you have hatched...
The moonlight shines down on two people in a fishing boat as they head out from the dock. Phelim, a boy of fourteen, is dressed in pyjamas and a sweater. Uncle Murdo, a middle-aged man, wears a thick fishing sweater against the cold night.
Murdo warns Phelim that his niece, Alexia, is trouble. She'll be leading him astray before he knows it, which is why Murdo wanted to bring him out here and warn him. Warn him of the awful danger he might be in.
Phelim is unsure. He wants to believe Murdo, but Alexia has been helping him for days now, and she knows things. She knows about a lot of strange things. Some of the things they've been through... Phelim starts to tell Murdo, but the man isn't interested in stories, see. Real things are much better than stories.
Is it true, Murdo wants to know, that Phelim is a chime child? Born as the clock struck midnight, and therefore blessed with magic and able to understand the fairies? Phelim says yes, that's what Alexia told him. See, she knows things, like the time when...
Murdo interrupts with his own story. Many years ago, when he was a young man, out alone on these very waters, he saw Hy Brasil rising out of the ocean. Just like it will tonight.
Phelim asks: Hy Brasil? The home of the fairies, explains Murdo. Them as can grant you a wish. Must grant you a wish, if you can throw fire ashore while they're here.
As Murdo lights a lantern, Phelim hears someone call his name. He looks back towards the dock, and sees a small fishing boat with a single sail, bearing down on them. Alexia, a girl of fourteen, is on board, and clinging to the top of the mast is Sweeney, a young man of about nineteen. They're both calling out to him not to do it, but he doesn't understand.
Just as Phelim points his friends out to Murdo, and Murdo yells at Alexia to go back, to stop being a wicked girl, the sea churns and the moonlight glints on a bronze castle that rises from the depths and floats to the surface.
Murdo shoves the lantern at Phelim, shouting over the fairy music that the boy should throw it, throw it as hard and as high as he can. Throw it, and wish for the fairy gold! Then can share it, just throw the lamp!
Even though the others are closing in, and shouting, Murdo is so insistent that Phelim throws, as hard and as high as he can. The lamp soars over the wall and vanishes from sight.
A face appears over the wall. Phelim can't help but be triumphant: ha! Now they must grant him a wish! - he yells. Sweeney yells a warning at Phelim from his boat, but Phelim yells back that if he's Jack O'Green, he can handle this very well all by himself, thank you very much.
The face replies: A wish? A wish? Wishes pishes. We don't grant wishes.
Phelim tries once more, this time louder, and slower: 'Where is your fairy gold?' The fairies reply: 'With the Worm, for safe-keeping, and our jewels too. Do you think we are stupid, man-boy?'
With Murdo at his back, asking what they're saying, what are they saying? - Phelim listens with growing concern as the fairy spots Alexia nearing in the other boat, and declares that the fairies are only here to steal human females for wives.
Phelim scrambles over to direct the boat away from the castle, all the while shouting to Alexia to turn back, turn away. She and Sweeney get the message far quicker than Murdo, who grabs Phelim and shakes him: what did they say? Where's the gold?
Phelim pushes Murdo away and starts to sort out the boat himself. Murdo persuades his own mind that Phelim is just hurrying to get the gold, and starts to help.
As the two little fishing boats race back towards the dock, the fairies take to boats of their own and give chase. Phelim notes that they stay well clear of the water spraying up aroudnd them. Fairy arrows fly through the air, some tearing through the sails, some landing on the deck.
Murdo panics, and in his confusion he is struck through the heart by a fairy arrow. Phelim sees Murdo slump over, dead. And the fairies are gaining on them.
As the boats reach the dock, Phelim heaves Murdo's body off the boat. Alexia is in shock: that's her uncle. Sweeney leaps from one mast to another, and is quick to lean down and try to stop Phelim: sailors must be buried at sea, or the sea will come to fetch them from the land. It's the lore. Phelim yells that he knows it, and tells them both to help them.
They drag Murdo's body as far up the sand dunes as they can manage, then Phelim roughly covers him with sand as the fairies start to crowd up the beach towards them. Run! - he shouts, when Murdo is lightly buried on land. Run!
They run, over a big dune and sliding down the other side. Phelim stops then, and turns to creep back up to the top of the dune and watch. The fairies get closer, and the sea is still. Phelim grits his teeth and whispers: come on, come and get him.
The sea is still. The fairies are almost at Murdo. Phelim says it aloud: come on!
The sea is still. The fairies are at Murdo's shallow grave. Phelim stands up tall on the dune and yells: come on! Come and get him!
The fairies are surprised by this yelling boy, and they hesitate. The sea pulls back, as if it's drawing in a large breath, the sound of which makes the fairies turn and stare.
The sea comes rushing forwards, rising up into a small tsunami that towers over the fairies before swallowing them in its attempt to dig Murdo's body free from the clutch of the land.
The fairies scream as they drown, and Murdo's body rolls slowly after them, all dragged into the sea which retreats to stillness, having reclaimed its own.
Alexia is curled up, crying. Phelim has found a tree not far away, and he sings softly to soothe her. Phelim kneels beside her and strokes her hair.
