“There she is! There she is!” Lily heard the calls even before Merryweather was at the mainland ferry station.

Three very beautiful and very elegantly dressed fairies were waving a greeting. Lily started to wave back – but then she realised they weren’t waving at her. She lowered her hand.

“I don’t mind,” said Lily to Merryweather. “I’m going to be fine here.”

But as Lily looked around at the unfamiliar setting, her courage failed her for a moment.

The mainland was very different from Sheepskerry.

There were no human people in sight, which was a relief, but Lily had never seen so many fairies. Not at the Fairy Ball; not at Queen Mab’s island meetings; not even in her dreams. How could there be so many fairies in one place? She gave Merryweather a quick kiss (that was her payment!) and unsteadily flew down the gangplank to the fairy town.

Lily saw fairies of every age and shape and size. They were all in a terrible hurry. And if they noticed Lily Bell at all, it was only to tell her to get out of the way.

But oh, what an extraordinary place this was!

Buildings crowded the streets – not just fairy houses for one family, but gigantic fairy houses that must have fitted a dozen or a score or a hundred fairies all together. The fairy houses were so high they seemed to reach almost to the sky. Instead of trees and flowers, there were long roads and pigeon buses. And looming up above the town were two enormous buildings. Lily could read their big signs – one was the Museum of Fairy History; the other, the Gallery of Fairy Art.

Lily was dazzled.

“Don’t stand there gawking,” said an elderly fairy to Lily. “Or if you do, at least move out of the way so an old fairy like me can get by.”

“Oh, of course,” said Lily. “May I ask, do you know the way to—”

But before Lily could finish her question, the elderly fairy had flown away.

How does anyone find her way here? Lily thought. But then she remembered the instructions Queen Mab had given her. A fairy named Avery would greet her at the ferry dock and then take her to stay with two mainland fairies, Claudine and Amanda Townley. One thing at a time, Lily thought.

“Avery, Avery. Where is she?” said Lily. She half wished she could squeeze Rosie’s hand right now or that Clara would take charge. She was even feeling that sometimes she was a little too harsh with Silver—

“Lily? Lily Bell of Sheepskerry?”

“Yes, that’s me.”

“I’m Avery Pastel, Claudine and Amanda’s serving fairy.” Avery was neat and pretty, and she smiled at Lily shyly. “Welcome to the mainland.”

“I’m very pleased to meet you, Avery,” said Lily.

“Let me take those,” said Avery. She picked up two of Lily’s bags.

“Oh, thank you so much,” said Lily. “They’re very heavy.”

Avery looked startled. “You don’t have to thank me,” she said. “I’m a serving fairy.” She led Lily to an elegant carriage. “You sit here,” she said, settling Lily into a comfortable seat. Then Avery took a seat on a bench at the back of the carriage. “To the town house!” she said to the carriage driver, a bright-eyed sparrow. And off they flew.

As the two fairies made their way over the tall buildings in the afternoon sun, Lily and Avery chatted about the mainland and what life was like here. “We don’t have serving fairies on Sheepskerry,” Lily said.

Avery was so startled she almost bounced right off her bench. “No serving fairies?” she said. “How do you manage?”

“We do a lot of things for ourselves,” said Lily. “The cooking and cleaning, the laundry, the baby-fairy minding. Even the wood chopping, although I’m not very good at that.”

“The serving fairies take care of that kind of thing here. Fairies like you – they don’t have to lift a wing.”

“Oh, how marvellous!” sang Lily. If she had been paying attention, she might have seen that Avery’s face fell a little. “I could get used to this!”