The Magical Lavender
Fighting Words Dublin, Story by Ayesha, 11 years old, Finglas, Dublin 11
CHAPTER # 1
Once upon a time there was a gorgeous girl named Jessica. She was a very sweet little girl with dark brown hair running down her back down to her waist. She had a little brother Christopher. She loved to play football with Christopher in the backyard. On rainy days, they painted amazing pictures of mythical unicorns and fire-breathing dragons.
One day, Christopher went out to play with his friends, James and Nicholas. Jessica was bored, so she got out her favourite book and took it out to the backyard for some quiet reading. She was a quick reader and in no time at all she had finished her book and was bored – again. So, Jessica decided to pick some of the flowers growing around her. She would give them to her mother later.
Jessica saw some beautiful lavender. She thought it looked simply lovely; lavender was also her favourite flower. She smelt the strong scent and bent down to pick it. But just as she touched it, she shrunk down to the size of a fairy. Now Jessica was absolutely tiny! A baby ladybird would have been big enough for her to live in, she was so small! Suddenly a something huge – a fly flew down next to her.
“Oh, hello, Fly,” said Jessica. “Could you please tell me why I am so tiny and help me get back big again?”
The fly frowned and said, “No, I am going to eat you!”
Jessica didn’t stop to think, she just ran. Ran as fast as her legs could carry her – which was not very fast, considering her legs had shrunk down with her body. She started screaming for help at the top of her voice, but soon realised that since she was so small, nobody could hear her.
Up ahead, Jessica could see a long dark purple thing. She wasn’t quite sure what it was. In fact, she had no idea what it was, but she could hear the fly buzzing after her not far off. This violet thing seemed safe enough, so she quickly climbed up. The terrified little girl stayed there until she was certain the fly had gone.
She started to explore the long dark purple thing. Jessica soon found out that this was actually more lavender, the same lavender she had touched that had mysteriously made her small. The lavender was amazing. It had rows and rows of lavender flowers, all stacked very cleverly, or so Jessica thought, so that each row had just a big enough gap to the next row to adjust space for lots of fairy-sized folk to comfortably live in.
Every single lavender bud had something different on it. Cinemas, restaurants, supermarkets, grocery stores, schools, libraries, playgrounds, zoos, everything you can possibly imagine.
“It’s like an apartment block,” thought Jessica. “Each row is a floor and every lavender bud is an apartment.”
As she climbed higher, Jessica saw two or three rows where each lavender bud was a house for the fairy folk to live in. There were hundreds of thousands of tiny people going round.
Jessica was very overwhelmed, so she approached one of the tiny people. This girl was dressed from head to toe in a long white flowing gown with very high heeled shoes, had a golden necklace around her neck and a beautiful diamond ring squeezed onto her ring finger.
“Hello,” she mumbled nervously. “My name is Jessica and I am afraid I don’t know where I am. I just touched a lavender flower and I became tiny.”
“Are you from the human world?” asked the girl.
“Yes, I am,” replied Jessica.
“Oh, that’s not very good, is it?” said the girl. “The king and queen hate people from the human world.”
“Who exactly are you?” said Jessica, quite frightened now.
“Me? I am – the princess!” said the girl, who started to shout. “POLICE! Police! She’s from the human world! POLICE!” screeched the princess, waving her arms over her head and pointing madly at Jessica.
Jessica ran for it. But the police were way faster than her. They had helicopters, cars and motorbikes, where as Jessica only had her little legs.
Before she knew it a policeman grabbed her from behind and screamed, “Got you!”
But a woman said, “No! Michael! Hand her over!”
And then Jessica was spun around to face the woman. The woman dragged her into the helicopter and flew off.
“BYE MICHAEL! YOU PUT YOUR FAITH IN THE WRONG PERSON!” the woman yelled down from high up in the sky.
“NOOOOOOOOOOO! SHE’S GETTING AWAY WITH THE HUMAN! GET THE KING AND QUEEN, SOMEONE!” howled Michael from down below.
Jessica fainted. Two hours later…
“You’re finally awake." The woman from the helicopter was leaning over Jessica.
Jessica screamed.
“Don’t worry. I’m not taking you to the palace. I tricked Michael, that’s the policeman, to letting me take you to the palace, because, well, the king and queen would have captured you and kept you in the Magical Lavender forever.2 said the woman. “My name is Mya, by the way.”
Jessica got up and went over to the window.
“I want to go home.” she whined. “My mother, father and my brother, Christopher, will be worried about me.”
“All right, let’s get you home,” said Mya.
“How come I became tiny when I touched the lavender?” asked Jessica.
“Because touching the Magical Lavender is the secret entrance. You become tiny as soon as you touch it,” explained Mya.
“But what’s the Magical Lavender?”
“It’s a lavender flower where all the magical people live together and at the very top the king and queen live with their little daughter, Isabella. If we go to the palace then we just might be able to get you back home if we ask Isabella for a potion,” said Mya.
“Isabella, the one who got the police after me?” asked Jessica, eyebrows raised.
“Well, uh, yes.”
“Great.”
CHAPTER # 2
“How do I look?” asked Jessica, stepping out of the bathroom.
“Perfect. Now you just need to act like one of the guards at the palace,” said Mya.
Jessica looked a bit scared.
“It’s all right. Isabella’s such an idiot she’ll fall for anything,” said Mya, sensing Jessica’s fright.
Jessica was now wearing a knight’s armour, armed with a sword.
“Is the sword necessary?” she asked for the millionth time. She knew if she was pretending to be a palace guard she would definitely have to carry a sword, but the thought made her feel uncomfortable.
“It’s necessary, 100%,” replied Mya firmly.
Jessica sighed.
“In a few minutes,” continued Mya, “we will head outside, in disguise, of course, and go to the palace and ask to see the princess. Then we will –“
“Go ask Isabella for the spell and get me home…” interrupted Jessica, sounding bored. She’d heard the plan so many times she knew it off by heart.
Mya rolled her eyes. “Okay, Jessica…ACTION!”
It sounded really exciting, but the real thing was very boring and ordinary. It was just two knights stiffly marching on the pavement alongside the road. Up and down went Jessica’s arms, it was quite hard work.
The palace was a lovely old castle that looked out of a fairy tale. Jessica thought the view would be simply marvellous! Jessica thought that only the king, queen and princess, and all their servants, guards, knights and royalty from different countries would be allowed to enter the palace, but she was wrong.
The palace was buzzing with people. Jessica looked at Mya questioningly.
“The king and queen aren’t very nice people but they want everyone to think that they are the best, so they let everyone living in the Magical Lavender roam around the palace,” explained Mya.
Jessica nodded. They marched up to a guard. He didn’t look happy to see them.
“What’s wrong now?” he said rudely.
“We wish to see the princess!” announced Mya in what she hoped was a mighty, confident voice.
“She’s in her bedroom,” said the guard gruffly.
Mya and Jessica wandered around until they came to a bright pink door with ISABELLA written across in pure gold.
Jessica knocked. “Come in!” someone called.
They went in. The princess’ room was about the size of six double bedrooms in one. It had a grand bed covered in silk sheets and it was painted a light purple. Isabella had filled it up with all sorts of toys and books.
“Your Majestic Highness, we would like to buy a potion from your mother and father’s stock of potions. Please, could we?” asked Mya, in the same proud voice.
“Certainly. Which one would you like?” asked Isabella politely.
“The one that brings you back home no matter where you are or where you live.”
The princess gracefully got up and went over to a large stack of bottles all multi coloured with different labels on.
She handed them one that was a dark maroon like red.
“€6.54 please.”
Jessica got out six euro and fifty-five cents. Isabella passed a one cent coin back to her.
“Thank you, your Highness,” said Jessica.
But Isabella recognised Jessica’s voice. “HUMAN IN MY BEDROOM!” she shrieked.
“RUN!” screamed Mya.
The two ran as fast as they could out of the palace and down the lavender. Jessica drank the potion just as her feet touched the grass. She grew back to human size. She rushed back to the house.
Her mother was anxiously standing at the front door.
“Jessica! Where were you! Your father and I were so worried!” cried her mother.
Jessica flung her arms around her mother. She was very happy to be back home.
“Where were you!” asked her mother.
“I found a lavender flower and when I picked it, I became tiny, and a fly chased me and I climbed up the lavender and the police chased me and – “Jessica talked at top speed. “And Mya rescued me and…”
“Jessica! I can’t understand a word!” exclaimed her mother. “Begin at the beginning.”
And so, Jessica recalled everything that had happened. It all came rushing out. She recounted the various happenings of the day. Of the lavender, of how she was tiny, of how the fly chased her, about the princess and the police, of how Mya had saved her and how they had pretended to be knights, about the palace and the potion. She finished her story with how she had climbed down the Magical Lavender.
“Well, really!” said her father, coming into the room. “Our little girl does seem to have the wildest and most exciting imagination.”
“No, Daddy, it’s true,” said Jessica.
“Oh, of course it is,” said her mother sarcastically.
Jessica couldn’t blame them; she wouldn’t have believed it herself if someone had told her!
THE NEXT DAY
Jessica went out into the garden. She wanted to find the Magical Lavender, not to shrink down again, but to say thank you to Mya.
She looked for hours but she couldn’t find it. Since Jessica’s little adventure, nobody has seen the Magical Lavender. No one knows where it is.
