Chapter Two
~~~The Dream~~~
I awoke in the dead of night. My nutcracker was no longer beside me. That's strange, I thought to myself. As I stood from my spot where I had slept, an ominous fog began to appear. There is something wrong. Then a mouse the size of my 5 year-old cousin scurried through the living room. I rubbed my eyes. "I must be seeing things." I said aloud, but then another came and scurried across. "Mother! Father! Fritz!" I cried.
The sound of marching and swords clinking together filled the room. I could have sworn I saw a life-sized toy soldier. Turning around, I found out that an army of mice had accumulated behind me. I stood there frozen as they looked at me with beady eyes.
"Don't eat me!" I yelled, but they charged anyway. I was sure they were going to rip me to shreds, but they simply brushed passed me. They were after something else. I turned around again and saw that a battle between mice and toy soldiers had begun.
I stepped to the side as the battle raged on. "This is nuts!" I said aloud to no one in particular. The strange thing was how mother, father, or Fritz hadn't come downstairs yet. It was a pretty loud battle that not even the heaviest of sleepers could bypass the noise.
"Huzzah!" A male voice called from the left side of the living room. I looked over to see my nutcracker, now maybe the size of a high school boy, fighting a very large rat with a crown on.
"The Rat King!" I thought. I watched them as they fought. The Nutcracker had a good counter attack, but the Rat King quickly defended against it and knocked the sword out of the Nutcracker's hand. Knocking him the ground, the Rat King was about to finish off the Nutcracker.
"Hey, Rat King!" I yelled so that he would turn around. He did. It was just the distraction need that let the Nutcracker hop off the ground, grab his sword and drive it through the Rat King's back. The Rat King doubled over, and died. The mice no longer with a king scurried off in terror. The toy soldiers cheered.
"Thank you!" The Nutcracker came over and kissed my hand like an old timey medieval would.
I blushed. "I just didn't want you beheaded and almost killed before Christmas." I said.
Someone clapped from the right side of the living room as if they just came through the dining room. "Well done, Clara." said Uncle.
I gasped, "Did you have anything to do with this?"
He nodded. "Didn't I tell you the Nutcracker was magical? Anyway, I wanted to reward your bravery by letting you and the Nutcracker go through the Land of Snow, then finally the Kingdom of Sweets."
"But Uncle I…"
Uncle offered out his hand. "Come," and I followed.