Chapter 2

After unpacking their stuff, the kids decided to take a walk in the woods. Their mum told them to be back before she and Nana Lilly left. Ollie was the first out the back door, running to the little wooden pirate ship that their Granddad had made, while his older siblings followed behind.

"Ahoy" Ollie called turning the wheel on the ship.

"Ahoy" Charlie replied giving is little brother a salute.

"Hey Ollie, big smile!" Maria called holding up her camera she took a shot of her little brother.

"Come on you two, let see if there's dragons in these woods" She said to them as she and Sally walked ahead. The brothers raced excitedly to catch up with their sisters.

"Did you think there were dragons and other creatures when we were younger?" Sally asked Maria.

"Well, I still like to think that they're real" Maria began as she put an arm around her sister's shoulder "I think it's more exciting to believe they are".

"Yeah it makes life more interesting" Sally said as the four continued exploring the woods. Being summer, there was colourful flowers dotted around the ground among the leaf-green trees.

Oliver had a stick and swung it around like a sword with Charlie beside him. The girls were just behind them enjoying the scenery and looking as the sunshine shone though the trees lighting up the leaves.

Sally remembered playing in these woods when she was little, there was something magical about this place, she and her siblings believed in magical creatures and they thought that the woods looked like the ones in Brave, she wouldn't be surprised if they didn't spot a wisp or two.

The young girl was deep in thought when she heard.

"Look, look" cried Oliver, pointing at a robin that was in a tree. The little boy ran straight to it.

"Ollie, wait" Sally called before she, Maria and Charlie ran after their baby brother. They actually liked playing with Oliver, allowing them to do things they did when they were younger. They didn't know how long they had run for but they were glad Ollie had come to a halt as they could rest. Soon Oliver began climbing on a tree roots, he was reaching up trying to touch the robin.

"Do you think he'll reach it?" Maria grinned as Oliver said...

"Come back birdie" several times.

"It won't be long before he spots something else" Sally replied, but as she took a step towards Oliver, the ground under her feet began to crumble and open up. Suddenly, Sally fell down into the hole in the ground, instantly her brothers and sister ran to see where Sally had disappeared to. They were so shocked the ground had opened up beneath Sally's feet and she was nowhere to be seen.

"Sally! Sally, are you all right?" Maria called down, as she, Charlie and Oliver peered cautiously over the edge in search of their beloved sister. The air was dusty and it took a few moments (which seemed like forever) before they could see any sign of life, then they heard a faint sound it was Sally groaning.

"You ok Sally" Ollie asked hoping she was alright he has tears in his eyes and he looked pale...

"I'm fine Ollie" Sally replied, not wanting to worry her baby brother. She wiped the dust from her eyes and looked around, she was surprised to see how big it was inside the hole, and it was like a small cave. She did wondered if it was an old fox hole, to her it just looked like a normal hole or what she would expect a hole to look like. As she adjusted to her surroundings she noticed something to one side of her it was covered in some dead leaves. Feeling stiff and slightly bruised, she rubbed her sore parts instinctively and she went up to it, knelt down and brushed the leaves aside. Sally thought it looked like a small package wrapped in old brown leather.

"Hey, I found something" Sally called up.

"What is it?" Charlie replied trying to see her

"I think it's a book, a really old book" Sally said picking up the book to get a better look but she couldn't see very well because of how dark it was.

"Ok, bring it up with you" Maria suggested then said to Charlie "Come on, help me pull her up"

Sally placed the book in her bag before clambering up and grabbing Maria's and Charlie's arms, to help her climb out. Soon Sally was back on firm land, she dusted herself off and Oliver gave her a hug, happy to see her safe.

"I'm still wondering, where that hole came from" Maria said after checking her sister was ok "I mean it just appeared out of nowhere".

"Yeah" Oliver agreed.

"So Sally where's this book you found" Charlie asked.

"It's in my bag" Sally answered "But I want to get a better look at it back at Nan's, err the time is getting on a bit"

"Hey it's ok. You had a scare, I would do the same sis, let go", Maria said putting a reassuring arm around her sister's shoulder.

Charlie sighed and taking his brother's hand and followed the sisters back to the house. It didn't take long for them to be back at their Nan's house. To their surprise, they could see their mum talking to a man and a woman; they were dressed in hiking gear. As the kids walked up the couple turned and headed into the wood.

"Mama!" Oliver called rushing up to her as she waved to them.

"Hey mum, who were those people?" Charlie said as his mum walked up to meet them, picking Oliver up.

"Campers, they asked if it was ok to camp in the woods and I said it was fine..." She stopped when she saw Sally. "Sally what happened to you? where did that bruise on your neck come from?"

They can now see a bruise on Sally's neck; she must have got it when she fell down the hole.

The young girl bit her lip "Well...I fell and...and"

"It's ok Sally you can tell me all about it later" her mum spoke softly and gently hugged her "you're alright now" Sally hugged her mum and then felt Ollie's arm around her which always made her smile. "Well, come on then, dinner's nearly done" mum said.

Throughout dinner, the three older children kept looking at Sally's bag, all of them becoming more curios, wondering why the thing wrapped inside was in that hole in a first place. After they had eaten, Sally wanted to have a closer look at the thing she found. She pick up her bag and pulled it out, Maria and Charlie (who was standing side by side of Sally) watched as Sally carefully undid the string but before she opened the leather bound book to discover her two siblings were waiting each holding their breath when…

"Oliver! Don't go in there", their heads darted up when they heard their mum. Sally quickly held the book behind her back. They looked to see mum holding Ollie away from double door "We're not allowed in there, that's Granddad's room, you won't like it in there!" mum told him before hugged her son and tried to distract him. The other children knew very well what was in there. That room was where their granddad kept his collection of mounted animals; they found that room really creepy and avoided going in there as much as possible.

"Alright" their mum started "We'll be back the day after tomorrow. So if you want to go to town, you'll all go. Don't stay up to late; don't go in granddad's room and no wild parties!" Mum told them all, they all laughed mum knew they would never have a wild party.

"You know you can trust us mum" Maria said as Sally sneakily slid the book on a chair and placed some of her drawings on top. The children helped mum and Nan place their bags in the car. Waving goodbye, the kids watched as the car pulled off and drove down the road.

When they saw car had disappeared, they all quickly went back inside. As soon as they were inside, Oliver was the one who grabbed the book with the drawing still on top.

"Here you go" he said holding it out to his sister.

She took it and bit her lip "To be honest, I'm not sure" she confessed rubbing her necklace.

"Yeah, don't you think its odd finding what I am assuming is a book, we found it in the woods and it was wrapped up? It must have been put there for a reason. I won't be surprised if it's not made out of human skin when you read it, it will bring the dead back to life" Charlie said crossed his arms.

Maria rolled her eyes and thought a moment and said

"In that case, maybe we should open it somewhere safe"

"How about the attic?" Sally suggested looking up.

"The attic?" Charlie repeated (Charlie hated the attic)

"Yeah, the attic, let's go" Maria said grinning and softly taking Oliver's hand.

"I don't think we should", Charlie said nervously just as his siblings were about to go upstairs.

"What, scared that the dead children will be there" Maria teased.

"Who?" Oliver answered.

"Well years ago" Maria started as she; Sally and Oliver climbed the stairs with Charlie shaking his head in disbelief but did follow them. "They say a witch used to take children from the town and lock them in this attic, when the townspeople planned to take her to jail, she threw herself off the roof of the house. Some of the children survived but most of them were never found again and legend says that the spirits of those lost children can still be seen in the attic and in the forest"

"Really" Oliver said clearly excited, but still looking a bit scared.

"I looked online sis and there's nothing about any witches or missing children" Charlie explained. His sisters told this story when he was little and it terrified him. He didn't want Ollie to be the same but he knew that his little brother was fearless.

"Come on Charlie, where's your imagination" Sally taunted him as Maria opened the attic door and turned on lights. The large attic was filled with the usual found finding in one. There were boxes, old furniture, Christmas decorations and old toys. Charlie closed the door behind them; they sat in the middle of the room, pushing some of the furniture aside.

Sally soon removed the leather covering and she and her siblings stared in awe as they saw it was a book but not just any book. It looked like it was made out of gold with a beautiful illustration of a castle embossed on the cover, which looks like one from a fairytale. There were four jewels one on each corner, a green square, a yellow circle, a red triangle and a blue hexagon.

"Wow" Oliver then said which made the others smile.

"You took the words out of my mouth" Sally said as she picked the book up.

"Definitely not made out of human skin" Maria smirked at Charlie who gave her a look.

"Mmm" Sally muttered, she spotted something odd about the book "That's strange there's lock on it"

"Let me see" Maria asked. Sally gave the book to Maria and she looked at it more. There was a small lock holding the cover closed. "Um, that's a problem" she said before giving it back to her sister

"What kind of book has a lock" Charlie said aloud.

"I don't know a diary?" Sally said. As she held the book, she glanced at the blue jewel, she wasn't sure why but it felt like there was something in it which made her curious then she thought she saw it glistening. Sally slowly pressed her finger on the jewel. She was so focused on the blue jewel, she didn't realise that one of her other fingers touched the block; suddenly they all heard a click and then felt a force like with wind all around them. The force of the wind was enormous, it pushed them back across the room and Sally dropped the book, knocked Charlie over on his back and papers were blown all over the room.

Everything went dark and the lights flickered. The children stopped and held each other close until the wind died down

"What was that?" Sally broke the silence after a while as they sat back up, windswept and surprised.

"I don't know" Oliver said simply

"Maybe we should go to bed and forget we ever found the book" Charlie then said standing up, it was too much for him and he wasn't too sure since things were going weird.

"Charlie, you're just overreacting" Maria told him, trying to calm the situation.

"Overreacting!" Charlie said loudly and this leads him and Maria arguing.

Thinking on what Charlie just said, Sally stared at the book and began to wonder about it. Was it magic? No, she thought things like that don't really exist but that never stopped her believing in it. She picked up the book and opened it, she and Oliver leaned forward and peered at the pages which looked brand new, that was strange to find. The writing was fancy and the pictures looked like the kind you'd find in very old books. Some pages talked about plants and others talked about history but some were more unusual these showed creatures like werewolves, fairies, unicorns and dragons. Sally found pages that look like ancient spells; it reminded her of something similar she had seen in movies.

"Look a dragon" Oliver said excitedly pointing at a picture of one sitting on a cliff edge.

"Sally" she heard Charlie which made her look up. "Don't touch it"

"Charlie please calm down" Sally said before looking back at the book "it's not dangerous, I think...I think it's a spell book"

"A spell book?" Maria said her eyes widened.

Sally nodded before she paused at a page that court her eyes.

"Listen to this, only those who are blessed, with a rare kind of magic, can open the door to lands believed from one's mind"

Both Maria and Charlie walked over to look and saw two pages that had in silver writing with the title "The power to travel". It also showed an image of a group of people next to a blue circle and seeing a person step through it. They all thought the blue circle must be a portal. Maria's mind was bursting with excitement but as for Charlie...

"Well we should bin it" Charlie then said. He felt something was wrong and he just didn't want in his family getting hurt and this was getting weirder by the second.

"Charlie..."Maria shouted, thinking that her young brother is overacting.

Before another argument started, Sally quickly said

"Maybe...maybe we should leave it for tonight and we'll look at it again tomorrow"

Seeing both her siblings faces Maria agreed and said "You're right, it's getting late" and then added brightly "and it's nearly your bedtime" she said as she pointed at Ollie and then picked him up and her baby brother giggled.

They turned the lights off before they closed the door. Charlie locked it; he wasn't sure why but it made him feel a lot better. They changed into their pyjamas, brushed their teeth and went to bed. It took a while for them to fall asleep, as they slept, strange things were happening. Lights were flickering, the TV turned on by itself and upstairs, the book started moving as if something inside was it trying to get out. The four jewels on the book began to glow, brighter and brighter by the second until they shot out of the book, bounced all over the room and then landed in different places. The book stopped moving but the jewels continue to glow. They glowed so bright and then the glows burst in colour dust. It seemed to the sleeping children all was well but things were far from being well, the strange happenings were only just beginning.

Note: if your wondering where are the Big Four? Don't worry they will be in the next chapter