Howl woke up the next morning feeling rather pleased with himself. He could not believe that Sophie didn't think he would get even with her for all her insults. He thought he was rather clever with the manure bucket in the doorway. He thought that something was moving in his blanket. He thought… Something in the blanket!

Howl throws the blanket off the bed and lets out a loud scream. There in his bed was about a hundred slimey earthworms.

Howl absolutely freaked. He jumped out of the bed and sprinted, still screaming loudly, to the bathroom.

Or at least he tried to. The moment he tried to open the door, his hand slipped off the door handle. Still freaking out, he tried several times to open the door with the same results until finally he lost patience.

In his freaked out state he used his magic to blast the door down, and was greeted with a bucket full of stinky muck. (Pond muck to be precise.)

Now blind and freaking out, Howl ran, or rather hastily stumbled, into the bathroom. He wasted no time and nearly broke his hand turning the water on full blast. Not even waiting for the tub to fill, he jumped in and began to splash water on his face to remove the muck. When he could see enough to grab the soap. He grabbed it and began to furiously scrub it all over him.

As the tub filled up some more, Howl began to calm down.

'It is amazing how relaxing in the warm blue water of of a bath can do. Wait BLUE!"

Howl began to scream and freak out all over again.

Sophie had spiked his bath water with blue hair dye. She also replaced the soap with a bar made of red dye. So now Howl's skin was a nice shade of violet.

Howl got out of the now purple tub and searched for a towel, but couldn't even find a washcloth.

Angry and humiliated, he ran back to his room hoping that no one saw him.

Howl looked in his closet to grab something to wear, and found that all his clothes were gone! All that was left in his closet was a frilly pink gown with a small note pinned to it.

Dear Howl,

When you are ready to give up. Just let us know.

Sophie

Howl practically had steam coming out of his ears!

"NEVER! YOU HEAR ME SOPHIE! I WILL NEVER SURRENDER TO THE LIKES OF YOU!"

Howl was not going to let that small slip of a woman get the better of him.

Sophie however, as Howl would discover later, was nowhere in the castle. Michael and Luna were absent as well.

Not wanting to walk around the house naked, Howl reluctantly put on the dress, a pair of shoes, and went in search of some real clothes to wear.

A few hours later however, Howl was reconsidering his options.

Sophie, knowing that Howl wouldn't give in so easily, booby trapped the whole castle.

Howl's shoes were filled with raw eggs.

All the doorknobs were coated with bacon grease, like in his bedroom.

All manner of cloth was removed from all the rooms and Sophie had filled them up at least half way with dry, scratchy straw.

All the doorways were rigged with buckets of pond scum, there was even a couple of frogs in them as well.

Howl, at last, went downstairs to confront and yell angrily at Sophie. However when he reached the main room he found dozens of vines of red flowers overflowing from hanging baskets that were hanging from the ceiling. Looking like a curtain of flowers, similar to the branches of a willow tree.

Since he couldn't see Sophie anywhere. He chose to approach the now chuckling fire demon, ripping flowers and vines from their baskets as he passed.

Calcifer was trying to contain his laughter at the sight of the purple Howl. Who by now was tarred and feathered with mud and straw, with a few red flowers sticking to his hands and some in his hair. He looked like a strange pond sprite.

"Wake up on the wrong side of the bed Howl?" Calcifer asked between chuckles.

"No! Sophie booby trapped the castle. All because I played one simple prank on her and that stupid cat!"

"I think it's more than that Howl, and you dumped poop on them."

"That doesn't make up for the fact that she has single handedly caused one of the worst mornings in my life."

"Well hate to tell you Howl but I think it is about to become the number 1 worst day of your life."

"Why is that?"

"Well… Those flowers that she hung from the ceiling are Meddlesome Myrtles. Their touch alone causes a large, red, itching rash and really bad face swelling."

"WHAT!"

Sure enough, a red itchy rash began to develop all over Howl's body and his face swell up to the size of a pumpkin.

Howl fell to the floor, thrashing and scratching his purple skin. Trying to make his itching go away.

Calcifer began to laugh loudly at Howl's display.

It continued like this for an hour, with Howl itching and Calcifer laughing, before Sophie and Luna came in through the door.

They regarded the laughing fire demon and the suffering wizard with smug smiles.

"Well Howl. What have we learned today?"

"That you're an evil conniving witch!" Howl shouted over the sound of his scratching.

"Perhaps. Are you ready to cooperate now?"

Howl almost said no. But he couldn't take any more of this. His eyes shut in pain he shouted.

"ALRIGHT! I'LL DO WHATEVER YOU WANT! JUST STOP ALL THIS!"

Howl sat up and opened his eyes to glare at Sophie and instead found himself glaring at the wall of his bedroom.

Howl was in his bed again, and there weren't any worms in it this time.

He looked down at his hands and saw that they were normal. Not a trace of grease, dye, mud, straw, or a itchy rash.

He slowly got out of bed and looked everything over. Everything looked normal!

He checked his closet, all his clothes were present and prank free.

He left the room, the door knob ungreased, and cautiously made his way down to the kitchen.

There Sophie and Luna were sitting at the table watching his reactions with very smug smiles.

Howl looked at the clock and saw it was only 7:00 am.

He looked back to the duo with a face that screamed anger and astonishment.

"It was all just a dream?"

"Perhaps. Are you ready to talk now?"

Howl controlled his emotions, nodding simply before sitting down across from his so called torturers.

"Sign this if you please Howl." Sophie said sliding a small stack of paper across the table to him.

Howl looked at it as if it was a piranha that would bite him if he tried to pick it up.

"It's not going to attack you Howl. It's a simple contract that will show that we understand each other."

"A contract?"

"First rule of any business Howl. Always get it in writing."

Howl knew now that she wasn't so innocent as she appears to be and started to read her so called contract.

I, Howl, hereby swear to do the following.

1. Never treat women like a possession or an inanimate object ever again for as long as I live.

2. Always be courteous and helpful.

The contract went on like that telling him how to behave and treat people for the most of the contract's pages until it got to the part that said that if he breached any part of his contract then Sophie and Luna would be free to make his life a living nightmare.

"Are you INSANE?"

"Either you sign and follow the rules of that contract Howl, or next time not only will we leave to the pain of the meddlesome myrtle but we will permanently dye your skin hot pink!"

Howl looked horrified for a moment before looking down at the contract and signing it in defeat.

Smiling happily, Sophie picked up the contract and put it in her pocket.

While she and Luna went to the kitchen to start on breakfast, Howl started to trudge back up the stairs to take a bath and get dressed for the day.

He glanced back on the room as he made his way up. He suddenly stopped turning back for a second look with his whole body numbing with shock.

There, hanging from the ceiling in the corner, as if it had always been there. Was a basket of red flowers called Meddlesome Myrtle.

My writers block is officially over! the flower meddlesome myrtle does not belong to me. HMC does not belong to me either.

A Special thanks to my friends Jeanie, Gwen, and Mary for giving me prank ideas.