Bandle had had about enough of this. One more snowball, and he was going to lose it on someone. He would rip this humiliating sign off of his back, throw it at the next person to throw a snowball at his head, and then he would tackle them. Unless they were a child. Then he would only toss them.

That morning, Bandle had to endure the frustrating punishment for his most recent screw-up: wearing a sign as he walked through town that said, “Throw snowballs at my head and win a prize!” Then, if anyone did hit him in the head, he was supposed to hand them one of the stuffed versions of a creature called a fluff-moo that he had in a bag to the respective “winners”.

Bandle decided that he would head out of the snowy village of Froljörow to see what progress his family had made in trying to fix the mess he had incidentally made. They were all working on one of the large stone statues that were positioned in a large ring around the village. Each one was crudely carved eons ago into the images of Jördic warriors, and together they acted as chains in a magical barrier that protected the village. Or at least it did, before Bandle broke one, thus the mad rush to fix it.

“Hello, everyone.” Said Bandle, when he reached the group of builders and sorcerers that were gathered around the broken statue. They all turned to glare at him when they recognized his voice. “Right…don’t suppose any of you have seen my family?”

“Bandle, what are you doing here?” came a man’s scruffy voice.

Out from the crowd came a smaller group of five people: his father the village chief, his mother, and his three older brothers. He was the shortest out of all of them—despite being over six feet tall—except for his mother. All of them looked tired, and as expected, all of them looked cross to see him.

“Well, son, let’s hear it.” Said the Chief, the largest of them all. “I see you still have some stuffed fluff-moos in that bag of yours, so why aren’t you still carrying out your punishment?”

“Dad, I just wanted to come and help.” Said Bandle.

“You can help by staying out of our way.” Said Valor, one of Bandle’s brothers. “You’ve helped the village enough as it is.”

“Look, I know I screwed up—”

“Again.” Cut in his brother, Handel. “You screwed things up for everyone, again.”

“But I don’t like it when you guys have to clean up for me, so I came to—”

“Oh, you don’t like it when people have to clean up after you?” said the Chief. “Well, neither do we, Bandle. And yet here we are in that same situation, again.” He sighed deeply before continuing. “Uh, you know what…Kroff, just…explain the new job to him and just have him get ready for it.”

“What?” said Bandle. “What new job?”

“There’s a trade that we need taken care of before the festival in a few days.” Said Kroff, the oldest of his brothers.

Bandle was shocked. “Wait…you’re really trusting me we a trade job?”

“No. We don’t trust you with anything.” Said Yonder, the last of his older brothers. “But as you can see, everyone that we actually trust is either here helping us fix your latest mess, or they’re actually doing their job with protecting the village.”

Bandle’s mother approached him next. She placed a hand on Bandle’s arms, sighed, and said, “Bandle, please. This is important. Try to do this to the best of your abilities—”

“Yeah, I will, Mom.”

“And, follow your father’s and your brother’s instructions exactly. We need those supplies. Not just for the festival either.”

After assuring his family that he would do his best—and after they made it painfully clear with the expressions on their faces that they had serious doubts about this—Kroff steered him away, back towards the village.

“You really worry them, you know.” Said Kroff, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “You worry all of us. You need to learn how to just do what you’re told.”

“I’m trying, Kroff.” Said Bandle. “I was doing fine staying out of trouble up until the other day…”

“Yea, I’ve heard that line before, Bandle. We all have. But here’s the thing…you’re thirty winters old now…you shouldn’t be getting into this much trouble still. The young ones look up to you. Now, think of what would happen if one of them tried that stunt you lot pulled.”

Bandle had been forbidden from even talking to anyone who didn’t know already—especially the youth of the village—about what he and his friends had been up to that caused one of the magical barrier statues to be so heavily damaged. The fear was that if any of the youth did find out what he had done, they would try to replicate the stunt. However, what I can tell you is that it had to do with a few boxes of fireworks, an old wagon filled with mammoth dung, and a frost giant that had chased the lot of them down from the mountain where their little adventure had taken place.

“And that’s just part of the problem.” Kroff continued. “All your trouble-making also looks bad on the family, and it really looks bad on Dad since he’s the chief. I'm just saying, try to be considerate of us too that’s all.”

It was no use. There was no talking his way out of this.

“Excuse me, Mister!” came a small voice from somewhere below.

They had just passed the old Fae wishing well that was in the center of town, and a little girl with blonde pigtails had tugged on Bandle’s shoulder to get his attention.

“Oh, hello there, kiddo.” Said Bandle. “You need help with something?”

“Can you help me with the wishing well?”

“Help you? What’s wrong with it?”

“It won’t work. My brother told me that it’s supposed to grant wishes this time of year, but I’ve…I’ve already thrown in all of my copper coins that I saved up all year into the well this morning…and nothing happened!” Tears were welling up in the little girl’s eyes. She couldn’t have been more than seven years old.

Kroff groaned and tried his best to pay no mind to the conversation. He never had much patience for the whining and crying of little ones, including his own. In fact, he made it a point to train it out of his own children as soon as they were old enough to understand him. But that was fine. Bandle didn’t mind dealing with children like this one.

“Hey now, no tears, little bean.” Said Bandle, using a thumb to carefully dry a tear from the little girl’s cheek. “Now, you see there’s a secret to getting the well to grant your wishes. You just have to wait until the moons are full, that’s all.”

“The…the moons?” the little girl sniffled.

Another audible groan came from Kroff at this point as he rolled his eyes. “Oh, please…” Bandle glared at him, though, and Kroff turned away, rolling his eyes again.

“Oh don’t listen to him.” Bandle waved off his brother. “He’s just allergic to fun and wishy-talk, that’s all. You see, in a few days, on the night of the Festival of Gloaming, look up into the night sky. On that night, all four moons will be full and bright blue. And when they are full and blue, that’s when the old magics of the well will spring to life. Then all you’ll have to make a wish and it’ll come true.”

“Really?” the little girl beamed. “Thanks, mister!” Her bright smiled dimmed a bit then. “But wait, I still don’t have any more coins…”

Bandle reached into his back pocket and pulled out a pair of copper coins and placed them into the hands of the little girl. “Here you go. Now you have enough to make a wish for yourselves and you can give one to your brother too.”

The little girl’s face burst into another enormous smile. She ran up to Bandle and shocked him with a giant hug. “Thank you, Mister.” She then let go, turned the other way, and began skipping off into the village. To where, though, Bandle didn’t know.

“Now why would you go and fill her head with nonsense like that?” said Kroff once the girl was out of earshot. “That wishing well hasn’t worked in a hundred years or something.”

“Yes it does,” Bandle said, determinedly. “I’ve told you before, everyone just thinks it doesn’t because just like that little girl, they always try to use it at the wrong time.”

“Uh-huh, right. Well, I still don’t think you should have filled her head with that one. Just think of how disappointed she’ll be when it doesn’t work.”

“It does work.”

“Oh yeah? Then how come you never wish for anything this time of year? I don’t seem to recall you ever coming home with anything outrageous or expensive that you shouldn’t have when we were kids. Or was this revelation of the well a recent discovery?”

The look on Bandle’s face soured then. “No…I didn’t. Let’s just say that sometimes it’s better to be grateful for what you have rather than wish for things you don’t. If you don’t…well, there’s no telling what kind of danger and ill will you could be inviting into yourself…especially when it comes to Fae magical artifacts.”

“Hmm…an interesting answer, brother…a suspicious answer. You speak of danger when it comes to the well, and yet you saw fit to tell that little girl exactly how to use it. Why is that?”

“The only reason I told her how to use it is because limits were placed on that well long ago…”

“Limits? What does that mean? Placed on it by whom?”

But Bandle waved his questions away. “It doesn’t matter. Just let it go. Just fairy tales remember? I wouldn't want to make your eyes roll out of your head from all the ‘nonsense’. Let’s just say it was a lesson well learnt…and just leave it at that, brother.”

Then, wanting to change the subject, Bandle said, “So, anyway, what does Dad want me to deliver and pick up for the village?”

“It’s a bunch of food for the festival along with some much-needed medical supplies.” Said Kroff. “And what you’ll be delivering is a few magical potions and other supplies. It’s all happening between us and this village up north. I forget the name of it, though.”

“Oh yeah? And Dad trusts me with something like that, huh? Did mom make him give me the job or something?”

“Well I don’t know who it was that came up with it, honestly. But like I said, it’s super simple. This job was made for you, Bandle. Literally. When Dad was putting it all together, he literally said, ‘It’s so simple, even Bandle could do it.’”

“Oh, gee. Great.” Said Bandle.

From then, over the next little while, Bandle listened to Kroff discuss the route and then he went to talk to his friends, Misfit and Jorry about helping him with the job. It took some convincing, as they were both still in hot water themselves about the whole statue incident, but in the end, they came around when he told them it would help put them in better standing again with his father. Once they gathered all the supplies they needed for their days-long journey, they saddled their bison, prepped their wagon filled with cargo, and went off into the north.