I, Candy
(A work of Disney Fairies fan fiction, originally written in 2021.)
By J.L. Love
Being a sugar fairy is wonderful, glorious, wondrous. I mean, flying all over Pixie Hollow, already the sweetest place for a fairy to live, making everything even sweeter? Well, it’s just about the best feeling in all the world, that’s all it is. At my Arrival Day, which seems like just yesterday, Queen Clarion told me my talent was known to her even before the talent talismans were presented. Now, I have no way of knowing if that’s something she says to all the fairies, but it sure made me feel good.
“Good morning, Rosetta,” I say as I fly over one of her many gardens. “May I say, your Freesias look as lovely as the gummiest gumdrops.”
“Why thank you, Candy,” she replies. “And they smell just as sweet, thanks to you.”
“I’m pleased as pudding to be of service,” I say.
“Where ya off to this fine morning?”
“To see Queen Clarion, honey.”
Rosetta giggles. “Uh oh. What did you do?”
“Nothing that I know of. I’m hoping it’s just to check in, and that I’m not in some kind of jam.”
An audience with the Queen isn’t always a matter of a fairy having done something that gets them or others in trouble. Still, I fly swiftly, well, as swiftly as a sugar fairy can, to her chambers in the center of Pixie Hollow.
Queen Clarion truly has a countenance worthy of royalty. Her shimmering golden gown and her butterfly-like wings are made of pure pixie dust, and they light up her chambers so brightly that there is hardly any need for the candles surrounding her throne.
“Candy,” the Queen says to me, “you have turned yourself into quite the accomplished fairy. You make your queen quite proud.”
“Thank you, Queen Clarion,” I reply, my glow glowing brighter, “sweet as sugar of you to say.”
“It’s true. Which is why I have selected you to travel to the mainland this spring, on a special mission.”
“Me? Jumpin’ jellyrolls! Um, excuse my language.” The Queen smiles. “But why me? Fairy Shari is the ambassador of the sugar fairies, isn’t she?”
“She is, but Fairy Shari is needed elsewhere in Pixie Hollow. I believe you are more than equal to the task, my dear Candy.”
“You flatter me like fluffy flapjacks, my Queen. What would you have of me, may I ask?”
Queen Clarion explains, as only she can, “During last season’s fairy camp, Nyx and some of the other scout fairies discovered a remote colony named Stoneridge. It’s located on the mainland, near one of their vast oceans. We must make certain that it is a safe and comfortable haven for fairies, and that those who might inhabit the colony in the future have everything they need to survive. Which of course, includes sweetness and light.”
“Of course,” I say. “I’ll not let you down, my Queen. You can depend on me as sure as a doughnut rolls downhill.”
#
After Queen Clarion dismisses me, I make a beeline directly to Zarina’s house. Though Zarina was born a dust-keeper fairy, she spends most of her time these days practicing alchemy. Pixie dust alchemy, specifically. Zarina and I have been working on something so secret that no other fairy knew anything at all about it; not Fairy Shari, dust-keeper ambassador Fairy Gary, not even Queen Clarion herself.
“Hi Candy,” Zarina says after opening her door. “Come in, come in. Did you bring it?”
“You bet your bonbons I did,” I pat the little brown pouch tied to my sash. “Since you gave it to me, I haven’t left home without it.”
I set the pouch on Zarina’s workbench and open it. We both have to shield our eyes from the brightness inside.
“Wow,” Zarina gasps.
“You can say that again, cupcake. It’s just the tiniest speck of blue pixie dust, but I’ve been sweetening it a little bit each day for the past month, just like you asked.”
“Okay.” Zarina slides a large wooden bowl to the center of the bench. “In here, I’ve got regular pixie dust mixed with dragonfruit blossoms and exactly two drops of honeysuckle nectar. Let’s see what happens when we add that extra-sweet blue speck.” She lowers her goggles, then picks up the sweet speck with tweezers. “Uh, you might want to step back a bit.”
I step back and she drops it in. Immediately the whole room is awash in the brightest luminescence my fairy eyes have ever seen. Once the brightness subsides, we look into the bowl.
“Well, I’ll be dipped in daffodil dew,” I say. “You’ve done it, Zarina. You’ve made…white pixie dust!”
“Sure looks that way,” she says. “Go ahead; see if you can wield it.”
I wave my hands over the bowl and after a short while, the dust responds slowly to my gestures. “I’m doing it,” I say, “but it’s not exactly easy as pie.”
“What do you mean?”
“Look at it. It’s as sticky as molasses from the Winter Woods.” With substantially more effort than I’ve ever had to use before, I manage to separate a tiny morsel of the white dust from the goopy chunk.
“Here,” Zarina says, “drop it into this mug of chamomile tea.”
“Okay.” When the dust hits it, the tea shimmers, glowing brightly and bubbling busily. Zarina goes to pick up the mug, but before she can raise it, the mug dissolves and coats her hands with sludge.
“Ew,” she says. “Can you get this gunk off of me, Candy?”
“I’ll try, sweetie.” I wave my hands, trying with all my might to lift the sludge off of her hands and back into the bowl. Again, it takes a lot of concentration, but I do it.
“This stuff might be too powerful for any kind of practical use,” Zarina says. She tries to take her pestle out of the bowl, but the stuff is so sticky, the whole bowl sticks firmly to it. “Huh?”
“I think this syrupy stuff just might be the stickiest substance known to fairykind,” I say. “Hey, maybe that could be its use; a super-strong adhesive.”
“Maybe you’re right. We could use it to repair broken things.”
“Muffin-ificent! Can I take some of it with me?”
Zarina giggles. “Sure, if you can manage to pull it apart.”
I scrape a small portion of the white dust into my pouch and head back to my home in Sweet Valley. When I get there, many of the sugar fairies are all flitting about in a frenzy.
Dulcinea dashes up to me, almost knocking me out of the air. “Candy! Where the hairy honeybuns have you been?”
“Um, nowhere in particular, chiclet. What’s up?”
“What’s ‘up’ is that the fairies have already left for Stoneridge, and you, ya dizzy dewdrop, were supposed to be among them.”
“Fruitcakes! I thought I had more time. Did they send another sugar fairy instead?”
“No, because Queen Clarion chose you. Now, get your hot cross buns over to the balloonport, on the double!”
“But I’m in deep meringue! I don’t have nearly enough pixie dust to make it all the way to the mainland.”
“No, you don’t, but your Alaska’s not baked just yet. The queen has sent a fast-flying fairy back to retrieve you.”
I double-time it over to the northwest balloonport, crossing my little fairy fingers in hopes that the fast-flyer who’ll be taking me to Stoneridge won’t turn out to be—
But, of course, it’s her.
Vidia.
She’s hovering over the balloon, her arms folded, and her foot tapping away as if there’s a floor beneath her instead of thin air.
“Looks like someone just had to be fashionably late,” she sneers.
“Sweet of you to come back for me, Vidia,” I say while biting my lip.
“I’m so sure. You wanna get in the basket, so I can get back to my real work, sugar cube?”
I want to tell her she’s not the boss of me, but I would hate for any sourness to get back to Queen Clarion. So, I say nothing, and decide to keep quiet as Vidia whisks me away.
Most of the fast-flying fairies are indifferent toward us sugars, but Vidia and I haven’t gotten along too well ever since she told the other fairies she thought we’d be useless in protecting Pixie Hollow.
“What do you plan to do, give the hawks tummy aches?” I remember her saying. Still there may be a part of me that’s glad it was Vidia who had to come back for me. She couldn’t be too pleased about this particular assignment.
In almost no time at all, we arrive at Stoneridge. It’s breathtaking. And I immediately know why the Queen named it what she named it, if indeed it was her who named it. The stone structures are too numerous to count; there are also several statues and figurines both stone and wooden, that look to be hand carved.
Vidia sets the balloon down and flits off before I can thank her again. My thanks would have been sincere, by the way. Besides being in trouble with the Queen, I would have hated myself for missing out on being here.
Fairies are flittering all over Stoneridge, busy making this lovely nook even prettier. Garden fairies are blooming flowers in big flowerpots and plumping up succulents planted along the western edge; animal fairies are making sure visiting birds and bugs have comfy places to roost; water fairies are spiffing up the shoreline and creating wave pools on the outer edge.
Chloe, one of the newer garden fairies, flies up to me. “Candy! So good to see you.”
“So good to be seen. This place is flan-tastic! The building fairies really outdid themselves. Do we know which ones were responsible for putting this paradise together?”
“Oh, you know how building fairies are; each of them thinks the last thing they built is the best ever. They’re all claiming responsibility for Stoneridge.”
I giggle. “Maybe it’ll turn out it was humans who put this cozy confection together.”
Chloe gasps. “Humans? Oh, no. I doubt that Queen Clarion would allow us to be here if she thought humans made this place. Myka and the other scout fairies have checked Stoneridge thoroughly and they assure us it’s fairymade. Besides, we all know that humans can’t even see fairies, unless they believe in them, right? And even then, only the human children can.”
“Really, sugar? I always thought that was just an old fairies’ tale.”
“I believe it. Don’t you?”
“I don’t know if I do, pudding pie.”
Chloe shrugs. “Let’s hope we never have to find out.”
“Well, I guess I’d better get my cakes in gear and get busy sweetening things around here.”
As I flitter around looking for things that could use my sweet touch, I notice Vidia flying super-fast circles around the outside of Stoneridge. “What’cha doin’, honey?” I ask. “You’re not a scout fairy, ya know.”
“Perhaps not,” Vidia replies while still doing laps, “but I’m…better equipped…to protect you…from dangerous…humans…than you, me.”
Well, now I wanted some humans to show up. Big humans. With butterfly nets. And those weird bottles filled with water that they liked to spray cats with.
To me, humans never looked all that threatening or dangerous, and I never understood how a grownup human could lose their belief in us. Besides, isn’t believing in something, and that something actually existing, two different concepts? Oh, well. Better get to work.
I find some aloe plants who are looking kind of droopy, so I sprinkle a little dust on them until they plump up and get shiny green like the delectable succulents they were born to be. There aren’t many flowers in Stoneridge, but I sweeten the soil anyway, so that any buds or bulbs that happen by will feel welcome enough to bloom here.
While I’m busy doing that, I settle down next to what looks to be a fairy statue. It’s even fairy-sized, though it’s made out of stone. It is of a fairy that I’ve never seen before; I can’t immediately tell what its talent might be. First of all, the fairy wings don’t look anything like real fairy wings. The statue’s ears aren’t pointed, either. Whoever made this probably have never seen a real fairy. Maybe grownup humans did make Stoneridge. I’ve never seen a grownup human. I wonder just how big they can get.
I hear fast running to my left. Vidia must be flying very low to the ground, because she can’t run that fast at all. I turn to my left. It’s not Vidia; it’s a bunch of sprinting thistles. Sprinting thistles? Oh, how I hate those things. So fast and so rude, the way they trample everything in their path. And they are spikier than the angriest artichokes. How did they even get here? If they’re left to run wild, they’ll wreck all of Stoneridge and it won’t be fit for anyone to spend summer at.
“Candy! Outta my way!” Vidia yells as she tries in vain to catch up to the spiky rascals.
“What the fudge?! How can I help, Vidia?”
“You can’t! Just stay out of the way while we fairies with real talents save the day!”
Myka, Trak, and a couple other scout fairies were chasing after the thistles too, but if Vidia can’t catch them, and she can’t, there’s no way that any of the scout fairies will. Wouldn’t surprise me a bit if Vidia had brought the thistles here just so she could show off by being the one to catch them. But I have nothing to base that on but a hunch.
Anyway, if that was her plan, it wasn’t going very well. And if the fastest fast-flying talent can’t catch them, then Stoneridge will be a pile of rubble by sunset.
Unless…
I do have that chunk of white pixie dust in my pouch. Maybe, if I pinch off a piece…roll it into a ball, like this…and…
I wait until the thistles come stampeding back toward me, then I whip the ball of white dust ahead of them and it splats on the ground. The thistles run over it and their tiny little feet stick instantly. Some of the pixie dust mixes with the island dust and it poofs up and sticks the thistles all together in a sweet, sticky web.
Vidia, still flying feverishly after them, can’t pull back in time, and before she knows it, she’s stuck in the web with the thistles. I turn my head away, so she won’t see me laughing.
The scout fairies eventually catch up to the sticky scene.
“Wow,” Myka exclaims. “Who stopped ‘em?”
“I did, sweeties,” I reply, trying to sound humble.
“You did, Candy? I didn’t know sugar fairies could do that,” Trak says.
“Yep. New thing I’ve been working on. Some of the things we sugar fairies can do could curdle your cobbler.”
“Really? Anyway, good job.”
“Yes,” Vidia adds, squirming and squiggling amongst the thistles, “good job, Candy. Now, can you get me unstuck from this gook, darling?”
“I’d love to, cutie pie, but I’m afraid I only know how to stick stuff. Unsticking is probably some other fairies’ talent.”
“CANDY!”
#
Silvermist and a few water fairies used some rather high-powered jets of hot spring water to get Vidia unstuck, and to keep the sprinting thistles in a tub where they can stay afloat and out of trouble, and later that afternoon, everyone is ready to head back to Pixie Hollow.
Except me.
There’s still no one who knows exactly when Stoneridge was built, and by whom, fairy or human. We’ll probably never find out.
I want to stay. I want to find out what’s making me want to stay here, or why Queen Clarion chose me to be the sweetener for Stoneridge. If I come right out and ask her, I know she’d never tell me.
I climb into the basket of a balloon being piloted by Zephyr; Vidia was one of the first fast-flyers to leave. I stand at the back of the basket, resting my head in my hands as I watch Stoneridge disappear from my view. I hope to visit again someday soon.
Some people cringe when they read their old fanfiction. Not me. I absolutely love this. I’ve reread it hundreds of times, mostly because of the joy it fills me with.
I loved coming up with Candy, the sugar fairy. And for whatever reason, I felt the need to have her speak in her own funny way. That’s how I came up with what I call her “sweetspeak.”
Everything she says, every sentence she utters, always has something related to sweets. I had fun coming up with the different puns and other sneaky ways I worked sweets into everything Candy says, without having to resort to using the word “sweet.”
Dulcinea, another sugar fairy, also talks in sweetspeak, because all sugar fairies do; they simply cannot help themselves.
And I named the place Stoneridge, because that was the name of the place where my Aunt Lois and Uncle Jerry lived when I was a kid.