Accompanied

Disclaimer~ Characters I created myself belong to me, therefore Darryl, Easnadh and anyone I choose to add along the way. If I choose at a later date to incorporate characters from the original "universe" then the Grace family and other such characters or objects related to The Spiderwick Chronicles belong to Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi. I am, in no way, gaining any profit from this fanfiction, be it virtually or in any other such way.

:sarcasm:

Now that the disclaimer is done and out of the way; this is an incomplete fanfiction. So incomplete, in fact, that all it is-- well... it's basically two 'teaser' extracts that are to be inserted into the story at a later date. What I typically do is write paragraphs out that are of scenes stuck in my mind and then build around them at a later date.

• This fanfiction is for The Spiderwick Chronicles. It was originally meant to be an original piece of fiction, but I felt that borrowing the idea of nixies might make it so it was more of a stand alone Spiderwick fic. So, non-Spiderwick fans can/should understand it too. That's the beauty of it.

• Last week I bought The Field Guide. Pouring through it, my eyes fell on the 'Nixie' page and there was some sort of... connection there. I suddenly had to write about a nixie.

• At first I planned to write a stand-alone story for myself, but I decided against that, since I’d be borrowing a lot of ideas (despite however mainstream they are) of Black’s and DiTerlizzi’s. I also thought I should attempt to get myself back into the familiarity of writing fanfictions again. Hence why this can be a stand-alone fic or just an original piece for non-Spiderwick fans to equally enjoy.

• I haven’t read Beyond The Spiderwick Chronicles. I only just started writing this when I remembered what the first volume’s title was. However, this fanfiction should be different enough so that if I do get around to reading it, I would not be put off of writing this. And it should be different enough to still be fresh and interesting. ... I hope.

• The main character is not a member of the Grace bunch.

I don't particularly want heavy crit, but just general feedback would be nice. 8D

Extract I

“What… are you?” The gurgle that he had allowed to pass from his lips, separated by a single hesitation, was enough to alarm the girl before him. At least, he assumed she was a girl. Her features were nothing if not feminine.
The creature’s eyes widened, her mouth opening in alarm.
He suddenly felt as if he wanted to reassure her, felt as if he were backing her into a corner, so to speak, and didn’t want this to be so. “I…”
Darryl blinked. And then she was gone.
“Wh-? Hey-!”
He darted to the edge of the pool, heart pounding in his chest. For some reason he was filled with a curious energy. A need. A need to understand. To have seen what he had thought he’d seen.
… There was nothing to suggest that she’d been there, nothing but a ripple which emanated from the area of water which she had slipped back into. And even that was faint.
There wasn’t even a silhouette to be seen, not in the shallows nor the deeper, murkier areas of the pool. Though the way the sun beat down upon it, the surface was more like a mirror. His own reflection registered with him. There was a strange, hungry look on his face. He didn’t even look like himself.
He deflated. No, it easily could have been his own imagination. And yet… something then caught his eye. Something trivial, but fashioned in such a way that it intrigued him.
Bending down, he picked up the object, chewing the inside of his cheek in wonder.
Then a satisfied smile spread across his face. It was a flute. A flute made of reeds.
And as soon as his fingers brushed over it, it unravelled. Remaining in his hand were three single reeds lying straight and taut, each with small holes punched into them.
He was torn as to whether he should take the curious items or not.
After a moment’s deliberation, he turned back, crouched low beside the pond and placed the reeds side by side at the water’s edge, just at the top of the bank.
He sat back, smiling. “It fell apart in my hands. Though I’m sure you’re clever enough to weave it back together again.”
He only hoped the flattery would save him from any evil that might befall him after this. He couldn’t explain why that thought had struck him, why he believed that he might, or should be, in trouble for her flute to have unwound in his hand, but a cold chill had descended down his spine. He swallowed thickly.
She could be capable of anything. After all, that creature, whatever she was… she wasn’t human.

Extract II

“My name?” Her voice was melodious. It drifted from her lips beautifully.
“Yes,” Darryl crouched down on one knee in front of her, his hands one on top of the other atop his leg.
She glanced at his face, and then inspected his stance, his hands. Once satisfied, she plucked a twig from her side and swam gracefully to another side of the pond, where the bank arched up higher, presenting a wide sparse of supple mud.
Darryl wasn’t sure whether he was meant to follow or stay put. After all, she’d only moved a few feet. The pond wasn’t particularly large. From here he could clearly see the exposed bulk of dirt, and it didn’t take him long to realise what she was doing.
She righted her grip on the twig, struggling somewhat to hold it like a pen as a human would due to her webbed hands.
She began carving letters into the mud. The letters spelled out: “Easnadh”.
Darryl didn’t even want to try and pronounce it for fear of insulting her by getting it wrong. But it didn’t take long for her to say it aloud herself. She turned back, expression neutral. “Easnadh.” She pronounced it: “As-na.”
Darryl sniffed. The name was probably Irish or Welsh, he couldn’t put his finger on which. The complex spelling for the pronounciation was as much a giveaway as anything.
“Easnadh,” he repeated.
The nixie inclined her head. “Yes,” she said, in that same pretty tone. And she smiled, her green hued lips arching upwards and her eyes shutting, seemingly content.
The tinny music emanating from his phone came to an end. Suddenly her eye’s snapped open and she looked on-edge, as if wondering what to do with herself.
Darryl held out his hands and gently made motions as if he were lightly pushing at the air, effectually telling her that it was okay, she could calm down.
Easnadh took a shaky breath and then darted back into the depths of the pond, her long, flowing tendrils of hair bobbing on the surface of the water. “What is it that you require of me, human? How is it that you have the Sight?”
“The what?” Darryl leant over to pick his phone up and start up another track. The faerie watched his every move. Hesitating, he highlighted a single song. He wasn’t sure whether to play it or not.
“The Sight,” Easnadh finally said. “You can see me, yes?”
He didn’t get a chance to answer her. Darryl placed his cell back down on the grass as Michelle Tumes’ Lovely drifted through the air, weaving over the pond to reach the nixie there. Easnadh’s eyes widened as the music began to play. This song calmed her in such a way that she shook out her hair and swam back over to the bank. She then half-heaved herself out of the water. Darryl almost choked on the very air he was breathing. This was the closest he’d been to her.
“This music… it’s splendid.” She hummed, smiling dreamily.
Now that she was so close, Darryl could see her face clearly. Her skin was a warm, opalescent shade of green with darker shades dappled over and around her nose. Like freckles. Her lips, too, were of a slightly darker hue than her skin.
He could see no human ears, as such, but what was reminiscent of a single fish tail knifed through her hair either side of her face. And yet, they were something entirely different about them. These appendages twitched subconsciously, and reminded him of a very delicate film, yet they were solid enough not to droop in any way.
And her eyes… they were blue.
“… what do they call you?”
“Huh?” Darryl snapped to attention, blinking as he was jerked from his thoughts. He calmed. “Oh, uh, my name? It’s… D-Darryl.”
“Well, D-Darryl…”
He grimaced, shaking his head. “No, no, just… Darryl.”
Easnadh tilted her head on one side. She had no eyebrows to raise sceptically, but the way her expression changed gave the impression that she was looking at him as if he were odd. Then, suddenly, two tubular antennae akin to two strands of hair suddenly whipped out from beneath her mane of brown-green. Darryl gasped and fell backwards onto his rear, blinking at her. They were the same colour as her skin, as long as his arm and flexible. He’d mistaken them as rather 3D markings on her forehead, where they had been mounted, as she’d had them tucked beneath her hair.
These antennae were not too thick, nor too wide, and they were almost a translucent green. The tips dived beneath the water.
“O… kay,” he said slowly, gulping and pulling himself into a sitting position.
Easnadh simply stared at him. “We are different, you and I.”
“I can see that,” he said.