The Discontented Gnome

There lived in the Magic Forest a gnome by the name of Guilder. Like all gnomes, he worked very hard from sunup to sundown. The Great Mother, who created all creatures to serve a purpose, assigned gnomes the task of tending the plant life in the forest. They labored through the spring and summer caring for young, tender seedlings and toiled through the autumn planting seeds and bulbs that would emerge from the soil the following spring.

It was only during the winter that gnomes got a break from their labors. In the cold months, gnomes mostly sleep, but they do wake occasionally to eat. And, if there is no deep snow on the ground, they visit with other gnomes.

One cold January morning, Guilder awoke with familiar hunger pangs. After eating a tasty dried mushroom and a few sweet, juicy winter berries, he went to the entrance of his gnome hole to see if it had snowed overnight. It hadn't.

Feeling a desire for companionship, Guilder put on his warmest tunic and headed outside into the frosty air. Shivering, he hurried to a neighboring gnome hole to visit with fellow gnome, Gramble. Seeing his friend fast asleep, Guilder gently shook him.

Gramble wasn't angry at being awakened since gnomes are sociable creatures and enjoy having company. The two friends sat in front of a warm, crackling fire and told stories, a favorite pastime for gnomes. After a while, Gramble took out a bottle of boysenberry nectar and started talking about earthworms, insects and soil properties.

Guilder grew bored and restless.

"Don't you ever get tired of working in the dirt?" he asked.

Gramble was shocked. This was very ungnome-like talk.

"I am a gnome," he replied. "It is my sacred duty to tend to the plants and trees of the forest. What else would you have me do? Stay in my gnome hole all year long?"

"No, I suppose not. But don't you sometimes wish you weren't born a gnome?"

Gramble nearly choked on his nectar.

"Not be a gnome? What crazy talk is this, Guilder?"

"I'm so tired of living and working on the ground or in the mud. More than anything, I wish I were a fairy."

"A fairy! Whatever for?"

In the sacred order of the forest, gnomes were solid, hard-working and respected citizens. Fairies, on the other hand, were mischievous, lazy creatures and not ones to be trusted. Still in all, Guilder was fascinated by the fae folk.

"I watch them when they play," he said wistfully. "They fly through the air, sing their strange songs and dance on the flowers."

"And they make a mess of the forest, knocking the petals off the blossoms when they do," Gramble grumbled.

"It would be wonderful to be so free. Imagine what it would be like to feel the sun on your face when you fly above the treetops or to float on the wind with your wings spread."

Gramble began to chuckle and then broke out in great belly laughs.

"I can just see you flying around in the air," he said.

He laughed so hard that tears fell from his eyes.

Guilder got up to leave. Gramble stopped laughing, afraid that he had offended his dearest friend.

"You are a gnome," Gramble announced proudly. "One of an old and noble race of folk."

"I know, but I wish with all my heart I was a fairy instead."

* * *

The word spread slowly through the frosty winter and more rapidly when the spring sun thawed the ice and snow in the forest: Guilder was not happy being a gnome.

When the sun coaxed the spring seedlings out of their slumber and the gnomes went back to work in the forest, Guilder's friends took great joy in teasing him. His cousin Primrose even went so far as to present Guilder with a fake pair of wings.

"You can't be a fairy unless you can fly," she laughed.

Guilder, though normally good natured, was annoyed by the constant jokes.

Soon word spread to the fairies, and they delighted in tormenting the little gnome with insults such as "wingless," "earthbound" and "mud dweller."

Guilder was so unhappy that he packed his bag and left his gnome hole to go find a new home in another part of the forest.

While he was climbing over an especially large tree root, Guilder was surprised by four roguish fairies who grabbed him by his arms and legs and hoisted him up into the air. Terrified, Guilder squeezed his eyes shut, but once he realized the four fairies could hold his weight, he slowly opened them. At first, all he could see were branches and the receding ground beneath him. Then the fairies raised him above the trees, and Guilder was astonished by the panoramic view before him.

Gnomes were born in the forest and spent their entire lives in the gnome community. As such, they knew of no other world but the tall trees and the forest floor. Guilder could now see that the trees came to an end and that there were stretches of flat, grassy fields and rolling hills that met an endless expanse of water beyond, which disappeared in the horizon. The small brook that meandered through the forest grew into a river that cut through the rolling fields and made its way to the endless water. Guilder stared in wonder, seeing what no other gnome had ever seen.

"Had enough?" one of the fairies asked him.

Guilder was speechless.

Then the fairies took him back to the ground where he belonged. The fae had meant their little prank as a joke, but Guilder thanked them profusely.

"You have shown me things I never knew existed," he cried joyfully.

The fairies were touched by Guilder's gratitude. They had never realized how limited a gnome's world was.

Having soared to the skies, Guilder turned around and headed back to his home. His fellow gnomes greeted him warmly. Primrose even wiped tears from her eyes.

"Are you all right?" Gramble asked with worry.

"Of course I am," Guilder replied. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"We saw you being carried away by those fairies. They didn't hurt you, did they?"

"No, no. They took me high above the trees and showed me what was beyond the forest."

"Beyond the forest?" the eldest and wisest gnome echoed.

All the gnomes gathered around Guilder, eager to hear his story. He told them about the green fields, the rolling hills and the winding river that led to the endless water.

No one believed him.

"The fairies must have dropped you on your head," Gramble laughed.

"It is true! I tell you I saw those things with my own eyes."

"Ridiculous!" the old gnome declared. "Land without trees and water as far as the eye can see! What nonsense!"

Guilder tried to convince his fellow gnomes of the truth, but no one would listen. Humiliated, he once more packed his belongings into a knapsack and left his friends and family. This time, he walked beside the brook and headed toward the edge of the forest. He would follow the river through the meadows and rolling hills to the endless water he had glimpsed from the air.

* * *

The gnomes believed Guilder would be back by nightfall, but when he didn't return they had no fear. They supposed he had spent the night with a gnome family he met while walking through the forest, as gnomes are extremely hospitable creatures. Guilder would surely be back in a few days' time. But the wandering gnome did not come back at the end of the week nor at the end of the month. Spring turned into summer and summer to fall, and still there was no sign of Guilder.

"Do you think he'll ever come home?" Gramble asked the oldest and wisest gnome.

"Who is to say?" the wise one replied. "Perhaps he has found a she-gnome and has decided to stay with her."

Gramble looked uncertain.

"What if ...?"

He hesitated, afraid to put his fear into words.

"What if everything he told us was true? What if there is an end to the forest? What if there is more to the world than our tall trees, forest flowers and mushrooms?"

The oldest and wisest gnome considered this for several minutes.

"I suppose it might be possible," he grudgingly admitted.

"And if there is a world so unlike our own," Gramble continued, "might it present unknown dangers for a gnome?"

"If such places do exist, and if Guilder did seek them out, there is nothing any of us can do to help him."

Gramble wasn't so sure.

Later that evening when work was done for the day and the hungry, hardworking gnomes returned to their gnome holes, Gramble hiked down to the forest stream. The cool, running water was a favorite spot of the playful fairies. As he had suspected, there were several fae folk frolicking in the water.

"What do you want, wingless?" one of them shouted when he saw Gramble standing on the mossy bank.

"I'm looking for my friend, Guilder. He has been gone since early spring."

As luck would have it, one of the fairies in the water was one who had helped hoist the little gnome high above the trees.

"I know this Guilder you speak of," he said. "What has become of him?"

Gramble told him about the events that had taken place the day Guilder left the forest.

"You foolish mud dwellers cannot see beyond the end of your long noses," the fairy cried. "Your friend, Guilder, has been up to the skies and seen with his own eyes the edge of the forest and the land and water that lie beyond, and yet you ignorant little gnomes refuse to believe the truth when you hear it."

Gramble hung his head in shame.

"But I suppose we fairies have our own faults. Our gift of flight has enabled us to know the truth and yet we selfishly kept it from you earthbound creatures."

The other fairies, at first contemptuous of Gramble, now admired the loyalty he had for his friend.

"Let us go and look for this missing gnome named Guilder," a beautiful and rare blue fairy declared.

Her fellow fairies readily agreed. They rose as one from the water, the moisture sparkling on their delicate wings. As they flew east toward the edge of the forest, more and more fae folk joined them.

The gnomes on the ground watched in awe at the colorful flock of fairies that flew overhead. Yet once the fae folk passed, the gnomes went back to work. No one wondered where the fairies were going or what they were planning. Gnomes—with the exception of Guilder—cared not what took place in the sky above them. They kept their feet firmly on the ground and their heads out of the clouds.

* * *

The last days of fall faded away, and winter cast its icy hand over the forest. With the plants in hibernation, the gnomes took to the warmth and comfort of their gnome holes. But for Gramble, there was no happiness in this peaceful time. His friend, Guilder, was gone and now so, too, were the fairies of the forest.

Gramble no longer doubted his friend's claims that there were flat, treeless lands, rolling hills and a great body of water beyond the forest's borders. What Gramble didn't know was whether that strange land was so beautiful that Guilder and the fairies preferred it to the forest or whether it held dangers that neither gnome nor fae could overcome.

"It is not knowing that makes it hard for me to go on without my friend," Gramble told Fiora, his she-gnome. "If I only knew he was in a better place, I would rejoice for him. But to think that Guilder exists no more—oh! that I cannot bear!"

Gramble's sadness came to an end two days after the first snowfall of winter. He and Fiora were sitting in front of a warm fire, sharing a very tasty mushroom cap when a familiar voice called to him from the entrance of his gnome hole.

"Guilder!" he cried with joy, running out into the cold. "Is it really you?"

"Yes, my friend. I have returned at last."

Guilder stood knee deep in snow. Above him hovered hundreds of fairies, all of whom were celebrating their own homecoming by singing their strange fae songs.

One by one, curious little heads popped out of other gnome holes. Shouts of joy and wonder could soon be heard from every corner of the forest.

"Guilder's come home!"

Gramble looked closely at his long-lost friend. He was not the same Guilder who had disappeared in the early spring. He had aged tremendously. A long white beard—one that rivaled that of the oldest and wisest gnome—had grown on his face. His hair, too, had grown long and white, and he looked a good seven or eight hundred years older than he actually was.

All the gnomes had emerged from their holes and, shivering from the cold, gathered around their wandering friend. Everyone was stunned to see the change in the little gnome.

"I have walked through the flat, treeless land," he began, immediately capturing every gnome's attention. "I have climbed the rolling hills, bathed in the winding river and wet my feet where the great water meets the shiny white soil."

"White soil?" the oldest and wisest gnome asked. "There is such a thing?"

Guilder reached into his pockets and took out handfuls of smooth, glistening sand. The other gnomes huddled around him, eager to touch the strange white soil.

Guilder continued, "I have seen many wondrous places and hundreds of strange new creatures. Some, like us, live on the land; some, like my friends the fairies, take to the air; and still others live in the water. I will tell you all about the sights I have seen—both the beautiful and the ugly. But right now I am tired and hungry. I want to get something to eat and then take a nice, long nap. You have the whole winter to hear of my journey."

So Guilder went into his gnome hole, nibbled on a mushroom and then promptly fell asleep. True to his word, however, he entertained both his fellow gnomes and his fairy friends with tales of his adventures that whole winter long. And Guilder's days of storytelling did not stop with the spring thaw. He continued to delight generations of forest creatures for several hundred years, until at last he closed his eyes never to open them again.

In all those centuries, Guilder never again left the forest, although from time to time, his fairy friends would hoist him high above the trees for another look at the treeless land, the rolling hills and the endless water. Having seen the world beyond the forest, Guilder was content to live on the ground, tend to the flowers in the forest and relive his adventures while sitting in front of a warm fire in the safety and comfort of his gnome hole.