Being a Friend | Teen Ink

Being a Friend

October 24, 2007
By Anonymous

Once upon a time, there was a land with giants, wizards, castles, devils, talking animals, and much more! But the strangest thing about this world was that everyone could do something magic like flying, concoct potions, be immortal, talk to the landscape, read minds, grow huge or tiny, change into animals, breathe fire, make people believe something that isn’t true, and mysteriously disappear or reappear.

Everyone could do that except Kaitlin, a thirteen-year-old girl. She found nothing unique about herself. She couldn’t do anything cool. One day at school, practically everyone was making fun of her, especially a girl named Stephanie.

“ You’re so weird!” Stephanie snickered, “Why can’t you just fly like me?”

“Or breathe fire?” A boy said.

“You’re obviously not smart enough to disappear like me,” a girl said as she… disappeared.

“I’m happy just the way I am,” said Kaitlin, but she really wasn’t.

One day, Kaitlin decided it was time to change. She got her friend, Cara, who could go back or forward in time, and Cara’s dad (he was a wizard). The three of them went to the king’s castle because the king assigned all of the special powers. But they did not know that they were being watched by an angry creature who took his anger out on innocent people.

At the castle, the queen welcomed them inside and brought them tea and cookies. The castle was huge with shining chandeliers and doors, doors, and more doors.

“Is there anything I can do for you?” the queen asked with a smile that glowed as bright as her crown.

“Yes, can we speak to the king?” Cara’s dad, Gwiggly, asked.

“Of course!” she replied and then hurried off to get him.

“So you want to find a magic power?” the king asked after the four talked for a little while.

“Yes,” Kaitlin replied confidently.

Okay. But first, you must complete seven tasks,” he said. “The first one is to get me a giant’s tooth!”

“Alright. We’ll see you soon with the giant’s tooth,” Cara said, then walked away with Gwiggly and Kaitlin, plus the creature they didn’t see.

*******

“So, does anyone know where we might find a giant?” Cara said up the road a little way.

“I may,” Gwiggly said, “It depends on if he’s hungry or not. When he’s hungry, he goes there because there’s a lot of food.

“What kind of food?” Cara asked.

“You don’t want to know!” Kaitlin laughed.


When they got to the cave, they could hear the giant. And he could hear them. He came out of the cave and towered about thirty feet tall.

“Hungry!” he boomed, then pointed at them. “Food!” He slowly reached down to grab them but they were faster than him and jumped out of his reach.

We need to think of a way to get his tooth” Cara panted behind a rock. “Well, what do we know about him?”

“He’s hungry!” Kaitlin said.

“I know what to do!” yelled Gwiggly. He told them his magnificent plan.

“Okay, ready?” Gwiggly asked Kaitlin.

“I hope”

Ready, set, Go!”

Kaitlin jumped out from behind a rock with a giant potato. It wasn’t really a potato, it was a rock that Gwiggly turned tan to look like a potato because the giant wasn’t very smart.

“Food!” the giant bellowed.

“Here you go,” Kaitlin said as she handed him the ‘potato’.

He took it and…Crack! The rock broke in half, which made the giant furious. But Kaitlin noticed that his tooth almost fell out, so she threw a rock at his mouth and…Pop! The tooth came out right in front of her. She grabbed it, and dashed for the rock with the angry giant behind her. She held Cara and Gwiggly’s hands and they poofed back to the castle. When they arrived, they gave the king the tooth and he told them their next task, get him Fairy Sand.

“Where will we get Fairy Sand?” Cara asked.

“How about FairyVille?” Gwiggly said.

“FairyVille?” Cara and Kaitlin both said.

“Yep, that’s where we should go!”

“I didn’t know there was a FairyVille,” said Cara.

“Me neither,” Kaitlin agreed.

So they were looking for FairyVille and when they thought they were lost, they saw a rock marked FairyVille. Then they looked all over the ground for Fairy Sand, but had no success. Then, a tiny voice said,

“Is there anything I can do?” It was a beautiful little fairy. “I’m Amelia,” she said.


“Hi, I’m Cara.”


“I’m Kaitlin.”


“And I’m Gwiggly.” they said.

“ Can I help you with anything?” She asked.

“Well, we kind of need Fairy Sand for the King.” Cara told her.

“No problem!” declared Amelia as she waved her hands and Fairy dust appeared.

“Wow! Thanks!” Kaitlin exclaimed, then they went to the castle.

When they got there and gave the king the sand, he told them that they needed to get him a whale jaw. So they went to a huge beach. Sometimes whales washed ashore there.

“We need to find a whale jaw somewhere.” Kaitlin reminded them.

“Hey! I see one! Over in that big cave thing with the hornets nest in it. I noticed it because of those shiny rocks.” Cara said proudly.

“Umm, Cara, that’s a giant hornet’s cave and nest. They probably ate the whale.” Gwiggly informed them.

“Oh.”

“Let’s go.” Kaitlin said nervously.

As they approached the cave, they could hear the humming of insects. They had to get an idea.

“I know! One of us could distract them while the others take the whale bones.” Cara said.

“That’s a great idea! And we could put the bones in the hornet’s nest!” Kaitlin said.

“And I’ll be the distraction. I’ll just put invisible walls around me so they don’t sting me,” Gwiggly exclaimed.

“Okay, Let’s go!” Cara yelled. The distraction worked pretty well. Cara and Kaitlin got the whalebones into the nest and were carrying it when their luck ran out. The hornets zipped over and were chasing them around. Cara tripped and Kaitlin was helping her up when Gwiggly screamed,

“Freeze the bees!” and the hornets froze in midair. “We only have thirty seconds. Go!” So they ran away and made it to the castle safely. They handed the king the hornet’s nest with the whale jaw inside.

“Wow!” he said, “Getting a hornet’s nest was my next task but you’re too quick. Okay, now you need to get me two glowing rocks,” he said.

“Where could we get those?” Kaitlin asked.

“Well, that you’ll have to decide,” he replied before walking away.

“We could try a glowing cave,” Cara said. So they had looked in fifteen books about rocks and caves when finally Kaitlin said to Gwiggly,

“Couldn’t you just make some rocks glow?”

“Well, I guess so!” Gwiggly said, then thought of a spell while Cara and Kaitlin collected six pairs of different types of rocks. They gave them to Gwiggly to test. He looked at the first pair and chanted,

“Rocks, rocks, from down below, for me now you need to glow.” Nothing happened. He took the second pair. Still nothing. Nothing happened for the third, fourth, or fifth pair either. It was all up to the sixth pair. They were made of quartz.

“Rocks, rocks, from down below, for me now you need to glow!” Nothing happened. But then, there was a light deep within the rocks. It grew and grew. The two rocks were glowing. They rushed the rocks to the king.

“Good,” he said. “This next task will be harder. I need the glass from a window in the evil wizard’s castle.”

On the way there, Kaitlin asked Gwiggly if he knew who the evil wizard was and where he lived.

“The Evil wizard uses his powers to kill people just for fun. He lives on Death Mountain,” Gwiggly whispered.

“Death Mountain?!” Cara yelled.

“Yes. I will take you there. Hold my hands,” he said. Then they were near the middle of Death Mountain.

“Be careful when we climb to the top. Sorry I couldn’t take us there,” he apologized. They climbed up the rest without much trouble. There were a few close calls but they were okay. A gigantic castle loomed in front of them.

“ If we’re lucky, he’s asleep. Once we get the glass we’ll need to get down fast, so I’ll make parachutes,” he said then three parachutes appeared. “Okay put these on,” he said. After they did, Kaitlin picked out a sharp rock and climbed to the nearest window. She peeked in, only to see the wizard’s hideous face. She screamed and then quickly cut the glass in the dark of the night. Cara and Gwiggly were already running to the edge. Cara tripped and Gwiggly jumped. As Kaitlin ran towards Cara, she looked back and saw an angry wizard flying behind her. She grabbed Cara’s hand and dove off the cliff.

As they were falling, Kaitlin tried to open her parachute. It didn’t open! Kaitlin and Cara screamed as they neared the ground. They were about to hit the ground when, RIP! The parachute caught on a rock only feet above the ground.

“Phew!” Cara said. Kaitlin looked up. The wizard was still behind them! They wiggled out of the parachute and ran over to Gwiggly. They held hands and POOF! They were back at the castle safely.

“Congratulations!” said the King. “Your last task is, I need two devil horns. Good luck!” Gwiggly “poofed” them outside.

“There’s only one place to get a devil.” Gwiggly said “And that’s…”

“Lived Live Land.” Kaitlin interrupted him.

“Lived Live Land? What does that mean?” Cara asked

“Lived Live Land is Evil Devil backwards.” Kaitlin explained.

“Oh.” Cara said, amazed.

“Let’s go. I can’t poof you there, there’s too much evil.” Gwiggly told them.

So they walked for a day then took a break to sleep. In the middle of the night, they woke up to screeching. It was the creature that was following them. They got out of bed to find a devil. Kaitlin screamed. The devil lunged. Gwiggly, Cara and Kaitlin got swords to fight him. It ducked and dodged and bit and hissed. It lunged forward, and killed Gwiggly and Kaitlin. Cara panicked. Then, she knew what to do. She went back in time to right before it killed them. It lunged forward to kill Kaitlin, and Cara cut off one of his horns. The devil Screamed and backed up. Then it made an earthquake with fire coming out of it. He pushed Cara, but Kaitlin caught her before she fell in. They battled with it until CRACK! Kaitlin threw a rock at the fiery-eyed devil’s other horn and it broke off. It retreated and ran away.

“Hooray!” they yelled. Cara didn’t tell them about how they would’ve died if she hadn’t gone back in time. They walked to the castle, and handed the king the horns.

“Very good!” he said. “I’ll be right back.”
He came back with a mirror. It was made of the things they brought him. The tooth was broken into two pieces and made the things that hold the mirror up. The whale jaw made the sides. The wizard’s window glass and the fairy sand made the reflecting part inside. And the glowing rocks, hornet’s nest and devil horns decorated the top.

“Look into the mirror and you will find your power.”

“It’s not reflecting!” Kaitlin said.

“That’s because you didn’t say the magic word.”

“Please?” Kaitlin guessed.

“No.” chuckled the King. “The magic word is an object. It is something that helped you in all of your seven tasks. Think about it.”

“Can I go back in time?” Cara asked.

“Whatever you need to do.” he replied. Cara closed her eyes and went back in time. They waited for about an hour when she reappeared.

“So. Did you figure it out?” Kaitlin asked. Cara had a sad expression on her face.

“I only came up with two things, and I don’t think they’ll help.” she announced, then whispered them in Kaitlin’s ears. Kaitlin went up to the mirror.

“Imagination?” she said. Nothing happened. “Okay, Rocks?” The mirror began to shine. It showed Kaitlin and across the top of it, it said “Being a friend.”

So Kaitlin’s special power was being a good friend. The King said they could come back anytime they wanted. They went home, and lived happily ever after.


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