The following is one of 2 stories I’m currently working on (the other being Darkclaw). It is not complete yet… but I do know the ending. I have scenes in my head, the journey to the destination… hopefully the other stories in there won’t keep screaming to me for attention. Anyways… here’s the beginning… enjoy…
Twilight’s Magic Garden
By Ben Marroquin
StoryMask.com
Once upon a time, in the small town of Twilight, on the corner of Roseberry Avenue, there lived a peculiar old lady with 3 cats in a quaint old cottage house. The small cottage’s roof was terracotta and the walls were the color of sandstone, but one wouldn’t know it from looking because ivy covered the walls in a sea of green. Charming flower boxes adorned the windows and a brass tulip shape bell hung by the sunset hue door. A welcoming sight to be sure.
Every morning the sun shone down the old lady could be seen outside attending the wondrous gardens that surrounded her home like a moat. Many of Twilight’s children would “ooh” and “ahhh” at the sight of her home on their way to and from school, and who could blame them? Fairy tale statues and lovely water fountains tickled their imaginations while exotic butterflies, birds, dragonflies, and bees danced from flower to unusual flower. Even small squirrel sized animals could be seen from time to time running underneath the small garden forests.
Small stone pathways wove through the gardens and harbored ivy patterned garden benches. Many children were tempted to open the waist high black iron gate of the fence that surrounded the house, tempted to sit on one of the many garden benches and play in her gardens, but didn’t because rumor had it that the old lady was a crazy wicked witch!
This was not said because she looked like a crazy wicked witch, no… not in the least. She wore spring colored dresses, not black. Her hair was silvery blue and shone like moonlight, not a scraggly dull gray ash. Her tan skin and oval shaped face was lined with kindly wrinkles, not a long angular wart infested face with deep angry wrinkles. And her 3 cats weren’t even black; one was as orange as sherbet, one storm cloud gray, and the last one a tan cream.
So how did she become known by such a cruel name? It was simply because she was different than others. After all, how many people do you know that are followed around by 3 frisky cats while singing and talking to their gardens? Plus, it didn’t help that many of the neighbors were jealous and said mean things about her because her garden was pictured on the front of the daily newspaper under Twilight’s Magic Garden.
And because she was different, and children being children, some of the mean spirited ones would play mean tricks on her. Some would put mud in her birdhouse shaped mailbox, some would toilet paper her garden, and some of the really mean ones would throw rocks hoping to break her garden statues while yelling “Green house witch, go away!”
It was a cool spring evening when Mia and Jayden Dabbin decided to play a trick on the old lady. A trick they had been playing for the past 3 evenings; Ding, Dong, Ditch.
Mia and Jayden smiled when they saw that the old lady was nowhere in sight. Jayden opened the black iron gate and headed up the cobblestone path to the door in a crouch, his sister Mia closely behind him. The small link chain that sounded the tulip bell gently swayed in the breeze. Underneath that bell Mia and Jayden played a quick game of rock-paper-scissors, a game Mia won.
The plan was simple, same as before, ring the bell and run through the garden to hide by the side of the home.
Ding, ding, ding went the tulip bell and off went Mia and Jayden, racing through the garden to hide, snickering as they went. Turning the corner, they found themselves greeted by one of the most fantastic aromas they had ever smelled in their young lives. A heavenly scent of mouth-watering proportions, a scent that led them to a small garden table garnished with a rose petal bowl teeming with freshly baked flower shaped cookies.
“Hello… hello, is anybody here?” asked the old lady by the door, and seeing no one about, she closed the door.
“Sweet! The old crone went back in, lets grab some cookies and go…” Mia was saying when Jayden grabbed a cookie a started eating it on the spot.
“Mmmm! It’s delicious,” he said as crumbs spilled out of his mouth. “You got to try one Mia.”
And seeing how much he was enjoying the cookie and having that heavenly scent tempting her so, she did indeed try one. It was the most delicious cookie in the world, like honey-dipped flowers with cinnamon on top. Before they knew it, they had devoured the whole bowl of cookies.
“Hurry, let’s go before she comes out for the cookies,” Jayden said as he tried to move his feet, but to no avail. His feet wouldn’t move.
“I can’t move my feet! They’re stuck,” Mia cried out in a whisper, looking down at her feet, seeing them surrounded by nothing but dirt. Looking up at Jayden she let out a small shriek, catching his attention. Jayden looked up at Mia and let out a small shriek of his own.
“What’s going on?” Jayden asked in fear and confusion. Pointing at Mia he continued, “You’re turning green!”
“Eek! Soo aaaree yyoouu!” Mia stammered back, finding it difficult to talk as her tongue began to change. Jayden opened his mouth to say something but only muffled sounds came out. That’s when the old lady came walking round the corner of the house towards them with a smile on her face and a song on her voice.
She walked up to Mia and Jayden and began poking and prodding them, all the while making comments like “Yes, very nice shading” and “Silky texture” and “Wonder if you’ll be a Popistar or Jabblylink or Tigersnap or something altogether new!” as the 3 cats danced around her and meowed their own comments.
The old lady jittered with excitement, grabbed a nearby garden chair, sat down, and began talking to the two. “Oh this is very exciting, it’s been a while since I’ve added to my garden. Why the last time was 2 months ago when that mean little rock throwing boy broke one of my statues! Well, I’d have none of that so I made him replace it. See, that’s him over there.” She said pointing over to a small statuette of a boy in old-fashioned clothing jumping over a candlestick.
“But where are my manners,” she said with much mirth. “I’m Autumn Fable and it’s so nice to finally meet you after all these evenings of ringing my bell.” Jayden and Mia looked at the old lady and made frantic motions with their arms and tried to beg for help, but only muffled sounds came out of their quivering green lips.
“Oh my, look at how adorable you look singing and dancing like that,” Autumn said with glee in her voice and a clap of her hands. “This is so exciting! I can’t wait to see what you’ll grow to be. Maybe you’ll be Gatorjaws or Bablyoons or Squidlyloos or Gabblysqwaks or even one of the many garden creatures that live here. The suspense is simply delicious! I do hope it will last,” she finished with a chuckle and poured herself a cup of green tea.
“Well then my lil’ poppies, would you like to hear some stories while we wait? Some fanciful fables to lighten the heart and soothe your sweet lil’ souls? … hmmm. I could do that, but it wouldn’t be true or at least, the whole truth.”
“See, it’s true that there was an old lady that swallowed a fly, but I know why she swallowed that fly. It’s simple really, it’s because she was a Bagroth! Oh they are greedy, selfish, and utterly disgusting looking creatures that have no self-control over what and how much they eat. They can grow to enormous size if one is not careful to stop them. Why, one almost ate my last garden in the last home I lived in, and would’ve too if it had not been for the Tizzywhurls, they showered the air with sleeping pollen… ending that dreadful day.” She said as her teacup made a small clinking noise on its saucer.
“It was kind of Mrs. Shoehorn to send her children to collect that Bagroth though, because I don’t know what I would’ve done with it. They towed it back to their shoe house and everyday that week, the air smelled of Bagroth stew,” she said laughing to herself, “her children were well fed that week!”
Setting her teacup and saucer aside, Autumn got up and began poking and prodding again. She tenderly held Jayden’s hand saying, “Such lovely tendrils you’re growing.” Causing Jayden to freak out again and shake about franticly to which Autumn happily remarked “my but you do love to dance!”
Making her way over to an equally “dancing” Mia, she held her face in her two hands and her eyes lit with green flecks as she inspected her head. “Simply beautiful my dear, the petals of your flower is growing splendidly.” Mia reached up with leafing hands and felt her head, where once there was brunette hair now long silky bluish white petals grew. She tried to scream out, but only soft high-pitched melodies escaped causing Autumn to sing along, a song about spring which the 3 cats merrily joined in on too.
It was quite a scene, had anybody been around to see. With the song being over, and the children’s transformation still going, Autumn returned to her seat and cup of tea to begin another tale.
“Now the next tale is a tale of woe, of transformation, and of vengeance! See, it’s true that the extremely fat and egg shaped Mr. Humpty Dumpty did like to sit on a wall to eat his lunch, and he certainly had a very great splattering fall, but what they failed to tell you was that Humpty Dumpty had a very bad gambling habit and owed a great sum of money, to someone who you should never owe that kind of money to…” she said and leaning closer whispered, “the Shadhowl.”
“A terrible man the Shadhowl, or at least he used to be a man before the change some 20 odd years ago… It is said that when he was a man he used to work for one of the biggest mob bosses in Faesing. But led astray by the visions of the daemon Syn, he was filled with greed and power lust, so he made plans to kill his boss, plans that Drak found out about. And so the man was captured, beaten, and on the brink of death when his body was discarded in the Crepuscular Forest.”
“No one knew what happened to him in that forest, but one thing was certain, something old, dark and powerful now lives in him, is now a part of him. He returned to Faesing in the dark of night and got his bloody revenge on his ex boss Drak and the goons that beat him. Now you’re really to young for me to describe just what he did to those poor people, but suffice it to say it was so bad that it put the fear of Hades in all the men, so no one challenged him when he made himself the new boss.”
“Over the months a change overcame his men, a change created by him. They became darker inside, more feral and fearsome. They soon became known as the Creeps. They made quite a sinister reputation for themselves and the Shadhowl. Soon, people were crossing the street anytime they saw the Creeps coming down the side of the street they were on. The Shadhowl used this fear to do many atrocious things, including something horrible to one of the sister Fates.”
“So it was only inevitable that when Humpty failed to pay what he owed that the Shadhowl would send his henchmen Creeps after him, and give him that very big splattering fall! Oh the pain Humpty’s adopted daughter felt that day the mayor’s Tinmen told her of the tragedy, it broke her heart. That’s the day she changed, became cold inside, for shame.”
“She went up to that wall, from which he did fall to give herself to the Fates, but they had other plans and showed her the hands that committed her father to grave.”
“So into the dark side of the city she did turn and hunt down those Creeps with Fates deadly silver laced blades. And when the Shadhowl learned of the fate they did earn, he disappeared from the lands of Fae make. Now it is said she hunts him still every night, through these strange lands of humans.”
(to be continued)