“I have an idea,” she said. “I think I know how to get your magical hairbrush back, Rosalie. Follow me!”
She fluttered partway around the tower to the window of the supply room and slipped inside. When all three of them were standing among the bottles and hair accessories, Rachel turned to Rosalie.
“Can you turn us into goblin hairdressers?” she asked in a whisper.
Rosalie looked uneasy, but she waved her wand. Instantly Rachel’s and Kirsty’s wings disappeared, their skin turned green, and their faces grew hard and bumpy. They were wearing the same green uniforms as the goblin hairdressers. Rachel had a mop of curly pink hair, and Kirsty had a pointy orange beard.
They looked at each other and laughed.
“I hope I don’t get the giggles when we’re talking to Jack Frost,” said Kirsty. “You look so funny, Rachel!”
“Please be careful,” said Rosalie. “My fairy magic is not at its full power in the Ice Castle. It might wear off!”
“Then we will just have to be quick,” said Rachel in a determined voice.
While Rosalie hid in the supply room, Rachel and Kirsty strolled through the archway into the salon.
“Stand back!” Rachel cried in a haughty voice. “Make way! The best goblin hairdressers in the world are coming through!”
“Hey, this is our salon!” the goblin with the mustache complained.
“It’s smaller than what we’re used to,” said Kirsty, sweeping past him to stand behind Jack Frost. “We will just have to make do! Now, Your Iciness, what sort of hairdo would you like?”
“We can do anything,” Rachel added, putting her hand on his shoulder. “Long! Short! Crimped! Straight! Just say what you want and we will create it.”
Jack Frost’s eyes lit up.
“Really?” he asked. “Can you give me long hair like Rapunzel’s?”
“No one can do that,” said the blond goblin. “I’ve tried!”
“But you are not the greatest goblin hairdressers in the world,” said Kirsty, waggling a long, bony finger at him.
“We can make all your hairstyle dreams come true!” Rachel exclaimed. “But first I need to brush out the tangles in your hair, so I will need to use your hairbrush.”
She held out her hand, but Jack Frost frowned.
“My hair isn’t tangled,” he snapped, clutching the hairbrush to his chest.
Kirsty leaned over his shoulder and tugged at the front of his hair.
“It’s full of knots!” she said.
She was hoping to distract him so that she could grab the hairbrush, but Jack Frost leaped to his feet with a yell.
“You’re not hairdressers,” he yelled. “You’re fairies!”
Rachel and Kirsty looked up at the mirror, horrified. Their green skin was fading, and their long noses and big feet were shrinking. As they watched, their wings appeared and their own hair replaced the goblin hairstyles.
“Sneaky, tricky, interfering fairy pests!” Jack Frost hollered, running around the salon. “You’ll never get the hairbrush! Never, ever, ever!”
“Quick, Rachel!” cried Kirsty, grabbing the blue wig.
She threw one end of it to Rachel, just as Jack Frost charged toward the door to the castle hallway. They crouched down on either side of the door, each holding one end of the wig, and Jack Frost tripped over it as he dashed through the doorway. With a yell, he belly flopped onto the floor and the hairbrush skidded away from him. Rachel sprang over him and seized the hairbrush.
“Rosalie!” she cried.
Rosalie zoomed out of her hiding place and grabbed the magical hairbrush. She beamed with happiness as she slipped it into her pocket.
“I have it back!” she cried in a delighted voice. “I can’t believe it!”
The three goblin hairdressers were glaring at the fairies with their arms folded across their chests.
“I knew they weren’t the best goblin hairdressers in the world,” said the goblin with the mustache. “Neither of them had a mustache.”
“The best goblin hairdressers have fauxhawks, not mustaches!” squawked the blond goblin.
Squabbling, they disappeared into the supply room. The three fairies looked at Jack Frost.
“It’s not fair,” he said with a sniff.
He was sitting up, but his head was bowed. As they watched, his bottom lip quivered. A tear dripped down his cheek and splashed onto the floor.
“I only wanted the magical hairbrush so I could have long hair like Rapunzel’s,” he mumbled.
He looked so unhappy that Rachel and Kirsty felt sorry for him. They kneeled beside him, took his hands, and helped him up from the floor.
“My dreams never come true,” he said in a sad voice.
“You shouldn’t have taken the hairbrush,” said Kirsty. “You could have just asked Rosalie to help you.”
“A fairy wouldn’t help me,” said Jack Frost.
Kirsty and Rachel looked at Rosalie. They knew how kind the fairies were, and they felt sure that Rosalie would want to make Jack Frost feel better.
Rosalie’s eyes twinkled, and she waved her wand. The blue wig rose up from the floor, shook itself out, and then floated gently onto Jack Frost’s head. Jack Frost patted his head. He wiggled it. He tugged on the hair. And then a wide smile spread across his face.
“It’s real!” he cried. “It’s really, really real!”
He ran to one of the salon mirrors and posed in front of it, practicing flicking his hair over his shoulder and twirling it up on top of his head.
“Hey, goblins, get in here!” he hollered. “I want hairstyles! I want hair gel! I want combs and clips and pins! I want braids and pigtails and ponytails! Get to work!”
All the goblin hairdressers scurried out of the supply room, laden down with all the things that Jack Frost had demanded. Rachel, Kirsty, and Rosalie looked at one another and laughed.
“Time for us to go, I think,” said Rosalie, pulling out her storybook.
When the pages opened, the three fairies were whisked inside the story once more. Fairy dust sparkled around them as they arrived back at the bottom of the tower. Rachel and Kirsty were human again.
This time, they were not alone. A dark-haired young man was standing there, gazing up at the window. He was wearing a velvet tunic with a golden belt, and a cape swirled around his shoulders.
“It’s the prince,” said Rosalie in a delighted voice. “I think the story is getting back to normal.”
“Rapunzel!” called the prince in a loving voice. “Rapunzel! Let down your hair!”
The girls waited, holding their breath. But there was no reply. Looking worried, the prince opened his mouth to call again, and then paused.
“Listen!” Rachel whispered.
Someone was singing in the tower. The exquisite voice rang out above them, and even the birds and butterflies flew closer to the tower to listen.
“Rapunzel is back,” said Rosalie in a delighted voice.
The prince was smiling now, his eyes shining with love.
“Rapunzel!” he called again. “Rapunzel! Let down your hair!”
The girls looked up, and saw a young woman leaning over the windowsill. She smiled and waved when she saw the prince. Then her long, silky hair tumbled down from the window, and the prince began to climb up it. Rosalie turned to the girls and gave each of them a fluttery kiss.
“Thank you for helping me get my magical hairbrush back,” she said. “The story is unfolding just as it should, and it’s all thanks to you.”
“We’re just relieved that Rapunzel and her prince are back,” said Kirsty. “It’s been a wonderful adventure for us.”
“I will never forget your bravery and kindness,” said Rosalie. “Good-bye—and thank you again!”
With a flourish of her wand, the tower, trees, and beautiful singing faded away. Kirsty and Rachel were once more in the playground tower. Around them, the other children were still playing with their sticker activity books. But now there w
as no sign of Jack Frost and his long blue hair. Every page and every sticker showed a scene from the original story of Rapunzel. Things were back to normal.
“How is everyone doing?” Alana asked, climbing up into the tower room. “Did you all guess the story before you saw the books?”
All the children tried to answer at once, and Alana laughed. She sat down to look at the pictures they had been completing with their stickers. Rachel picked up a spare book and turned the pages until she found the picture she wanted.
“Let’s color in this scene,” she said.
It was a picture of the prince reaching the tower window right after he climbed up Rapunzel’s hair. The girls exchanged a happy glance and started choosing stickers.
“Alana, what happens after the prince climbs into the tower?” asked a boy.
“Rapunzel and the prince go off together to live in their own royal kingdom,” said Alana. “It has a very happy ending—as all fairy tales should!”
Kirsty and Rachel smiled at each other.
“I hope there’s a happy ending for all the Storybook Fairies,” said Kirsty. “We still have to help Ruth the Red Riding Hood Fairy get her magical object back from Jack Frost and the goblins.”
“We will,” said Rachel, as she colored in the prince’s velvet tunic. “Like Alana said, all fairy tales have happy endings!”
Kirsty grinned. She couldn’t wait to help Ruth find her magic basket.
“There’s something so magical about a campfire,” said Kirsty Tate, warming her hands as the flames flickered.
“I love staring into the flames,” said her best friend, Rachel Walker. “If you look at them for long enough, you can start to see pictures in there.”
The girls leaned against each other, feeling happy, sleepy, and relaxed. They had spent a wonderful weekend at the Wetherbury Storytelling Festival, but now it was Sunday evening and the fun was nearly at an end. Together with the other children from the festival, they were sitting on logs in a circle around a campfire. Alana Yarn, one of their favorite authors, had helped organize the weekend, and she was sitting on a log, too. The girls had had a wonderful time getting to know her.
“So,” said Alana, looking around the circle at them all. “Have you enjoyed the Storytelling Festival? What was the best part?”
Everyone nodded and started to call out their favorite moments.
“The only bad thing about the whole weekend is that it has to end,” said Rachel.
Alana smiled.
“We still have one more storytelling session before you have to go home,” she said.
There was a large wicker basket in front of her, and she began to rummage through it. Rachel turned and smiled at Kirsty.
“Thank you for inviting me to stay this weekend,” she said. “It was a great idea to come to the Storytelling Festival—I’ve had an amazing time.”
“You’re welcome,” said Kirsty. “I’m really glad you came. I like everything ten times more when you’re here. It’s been an extra-special weekend.”
Rachel nodded. “Especially because we’ve had such a wonderful time with the Storybook Fairies,” she whispered.
Rachel and Kirsty had shared lots of secret adventures with fairies, and meeting the Storybook Fairies had been enchanting. Elle the Thumbelina Fairy had whisked them away to the Fairyland Library, where they met Mariana the Goldilocks Fairy, Rosalie the Rapunzel Fairy, and Ruth the Red Riding Hood Fairy. The fairies were all very upset because Jack Frost and his goblins had stolen their magical objects, but Kirsty and Rachel had already helped get three of the objects back.
“I just hope that we can get Ruth’s magical basket back soon,” said Kirsty. “Until then, Jack Frost still has control of her story.”
Copyright © 2016 by Rainbow Magic Limited.
All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc. RAINBOW MAGIC is a trademark of Rainbow Magic Limited. Reg. U.S. Patent & Trademark Office and other countries. HIT and the HIT logo are trademarks of HIT Entertainment Limited.
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
ISBN 978-1-338-05502-3
First edition, March 2017
Cover design by Angela Jun
e-ISBN 978-1-338-05503-0
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Rosalie the Rapunzel Fairy Page 2