The Brothers and the Flying Fish Rocket

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In the misty forests of Greenspring lived two goblin brothers who couldn't be more different, yet stuck together like two buttons on the same jacket. The older one was called Finbar, with a sharp eye and a hat that always seemed a bit too big. The younger was Elric, dreamy, with a smile that brightened the world. Both carried small backpacks full of knick-knacks, because those who were never prepared quickly fell by the wayside in goblinland. Their greatest treasure, however, wasn't a bag full of gold, but a relic: a metal flying fish as big as a pony, its scales made of greenish-tiny copper. It had gears in its flippers, a rotating screw in its tail, and eyes that sparkled when it woke. No one knew exactly who had built it—perhaps an old tinkerer, perhaps a forgotten wizard. To the brothers, he was simply Brassel, their friend. That morning, with the sun barely peeking through the fog, Finbar and Elric climbed onto Brassel's back. "Today," said Finbar, "we'll fly beyond the forest. Perhaps we'll find the Silver Lake the old men tell of." Elric grinned and tightened his backpack. "Or at least we'll find a new adventure." With a rattle of gears, Brassel rose into the air. The trees grew smaller, the fog broke, and below them the world spread out like a map full of secrets. The wind whispered around their ears, and Elric cheered as they burst through the clouds. But not everything in the air was friendly. Soon, strange sparks appeared among the trees: swarms of glowing pollen clustering like fireflies, forming a kind of shimmering wall. Brassel twitched, the gears screeched, and the flying fish began to stagger. "Hold him up!" cried Finbar, clinging on. "He won't!" Elric gasped, trying to soothe Brassel's throat. The pollen clung to the metal fins as if trying to pull the fish back into the forest. Then Finbar remembered an old rule of the goblins: Light spirits cannot be conquered with force, only with sound. He reached into his backpack, pulled out a small flute, and began to play—a simple melody they had learned from their grandmother. The pollen trembled, floating up and down, then dissolving like mist in the sunlight. Brassel snorted, freed, and rose higher again. Elric laughed with relief. "Your playing saves us more than once, brother." "And you," Finbar replied, "keep Brassel calm when he's frightened. Without you, we would have ended up in the thicket by now." And so they flew on, until something glittered on the horizon: a sheet of pure silver, shining in the sunlight. The Silver Lake was no legend—it really lay there, hidden among the hills. The brothers cheered, Brassel purred softly like a cat.