, and sadly babies are too fragile for most of our usual remedies. We couldn’t do anything for the Smiths last time.

“Oh dear, Cyclamen… What did she do to you?” Fays are magic beings, like witches, but, unlike witches, they are really egocentric ones. They will help you, of course, but their help comes at a cost far greater than just a few potatoes.