“How can we be slipping in the Shire? No offense Zizz but those stupid Sprites love me. I swept the Fae in the primaries. This can’t be happening, Zizz,” Lord Wonks wailed.

Frowning at her spreadsheets, Zizzle fluttered behind her boss his excellency Lord Kev Splitfoot Wonks of the ancestral seat of Elfin Glen, leader of the seven realms and the outer provinces. Wonks strode up and down the imperial court with quick angry steps. He threw the golden scroll of polling results into hearth. Sparks showered the office. Pansy, Tansy, and Fred scurried to douse the Golden Fleece carpeting. Coughing, Zizzle his campaign manager flew in agitated swirls among the smoke.

“Fair leader, this is what I am trying to explain. You cannot count on your past successes. You’re not connecting with the woodland fairies under 100 years old. Tavros is popular with young males from merfolk to centaurs and his numbers are on the uptick among females of all ages.”

“That bloody Orc! He’s a thick necked boneheaded green son of a witch. Born to the purple and pretending to be common. How can he do better than me? What am I paying you for?” Wonks said flinging his tray of honeyed cheeses to the floor.

Next Wonks threw a crystal vase of blinking buttercups against the wall. He swept the news scrolls from his desk. The trio of pixies buzzed into action to clean the mess.

“Sire if you could take a deep breath. We need to appeal to a wider voter base. Have you considered launching that dragon treasure drive for the orphanage?” Zizzle asked hopefully.

Waving a dismissive hand, Wonks bit a jubjub sweet fruit then spat the blue fruit chunks at his pixie servants. In a buzzy blur the servants cleared away all the food trays. Raging, Wonks paced.

“No, Zizz, my people don’t want to watch their leader ladling stew to snotty nosed urchins. They want pomp and majesty. How can that dirty horned Orc being rising?” Wonks shouted and kicked a bejeweled chair across the room. “Explain!”

“Tavros is relatable. An Orc of the people but from the Olde Branches. He did save those hobgoblins from that burning hospital, sire,” Zizzle said drily.

“Fiddle Faddle that stupid oaf is a soldier, big deal. I threw two Solistic galas. Two! Something must be done,” Wonks sobbed.

Their leader collapsed on a chaise lounge, upsetting an antique best of the Dowager Queen Glianda. Fred and Pansy caught the statue. Tansy buzzed around Wonks’ head.

“Zizz what’s this about a storyteller mirror from Tavros’ ancestor!” Wonks shrieked.

Zizzle glared at the pixie.

“Well I knew you wouldn’t be interested in dirty politics. A traveler, a vagrant really, was picked up by the border brownies found a storyteller in the Orc Foothills. Apparently Tarvox the Great Tarvos’ grandfather loved another before his marriage to Lady Halyx of the Orcs” Zizzle said haltingly.

Elated, Wonks leapt from the chaise, plucked Zizzle from the air, and shook his campaign manager by her shoulders.

“If the talisman is to be believed Tavox the Great’s lover died in childbirth and the babe was raised secretly under the royal house of Orc,” Zizzle said between shakes. “Leprechaun, Tavros is part Leprechaun!”

“Scandal, I knew it and with a trash elf. We have him now,” Wonks exclaimed.

He climbed on his ornate desk and began to dance a mock leprechaun jig. The pixies and Zizzle the sprite exchanged glances. She had hoped her boss would have made a different choice. Drooping Zizzle flew from imperial court to retrieve the traveler’s mirror.