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"Before him, kneeling with her feet splayed out behind her like wings, was a slight human girl, around ten years old. She was staring, transfixed, into the remnants of an open fire burning in the hearth. The pixie was taken by the way her long honey-brown hair swung about her, as if drawn by magnetic forces. She blew a loose strand of it out of her face and turned to pull one of the braces of her dungarees back onto her shoulder with a slender finger. as she did so, she looked up for a moment at the window. The pixie froze in the intense gaze of her green eyes. Seeing nothing, the girl turned again to the fire. As her hair fell back across her face, the pixie glimpsed an ear. He marvelled at its fine proportions."
Things you definitely won't know from this description, some of which come up later in the story and some which don't: Ella is directly descended from the most pure Elven lines. And while she looks completely human and inconspicuous on first look, there is something ethereal and splendid about her when you look more closely: She is ten and a half, nearly eleven. She has a natural gangling elegance to her, a bit like an afghan-hound. Her eyes are full of light and loneliness and wonder but also humour, a lust for life and determination. She has straight if unruly hair, slender hands, a dust of freckles under her starry eyes, ears that end in subtle, fine tips, bony shoulders and translucent skin. She has a fine bone structure, a high forehead, a full mouth and her eyes are almond-shaped and emerald green, BUT all her features are just a tad exaggerated which is what makes her so odd, and striking to look at. One can't help asking oneself if she is one day going to be stunningly beautiful or just weird looking. Her basic outfit is a white cotton top/ t-shirt, levi-jean dungarees that are scrappy at the feet because they're too long, a dirty pair of once-white converse trainers whose laces are never done up and a hair-band around her wrist. She is an excellent skateboarder, a fast runner and a strong climber. She is tomboyish but in a fragile way. For example, she will hurl down a hill on a skateboard but if you saw her doing it you'd be terrified that if she fell off she might smash to pieces. She is lonely and isolated. But she has spunk and courage. |
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"On the bed, right next to the purple wrapping, sat a little man about the size of a pepper mill. He wore scruffy green boots with bells on the tips, a long green hat with another bell on top, a red-and-white stripy top and a matching backpack. She peered closer. He had a little nose and pointy ears, a generous mouth, lime-green cheeks and big, round, warm, watery eyes. Ella leaned over even closer, and was about to touch him when he stood up."
Things you might not know from this description: Dixon has particularly big eyes for the size of his head. They're only ever so slightly too big for his head but certainly enough to be out of proportion. They are intensely gently eyes, full of love, kindness, servitude and uncertainty. They are a sapphire blue colour. Although young as far as pixies go, he is around 150 years old. Dixon is incredibly scattered and emotionally volatile and can swing between being either unnecessarily UP or terribly doooown and back again from one moment to the next. His emotions are at the mercy of other people's behaviour. If he were to visit a shrink, the shrink would want to put him in serious therapy. Neurotic is the word that springs to mind, but in a good, pixie-like way. His body is at war with his own instinctive reactions. it's almost as if his body and his mind do not work in partnership at all. he has to hold his own mouth shut sometimes to stop himself talking for example. He is quite scruffy. And the stripy top he wears all the time is actually a body stocking with arms too long for his arms. |
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"A slight boy, short for his ten-and-a-half years, sneaked inside and headed over to a trunk in the corner. His face was almost hidden under a pair of oversized glasses resting on a snub nose, and a shock of strawberry blonde hair shot out of his head. His skin was completely covered in freckles, right down to his legs with their knobbly knees poking out of his filthy shorts. A small, wriggling hessian sack hung off his wrist."
Charlie is an exceptionally fast runner and much stronger than he seems. Charlie's clothes and hands and knees are always dirty, as if he's been out digging potatoes for a week; he wears khaki shorts most of the time, a tee-shirt that won't stay tucked in and old trainers. He is a cheeky little bugger but because he looks so little and wears these totally geeky spectacles and sees things no-one else sees, he gets horribly bullied at school. Charlie is descended from a very noble goblin-protectorate line which means that when he grows up, while he might never be tall, he will have a strong jaw-line and the lithe physique of his warrior ancestors. So while he is almost cute looking as a child and his glasses might make him look a bit geeky, he will grow up to be discretely formidable and strangely handsome. |