BOOM! The whole room shook from the power of the explosion. Everyone turned to glare at the corner of the room where Lilly and her best friend Autumn were sitting on the ground coughing from the dust their latest explosion had shaken loose.
"Another explosion you two? We really can't afford to keep repairing the damage you make… please try to improve your potion making skills before this whole place comes tumbling down on us." Her teacher, Qualikum sighed, rubbing his head where a dislodged rock had hit him.
"It wasn't my fault this time!" the teacher looked at the fairy girl, Lilly with little conviction.
"The directions were smudged and it looked like it said 82 grains of salt… but it actually said 22." Lilly defended her self without much of a convincing voice herself. Autumn just sighed, pulling her friend up and dusting herself off.
"Obviously it had been 22… no one would use 82 grains of salt in a simple flying potion. An invisibility potion maybe, but a flying potion?! Lilly really doesn't know her potions at all." Autumn thought, somewhat sourly. She was used to the constant explosions but what she didn't understand was how her friend could be such an air head, what with spacing out in the middle of classes. Once she even accidently dumped a whole vile of river water instead of just a drop into the mixture that was their final exam the year before.
Qualikum cleared his throat to get the room's attention. He then began to speak.
"Since there's a festival tonight, I suppose I can allow you all to leave early to get ready. Class dismissed." At that there was a loud cheer and then sound of chairs squealing back filled the air as the excited teenagers flew off to prepare for the yearly moonlight festivities.
"Hey Autumn… aren't you just stoked for the festival!? I think I'm gunna take a birds eye view from up one if the trees… wanna come with me? We can watch the fire and all the dancing…" Lilly attempted to sway her friend into staying with her. "You had me on the word 'trees'" Autumn smiled, her love of nature -especially the trees of the forest they lived in- was enough persuasion to make her do almost anything.
"Yay!~" Lilly said, hugging her friend mid-flight, sending them spinning and laughing.
"Lilly, sometimes I think you're too hyper…" Autumn started with a serious face, making Lilly frown as if she was getting scolded. "… but if you weren't, you wouldn't be my bestie. Let's go find a good tree!" she smiled, setting off deeper into the forest.
-a few hours later, at midnight
The pair were sitting high up in the tallest oak tree. From here they could see the entire island; the edge of the forest, the caves, the ruins with the huge, crumbling stone pillars, even the sparkling ocean on the other side of the mountains. They could hear the birds singing, and somewhere off in the distance a stream was gurgling happily. From below them was the sounds of singing, laughter, and music. The full orange moon took hold of the sky, spanning a huge distance, but not completely blotting out the bright yellow stars. The smell of the crackling fire drifted up to them, mixed in with the sweet smelling breeze and the smells of the forest around them. It was a gorgeous night. But then suddenly, the noise of the party stopped abruptly.
Autumn peered down through the branches of the tree, tying to see through the darkness, but to no avail.
"I can't see anything… I wonder what happened." Autumn whispered, thinking aloud her worries. Lilly looked down, her night vision a little better than her friend's. What she saw made her eyes widen. There were tons of little black-ish purple creatures running around, tearing up the little houses and chasing all of the fairies and pixies out of their homes and into the thick forest.
"What's going on? There hasn't been an attack on this island for thousands of years…why now?" Lilly wondered, motioning for Autumn to stay hidden and not talk. Autumn looked a little bit skeptic, but one look at the fear in her friend's eyes told her to listen to directions.
A few minutes passed, the screams and crying of the smaller children chilling them to the bone. Even the usually pleasant smell of the bonfire wasn't reassuring any more. After a while the noise subsided, leaving only the eerie howling of the wind. Whatever the creatures were had left. The little pixie girl Autumn was the first to climb down, her hazelnut hair whipping around her in the wind of the high altitude. Lilly followed, the flowers that were holding her blonde hair out of her blue eyes flying off in the current. The wind was unusually strong for what was a relatively calm night.
When they reached the bottom they flew over to the remains of the houses they had known so well, the light from the moon a little stronger now that they were in a clearing. The houses were all destroyed. Generations of history lost in a matter of minutes without a trace of anyone or anything left. And now they were alone.
Finally, Lilly broke the silence.
"Why… what… who would do this?" she wondered aloud. Autumn on the other hand, was investigating what little was left of their town. After a few minutes of intense thinking she suddenly spoke in a loud voice.
"AHAH! I GET IT NOW!" she exploded, making the birds fly out of their trees in a panic and also causing Lilly to jump out of her skin.
"What'd you find Autumn...?" Lilly asked, more than a little annoyed at her friend's outburst. In reply, the pixie girl held up a piece of paper with a crudely draw map on it. On the back it said: "In case one of you morons gets lost again."
"Do you know what this means?!" Autumn asked, receiving a blank look from Lilly.
"Uh that some people get lost a lot and suck at drawing maps?" Lilly suggested, completely uninterested.
"No you weirdo, pay attention. No one in this town ever leaves, so that must mean it came from someone outside of the island. And how long has it been since someone came to the island?" she prodded. No reply came.
"Lilly are you going to answer my question?" she said through clenched teeth, getting a little bit more than annoyed.
"Oh what you were actually asking me? Well uh… I dunno probably about… 20 years or so. Give or take 5 years." Lilly answered, not exactly getting where Autumn was going with all this.
"Exactly, and this paper looks new. No one here would need directions anywhere, and any papers from 20 years ago would be all shriveled. So this must be from the things that did this!" she waved the paper around in the air. A look of comprehension found it's way onto Lilly's face as the new information sunk into her thick head.
"So what you're saying is that if we follow this map backwards we should be able to find where they came from and hopefully find out what the heck is going on?" Lilly said, confusing herself with her own words. Autumn nodded and set off in the direction the map suggested, with Lilly trailing behind her.
After a while they came to the mouth of a huge cave in the side of one of the many mountains. The couldn't see much into the cave, as the sun was just beginning to rise. The pair had been traveling for about five hours now, and even though they were both tired and hungry, curiosity pushed them forward and into the cave. After a few minutes of blind navigation through the cave and a couple twists and turns, they could see a light. It was a lantern hanging on the damp stone wall. The light was dim, but it was all they needed to know that they were on the right track.
A bit more flying, and they came to the end of the tunnel; an opening to the other side of the mountain they guessed. They stood there with their mouths agape, looking at the places they could never see even from the highest tree of all the island. No one they knew had ever passed the large ring of mountain ranges, let alone gone right through one. But they quickly shook themselves and reminded each other of their mission. So onward they trekked. Nothing blocked the path they were taking for the most part, so they arrived at their destination mostly unscathed. Where they wound up was at a little rock with a door placed squarely in one side of it. Lilly opened the door without a moment's hesitation, Autumn biting her nails and expecting something to jump out. But nothing did, and Lilly beckoned Autumn over.
"There's stairs… I wonder where they lead?" Lilly wondered aloud, not waiting for a reply from Autumn and starting downward. Autumn followed warily, not wanting to have to get into a fight with whatever could be lurking down there.
"Are you sure we should go down here… I mean… isn't this trespassing or something?" Autumn asked, unsure of the long flight of steps.
"It probably is, but whoever lives here probably ransacked our town, so this makes it about even." Lilly replied, totally confident with her logic. They continued in silence, the stairs seeming to never end. Suddenly there was a turn in the stairs, which Lilly didn't notice, causing her to walk straight into the wall. Autumn stifled laughter and continued walking, reaching the bottom of the steps while Lilly was rubbing her forehead. When Lilly finally caught up, Autumn was looking around incredulously at the size of the room that emerged from the narrow stairwell and the tiny rock-hut. It was huge! The walls were made of ice, yet it was as warm as a summer night, and the floors were polished marble, speckled with flakes of gold dust. At the end of the room was a huge wooden door, trimmed with gold and silver and painted a rich caramel colour.
Through the door came a small figure, no taller than a dwarf, but hunched over and beardless. On his head was a bandana, and his feet were clad with slippers. Autumn thought it over and determined that he must be a goblin. He looked up from the papers he was reading and noticed the two girls. He stopped in his tracks and sighed.
"Now I have to get those morons to catch you two… you people just have to add more work to my busy schedule don't you?" as he spoke, he pulled out a remote control with a big red button on it, and suddenly the two girls were surrounded by the creatures. They were carried off to the even-more-underground dungeon and thrown into a large cell shrouded in shadows.
When they creatures were gone, a voice came from the shadows.
"Why are you two here? Did they kidnap you as well?" the voice said. It was a beautiful voice, and it was definitely female.
"No… we came here looking for the people who destroyed our homes. I suppose you could say we found them." Autumn said with a slightly hysterical laugh. She was obviously not happy about being locked up in there. The voice laughed as well and the lady moved out of the shadows. She was very tall, at least six feet, and was astonishingly beautiful. The girls took a sharp intake of breath as they realized just who they were in the presence of. They quickly dropped down on one knee and looked at the floor, not daring to meet the eyes of their princess, Rain.
"There is no need to bow in such a place my children. Please rise so I may look upon you as equals." She said, an air of royalty ringing from her voice. The girls rose slowly, looking up a long way, for they were both only about 7 inches tall. Rain smiled at them and then looked as if she were making an important decision.
"You said you traveled here alone, unarmed and unaided, and only to find the people who destroyed your village?" she asked the two. They nodded slowly, wondering what she was thinking.
"Hmm… I wonder… would you two be alright with doing me a favor? It might be a bit difficult… but I believe you two can do it." the two small girls looked at each other for a second, then nodded.
"What do we need to do?" Lilly asked, eager to help, as usual. Rain explained to them about what the goblin (whose name turned out to be Narferai Hemletonson the Third, but Lilly and Autumn decided to just call him Narfy) was up to, kidnapping her and trying to get her to tell him the location of the book and scrolls that hold the strongest magic in the world, and also that she was most likely the cause of their town being destroyed, because Narfy knew that the scrolls and book were on this island, so he had been searching the entire place. After a bit more explaining, the girls came to a conclusion.
"So… you're saying you want us to escape from here, go to where the scrolls and book are, and use them to get rid of Narfy and the creatures?" Autumn asked, not quite believing what she was told.
"Yes… do you think you can do that? I would be forever in your debt." Rain practically begged them to help her, and of course they couldn't say no to royalty now could they?
So they just nodded, flying out between the bars of the cell with ease. They followed the princesses directions towards the opposite end of the ice cave, and then came to a small tunnel, just big enough for them to go one at a time. At the end of the tunnel was what looked like a room of glass. They continued on carefully, flying the whole way across, realizing that it was just very thin ice, below it the oceans that surrounded their large island. Onward they went, until they reached a place that was considerably warmer than the last few rooms, with no ice at all. Instead what they saw was crystal clear water, and through it they saw what looked like a stone table, covered in runes and scrolls, and also a book. They stared in amazement at the beauty of it all, and then remembered that they were supposed to use them to get rid of the bad guys.
"So we have to swim down through that water and get those? It looks really deep… can we make it that far in one breath?" Autumn asked, doubting that she could swim what looked to be about 20 feet down. It was like climbing the trees at home while holding her breath.
"I don't know if we can… but we have to try don't we? We can't just turn back now. And besides, maybe we can turn our home back to how it used to be with them too! We'd be heroes!" Lilly said, excited for another turn in the adventure. So down they dove, holding their breath until they thought they would burst. Just as they were about to go back up for air, Lilly took in a gulp of water, only to find that she could breath normally.
"Autumn… breathe. It's like air! Ohhhh this is so cool!" She ranted, shocked by the new twist in their adventure. Autumn looked a little skeptic, as usual, but took a breath in as well. Her eyes opened wide as she took a breath of sweet tasting air, not even a drop of the warm water falling into her mouth. She felt her hair, it wasn't wet at all. They grabbed the scrolls, as many as they could carry, and brought them up to the surface. They found a flat rock and piled them up there. As soon as they all were up there, as well as the book, the two of the climbed up as well. Everything was completely dry, not a drop of water in sight.
"It must've only been to stop people from getting to them..." Autumn thought.
"So now we just have to look for the right spell… we should probably start in the book. It might have a table of contents." Autumn suggested, taking the rational approach. Lilly opened the book and flipped past the first few pages.
"Yep… table of contents. Right where it always is. These big old books are so boring and predicta- whoa… look at all this stuff! 'fire casting', 'shadow moving' … oh here! 'Evil demolishing'! that's perfect!" Lilly flipped to the page it said, just as a huge explosion shook the room. The wall on the left came tumbling down, the stones falling into the water without a ripple being made. It was as if the water wasn't even there, but as soon as the stones were in the water, their momentum died instantly and they fluttered down to the bottom.
"I think I must thank the two of you for leading me right to what I've been looking for all this time. My dear uncle would be proud. Why, haven't you heard? I'm the next in line for leader of the underworld! But first I have to get rid of my filth of an uncle. That is why you are going to hand that book to me right away, so that I can take control of this pitiful upper world and…" Narfy rambled, not stopping.
"Do you think he's ever going to stop talking? Maybe we should just get rid of him now… while he's distracted." Autumn suggested quietly. Lilly nodded discreetly, looking for the right spell, while the goblin continued his speech.
"… and what with his face being on the currency of my precious underworld, why he even made my little Darklites resemble him…" he droned, not even looking at the two.
"Found it!" Lilly exclaimed quietly, pointing to a spell labeled 'to remove all evil'. The two started to chant the spell together.
"evanui… totus… malum!" they said. In a flash of bright, white light, Narfy and all the creatures that were apparently called Darklites, vanished into thin air. The light lasted for a long time, almost blinding our two heroines.
When the light subsided, they found themselves in a very comfortable bed, in a wondrous room. It was as fit for royalty, silk beddings and the colours of the forest all around them. They sat up, full of wonder, and looked around.
"Where… are we?" Lilly asked.
"You're in the royal palace, great saviors of our world." A familiar voice said.
"Saviors… oh… I remember now. The white light! So I guess it really did work..." Autumn voiced her thoughts out loud once again.
"Yes it worked, and as I said before, I am forever in your debt. We all thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Lillian Flower and Autumn Leaf, please rise. You are to be knighted on this night, with your entire village in attendance." The princess said two the two little girls. "You will also be rewarded for your great acts of bravery. Your families are now forever honored by the royal family, and will never go through hardships."
The faces of the two girls lit up. They were heroes, and now they could go back to their families. There was now no more evil in the world, and the two small children of Dearland Woods were legends for the many thousands of years that the island has seen. Even today they are thanked once a year on the day of the still celebrated Moonlight Festival. The world will forever be in peace thanks to the intelligent pixie girl, Autumn and the small adventurous fairy, Lilly.