Sweet Sting

By Cassandra Hamm

“Is that a taikina?” Seana faces me, shoulders squared.

I drop the pastry, sending sliced nuts and golden berries across the silver tablecloth. “Um.”

Behind my sister, faeries and pixies continue dancing. Dust scatters off the pixies’ wings. Not fair. The pixie dust in their dishes makes faerie food taste like dirt.

I spot Ederra in her pretty, blue dress, and my stomach flips.

“Just what do you think you’re doing at the buffet table, Zoran?” Seana asks.

Grabbing the fallen pastry, I stick the marja berries and mutteri nuts back into the blue neste sap. “Eating, obviously.”

“No, you aren’t.” Seana points a rigid finger at me. “Not tonight. This is Carys and Khan’s engagement party, and you will not ruin it for them.”

Good to know their names, not that it matters. I’m here for the food. “Shouldn’t you be dancing or something?”

She folds her arms over her chest. “The answer is no, Zoran.”

I point at the pixies playing their leaf harps nearby, singing in impossibly high voices. “Hey, isn’t that a great song?” The taikina is halfway to my mouth. “Just listen to that melody.”

Seana’s hand lashes out, and the pastry falls to the table again. She has no respect for food. “Don’t you dare try to distract me.”

Ederra’s lavender hair catches my eye. Why is no one dancing with her? Seriously, is everyone blind?

Well… I could dance with her. Maybe.

“I’m not going to keep cleaning up your messes, Zoran,” Seana says.

She’ll come around when she sees my bloated face. Perks of having a healer for a sister.

“You know what you should do?”

“Eat this?” I lift the dough to my mouth, breathing in the scent of honey and sap.

“No! You should ask Ederra to dance!”

Does she have to be so loud? “I will, okay? Just—”

“Yeah, like you were going to at the Elven Treaty celebration? Or at the Kukka Blossom Festival?”

I imagine saying, “Want to dance?” but in my head, the words always come out fuzzy and indistinct. Then I trip over my feet and knock her to the ground, and she runs out of the room, and everyone laughs…

“Whatever. I’ll do it after this is in my stomach.”

“I’m serious, Zoran. If you eat that, I’m not going to help. You’ll be in pain for the rest of the night.”

I roll my eyes. She won’t follow through on her threats. She never does. I hold up the taikina.

Her lips tighten into a thin line. “Don’t you dare.”

I lick the edge. The neste sap dressing, savory and cool, taunts me.

“Zoran Caio Ogbu.”

I bite into the taikina. The soft nuttiness of sliced mutteri, the juicy sunburst of neste sauce, and the bitter squish of marja berries, all brought together with the honeyed dough, melts in my mouth. Then comes the core, my weakness, my nemesis––cloud-fluff cream with the sweet sting of pixie dust.

I don’t care that I will be in severe pain in a few moments. This is worth it—a whole glob of pixie dust wrapped up in pastry goodness, like a hug after a long day.

“How many times”—Seana slams her hand against the table, rattling plates—“have I told you not to eat pixie dust?”

I take another bite. Nut-and-cream perfection.

Then it starts: burning in my throat, warmth flowing into my swelling cheeks. I cough sparkling dust into the air.

Seana shakes her head, then turns.

Blinking, I attempt to say, “Wait,” but it sounds more like “waib” with my swollen tongue. “Pweathe, Theana!”

“You’re fine. You won’t die.”

Come on! Does she really want me to humiliate the Ogbu name?

The gasping starts—first from the people closest to me, then the ones farther across the room. The dancing stops. The pixies’ music falters. Even Carys and Khan halt their swaying to look at me.

Ederra winds her way through the crowd toward me. No, no, no! This is exactly what I wanted to avoid. I back against the food tables, wishing I could die.

The faery’s eyes are soft, round and golden like a marja berry. “Are you okay, Zoran?” She reaches out as if to touch my bulging cheeks, then yanks her fingers back. Her lavender hair glitters with dust she swiped from a pixie. “Food sensitivity?”

I nod, my stomach as twisted as a fried suola. The faeries and pixies laugh; even Seana smirks. I wait for Ederra to join in.

“Come on.” Ederra links her arm through mine. “Let’s get you to a healer.”

I stumble alongside her. My tongue is tingling, hopefully shrinking to its normal size. I don’t know how this works. Seana has never refused to heal me before.

We push through the tree-bark door and step onto the grass. Stars gleam far above, making her dusted hair sparkle.

“I have a food sensitivity, too.” Ederra begins climbing the ladder that leads to our treehouse settlement. I hurry after her. “To krydderi.”

I make a face. Being allergic to pixie dust is rough, but at least it’s only used in special party food. Kryderri is in every decent faery recipe.

“My limbs lose feeling, my nose gushes blood, and I usually pass out.” Ederra’s laugh is so much better than pixie harp music. “Let’s just say I avoid kryderri.”

I reach the top soon after Ederra, who pulls me onto the wooden platform.

“What’s yours?” she asks.

I nod at her hair.

“Pixie dust? That’d be awful!” Shaking her head, she tugs me along the wooden terraces.

She’s holding my hand. Marjas and mutteri, she’s holding my hand.

She knocks on the door to the healer’s settlement. “I can’t resist the dust.”

I point to my face. Me neither.

Ederra laughs, but not at me. A glow like a warm taikina fills my chest.

Maybe tonight wasn’t a disaster, after all.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Cassandra Hamm has always been fascinated by the inner workings of the human mind. She received her B.S. in psychology and continues to apply her knowledge to her characters. Her love of writing prompts has spurred her to start blogging, submit stories to amazing websites like this one, and host flash fiction contests on Instagram. She may or may not be obsessed with cats, jigsaw puzzles, movie soundtracks, and Broadway musicals.

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