The Whispering Woods and the Lost Laughter

Previously

…Lily, her heart swelling with a feeling she couldn't quite name, looked around. The woods were still serious, still subdued, but there was a crack in the facade. A small, hopeful crack that had been made by a girl’s uncontrollable laughter. And in that crack, a glimmer of something new was beginning to bloom. The first, tentative breath of joy, exhaled by a tiny, forgotten sprite, was the most beautiful sound Lily had ever heard. The spell, so ancient and so strong, had just received its first, delicate fracture.