"There's Always a New Rainbow"

While the last drops of rain fell on the sea, Quicksilver looked to the horizon. She had her long brown hair turned up by the wind and she looked around herself.

**Eelstrike!** she called. **My cub... where are you?** The rain had been strong, that day: all the elves had run away... and Quicksilver had lost her cub in the confusion.

**Eelstrike! Eelstrike!** Quicksilver was desperately crying. Redreef swam until her rock.

**Quicksilver, the others are all searching for your cub. We'll find Eelstrike very soon,** he said.

**I know that!** Quicksilver sobbed. **Redreef... where he can be? Oh, I'm SO thoughtful!** she cried. **I've already lost my parents, Redreef. Must I lose my cub, too?**

**Quicksilver, I know your love for your parents and your cub is very big,** Redreef said, **but there's a thing that you must understand: there's always a new rainbow, after the storm.**

**A rainbow... a new rainbow... oh, my poor cub!** Quicksilver cried.

She swam away, looking around the bottom of the sea and hoping to see her cub... but without results. Finally, she saw Silverripple.

**My friend... have... have you found my cub?** she asked, thoughtful.

**No, I haven't. I'm sorry, Quicksilver. I've searched for him for a long time, but now I've the suspicion that...**

Quicksilver closed her mind to Silverripple's sending.

**Oh, no! NO! My cub isn't dead, do you understand? Eelstrike! Eeelstrike! Where are you? He isn't dead... I'm sure... he cannot be dead... My cub! My cub!** she shouted, and she swam away with foolish screams.

**Quicksilver! Come back!** Silverripple called, but Quicksilver didn't answer to her. She swam sobbing for miles and miles until a far and solitary rock under the sea. Here, she fell to the rock and cried and sobbed, desperately.

**My cub isn't dead! My poor cub! Eeelstrike!** she cried. Suddenly, she felt a sending in her head.

**Mother? Mother?... Help me!**

**Eelstrike!** Quicksilver sent. **Oh my cub, my adored cub, where are you? Where?**

**Mother... I'm... I'm prisoner in a grotto...**

**A grotto?** Quicksilver repeated.

**Yes... I entered during the seastorm... but some rocks fell from the ceiling of the grotto... mother, now I cannot exit!**

**I will immediately free you, my cub!** Quicksilver said, and she looked around herself. Finally, she saw a grotto that wasn't very far from her: the door was covered by some rocks. **Are you here, my cub?** she asked.

**Yes, help me mother!** Eelstrike said.

**Sure... I will help you...** Quicksilver tried to send to the tribe. **Redreef! Silverripple! Shark! I've found Eelstrike!** but she immediately understood that she was much too far from them. So she began to push away the big rocks by herself. The rocks were very big and heavy, and after only ten rocks she was tired, but she never stopped. Unfortunately, she was so devoted to the rocks that she didn't see the very hungry sea snake behind her. The snake wasn't stupid and waited until when Quicksilver was very tired. The thoughtful mother pushed away almost twenty rocks, before she could only take Eelstrike's hand. And she finally saw the snake!

When she turned and saw the ugly mug behind her, Quicksilver tried to hit the snake with her knife, but for the fear, the knife fell on the sparkle. Then, a horrible thought arrived in Quicksilver's mind. After her death, probably the snake could go to Eelstrike and kill him, too! She desperately tried to shield the opening of the grotto with her body before she died, and she closed her eyes, awaiting the bite...

But the bite didn't come. Quicksilver opened her eyes and saw the sea-snake who was hit by a spear, dead. And suddenly Shark arrived at the grotto.

**How are you, Quicksilver?** she asked. **Has it bitten you?**

**Oh, Shark! I'm fine!** Quicksilver said, returning to see how Eelstrike was, afraid in the grotto. All the other elves arrived to help Quicksilver to push away the rocks - and when the "door" was sufficiently large, Quicksilver entered and swam to embrace her cub.

**Oh, Eelstrike! My son! How are you? Have you need of a healing? Are you hurt?** the mother asked, crying.

**I'm fine. I was only afraid,** Eelstrike said.

**And I was, too!** Quicksilver said. **I thought... oh, but not to think it. Now it's all finished... oh, my son!... and we're together again!**

Mother and son swam until the sea's surface and they looked to the sky. On the pale blue sprayed with white clouds, a colourful rainbow was born.

**Redreef said the truth,** Quicksilver said to her cub.

**Remember these words, son... there's always a new rainbow!**

And together they swam away with the others of the colony.