"The Trouble with Magical Beings" (A Fantasy) Chapter 4

Daniel had read the rules over and over until he knew all twenty by heart.  Jenny only knew two, not to lie and not to be selfish, that was all she could remember from the list, but he’d be sure she didn’t break any of the others.

It was nearly midnight and they were standing on the deserted beach waiting for Kale to arrive.

“Are you worried?” Jenny asked him quietly.

“No, we’ll be fine, and besides what can an adventure through candy covered fields on harmless, happy horses do to us?”

“But you asked for transforming robots that had to protect the world, and that sounds scary.” Jenny reminded him.

“Hey, don’t worry…besides we’re not sure which adventure we’re getting anyway,” Daniel reasoned but in thinking it over, maybe he should have agreed with her friendly mustang world after all.

“Are you ready?” The deep voice behind them made them both jump in surprise.

“Why do you do that?”  Daniel asked, his heart nearly beating out of his chest.

Kale chuckled, “Sorry, just checking your reflexes. You’ll need to think fast in your adventure.”

“Why?” Jenny’s lower lip trembled.

“Oh, littlest one, you don’t have to worry, your adventure will not cause you any harm.”

Jenny smiled comforted by Kale’s words. She was glad it wasn’t going to be scary.

Naia flew next to her father and nodded to Daniel, “My dad wanted me to see you off on your adventure.”

“That was nice,” Daniel said, but he didn’t really see why Naia had to be there?

“That’s not entirely the reason you’re here Naia,” Kale told her sagely.

Naia turned to her father in surprise, “It isn’t?”

Kale shook his head but didn’t elaborate. He looked down at Daniel and asked, “Are you prepared to begin this challenge?”

“I think so.”

“Good, here is your world of adventure,” he said and pointed to a circle of water churning in the dark ocean.

The water circle lifted up until it was perpendicular to the sand and the center of it grew wider, opening enough for Daniel and Jenny to step in.

Daniel stepped back quickly; suddenly he wasn’t so sure about this adventure.

“What about our mom and grandmother, they’ll worry if we aren’t home,” Daniel asked.

“No need to be concerned,” Kale assured him.

“Did you make look alike robots?” Daniel asked with wide eyed curiosity.

Kale smiled and said, “Are you ready to start your adventure?”

Daniel turned to Jenny, “Are you ready?”

“Only if there are ponies in there,” Jenny said looking up at Kale with hope.

“See for yourself little one,” Kale pointed to the spinning water circle and as the central water began to clear they all could see inside.

A sunny world of little mustang ponies appeared. The Ponies were jumping over fences, flying through rainbow colored clouds and in the distance there was a mountain made of ice cream with rainbow sprinkles raining down on it. There were lollipop trees and gumdrop fields and some of the mustang ponies were grazing on licorice grass.

“Oh yes, I’m ready to go,” Jenny nodded enthusiastically pulling on Daniel’s hand to go inside.

“Great, it is Mustang’s in Candy Land,” Daniel sighed as he walked closer to the circle with Jenny but they didn’t have to step into it because they were magically pulled in as soon as they were close.

Jenny giggled when she saw the licorice covered ground beneath her feet.

“This is fun!” She laughed and ran from her brother over to a yellow tailed mustang pony that was grazing on some of the grass. The mustang pony bowed down and let her climb on its back.

“I’m not riding on a little mustang,” Daniel grumbled and suddenly a black stallion trotted up to him. It wasn’t a mustang and it wasn’t small like a pony either, it was a full size steed, but it didn’t look like a friendly horse.

The Stallion shook its large head at Daniel and sneered as it whinnied.

“Am I supposed to ride you?” Daniel asked it

The horse nodded but didn’t bow down to make it easy for him and it took Daniel several attempts to jump up on its back.

The horse whinnied at his attempts and Daniel thought it sounded like laughter. He finally got a good hold and climbed on.

“Your Adventure is about to begin,” Kale’s voice boomed into them but Daniel and Jenny couldn’y see him through the churning water circle.

“We’re ready.” Daniel answered.

 “Good, and since she has some lessons to learn as well, Naia will accompany you on it.”

Daniel and Jenny clearly heard Naia’s unhappy response.

“What? Dad no, please I don’t want to go.” Naia pleaded desperately but in the next instant she landed on the ground next to Jenny’s little yellow tailed horse and the spinning water circle vanished.

Naia called to her father begging him to take her back home, but like the water circle, he was gone too.

“You look different,” Daniel said wondering why she’d had to change to be in the adventure with them.

Naia looked down and screamed she was no longer tiny. Her father had made her human. This was not a good sign at all. Her father had not forgiven her for racing out into the human world without permission and causing this problem. He was disappointed in her and now she’d have to prove herself worthy too.

“Can you still do magic?” Jenny asked her curiously.

Daniel wondered about that too.

“I don’t know,” Naia said with a frown.

“Try something,” Daniel told her.

Naia closed her eyes and wished and when she opened them she quickly looked down and saw that her clothes had changed.

“That’s great!” Daniel said with encouragement.

“Not really,” Naia said in defeat, “I wished to change back but all it did was change my outfit. I think my magic’s been watered down.”

“At least it’s still magic and we may need it,” Daniel offered the small encouragement.

 “I guess,” Naia nodded.

“This is my little sister Jenny, and Jenny this is Naia,” Daniel introduced them.

“Hi Naia,” Jenny said happily.

“Hi Jenny,” Naia responded, but with little enthusiasm.

“You might as well pick a pony,” Daniel told her, pointing to the team of mustang ponies standing nearby.

“Sure, why not,” Naia said resigned to her fate and looked over at the smiling little horses. “I guess I'll take the green tailed one, it matches my eyes.”

“Not anymore,” said Jenny, “they’re brown now.”

“What?”

“She’s right, they are brown,” Daniel looked at her and confirmed it.

Naia told herself she would not cry. She would not fall into despair. She’d just have to prove herself worthy and earn back her father’s respect…and her green eyes...and the rest of her magic powers.

“Come on let’s get this adventure started already,” Naia said as she trudged over to the green tailed, mustang pony and the little horse bowed down letting her climb on its back.

“What happens next?” Jenny asked excitedly and her answer came from the thunderous sound of footsteps coming from the direction of the Ice Cream Mountains in the distance.

“What’s that?” Naia asked.

Daniel was afraid he knew the answer. It sounded like very large, robots.

Sure enough large metal heads could be seen over the tops of the mountains and they were heading their way.

The ponies and the stallion with their riders on board began to run in a circle until they took off into the sky.

They were flying above the clouds but not away from the robots, instead they were flying directly towards them.

“How do we turn these things around?” Naia asked.

“I don’t think we can,” Daniel said trying to steer the Stallion but it shook off his attempts and continued flying towards the mountains.

“Don’t worry, mustangs are our friends and they won’t lead us into trouble,” singsonged Jenny.

“Are you sure?” Naia asked her.

Jenny shrugged, “Mustang’s are like that but I’m not sure of Robot World,” she told her and gave her brother a knowing look.

“Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have asked for transforming robots.”

“You asked for what?” Naia said as the ponies flew to the top of the mountain.

“It doesn’t matter, we just have to deal with it now,” Daniel said over the noise of the raining rainbow sprinkles that were falling hard and fast and stung a little as they hit him.

The two ponies landed on the slippery mountaintop and began to lick the ground. A combination of flavors in rainbow streaks covered the mountain top. There was even a chocolate sauce waterfall cut into the side of the mountain.

Daniel’s stallion refused to land on the sticky mountain and instead just shook off his rider.

Daniel landed in a heap on the cold sticky ground and slid a foot down the mountain before he got a hold on an outcropping spoon and climbed onto it.

“Great, now how do I get out of this?” he asked sarcastically sitting on the spoon.

“You’re going to need a shower,” Naia said laughing and suddenly the sprinkles began to rain down even harder on Daniel at her words.

He looked like a human ice cream treat and Jenny giggled.

“If you wanted some ice cream Danny all you had to do was ask your horse nicely, you don’t have to roll in it,” and to prove it, Jenny whispered to her own pony, “Pistachio please?”

Her pony nodded and a large cone of pistachio ice cream appeared in her hand.

“See?” she said triumphantly holding the cone up to show her brother but he wasn’t amused.

The raining sprinkles were annoying and Daniel tried to shake them from his hair but they were falling too fast to make a difference.

“How do I make it stop?” He asked Naia.

“I think you need to ask your horse,” Naia  laughed as she told him.

Daniel looked up at the stubborn stallion and it appeared to be laughing at him too but he asked, “Can you help me out of this?”

The horse whinnied grudgingly and in the next instant Daniel was clean and sitting comfortably on the Stallion’s back.

“Thank you,” he whispered with true gratitude to the horse.

“Where did those robots go?” Naia asked looking around, “I don’t see them now.”

Daniel looked through the now softly, falling sprinkles and didn’t see them either but then he noticed a few large boulders of ice cream moving suspiciously.

“Look out,” he warned but it was too late.

The movement of the large boulders caused the mountain to shift and the two ponies with their riders slid half way down the mountain but the ponies were able to fly back up to Daniel and his stallion.

They all hovered in the sky as they watched the boulders below unfold and transform into large imposing robots.

Suddenly, an army of human looking robots, with large boulder like heads, stood regimentally before them.

“I am Granite who are you?” The lead boulder robot asked Daniel in a loud thunderous voice.

Daniel gave him a friendly smile and thought that maybe this was to be his part of the adventure. He had asked Kale to be the leader of transforming robots and to help them protect their world from invaders. He smiled at the thought of leading these massive robots.

“I’m Daniel and this is my sister Jenny and our friend Naia, I think I’m supposed to be your leader and help you against invaders,” he told Granite with a wide confident smile.

The booming laughter from all the robots shook the ice cream mountain dangerously and a volcanic flow of ice cream lava shot out from its top raining down on Daniel and Naia but not on Jenny.

The lead robot, Granite, held his side as he laughed at the sight.

“It’s not funny,” said Daniel wiping ice cream from his eyes.

“No it’s not!” Naia agreed with him trying to cover her face from the still flowing ice cream lava.

“Oh, but it is,” Granite said straightening to his full height and looking directly at Daniel. He smiled, but his smile was not friendly as he said, “You think you’re our leader against invaders? Now how can that be, when you are the invaders…and now our prisoners?”

The robots began to walk threateningly towards the three riders.

Jenny had watched the big, mean robot with little concern but at his words to her brother, her little heart raced. Nobody bullied her brother.

“Mustangs away,” Jenny commanded.

Naia’s pony immediately flew next to Jenny's but it took another scary second before Daniel’s stallion obeyed the command.

The three horses lined up and, just as the robots came within reaching distance and with Granite about to grab Daniel, all three horses took off with lightning speed.

The three flew high up into the clouds escaping the robots, or so they thought until they looked down below and saw the robots were shape shifting into jet planes.

“You had to ask for transforming robots?” Naia said accusingly to Daniel.

“Let’s just get out of here, fast,” he said.

“I know where we can hide,” Jenny said and yelled, “To the pony cave!”

The horses obeyed hitting warp speed as their riders held on tight.