nly on the hands he
was holding, almost throwing his comrades on their faces, and breaking
the line. He turned right about, swinging the others with him, and came
leaping and running back.

"What is the matter, little comrade?" he asked. "What is the matter?"

"In all your flying 'round the world, Wild Star, you must have seen my
mother Helma. She is lost. Oh, can't you tell us where she is?"

"Yes, of course. But I didn't know she was lost. I thought she was
visiting Earth-friends."

"Truly, truly?" Ivra's eyes shone with joy, and Eric grabbed his cap
from his head and threw it up in the air shouting, "Hurrah!"

"Oh, will you bring her to us right away?" Ivra begged.

Wild Star looked doubtful. "Perhaps she wouldn't want to come."

Ivra laughed merrily at that. "Then take us to her," she said, "and you
will see how she wants to come when we ask her."

"Give us your hands, then!"

They held out their hands. Ivra's was grasped by Wild Star's and Eric's
by another Wind Creature. With their free hands they clasped each
other's. So the four started running down the hill, while the rest of
the Wind Creatures flew off over their heads.

Wild Star and his comrade ran faster and faster, until Eric wondered how
it was that he and Ivra were ever keeping up with them. Soon he realized
that his feet were scarcely touching the ground. At the foot of the hill
stood a little group of birches, and they were running right upon it. He
did not see how they could either turn out or stop themselves at that
speed. Almost as soon as he had seen the birches, though, they were
beyond them. They had not turned out, they had jumped right over the
birches, and they were much higher than Eric's head! They were running
so swiftly now that only their toes ever touched the ground,--if _they_
did.

What fun it was to run like that, the wind at their backs, and the Wind
Creatures drawing them strongly forward faster and faster and faster
until they were really flying just above the snow.

Across white fields they skimmed,--over fences and frozen streams,
bushes and banks, through orchards and meadows, on, on, on, until they
came to the town.

There Ivra pulled back for a minute, and the Wind Creatures slowed down.
Eric knew why Ivra was afraid of the town. She had told him all about it
while they played in the wood. Helma, her mother, was a human, but she
hated the town and loved the fairies and their ways. That was why she
had run away