Avalee cradled the fairy in her hand as she walked briskly home. The sun had set below the tree line, deep shadows taking hold of the forest. As she entered the burned-over clearing containing her cabin, she felt another trap spring. The fairies are restless tonight, she thought. Good.

She turned the brass handle to her home and entered, closing the door behind her. She set the fairy down onto her empty kitchen table before breezing over to her cabinet and retrieving a glass fairy jar. She unscrewed the lid and was about to pick the fairy up when she stopped. If I wish to endear myself to it, I should treat it better. She put the jar away and rifled around in the cabinet for a moment before making a decision. She left the cabinet and went to her bedroom, finding a sewing tin full of thread and scraps of fabric. She removed the errant bobbins and found a piece of silk large enough for her liking, tucking it around the rest of the scraps to act as a makeshift mattress. She found a cut of velvet and returned to the kitchen, tin in tow.

Avalee lifted the purple haired fairy up with her thumb and fingers, delicately placing it in the tin and covering it with the velvet. She set the tin on the table. Moonlight drifted in through the kitchen window, painting Willow in silver. Avalee looked at it a moment and pondered her options.

Once again the thought of simply consuming it passed through her mind. She wondered why she hadn’t already. Surely this was all more trouble than it was worth. Still, something seemed wrong to her about eating the little thing. Unlike the other fairies she had consumed, this one was completely, utterly helpless. No magical ability, no powerful conduit of power, just a creature of the woods. Avalee bit her lip. Just as Hannah had been, her mind spoke, unbidden.

No, consuming her in this moment was out of the question. Instead, she would slowly teach her the ways of magic, just as she said she would. In turn, she would subtly interrogate her on details of the fairy nexuses; location, population, patterns and traditions, and roughly how many there were in the immediate vicinity. She would crosscheck the answers with the results of her own research as validation, and perhaps find something new along the way. And then, when the thing wasn’t so helpless anymore…

Avalee licked her lips. It did look delicious.

A tugging on her consciousness reminded her that her trap had sprung. She turned toward the door but stopped. Just in case, she thought, and wove a tangled barrier around the tin. The barrier was invisible to the eye but resembled a woven basket turned upside-down in the magical plane. It would isolate the space within it from outside magic and vice versa, as well as prevent the fairy from leaving physically. Now any ritual Avalee wished to perform wouldn’t wake the sleeping thing, and any attempts from the fairy to leave magically (if indeed it could) would be severely dampened.

Satisfied with her handiwork, Avalee left the cabin once more and walked into the dark of the woods.

---

Avalee approached her trap and broke into a large, grin. Struggling in her trap was not one fairy, but two. They both seized up as she approached, staring at her with wide, terrified eyes.

“Belladonna…” Saffron whispered, their whole body shaking. “Leave, hurry!” Saffron’s blond hair shone white in the moonlight. Their body was hopelessly tangled in the silky web, arms twisted at odd angles. Belladonna was entirely free from the trap save for her left hand, which was stuck to a particularly large globule of sap. She tried to free Saffron, fighting harder with each passing moment as the giantess approached.

“I’m not just leaving you here,” Belladonna said through gritted teeth. Her gold eyes flashed as she focused on the task at hand, willing herself to not look at her impending doom. She braced her feet against Saffron’s hip and pulled at a strand with all her might, tearing it free of her paramour. She was so intent on removing the web that she physically jumped when she felt a set of huge, warm fingers curl around her.

Belladonna and Saffron screamed in unison as Avalee plucked them up. The giantess smiled down at her prey and began to burn away the thread just as she had before. Pine-smelling smoke filled the air and the two fairies fell into her waiting palm. She closed her fist around them, two little heads poking out from behind her thumb.

“My, my,” Avalee said, feeling the little struggles. “What have we here?”

One of the fairies – the dark-skinned one – spat onto Avalee’s thumb. Avalee’s smile widened. “A feisty one, aren’t you?” She raised her hand slowly to her lips and heard their screams become shriller. She pressed her huge, soft lips down gently on the dark-skinned fairy’s curly, tied back hair and deposited an overwhelming kiss upon the little thing. “You’ll go down nicely.” She said.

Saffron and Belladonna screamed, the giantess’ grip like soft, warm iron around them. Belladonna shrieked in horror as the huge lips descended over her, certain she about to be enveloped and eaten. The giantess instead kissed her, and Belladonna flew into a manic rage. “LET US GO!” she yelled. “Get your filthy hands off us!”

Avalee smiled. “Hush now,” she said. “Let’s go home.”

The giantess lumbered back into the woods, carrying her two prizes like a pair of flowers she had picked from the forest floor. Saffron was inconsolable, sobbing into the giantess’ hand. Belladonna’s mind raced. One of her arms was free and she used it to stroke Saffron’s hair, consoling them quietly as she worked to find some means of escape. Overpowering the giantess physically would prove impossible, but perhaps she could find a way to distract her magically…

Avalee reached her cabin. An embroidery loom was already sitting on the glass table on her porch. She could remove some of the design from earlier that day and redo it. She needed to see Hannah again. It was a good thing she had caught two, she could at least save one for later. Avalee dropped the two fairies into the open jar that once housed Sage and screwed the top. She began unravelling green and grey thread from her loom.

Belladonna and Saffron hit the glass floor of the jar. They both shivered as the heat of the giantess’ hand left them.

“This can’t be real…” Saffron said. They touched the glass wall in front of them tentatively, looking up at the enormous woman sitting in a chair right next to them. She was absolutely huge. Her body cast a long, deep shadow in the moonlight, turning her into a terrifying silhouette. Her motions were too fluid for a creature that big. It was like watching a storm coalesce in the clouds. Something powerful and horrible was about to happen.

Saffron was wrenched out of their thoughts by a flash of light behind them. They turned and saw Belladonna’s hands dancing, pulling and snapping strings, crackling white sparks flashing with each snap. The metal lid above them had air holes punched in it, and Belladonna focused on one of them. The metal sparked as she pulled her hands back as though she were combing her hands through a staticky woolen fabric. Belladonna’s face was a mask of concentration. She felt thread between her fingers as desperation guided her actions. The hole widened slightly.

A sudden shadow, a flit of movement. The giantess’ hand slammed over the lid, knocking the two fairies back. The sparking metal fizzled and became inert once more.

“Powerful little thing…” Avalee said, her hand pressing against the lid. A smile tugged on her face as she looked down on the two fairies cowering below her. She could feel the heat of the metal on her palm. “Intriguing…”

The giantess picked up the jar and unscrewed the lid. Belladonna tried to shoot upward toward the opening, but her wings wouldn’t respond the way she expected. She felt sluggish. In that moment of confusion, the giantess swiped her into one hand and Saffron into the other. Dazed, Belladonna opened her eyes to the magical plane. She gasped at what she saw.

The cabin was surrounded with an extremely dense web of magical line, so thick that moving a hand through it was like strumming a harp. She watched in awe and terror as the giantess’ concentration swept through this mire of thread, knots tightening and pulling in a wave following her thought. Her power over this place is immense, Belladonna realized, her throat tightening in panic. She was even able to mask her true ability from a casual glance. There’s no way we can beat her if she’s paying attention…!”

Belladonna saw and felt ice-cold thread constricting around her wrists, ankles, and wing-tips. The giantess opened her hand, letting Belladonna dangle in mid-air by string invisible to the naked eye. Belladonna struggled and screamed in frustration, her mind letting go of the magical realm and returning to the physical one. Her stomach dropped and anger swiftly gave way to despair.

Avalee held the blond one between two fingers as she bound the dark-skinned one. The blond struggled mightily as she rolled it this way and that between index finger and thumb. A yellow mana stone glowed in its wrist. Avalee lifted it to her mouth. She exhaled slowly, parting her lips and blowing hot, humid air onto it. Her eyes glanced up to the bound one and she smiled, watching its anguish. Powerful as it might be, it couldn’t do anything if her concentration was on it. She briefly considered eating that one first instead, but thought better of it. She had experienced a debilitating, weeks-long sickness from eating too many fairies at once before, and she believed it to stem directly from how potent their combined magical ability was. Though Sage was quite weak in that regard, she didn’t want to risk anything. Two weak fairies in a day shouldn’t be a problem.

Saffron screamed into the void between the giantess’ lips, their hands pushing at the soft flesh, trying to get it away from them. “Please, please, please, no!” they yelled, the heat from the giantess’ breath overwhelming them. They could hear the crackling of saliva from just beyond those lips as the giantess’ tongue moved. The merest edges of white teeth were visible, shaking Saffron to their core. She’s going to bite me in half, Saffron thought, panic filling them to the brim. I’m not food, I’m not food, I’m –!

The lips came forward and Saffron was pushed headfirst into the dark, hot maw. Their screams were silenced to the outside world as Avalee held them there, hips and legs dangling from her mouth.

Belladonna let out a strangled cry when Saffron’s upper half slipped between the giantess’ lips. She struggled harder than ever against her bonds as she watched their legs kick ineffectively at the enormous chin. The giantess returned to her sewing, horrific sounds of sucking and smacking punctuating each stitch.

“Let them go! Oh god! You disgusting witch! Let them go! Saffron! Saffron please!” Belladonna screamed. The chill of her restraints subsided and was replaced by something white-hot as Belladonna pumped as much energy as she could through them. She felt power flow through her, every vein in her body tingling with sensation as fire spread from within to without. Her bonds began to smoke.

Suddenly the giantess’ eyes were on her and the heat was swiftly shunted away through the vast network of thread. Belladonna froze, the giantess’ gaze pinning her in place. Their eyes met and Belladonna was overwhelmed by the feeling of being totally exposed. She was nothing to this witch. She could do naught but watch as a terrible tongue poked between Saffron’s legs, curled up behind their ass, and took them inside, sealing them forever inside the giantess. The great witch stared at Belladonna, brown eyes burning with an intensity Belladonna almost envied. Her lips squished and stretched as she maneuvered Saffron within, a long, deep “mmmmmmmm” rumbling from deep within her throat. The giantess was enjoying Saffron’s taste. Belladonna’s stomach turned and her blood ran cold as she realized the inevitability of Saffron’s fate. “No no no…”

The witch did not break eye contact. She swallowed Saffron down, whole and alive. A lump slid down her throat, any semblance of the blond masked by smooth, pale flesh. The giantess’ lips parted once more as she sighed. Saffron was gone.

A light went out in Belladonna. All the fight disappeared. She barely registered as the witch picked up a pair of scissors and cut a thread in her needlework. She passed out as a wave of powerful energy washed over her, plunging the world into shades of red and black.

Avalee held the little blond dangling from her mouth, tasting its face and chest with an uncaring, probing tongue. She pressed it up against her hard palate, rubbing it back and forth as she felt its ineffective little fists punch her lower teeth and gums. She worked on her embroidery, stopping only as she felt a searing heat on her face. She looked up and her eyes widened. The powerful fairy was glowing bright as a lantern, gold veins in its wings searing into the night like incandescent filament.

As she sucked on her treat, Avalee willed the net around the fairy to tighten, and was surprised when it didn’t immediately respond to her. She tried again with renewed concentration, putting down her needle and thread to touch the magic line with her fingers. This time it did as she willed, and the brilliant energy dissipated as fast as it formed. Avalee stared intently at the little golden-eyed fairy. Something about that terrible heat reminded her of that day. Her mind clouded with hatred and anger as she and the fairy glared at each other.

With a flick of her tongue, Avalee took the blond the rest of the way into her mouth. She tasted its panic and let out a low moan, exaggerating her own enjoyment to torment the fairy trapped in her web. She smacked her lips and wrestled her sweet with her tongue, being a bit more rough than usual. It put up a valiant fight, but was no serious match for her. Without looking away, Avalee maneuvered the fairy to the back of her throat. She felt its movements intensify as it realized where it was going. Saliva built up in Avalee’s mouth, already aiding in the digestion of the struggling creature.

Avalee swallowed the fairy. She felt it travel down, down her esophagus, pause deep behind her chest, and then drop into her waiting stomach. She felt the power from its mana stone course through her, and felt an immense satisfaction when the bound fairy slumped in defeat. She picked up her scissors and let the ritual take hold. As the trees sprung up around her, one of her hands found its way to her belly. She rubbed it slowly, warmly, knowing that behind the blue fabric of her dress, behind her smooth pale skin, was a living fairy trapped within her body forever, destined to be completely absorbed and used to fuel her delightful ritual.