Jay - Faerie healing

"Cuz that cut on your leg looks reeeeeal ugly, and I can cure it!"

Compelling argument. Jay leaned or fell over, fumblingly undid a latch on the cage door, and let out the fairy, prepared for all sorts of horseshit to ensue.

It ensued. The fairy burst skyward in a puff of noxious dust that sent Jay straining and coughing and streaming tears. It descended back to face level, gripped the brim of his hat, and hung from it to look him in the eye. He'd described the fairies Charm ate as rodent-sized people, and that was still true, but this one looked more like a large insect than a small mammal. Dark compound eyes, two twitching antennae, and dragonfly wings composed of incandescent scales, from which more dust puffed intermittently until he sneezed the fairy away from him.

Frenetic spasms reoriented the spiraling fairy in midair, where it settled to a hover maintained by thrumming its wings like a hummingbird. It wore no clothes. It also lacked visible genitalia, so Jay could only guess at its gender, if it had one. Its body, slender, bristled with silvery filaments that lent it a general fuzzy look.

"Wow! I like this hat!"

Wooziness crept in. "Heal me already."

"Right right right! Sorry got distracted. Stupendous hat though! Okay anyway."

The fairy zipped in a circle over his thigh and expelled a rainbow powder puff that stung sharply. But as the dust settled, the sting settled too. And when the dust cleared, not only did he no longer have a wound, but the bloodstains were gone and even the gash in his jeans was repaired.

"Nifty magic, huh? Impressed?" The fairy dropped cross-legged onto his knee. "Wait—wait wait! I forgot to introduce myself! I am—"

***

[2] The Same Place in a Worse World