After quickly descending ten flights of stairs Buck felt relieved to remove his bowler hat and tie. It was the first thing he did as he walked out the large arched front entrance of PJ Freeman’s. It was the highlight of his day. He crossed the courtyard of the bank and sat on a grass covered wall beneath a drooping willow tree. This was his usual spot as he waited for his father to appear. Looking at the ten story hulking mass of PJ Freeman’s in front of him always filled Buck with both a respect for the labour required to construct the building, but also a disdain for the labour that took place inside it.
Their father and son routine was to walk home together to their cottage two miles away. Buck Senior had a habit of working past his contractually obligated hours.
Buck nodded to some of the other leprechauns who were making their way home from the bank in groups. Branna Greenwhistle passed by completely oblivious of his surroundings as he scanned the yellow parchment he had been working on earlier. He was known to take his work home with him from time to time, and this was one of those particular days. Buck suspected he didn’t do it to impress Mr Quid, but simply because he loved his work so much. Mr Quid was willing to turn a blind eye to the practice once it resulted in more work being completed.
Buck’s position on the wall afforded him a majestic view of the ocean that spilled out from the cliff edge in the distance behind the bank. The retreating sun painted vibrant reds and oranges across the horizon. But the sunset paled in splendour to the magnificence of the Innis Freeish rainbow that constantly hung above the island. The leprechauns simply called it the Arc. The semicircle draped the sky reflecting reds, greens, blues and some lesser known colours onto the glistening waves below.
Starting from the centre of the Arc, the colours slowly bulged and pulsated toward the outer edge, causing a cascading glitter of mixed colours to sprinkle from its surface, before finally dissipating into thin air.
It was one of the few facets of magic that was tolerated on Innis Freeish. There was a general ignorance on the island as to how it functioned, but there was an understanding that the Arc somehow protected the island from outside hostility. As the leprechauns had no military or armed defence of their own, the Arc was their first, and only, line of defence. But no leprechaun on the island had ever seen it do anything, other than the slow rhythmic pulse they saw it perform on a daily basis. Buck found it unfortunate that most of the other leprechauns took the breath-taking beautiful of the Arc for granted. He had heard Percy Underhedge complain numerous times about how it disagreed with his own aesthetic sensibilities.
“And what does the bloomin’ thing actually do? Nothing! It just sits there in the sky like a lazy fool!” Percy would exclaim.
Most of bank’s employees had left by the time Buck Senior emerged from PJ Freeman’s. He approached Buck with a giddy smile on his face.
“I closed out that Huckleton whiskey account today son. You should have seen me,” Buck Senior said as he stroked his moustache. Buck Senior’s moustache dominated his face. Not because of it was overly large in size, but rather because his other facial features provided such poor competition. His moustache had held onto most of its red colour over the years, even though the remaining hair on his head had long ago surrendered to grey. Buck Senior was wearing a similar styled suit to Buck, just a slightly different shade of green.
“Everything in the ledgers balanced,” he said while miming some fancy ledger work, “even the stuff that wasn’t supposed to. It was beautiful”. Buck Senior had a habit of performing air accountancy when reliving some of his proudest work.
“That’s great Dad,” Buck said while trying to sound impressed.
“I wanted to take the ledger home to show you and your brother, but Mr Glendacob said no. Bank policy, you know how it is. How was your day?”
“Magical,” Buck replied sarcastically.
“Keep working at it,” he said with enthusiasm, “you’ll soon have days like mine. There’s nothing like the thrill of writing that final number into the opposite column and realising everything has balanced out. Now that’s real magic. I might be in line for a promotion at the end of the cycle, if I keep balancing at this rate anyhow. Who knows, I might be managing the Huckleton account on my own this time next year.”
Buck managed to fane a smile to appease his father. All Buck dreamed about was one day becoming a skilled magician. But the days of making a living from magic was long gone his father would firmly remind him. All serious leprechauns focused on accountancy these days. So Buck found himself working with accounts like his father, and his father’s father, and the fine tradition of Snagglepots working with accounts trundled on.
Buck hopped off the wall and the two started walking home together. Innis Freeish was mostly a rural island of open pastures, rolling hills and moss covered walls. Roads on the island were small pathways that connected together different communities of leprechauns. Grass sometimes grew in the middle of the roads but was mostly kept in check by the constant trundle of leprechaun boots.
PJ Freeman’s was located in the most affluent parts of Innis Freeish in an area called Glen of the Fine Dwellings. All of the island’s banks, and most of the richest leprechauns’ houses, were clustered together in this community. All the buildings in Glen of the Fine Dwellings were built from sandstone bricks.
“Not only is sandstone brick superior structurally to limestone brick,” Buck Senior started to say as they left the PJ Freeman courtyard, “but sandstone affords all the benefits of elevated social status my son.” Buck hated it when his father started talking about the advantages of sandstone over limestone; he’d heard the speech hundreds of times.
As the king of PJ Freeman’s, Thornbow Silverline’s house took pride of place next door to the bank. It was a typical leprechaun house for that part of the island. It had four bedrooms over two floors with exposed brick, a thatched roof and a strong wooden door. Since leprechauns had never thought to invent glass, all windows on the island had wooden shutters that were closed when it got chilly. A rather plain square garden of grass adorned the front.
Buck glanced at the Silverline house to see if Penny was back from her embroidery lesson. He knew how much she hated those classes and was always eager to leave as early as possible. A thin trail of smoke coming from the chimney told him someone was at home. Buck Senior noticed the direction of his son’s gaze.
“A Sliverline, of all leprechauns,” he said smiling while shaking his head, “friends with my own son. If only your mother was alive today to see this. But don’t imagine it will last unless you climb your way up the ranks of management like Finbar.”
Being compared to his brother Finbar was another thing that really got on Buck’s nerves. Which was unfortunate as Buck Senior also had a habit of doing it regularly.
“What makes you think she’s into all that?” Buck added.
“A Silverline, not interested in banking! Have you been eating some of Fido’s num nums?”
“Just because she’s a Silverline doesn’t mean anything,” Buck replied.
“It means one thing. It means she’s a Silverline. And the Silverline’s are into banking,” Buck Senior said with a tone that implied the discussion was over. The two continued walking in silence as they passed some of the other banks in Glen of the Fine Dwellings. Looming sandstone structures cast a long shadow over the pair as they walked.
Having left Glen of the Fine Dwellings behind the Snagglepots happened upon a most curious sight on their way home. A small brown Shetland pony was galloping along the road against them in the direction of the Glen of the Fine Dwelling. But galloping isn’t really the correct word, for galloping implies grace of movement and swiftness of speed. The pony that approached Buck and his father looked as though it had completely forgotten how to be a pony, and was suffering severe distress as a result. Its legs were flailing in the most unusual running technique Buck had ever seen.
To make matters more ridiculous the pony was making a strange panicked screeching noise that neither Snagglepot had ever heard before in their lives. The fact that it was almost dark at that stage made the encounter even most bizarre.
Buck Senior looked around in all directions while squinting his eyes to see if he could find the pony’s owner. With the exception of a few trees and stone hedges here and there, it was open fields, and nothing else.
“Most peculiar,” he said as much to himself as to Buck.
Buck Senior stopped the animal in its tracks as it passed them. All ponies on Innis Freeish wore grey blankets on their backs with their names embroidered in red lettering on the bottom. The pony they encountered wore no such blanket.
“A pony without a blanket, most peculiar indeed,” he added in the same tone. Buck Senior stared into the ponies eyes for a moment. He saw a level of wildness in the animal that alarmed him. It was a mixture of senseless urgency combined with frantic confusion.
“Where are you going to in such an awkward hurry mister?” he asked the pony in a hushed voice. Shetland ponies are incapable of understanding spoken word or of speaking it themselves. So Buck Senior’s question was more rhetorical in nature.
“We’ll have to find out where you…” but before Buck Senior could finish, the pony reared up on its hind legs, and sped off in the direction of Glen of the Fine Dwellings. It continued with the same undignified running style as before. The screeching continued unabated.
“What in the world got into that fella,” Buck Senior said, “running crazy like he’d just seen an elf.”
Buck was secretly relieved the pony had fled. While he was intrigued and concerned about the animal in equal measure, he was also eager to get home. He wanted to practice some magic before meeting Penny the following morning. Employees of PJ Freeman were given one day off work each week for personal time.
“I’ll file a report with Abnor first thing Monday morning,” said Buck Senior.
Abnor was the Department for Abnormal Affairs. It was an organisation that documented anything that occurred on Innis Freeish that was considered out of the ordinary. The senior council of elders liked to highlight the important role Abnor played in keeping them informed of any potential elf activity on the island.
“Do you think he’ll be alright?” Buck asked.
“He’s heading in the right direction anyway,” Buck Senior replied without explaining what he meant. “Let’s be getting home, the night is almost upon us.”
It was pitch black by the time the two Snagglepots arrived home to their limestone cottage in a small town whose official name was the Village of Reasonable Aspirations. The locals simply called it the Village, while the residents of Glen of the Fine Dwellings shortened it to Assville.
Buck Senior lit a couple of lanterns in the living area of their cottage. He then sat down on an old rocking chair and picked up a parchment with some financial information written on it. The living area was sparsely furnished with a few wooden chairs and a small table. An open fire was the centre piece of the room; some pots, pans and other cooking tools hung down from the hearth. Buck went straight to his bedroom as his father started saying something about sandstone again.
“You need to set sandstone as a major goal in life son, it’s a higher quality of stone you see,” Buck Senior was explaining while half looking at the page right in front of him. But Buck had already closed his bedroom door at that stage.
Even through the Snagglepot cottage was small, it was more than big enough for two leprechauns. An average cottage in the Village would typically accommodate five or six leprechauns. Their limestone cottage consisted of three rooms: two were bedrooms while the third, and largest, functioned as a family living and cooking area.
Finbar’s success at Goldpack Investments allowed him to rent his own cottage in a different part of the Village. Buck missed having his older brother around but was consolidated by the fact that he got his own bedroom. The books on Buck’s small book stand rustled from a slight breeze that entered through the open window. He lit a small lantern that was attached to the wall.
“Fido?” Buck enquired.
Fido was Buck’s pet puka. Puka’s were little creatures native to Innis Freeish’s only forest known as the Bushy Brush. They were sometimes taken in by leprechauns as pets when they were found injured, as Fido was. Relative to a leprechaun they were about the same size as a squirrel, with bright bushy tails and compact little faces with pointed ears resembling a baby rabbit. Their chestnut coloured fur was silky to stroke and very water resistant. This characteristic was particularly useful as pukas loved swimming, but hated getting wet.
Buck always left his window shutter open while at work so Fido could come and go from the house as he pleased. Pukas were very social animals and would often meet in groups together somewhere in the Village during the day. All the others pukas in the Village were in various stages of recovery from different injuries.
Fido peaked out from underneath Buck’s single bed. He had been sleeping, and rubbed his eyes with his little hands. In spite of the slight limp in his right hind leg, Fido sprinted across the room on all fours. He then climb up Buck’s leg and sat on his shoulder.
Pukas were very intelligent for their size. They communicated with each other using a string of chirping sounds that leprechauns couldn’t understand. They also displayed a capacity for affection towards the world that is rarely seen in living creatures. It was one of the reasons they made such great pets.
“Hey little fella. How are you?”
Fido let out a few chirps then started rummaging around Buck’s breast pocket using his tail for balance. Buck knew he was looking for a num num.
Num nums were the roasted fruit of crannor trees that grew in the Bushy Brush. The small red berries turned pale blue when heated, and caused a type of hyperactivity in pukas when eaten.
“Hey, I gave you a num num this morning. And one when I came back for lunch as well. It’s too late now Fido,” Buck explained.
Fido crossed his arms and frowned.
“Sorry,” Buck added.
Fido looked Buck in the eyes for a moment then gave him a hug. Pukas liked hugging.
Fido climbed down from Buck’s shoulder and ran to the bookshelf, and pointed at one of the books. He was jumping up and down with a big smile on his face. Fido wanted to see Buck perform some magic, and Buck was thinking the same thing. He grabbed one of the books and laid it open on his bed. He had been practicing one specific spell for over two weeks and wanted to have it perfected to impress Penny the following morning.
“Okay, but I have to be quiet,” Buck said to Fido.
Buck wasn’t in the mood to be lectured by his father about performing magic. Buck Senior was worried that his son’s interest in magic, and lack of interest in banking, would ruin his friendship with Penny.
“Their class of leprechaun have no time for magic,” he would often remind his son. “They can afford to buy whatever it is they want.”
The use of magic had increasingly been viewed as a pastime of the lower classes of society on Innis Freeish. An inability to pay for something with hard earned gold coins was seen as a personal failure in life. Deep rooted in leprechaun culture was the desire to portray one’s family as being better off than one’s neighbours. As the generations went by the upper classes gradually abandoned magical pursuits as a show of their superior buying power. And so the middle and lower classes followed suit in an attempt to keep up with the higher ups as they were called. By the time Buck developed an interest in magic it had been all but banned on Innis Freeish.
For the next hour an array of unusual coloured lights and popping sounds took the place of the boring lantern light and stillness in Buck’s bedroom.