Chapter 10

"Lily? Chichi? Where are you?"called Phil as he was walking around, his eyes desperate to adjust.

"And for that matter…where am I?"he wondered as the surroundings came clearer.

Suddenly he knew exactly where he was though it baffled him how in the world did he get there. He was standing on the Beauvillage playground. Looking around he saw that he was completely alone there. Now however, the feelings of fright were overcome by a strong sence of nostalgia. So many moments spent here. He recalled how he and Chichi came here the day they befriended eachother. Spotting the swings he smiled and approached them. Sitting down on one of them he closed his eyes, began to swing slowly and thought back to his childhood days. When he was just a pipsqueak, like Lily fondly used to called him. They spent many days on these swings reading books and stories. He immersed himself deeply in the memory… a pipsqueak sitting on Lily´s lap, the book in both their hands as they were taking turns reading, the pair of them laughing when something comic happened in the plot…they spent hours nearly each day like that until Grandpa Phil came to collect them and they walked Lily home before going home themselves…

Phil´s smile faltered…he really really missed him…

"Why so sad young one?"came a voice to his right.

Opening his eyes, he swiftly turned and saw, that to his right occupying the second swing sat an old man dressed in pure white robes that matched his long white beard. The man smiled kindly at him as Phil was trying to puzzle out who is he...he seemed oddly familiar.

"My name is Balthazar."said the man extending his right hand.

"I´m Phil."said Phil, taking it.

The man´s eyes twinkled as they shook hands.

"I know, you see I know your grandfather. You´re very similar to him. Very befitting that you share his name."said Balthazar smilingly.

Phil´s eyes widened in surprise.

"You... you knew him?"

Balthazar shook his head.

"I know him, young one and that´s a big difference."

Phil´s eyes turned sad again.

"I´m sorry...but he´s dead... he died 8 years ago."

Balthazar however was still smiling as he shook his head again.

"Eventhough he´s gone from the material world, ones who love us always remain with us. In here..."he gestured to his head.

"And in here..."he said as he placed his hand on Phil´s heart.

For some reason, Phil´s heart was feeling warmer and warmer. Getting what the old man was getting at he let his memories wash over him, thinking to all the good times with his grandpa. Suddenly he indeed felt better and a large smile spread on his face as he looked back at the old man. Balthazar´s smile matched his and the two shared a small laugh.

"Anyway, I have the strangest feeling that I know you from somewhere."said Phil smilingly.

The old man laughed a bit.

"Well, I´m an old time resident of Beauvillage. Waaaay too old I feel sometimes. But you should know. Afterall you and that smart blonde friend you have did find a few things about me, including the treasure I hid near the river. Well done by the way."said Balthazar.

Phil screwed his eyes as he was trying to recollect the memory, but strangely...he couldn´t.

"I... I can´t remember somehow."he said.

Balthazar smiled again.

"It´ll come to you. But I have to say Philip, you have found only one of the things I was trying to hide away. I know that you also found the chest in the museum. But its useless without the key. That´s what you have to find now. In in that chest is everything that´ll you need to solve the mystery. But my house is not the place where its hidden. Unfortunately the key was stolen from me. You will have to use the gemstone to find it. But you kids are smart. I´m confident that you can do it."

Balthazar stood up from the swing and started to walk away. Suddenly he turned and looked at Phil over his shoulder.

"And one more thing, Philip. You kids be very carefull about one thing - Green sorcery is no plaything. You have to know what you´re doing and be carefull to always obey the rules. I would really hate to see you or your friends having to pay the price…"

With that the old man walked away and dissapeard in the mist, which wasn´t there before. Phil stood up too and ran after him.

"Wait… what price…?"

But no use, the old man disappeared in the mist which seconds later surrounded him as well.

...

Phil´s eyes snapped open and he sat up. He was in his room. In his bed. As he was looking around he didn´t notice, that the gemstone necklace which was still around his neck stopped glowing.

"It was a dream."he realized.

"But sure a weird one."

Getting out of bed, he glanced at his Gzorbial alarm clock.

"Huh? 7:10? What gives?"he wondered outloud.

Every school day, precicely at 7 am his mother came up to make sure that he got up in time for school. Whether he was up or not. He glanced uncertainly at the door, but no sound was heared from outside. Shrugging, he got dressed and took his schoolbag, which he prepared yesterday before they set out into Balthazar´s house. He remembered that after the show of lights ended after a few minutes, everything settled down and the house completely calmed down. Even the owls stopped hooting. Deciding to call in quits for the night, the trio exited the house and went immediately home so that they could get a few hours of sleep. Before that however, Chichi took a few books that caught his interest. However they had yet to examine a single one of them, or sort out the Dragon Lord action figures they brought back. Unsurprisingly Chichi was as excited about them as they were. For the moment, Lily had them at home and Chichi had the books. And Phil had was the gemstone necklace. As he was walking downstairs into the kitchen, he realized just how hungry he really was. However, when he stepped in and wanted to say "good morning" to his parents, he found that there was no one in there, which was strange since his parents usually enjoyed their morning coffee around this time. Looking into the living room he saw them standing in the yard trough the window. They were talking to one of the neighbours. In fact as he looked closer, most of the neighbourhood was there and was chatting about something. Opening the door he walked out of the house to them.

"G´morning. What´s...?"

Before he could ask what was going on, he gasped. Their garden´s vegetation had incredibly grown. Trees held fruits, flowers in his mother´s flower patch had sprouted more than ever before and now sported briliant colorfull petals, it was as though the Beauvillage´s harvest time had come in extremly late and paid off its citizens with quite a large interest. Stunned into silence he listened to his mother talk to one of the neighbour ladies.

"I can´t explain what happened. I mean, the harvest time ended weeks ago and yet..."she said to the woman wearing a purple colored hat, both of them completly perplexed.

"It looks as though it has simply grown over night."said Phil´s father as he was picking an apple from their tree and taking a bite from it.

Phil gasped again.

"C...could it be...?"he wondered, grabbing the gemstone necklace under his shirt as the conversations around carried on.

"Our garden too..."

"Yeah ours too..."

"Seems that the entire Beauvillage seems to have..."

"But..but how?"

Suddenly there was a loud squeal of pure joy from the Tofu yard. Looking around they all saw, that the elder Tofus along with Beth Hubbub were celebrating something.

"IT WORKED! IT WORKED!"exclaimed Pop as he looked over the yard, pumping the air and jumping up and down like an overjoyed teenager.

Suzie, Cracker and Curly were jumping around too, each as happy as their masters.

Titus was seen at the fence that separated their yards along with Billy and Lola, all three of them wearing looks of complete awe.

"Y...you gotta be kidding."Lola stuttered out.

"I...im...impossible..."whispered Titus while Billy was simply too stunned to muster any kind of comment at all.

Beth on the other hand wasn´t having this problem. She was as overjoyed as Mom, Pop and Buba whom she was standing with in the Tofu vegetable patch.

"Look at this...! Every single vegetable has grown... tomatos, carrots, onions...everything! Oh Vi, the Soil renewal ritual actually worked!"she squealed as she and Mom grabbed eachother and started jumping around like school girls.

"Mmm...these raspberries are incredible."said Miles as he was kneeling at the bushes and helping himself to some.

"The fruits in the greenhouse have grown as well. Even the strawberries."said Buba while smiling radiantly, staning next to the munching Miles.

"WOW! I LOVE STRAWBERRIES. CAN I HAVE SOME?"exclaimed Miles looking at Buba as though Christmas had come early.

Buba giggled and gently ruffled Miles´ hair.

"Of course you can, dear boy."

Suddenly with another squeal, Bee had entered the yard, running at top speed and swiftly embracing Beth and Mom.

"I can´t believe it...I can´t believe it...the ritual worked... my garden is completly overflowing with life energy."she squealed as the three started to jump around once again, Suzie and Curly running around them in joy.

"Hoo boy. I just had a greedirific idea! Can I have some of the fruits? Middletown has a small shortage of them and Frank would give king kong cash for it."said Miles standing up.

"MILES!"exclaimed Bee before she launched herself onto him, nearly knocking him to the ground.

"Wha...what´d I say?"asked Miles in alarm before she practicly pecked him with kisses all over his face.

"It´s...all...thanks...to...you..."she said between the kisses as Miles´ face was starting to gain color.

"Thanks to you the ritual worked. You´re the best, Michael Miles."she said as she embraced him tightly before Miles grabbed her just as tightly and started to spin her around as the pair of them laughed along with the rest of the yard.

"She´s right. We owe the success of the ritual to you, Miles."said Pop, while patting Miles on the shoulder when the pair stopped spinning around.

Miles grinned while still holding Bee, who was looking at him with sparkling eyes and both of them blushing a brilliant shade of red.

"Well...thanks...I...I mean...my pleasure..."he stammered as he scratched the back of his head.

The pair let go of eachother and Miles coughed as he desperately tried to fight down the blush.

"Well...anyway, I really should go inside to call Frank but before that..."he said ginning at everyone.

"...why not celebrate with a Green dance."

The others gave a shout of aprooval and immediatly started to dance the ritual dance with Curly, Cracker and Suzie joining in. Phil noticed that there was once member of the Tofu clan who was not present. Looking into the Tofu house´s windows he immediatly spotted Chichi, who was looking over the backyard from Lola´s window and his expression matched that of his.

...

By the time Phil and Chichi arrived at the schoolyard, rumors have already begun to spread. Simply by walking to school they could tell as much. Many people glanced at Chichi and several ladies have whispered to eachother. The awesome twosome wasted not a moment to speak with Lily. Sharing a small conversation they walked her to her bus stop, they made sure not to be overheared and agreed on meeting in the Hidehole after school before Lily got on the bus leaving the two to walk to theirs.

"I still can´t believe that the Sorcery is real. I´m begining to think that the dream I had wasn´t a dream at all..."commented Phil quietly as they crossed the school gate.

Chichi nodded as they stopped.

"If it was, then we have to take what Balthazar said under advisement. In any case, we´d better look over the books I took from the house before we dare use the gemstone again. We might trigger something again and thistime we may not be so lucky. Two things are bothering me though... first, you mentioned that Balthazar said that the key was stolen from him... but by who? And second, what in the hell were the Brainless foursome doing in Balthazar´s house...?"

The two pondered upon this for a second before they heared their names called.

"Uh-oh and here we go..."muttered Chichi as their classmates hurried to them.

In a single instant Oliver, Liam, Brian, Maurice, Abbygail and other classmates formed a circle around them and instantly started to bombard Chichi with questions. As he and Phil tried their best to answer everyone´s questions, carefull not say a word about Balthazar Bunglewood or mentioning their last night´s adventure in his house, Chichi noticed the absence of someone whom a part of him expected, even wanted to be there. Stealing a glance at the stairs, he noticed that April was sitting there with Emily and Chloe, all three of which engaged in what appeared to be a serious conversation. Chichi had a sneaky feeling that whatever they´re discussing was not related to Green Sorcery one bit.

"What topic could they be discussing so seriously when this has just about everyone in Beauvillage occupied?"he wondered.

Before he could try to approach them however, Oliver shot yet another question. Chichi sighed as he racked his brains on the answer but not without stealing another glance at the three girls.

"...so I asked Archie, but he said that they´re working on a top secret case. I can´t imagine what could it be though..."said Emily sadly.

She really thought that Archie would help her with this. Chloe rolled her eyes.

"Figures."she muttered under her breath, carefull not to let Emily hear her.

"I heared from my Mom, that Wiseman and his brotherhood are to investigate that ghost."said April recalling her parent´s talks at yesterday´s supper.

Chloe giggled.

"Brotherhood of the Ghosthunters. Kinda cool."

Emily however looked very scared.

"This is no laughing matter! I heared that the former mayor of Beauvillage died a gruesome death. This...this could really be dangerous! And Archie said that they were going somewhere, but he didn´t tell me where...oh no..."she said panicly.

She stood up and looked around the yard franticly.

"I can´t see him or Tex or Nick anywhere and they´re ussually here by now...oh no...what if...what if the ghost got them?"she fretted as Chloe and April stood up.

April quickly placed a hand on Emily´s shoulder.

"There now, Emmy. I´m sure they´re all right."she said soothingly.

"How can you know that?"shot Emily quickly, positively on the verge of tears.

"Because here they come now."said Chloe pointing a finger on the schoolyard enterance.

Indeed the trio has arrived, but they were walking slowly and looked horrible.

"Archie!"called Emily.

Instantly she ran from the stairs across the schoolyard before April and Chloe could even register it. Archie barely had time to react before Emily litterally threw herself on him, catching him in a bear hug and squeezed him to her tightly. All three boys looked confused at what was she doing and Archie´s face sported a small blush which was growing by the second.

"E...Emmy?"he asked the girl uncertainly as she looked at him, but still not releasing him from the hug.

"I was scared that the ghost had gotten you."she explained.

"Hey...how do you know about that?! Were you shooting your mouth off again?!"asked Nick, narrowing his eyes on Archie.

Archie swifly shook his head and Emily turned to him.

"He didn´t, Nick. I heared about your brotherhood investigating the case, that´s all."she explained.

"I guess the adults must´ve been talking about big brother Frederick´s promise."said Tex.

Nick fixed Archie and Emily with a small stare. Then nodded.

"Right...a...a...achoo!"he sneezed loudly enough for the entire schoolyard to hear.

"Anyway, you´re really investigating the ghost of Balthazar Bunglewood? Did you three by any chance go into his house?"she inquired.

At the very mention of the house or the ghost, the three boys instantly turned paper white. Emily felt Archie shaking in her hug.

"What? What´s wrong?"she asked, looking from one to the other as she tightened her hold on Archie, who returned it shaking like mad.

"P...please don´t mention that place Emmy."he said to her shakily.

Emily gasped.

"You mean you´ve been there?!"she asked, her voice taking on a bit of anger.

Nick and Tex instantly shook their heads in negative.

"Of...of course not...Em..a...achoo!"said Archie before sneezing just as strongly as Nick did.

Nick and Tex nodded their heads too.

"Who in their right mind would go there anyway...a...achoo!"said Tex sneezing as well.

Emily narrowed her eyes.

"What were you three doing then? You look as though you haven´t slept a wink."she asked.

Nick and Tex stole a small glance at eachother. Tex shrugged his shoulders a bit and Nick sighed a bit.

"We had training yesterday night."said Nick hoping she would buy the excuse.

She didn´t.

"What kind of training?"

"Survival training. We detective aids have to be prepared for anything...a...achoo!"explained Nick.

"Looks like you three were going out of your way to catch a cold."said Emily narrowing her eyes.

"We must be strong. A cold is no...a...achoo!"explained Tex finally joining in.

"Anyway let´s get to class. Archie... don´t forget. Rule 23! Got it?!"said Nick as he and Tex turned to the school and moved along the schoolyard.

"Yes, brother."said Archie quietly, still in Emily´s hug.

Following their yesterday´s investigation, Wiseman issued a new rule in the brotherhood. One that would definitely become usefull later on as well: Rule 23 – That NEVER happened.

Emily looked questioningly at the boy in her arms.

"Archie? What´s rule 23?"she questioned.

Archie however shook his head.

"Sorry Emmy. I can´t tell you that."

Emily narrowed her eyes again.

"Don´t you trust me, Archie?!"

Archie looked at her uncomfortably.

"Its not about that, Emmy. It´s just that this is a thing of the Brotherhood..."

Emily saw red in one second.

"So you make me worry like that, doing who knows what and then refuse to say anything because of some stupid rule of the Brotherhood?!"

Archie shook his head.

"Rule 23 is a wise one. I´m a member of the Brotherhood of the Wise and as such I must obey its rules."he said firmly.

At once, Emily released him from the hug and turned her back to him.

"FINE! Be that way. If your precious Brotherhood is more importaint to you than me..."she exclaimed and stormed back across the schoolyard.

Archie was left there standing completly perplexed.

"What did I sa...a...aaachooo!"

...

Emily was still hurt when the classes ended. She kept stealing hurt glances at Archie over the course of the classes, but resolved not to speak with him for today at the very least. Instead she resolved to solve the mystery of who wrote that incredible novel. She and Chloe were waiting for April at the lockers.

"Look Emmy, don´t worry about it, kay?"said Chloe attempting to cheer her up as best she could.

"Easier said than done when you´re in love."said Emily sadly.

Just then Nick, Tex and Archie came out of the classroom apparently deep in hushed discussion. Archie stole a small glance at Emily and was promptly awarded by a hurt glare. The same hurt reflected in his eyes, but he carried on walking with his brothers as they exited the school.

"Its times like these, that I really wonder what in the hell does she see in him..."mused Chloe as Emily fixed her stare on the floor.

Suddenly April came out of the class with Chichi and Phil. Phil smiled, said something to the two of them and walked off. Something that made both of them go scarlet.

"Oh, he´ll pay for that."muttered Chichi glaring his best friend´s retreating back.

April giggled.

"Anyway, thank you for bringing me that hair-clip. Where ever did you get it?"she asked.

Chichi chuckled and winked at her, givig a thumbs-up.

"Trade secret."

Both of them shared a small laugh.

"Ok. So you guys check over what you can and if you will need any kind of help, let me know, kay?"he said as they stopped at Chloe and Emily.

April nodded.

"Thank you Chichi."she said appretiatively.

"Anytime April, anytime. Now if you girls will excuse me, I have a best friend to smack."he said cheekily before racing from the hall and out of the school.

The three girls shared a giggle.

"What´s that, April?"asked Chloe looking at the new wooden hair-clip, which had a small mineral stone in its middle.

"Chichi said that he found it somewhere and thought that I might like it."she explained.

Emily sighed.

"You have no idea how lucky you are, April."she said, her thoughts on Archie.

"Yeah. Chichi´s a nice guy."nodded Chloe.

April gave a long sigh and out of habit grabbed her ponytail with both of her hands.

"That´s why I love him so much."she said.

Emily gave a dreamy sigh and Chloe giggled a bit.

"All right girls. Let´s get outside. Its nearly time."said April and the three girls exited the school.

"So Chichi will help us on this?"asked Emily as they walked trough the schoolyard.

April shook her head.

"He said he will only when we won´t be able to solve it on our own. In the meantime I got someone else to help."she said as the two girls fixed her with a confused stare.

"Who?"asked Chloe.

In that very moment a bright blue van came to a loud stop in front of the school perimeter. Out of it jumped a black-haired young muscular man, who almost everyone in Beauvillage knew by now.

"WASSUUUUUPP!"he called as Emily´s and Chloe´s jaws dropped.

...