Emily was walking through her front yard and humming absentmindedly until she tripped on a stone.
“That’s funny- I never noticed that stone before,” said Emily.
She slowly picked up the stone and angled it at the sunlight so that she could see it better. It had a gray sheen that was almost white and it sparkled several colors of the rainbow. Suddenly a rainbow sprang from the stone. In surprise Emily dropped the stone, and the rainbow disappeared.
“What was that?“ Emily said to herself.
Emily picked up the stone again, and the rainbow returned. But this time, Emily touched the rainbow carefully, and to her surprise, it was solid. Then, not knowing why she was doing it, she slid onto the rainbow. Then suddenly, a strong wind whisked her away. Terrified, Emily clutched on to the rainbow as she slid on it. It winded around and around and around like a slide in a playground, and then there was a sudden up. She stopped at the top for a moment to look down at the beautiful scenery of the buildings lining up and the rolling green hills. Then suddenly, she went down fast like a rollercoaster, and the kind of thrill in her stomach was the same kind of terror and thrill in your stomach. Then, she went down so near, her feet grazed the top of a roof. And then up again into a white cloud (they’re much more cold and wet than you think they are). Down down down down, faster than she had ever gone before, so fast she wasn’t able to give the breath to scream. She saw, coming up, a gray stone wall. How do I stop it? How do I stop it? How do I stop it? Was all Emily thought right before she crashed into the wall. But it wasn’t a regular wall. She went through it and spiraled in a white light, her body morphing and reforming. With a bright flash she hit solid ground.
Emily groaned as she stood up, and as she looked around, she noticed that she wasn’t in Westchester. Emily also felt like she wasn’t in any other place on the planet earth. Emily felt like she was in a different universe. As Emily looked around she noticed that this planet was much brighter than earth and much less polluted than the cities Emily had visited. The air was fresher and horses that seemed to glow unnaturally grazed in the fields ahead of her. A stream of fresh water up to Emily’s knees rolled past her. She heard the crashing of a waterfall below. The fish in this land were very different. It seemed they had both lungs and gills. All of them sparkled in three different colors, and each of them had a pair of underwater wings that could be used for both sky and water. Some of the fields were strangely flat, and some were rolls and rolls of green hills. Tucked in each hill were little towns, looking so small from where Emily was. But then, far away, the valleys turned dark and shriveled, as if darkness had taken over that place. Another weird thing was that instead of birds flying around in the daylight, there were bats instead, except the bats’ voices sounded exactly like the chirp of a bird. One thing that stuck out most to Emily was a valley that seemed to go on forever like it was endless, with the same flowers blossoming, the same clouds moving, and the same bats chirping. The endless valley seemed strangely too good.
“Strange,” Emily said.
But just as Emily was taking this new world in, a big beefy hand grabbed her by the shoulder. Emily started to scream, but another beefy hand wrapped an old piece of cloth around her mouth and tightly knotted it. Both hands were wrinkled, green, and hairy.
“QUIET,” said a gruff voice.
And she came face to face with a what looked like an ogre from a children’s story. Its skin was green and it had boils all over its body with bloodshot eyes, a pointy nose, stringy hair, and bits of mold around its body. It was plain ugly. All it wore was a dirty brown cloth that must have had a color a long time ago, but had gotten much too dirty for appearing. Emily also noticed that there must have been more of the cloth draped around his body, but it had rotted away with time. Then she was thrown into a smelly sack . After that Emily forgot what happened next because she fell into a restless sleep.
When Emily awoke she found herself in a cold cave surrounded by ugly ogres and all of them grabbing for her and moaning and saying things like:
“I get to eat her brain- that tastes the best.”
“No no no, I get to eat her brain!“
“Can I eat her toe nails?”
“Leave the eyeballs to me.”
Emily crawled away from the crowd of ogres, her stomach turning around and around as the ogres got closer and closer, until she was cornered. Then, one orge that looked like the leader reached forward for Emily with one grubby hand. Emily could not help herself with all the fear building up inside her, and she screamed. The ogre reaching for her took his hand away as if surprised. This gave Emily time to think, and the first thing that Emily thought was RUN! And Emily ran and ran and ran. She ran past the leader ogre and Emily dodged the other ogres reaching for her. Then one daring ogre ran in front of her as she was running, and, not having time to think, Emily dove under the tough looking ogre.
“Oooohhhh!” groaned the ogre.
“After our food!” roared the leader, “or you get no food.”
Emily quickly scurried over the boulder blocking her path. There was a wall made of stalagmites that was blocking her path, and the only way to get through was by going up and over it. Not wasting any time, Emily jumped up on it and started climbing, but a small child ogre grabbed her foot.
“I got food!” he cried.
Emily kicked him in the face, but instantly felt bad as he started crying.
“Sorry!” she said as she started climbing higher and higher.
She could feel the ogres huffing and puffing as they climbed up the stalagmites. One more ogre jumped on. Emily heard a creaking sound, and one of the ogres on the ground yelled, “Too much weight!” and the stalagmites crashed to the ground. As they crashed down with Emily at the top, her leg fell forward, scraping a stalagmite and making a small wound on her leg. Biting back her pain and her fear, Emily kept running. There was one boulder blocking the entrance.
“Haha!” roared an ogre, “Our food is blocked.”
But what the ogres didn’t know was that Emily or any other human could easily squeeze past the sides of the boulder. So Emily pressed herself against the wall and squeezed past the boulder into the cold night air.
Emily looked around. The first thing she saw was a structure that looked like a house. She started running/limping toward it until she heard a big BOOM. She turned around and saw the ogres had pushed down the boulder and were filing out. Turning on her heel, she started running as fast as she could to the structure. At last she got there and it turned out it was a stable.
“Must be an abandoned stable,” muttered Emily to herself.
Slowly, she opened the door as it creaked open. Then, with one last look behind her, she closed the door. Emily walked around cautiously until she found an old patch of hay. Right before she went to bed, Emily washed her wound in the stream. Then, she snuggled down deep inside the hay. Her dreams were filled with ogres grabbing, screeching, groaning, wanting to eat her.
And the leader saying in a too-sweet voice, “Come to me, Emily. Come to me.” And reaching his gnarled hand toward her. Emily awoke many times with cold sweat.
Sunlight streamed into the stables, making the hay Emily was sleeping in seem pure gold. Emily blinked a few times, and she felt something soft nuzzling her cheek.
“Get away, get away! Stop it ogre,” mumbled Emily.
Then, something licked her cheek.
“What?” Emily said, and this time fully opened her eyes.
To her surprise, there was a white stallion nuzzling her cheek. Emily blinked a few times, and she got up, groaning as she dragged her leg behind her.
“I guess this isn’t a completely abandoned stable,” she whispered into the stallion’s ear. “You’re a beauty,” she said, stroking the stallion’s mane.
It was a pure white horse with a glossy white coat and a thick bushy tail. With big chocolatey brown eyes. And as Emily was stroking its back, she noticed something different. It had huge white wings folded up by its sides, shining with a silvery sheen.
“A pegasus,” Emily whispered, amazed.
She stared into the horse’s eyes for a while, and finally she broke from the phase.
“Well, I better go,” Emily said, and she peeked at the door.
The field looked deserted.
“Good,” she said, and she started out on her way.
Emily had been walking for a while, and her leg had turned a sickly green color. The scenery hadn’t changed at all. She was still in what seemed like a neverending field of green grasses and small streams. Flowers bloomed brightly in the morning sun. Suddenly, she heard the sound of a horse trotting behind her. She turned to look and saw the beautiful stallion had been following her.
“What are you doing here?” she questioned.
It gently nuzzled her chin.
“Well I guess you’re gonna stay with me, so I better name you,” Emily said, “I think Snowy will be good, since it suits your pure white color.”
Suddenly, the stallion stretched out its big, white wings as if stretching his arms. Emily turned and started walking again, but the stallion stayed there.
Emily turned around and asked, “Aren’t you coming with me?”
The stallion held his head high and lifted his wings even higher.
“You want me to go on your back?” she asked.
The stallion nodded his head. He got down on his knees, and Emily jumped onto him.
“Ow!” she flinched as the pain in her leg intensified.
Snowy put her down and started licking her wound.
“Oh don’t do that, Snowy. It’ll probably make it worse!”
But to her surprise, when Snowy was done her wound had completely healed.
“You have healing powers?” Emily said, shaking her head. “This place really is crazy.”
Emily jumped on again. Then Snowy held his wings out and started running as fast as his legs could carry him. Faster and faster and faster, until they were lifted into the air. Emily clung onto his neck and looked down at the valley. It looked beautiful from up here. And she floated past clouds in the blue sky.
It was nighttime and they were still flying past the stars and the moon. Emily grew drowsy soon, and slept comfortably on Snowy’s back as he landed gently on the grass. Then, he too nuzzled up beside her and closed his eyes. But he opened his eyes quickly, sensing the danger around them, and instead stood pacing around Emily, protecting her all night.
Snowy neighed and awoke Emily.
“What is it?” Emily said, and she opened her eyes.
As she stood up, she saw a tall, lean boy with a red mop of hair, brilliant blue eyes, and a lopsided grin. Snowy protectively stood in front of Emily, separating her from the redheaded boy.
“Who are you?” Emily said with a tinge of cautiousness to her voice.
“My name’s Jack,” he said, spit on his hand, and put his hand out to her.
“Um hi?” she said, and waved her hand shyly, NOT accepting his hand.
Jack, getting the message, quickly put his hand away.
“Now we better be going,” he said and jumped onto Snowy.
“What do you mean?” Emily asked.
“A long time ago,” he said, “a prophecy was made about a girl from the human world who would stop the ogres from eating the innocent people in our towns. “
“Me?” Emily said, her eyes widening. “But I almost got eaten myself!”
“Eaten or not, you’re the girl from the prophecy. But no time to chat. Come on. Quickly!” Jack said, lifting her onto Snowy.
“Away from here! Wherever we are,” said Emily.
Finally, Snowy landed for a break in the endless field.
“Do you want something to eat?” said Jack.
“I’m okay,” said Emily, but her stomach growled in protest.
“Seems like you’re hungry to me,” said Jack.
“You win. I’ll take a little bit,” said Emily
He handed her a fresh cob of corn. Emily munched on it happily.
“So tell me more about the prophecy,” Emily said as she munched on her corn.
“Well, it is really simple, the prophecy. It was made 16 years ago when I was just a wee baby. It was made by an old wizard whose name is long forgotten. One day he fell into a phase that lasted for days. He wouldn’t eat or drink for days, and all he did was stare into his magical orb that held all his powers. While he was staring at this orb, evil spirits seemed to be dancing outside of his workshop, taunting him, but he listened to none of them. And when he got out of his phase, he was never the same, but still he did have some good in him and went straight to the king of Exbow.
“The king of Exbow?” Emily asked.
Jack looked at Emily like she was some evil creature that disgusted him. “You don’t know the king of Exbow? The king of Exbow is a fair leader who rules this land. King Exbow at once made the prophecy official, so that every knows about the prophecy. It is said that a human girl riding a pure white stallion with wings is to defeat the ogres terrorizing the innocent people.”
“WOW, this place really is magical,” said Emily, amazed.
“That’s the only thing that makes us different from your world- everything here is magical. Even you are, when you are in this world. Every one of us has a power here. Now, I would like to know what yours is,” said Jack, eyeing her suspiciously, with one eyebrow raised.
“W-what? I h-have no idea what y-you are talking about,” Emily stuttered as Jack’s eyes bore deep down into her. It was as if he could read her mind, and it made an uneasy feeling in the air.
“Let me show you what I’m talking about,” said Jack with a touch of distrust in his voice.
Emily watched Jack as he closed his eyes, then suddenly, he disappeared. And a moment later, he was right next to her.
“What was that?” said Emily, staring into space.
“My power is that I can teleport myself.”
“This place is more like Superhero land than fairytale land,” Emily said.
`I can even do that with other people,” he said, “I’ll do it with you.”
“No no no no no,” Emily said.
“Too bad,” said Jack with a slight grin.
Emily felt a warm tingling go up from her spine into her head till it felt like her head was floating with warm liquid.
When Emily opened her eyes she was far behind in the stables where she had met Snowy. She heard the sound of an ogre’s grumbling right outside the stable.
It said, “She’s wounded. She can’t get far.”
Emily crept down and hid, but one ogre saw her.
“It’s her!” he growled.
“What are you talking about?” said the ogres, “We checked ten times remember? Last time it was a bat.”
“Well if you’re not gonna check, I’m going to,” said the ogre, and he shoved the door open.
“Jaaack, now would be a good time to leave,” Emily said, hoping Jack would hear even though he was miles away.
Just as the ogre was reaching to grab for her, Jack appeared right next to Emily.
“Let’s go!” said Jack, and tightly gripped her hand.
The tingling sensation was back, but Emily didn’t notice it as she saw the ogre’s eyes widen as he reached a little bit farther.
“Alert the ogres more up west!” he yelled.
Then, they reappeared in the field with Snowy.
“How did you do that?” she said.
“Magic,” Jack answered.
“But now they know we’re up west,” said Emily.
“Probably not too up west. Nothing to be worried about,” said Jack, patting her gently on the back.
Suddenly, a rumbling was heard, and when Emily and Jack looked up a rampage of ogres was thundering toward them.
“Yeah. Nothing to be worried about,” said Emily.
“Run! Hide!” Jack cried.
He scurried behind a tree. Emily looked around for a hiding place, but she saw nothing to hide behind. Emily saw Jack beckoning her from behind the tree, but she knew they would be too big together, and it would only put him in more danger. Emily shook her head at Jack and grimaced. Emily started running, but it was too late, an ogre had already grabbed her by the shirt.
“Get off me!” Emily cried.
Jack jumped out of his hiding place.
“Hey! Nananana booboo!” he yelled to the ogres more behind.
One of them leapt out and grabbed Jack.
“Aaawww,” whined the ogre, “He’s not the girl.”
He dropped him roughly on the ground,
“Ugh,” Jack groaned as he landed hard on his backside.
“You stupid murderer,” Emily said, not thinking.
“Enough!” cried the ogre, and he bopped her on the head so hard that Emily felt the vibrations through her whole body.
All the blood in her body went to her head.
Emily felt dizzy and the images in her head blurred.
Emily forced her eyes open and saw the blurred features of a orge.
A cold laugh filled the field, and everything went black.
When Emily woke up, she found herself in what seemed like a jail cave. There was some kind of hardened liquid as the bars around her. The ground was cold, but Emily could feel the pulsing of the earth beneath her hand. The jail was dimly lit with one torch. A bowl of mushy, green stuff that looked disgusting was by her feet.
“I need to get out of here,” whispered Emily.
She tried breaking the liquid bars, but they were surprisingly hard. Emily heard a cry and looked up. There were bats hanging from the ceiling in her cell.
Jack crept out of his hiding place. He saw Snowy easily walking toward him.
“Emily, come on out!” he said.
Snowy pointed his head toward where the ogres had headed.
“Oh no,” said Jack. “Come on,” he said turning his head to Snowy. “Their traps are still on the ground we’ve got a long journey ahead of us.”
Emily heard a moaning in the cell next door. “Who’s there?” said Emily, her voice echoing in the hallway.
“Meeeee,” moaned the voice.
“Show yourself,” said Emily.
“It’s just meeee,” moaned the voice again, and this time, it sounded like it was right behind Emily.
“What?” said Emily, and she whipped around. In front of her, she saw something light and wispy. Emily put her hand through it, and it felt like she was going through cold air. “You’re a ghost?” she said.
“No, a spirit,” said the spirit.
“Okay, spirit. What were you before?” said Emily.
“I was a girl like you,” the spirit said.
Emily looked at the spirit. “Not meaning to be rude, but you look a little bit more like a cloud.”
“I cannot be in my boooooooody,” the spirit said. “for I died a long time ago. My boooooody is in the cell next door if you want to see it.”
“Um, no thank you,” said Emily. “But I would like to know what your name was as a girl.”
“I forgooooot, it was such a long time ago,” said the spirit.
“One more question, if it doesn’t bother you too much,” said Emily, “How do I get out of here? I mean, you seem experienced enough.”
“You have to unlock your inner power,” said the spirit, and it started to dissolve into thin air.
“Wait! What do you mean, ‘unlock your inner power’? What? No! Don’t leave!” Emily said.
But the spirit was already gone.
“Thanks for the help!” said Emily, a little bit sarcastically.
“Unlock your inner power? What does that even mean?” said Emily. “Unlock your inner power? Unlock your inner power?” Emily kept saying to herself. “Unlock your inner – POWER! Of course! My power that Jack was talking about, like some kind of psycho!”
“But how do I do that?” said Emily. “Oh, great,” said Emily, throwing her hands up in the air. “I know what to do but I don’t know how to do it.”
Emily sat on the cold floor, sulking. Soon her thoughts drifted off to how mean the ogres had been to the innocent people in their towns. All their bloody hatred was boiling inside of her, making her head hurt and her cheeks red.
“I am getting out of here no matter what, and I’m going to say what I want to say to those jerko ogres,” Emily said, grinding her teeth.
With all this anger building up inside her she felt the same tingling sensation up her back. The same tingling sensation when Jack had unleashed his powers. And, for some reason, she looked at the bars and stared deep down at them. She imagined the bars breaking apart by her command, and then she heard a cracking sound and looked up. The bars looked like they had been pried apart and Emily easily stepped through. With her newfound power, Emily found confidence in herself and started walking toward the door. Until she came across a metal bolted door in front of her. Knowing how to use her power, she used her power to open the door. An ogre guard was standing in front of her. He raised his hand to punch her on the head again. But she moved his metal helmet above his head and dropped it on him before he could move a muscle.
“Ooohhhhhhh!” the ogre screamed.
Emily turned on her heel and started running. Suddenly, she saw something that didn’t look like an ogre with a red mop of hair and its back turned from her. Must be a really short ogre, Emily thought. And she lifted a torch until it was touching the ogre’s fingers.
“Hey! Ow!” said the ogre, and he turned to face her.
“Jack?” Emily said.
“Oh my gosh, Jack! You’re here?” said Emily, and she flew into his arms.
“Come on, Emily! We have to go now!” said Jack as he sucked on his fingers.
“Sorry about the torch,” said Emily as they started running. “I thought you were an ogre.”
“Did you think I looked like one?” said Jack.
“Hey,” said Jack, a new realization coming to him. “You found your power! But … it’s fire?” said Jack, looking confused.
“No! said Emily with a laugh. “I can move things without touching them. Hey, where’s Snowy?”
“Well, he’s supposed to wait outdoors to fly away with us, but I don’t think he really liked the idea of doing that.” Suddenly they heard a crash, and Snowy leaped through the window.
“Snowy!” said Emily and Emily ran forward, about to embrace the stallion, not knowing that a big ogre was right behind her with a pan raised above her head. Snowy and Jack both shoved her out of the way, at the same time making them tumbling into a ball together with Jack sprawled on top of Snowy.
“Run!” Jack cried, as he and Snowy got up.
And Emily ran. Emily turned to see Snowy and Jack fighting against the ogres, but she could also see that they were outnumbered. Ogres kept blocking her path, but she kept burning them with torches. Suddenly Emily saw light and had hope – until the leader ogre grabbed her by the neck. He squeezed and Emily started coughing as he choked her. Without being able to focus Emily couldn’t move things.
“Emily!” cried Jack, and he threw her a dagger that he had disarmed from an ogre.
But right after that, an ogre tackled him to the ground. And poor Snowy had cuts covering his body. Without thinking, Emily took the dagger and stabbed it into the leader ogre’s eye.
“Aaaaahhh!” the ogre screamed. And he dropped Emily on the floor.
Emily watched in horror as he evaporated into the air. All the ogres turned to her in horror, but when Emily thought they were about to attack her, instead they bowed down deep to her.
“Am I missing something?” said Emily, looking around, confused.
One of the toughest looking ogres said to her in a deep, gruff voice, “Whoever kills the leader of our tribe is the new leader. What must we do for our new queen?”
“Um,” Emily said, about to tell them to stop eating innocent people, but then she heard Jack coughing, with a cut on his forehead, and Snowy whimpering on the ground.
“Help my friends,” Emily said.
Soon Jack and Snowy were all healed by a magical antidote that only the ogres knew. Emily had ordered the ogres not to eat innocent people from neighboring towns, and now the ogres ate good meals of berries, nuts, fruits, and the occasional deer. Emily also didn’t forget her debt to the spirit, and had the spirit set free. Emily did feel some happiness as she watched the spirit spiraling out and whooping with joy. But as one of her ogre servants handed her an outfit to wear that day (a white blouse and jeans), Emily said, “I can’t stay here. I have to go back to my home.”
“You cannot,” said the gruff voice of her servant, “Now that you are our queen you cannot leave us without us having a new ruler.”
But already an idea was forming in Emily’s head.
The next day an announcement had been made that Jack would be the next king of the ogres.
“And from now on,” said Emily, “instead of killing each other to be leader, you will choose who will be the leader. But I have to leave.”
Jack handed her a stone that looked exactly like the one in her backyard.
“It’s your only way back home,” he said with a slight bit of sorrow in his eyes.
So then, they went out into the great field. As Emily held up the stone to the sun for a moment she paused.
“Goodbye,” she said to the ogres.
She and Jack hugged, and she nuzzled Snowy and gave him a sugar cube. Then Emily held up the stone to the sky and the rainbow sprang up. Emily slid on it and the wind whisked her away.
“I’ll be back!” Emily cried as the wall came up.
Emily hit it with confidence, and she went through the portal back into her backyard. Holding the stone tightly in her hands, she heard her mother call her.
“Emily! Dinnertime!”
“Coming!” Emily said, and she slipped the rock into her pocket.
THE END
Short story about snowy
Once the mythical animal, Pegasus, had a small colt, but sadly the colt was weak and sickly. One day, the colt went out on a walk alone, and there was a earthquake. The colt was badly hurt and almost died. The only way for the delicate colt to live was for it to go to a different planet, for that was the only planet that had the medicine. It was called Exbow. But that meant never coming back home for the colt, because once the colt went to the new world, he could never come back. The colt grew big and strong with the good raising of a humble farmer, but when the young stallion bothered the other farmers, the farmer was forced to let the stallion into the wild. Luckily, he survived and became Snowy years later.