young tom of moth

Once there was a little boy named Tom who lived in the land of Moth. Tom was a voracious little fellow with brown shaggy hair and wandering eyes. He liked to skip and play, even read when the adventures satisfied him, but mostly he loved animals.
     Now, Moth was a strange place, full of bogs and swamps and pesky insects, indeed lacking what most decent people would deem necessary for the growth of young boys: trees and grass, or at least a little sunshine. But Tom’s parents were in the mud business and were naturally drawn to Moth, as it was the number one source of mud and clay products in the seven provinces. They created a humble yet stable home for themselves and their boy amidst the muck and mire of Moth.
     Unfortunately for Tom, Moth wasn’t thriving with wildlife population. Being surrounded by lush forests and gleaming countrysides, any furry visitors unfortunate enough to get a taste of Moth’s oozing atmosphere never stayed too long. There was, however, an alarming population of bullfrogs, most of which ended up in stews, but one of those frogs--whether unfortunate or otherwise is up to you--ended up in the hands of young Tom one muggy day while he was out for a mid-afternoon stroll.
     His mother had coaxed him out on this muggiest of summer days to expel some of the pent up energy that had resulted in a broken pot that morning. So there he was, basket in hand, feet in mud, digging up some frogs. His stepfather would expect good effort in bringing home plenty of hoppers for the evening’s stew, but Tom liked to play a secret game to see how many he could carry just out of their land’s border--not to be naughty or ornery, but out of a great disgust for frog stew. It scared him how thoughtlessly his mother flung the frogs to their watery deaths, but mostly it was the taste.
     In any case, he loathed to see such pleasant and amusing creatures come to their deaths (even worse that he should play a key part in it), and he wished only that these frogs would have a few more days to live with their families, play with their kids, kiss their wives, and take a nice long mud bath.
     So it was, that mid-afternoon, that Tom came across a rather plump one, with lots of warts and speckles on his back, and as he reached down and picked it up, it chirped up in a way that sounded to Tom very much like, “Hello!” It startled Tom so much so that his basket fell clean off his arm. The lid undid itself and the whole of his jumpy crew fled before he could latch them in again. Splotches of brown hopped and jumped all around Tom, and he leapt and slipped all around trying feverishly to catch them again. All of them got away, to be caught another day, save one. The large chatty fellow from earlier sat perfectly still right where Tom had dropped him and seemed to eye Tom up and down with his beady eyes.
It hopped once, closer to Tom who sat annoyed in the mud, and chirped up again.
     “Hello!” it said.
     “Hello,” Tom managed to say this time.
     “Sorry you lost all your frogs,” it said, rather kindly.
     “That’s alright,” Tom said. “I was going to let them go anyway. But now I’ve nothing to bring back home and it’s nearly supper! Father will be very cross.”
     The large bullfrog hopped once more and landed on Tom’s left knee. “Well, human boy, if you’d like, I can take you to a place where the frogs just jump right in your basket! Or whatever you’d like to catch. Doesn’t have to be frogs, of course.”
     “Really?” Tom was very young and quite naive, so he believed this talking frog right away, and he was very much looking forward to not eating frog stew this evening.
     “Certainly! Just follow me to my mistress, and she will take care of you.”
     “How long will it take to get there? Can we get back by supper?”
     The frog answered without hesitation. “It’s just a hop away!”
     The frog bolted off of Tom’s knee and hopped from stone to log to land. Tom followed quickly. Having been growing up in the swamps of Moth, Tom was comfortable moving quickly on slick stones and soggy soil. One simply gets used to randomness of swamps, after a while.
     Tom, while being absent-minded in his young age, was nevertheless a kind and respectful boy, thanks to the teaching of his mother, and asked of the frog, “What can I call you?”
     “Uh,” the frog paused for a moment, thinking, “Twuth, I should think.”
     “Twuth, the sun is nearly down now, and it’s getting hard to see. Supper will be ready soon, and I really must be home. Mother will be so worried as it is. How much farther?”
     “Not much farther now, human boy! Keep up!” Twuth’s chirp sounded to Tom a little strained.
     “My name’s Tom, by the way,” he offered, but Twuth didn’t respond. Tom began to feel a tightness in his chest. His mother, who would frequently translate his emotions for him, would call it fear.
     When the light of the setting sun had finally died away and left all the swamp in a pit of blackness, Tom stopped very suddenly and, too afraid to even sit down, started to cry.
     Although Tom couldn’t see him, Twuth jumped back to Tom and asked, rather agitatedly, “What’s wrong? We can’t stop now.”
     “I can’t see! I can’t move on and I can’t go back! What do I do, Twuth?”
     Twuth sighed and said, “Stay here, I’ll be back.”
     “No, Twuth! Please don’t leave me here!” Tom heard a few splashes far in the distance then nothing again.
     Like most nights, thick gray clouds shrouded the moon and stars and the bullfrogs croaked their lullabies. Tom felt around him for a rock or a log to sit on; he was so very weary. Just ahead of him was a large smooth rock that Tom rested on and hopelessly waited for Twuth’s return.
     When the bullfrog songs had died off, Tom felt utterly alone. And though the moon peaked out of a break in the clouds, he started to shake from his fluttery heart. Tom wanted to close his eyes yet desperately kept them wide for fear of being snuck up on. He felt more than heard movement to his left and whipped around to face it. He drew his knees up to his chest and didn’t blink at all while straining to see into the darkness. He imagined he saw a dark figure outlined by the light of the moon, but the clouds moved on and hid it away again.
     At this precise moment, Twuth called out at a distance. His chirp was gone.
     “Human boy! Oh, where did I leave him. He was right here! Human boy!”
     “Why did you leave it at all, you twit? It could have run away,” said a new voice. It sounded like a young girl.
     “No, he was scared stiff when I left him. And where would he go in this muck? Human boy!”
     Tom decided to call out, because where could he go otherwise? “I’m here, Twuth!”
     “You told it your name?” the girl voice snidely remarked.
     Tom saw two bright lights out along the swamp, coming closer and closer to him.
     “Fireflies?” he said incredulously. He loved to hear his mother talk about the blue fields of her childhood light up with fireflies like a reflection of the night sky.
     “We’re not bugs, human filth! We’re faeries! I’ve never been more insulted!”
     “Reida,” Twuth chuckled uncomfortably. “Be kind to the human boy. Or at least pretend,” Twuth whispered.
     “Twuth, I’d like to go home now. Can you two show me the way?”
     Twuth looked to his companion, a pretty little lady with silver wings, who crossed her arms and glared at him.
     “Well,” Twuth said, “you don’t want to go home to your mother empty-handed, now do you?”
     “I don’t care. I need to go home. Please take me home.” Tom was adamant.
     “Okay, human boy, I’ll take you home. Do you remember which was it was?”
     Tom turned around and pointed in the darkness, away from the faeries. “It was this way. I remember because you—” When Tom turned back around, Twuth was very close to his face and blew something into his eyes. A blinding light overwhelmed Tom, and then he knew nothing else of that night.
     When he woke, the sky was pink with first light, and the mists hovered over the nearby water, but Tom lay in soft, green grass for the first time since he could remember.
     He sat up and looked quickly around—for Mother, for Twuth, for anyone—and directly behind him, clouding all his vision, stood—no, hovered!—a beautiful and large woman. Her hair cascaded down around her round face, and she wore a glimmering gown that hung down to just reveal her bare feet, which were hovering inches off the ground for just a moment before she landed gently and kneeled down next to him.
     She offered Tom her hand, and he gingerly took it and got up.
     She looked him directly in the eyes. He felt like he needed to back up, or avert his gaze, but her intensity held him. He was too preoccupied with her eyes to notice her plump lips say, “What is your name.”
     “T-Tom.”
     “Tom . . . ? ”
     “Eh . . . Thomas Parr.”
     “Tom.” She smiled and backed off a little. The intensity in her face lessened, but she didn’t avert her gaze. “Do you know who I am?” He shook his head. “Why, I am a queen, and a queen of faeries, no less. And you owe me quite a deal, Tom. Do you know why?” Again, he shook his head.
     “You don’t?”
     “U-uh um, no, ma’am.”
     “I rescued you, Tom.”
     Suddenly he remembered how very far he was from home, and how much he wanted his mother. He started to cry. “I want to go home!”
     “Oh, of course you do, Young Tom! I’m sure your mother must miss you terribly, and that’s why I rescued you, you see. I’m going to take you home.”
     He sniffled and wiped his nose with his sleeve, all the while keeping eyes locked with the Queen of the Faeries. “You are?”
     “Yes, but first you must make me a promise.”
     Unthinking and sweet, Tom replied, “Of course.”
     “Of course, my lady, Tom. I am a queen after all,” she chuckled.
     “Oh, uh, of course, my lady.”
     She beamed. “Good boy. Now you must make me a promise. I did you quite a service, and now you must do me one. Can you do that for me?”
     “Yes, my lady.”
     “It’s a special honor, bestowed upon only the bravest of individuals and the most handsome young men. . . You’re going to be my Captain of the Swamps, my Champion of the Mists, my personal bodyguard. And you get to live at home, comfortably with your dear, sweet mother. How does that sound?”
     “But how can I protect you if I’m home? . . . Uh, my lady.”
     “Oh, I’ll call on you when I need you.”
     “But what if I’m not at home?”
     She took his hands gently in her large yet delicate ones. She said with a smile, “Oh, don’t you worry, Young Tom. You’ll hear me.” Her smile chilled, and she looked intensely again in his eyes, and his mind went blank for a second. “And you will come when you’re called, won’t you?”
     “Yes, my lady,” he said flatly.
     She smiled fully again and went to kiss him on the forehead. “Good boy.”