Fat & Bones Read Online Free Page B

what I said,” said Fat.
    â€œExcellent.”
    â€œStop repeating what I say.”
    â€œStop repeating what I say,” said Leonard. He had forgotten where he was.
    Fat raised the knife. “Do you want me to give that wound a twin?”
    â€œExcellent.”
    Fat peered across Leonard’s eight eyes. “Hmm,” he said, “I might have drawn too much.” He shrugged.
    Higher in the tree, several limbs above, the kettle shrieked inside Leonard’s hole.
    â€œMy kettle,” whispered Leonard.
    Fat kicked aside the broken sunglasses on his way to his worktable. He poured Leonard’s blood into the Bluebell Blindness Inducer potion and swirled the mixture.
    The kettle’s scream cut through the night.
    â€œWhere can a fellow go for a little peace and quiet?” Fat shouted, banging the potion on the table.
    â€œKettle,” whispered Leonard.
    After fanning his wings and stomping his feet, Fat realized that if he did not want the tree to burn down, he’d have to take the kettle off the fire himself. He glared at Leonard, slumped in the corner. The spider had ruined the evening.
    And yet …
    The spider was also his neighbor. Did rules about helping a neighbor in need still apply in this day and age? Fat sighed and threw the knife onto the worktable.
    â€œI am ever one for sacrifices,” he said and pulled out a clean white cloth from the cupboard. He fluttered over to Leonard and placed the cloth upon the spider’s wounded leg, staunching the flow.
    â€œYou sit tight,” said Fat, straightening Leonard’s stocking cap. “I will return shortly.”
    While Fat flew out to tend to the kettle, Leonard slowly regained consciousness. He could hardly move his legs, but his eyes cleared a little. By the time Fat returned, kettle in hand, Leonard had dragged himself to the middle of the room and propped himself against a chair.
    â€œYou’re recovering well,” Fat said. “That’s quite a constitution you have.” He held up the kettle. “I saved the tree from burning. Shall we share a cup to celebrate? I think I have an herbal variety around here somewhere.”
    Leonard did not want tea. He did not want to stay and chat.
    However, being unable to move, he had no choice but to curl a leg around the teacup Fat set on the floor.

    Tea made Fat convivial. “Tell me, neighbor, how did you come by your love of poetry? You see, when I was young, I kept a journal of verse. I was no master of the form, you understand, but I came up with one or two pretty turns of phrase.”
    Fat droned on. To hear the fairy talk, a listener would think he had been the one starved for conversation.
    But Leonard didn’t hear or care. Weak though he was, he smiled.
    Before Priscilla Mae had slipped into the night, she had whispered to him, “Find me under the eaves. Poetry moves me.”
    A single whiff of love had swept Leonard free of gloom.
    â€œWhat a day, eh, neighbor?” said Fat. He looked around his hole with a satisfied grin. “Incidentally, how did that other spider escape?” He chuckled. “Now she was a sneaky one.”

    In the deep, dark night, unpopular but necessary creatures emerge from their hiding places and undertake unpopular but necessary activities. When dawn shoves the night away, no one speaks of these things, including me. But dawn has not arrived.

Priscilla Mae crept back into the night, away from the fat fairy’s tree.
    From a distance, she heard singing.
    She paused, dangling in the cool night air.
    A thousand voices rose, as clear as the stars above.
    Priscilla Mae listened carefully, eagerly, to discern the words of the song.

Dead man, dead man, once a beast,
    Now a splendid midnight feast,
    Newly dead, your blood still fresh,
    Best of all’s the softest flesh,
    Dead man, dead man, once a beast,
    Now a splendid midnight feast.
    Maggots—she should have known. Not a pretty sight,