“They’re shaking the tree to try to get the petal loose,” Rachel gasped. “We’ve got to get it before they do!”
Tia waved her wand over the girls, and Rachel and Kirsty began to shrink. They became fairies again!
“Let’s try and fly up to the petal without the goblins seeing us,” Tia suggested. “But watch out for the falling blossoms!”
“Okay,” Kirsty said, fluttering her wings. “Let’s go!”
She and Rachel followed their fairy friend as she easily dodged the falling petals. It’s just like flying through a blizzard of sweet-smelling snowflakes, Rachel thought, as she zoomed upward.
“Keep shaking!” one of the goblins shouted from down below, still rocking the tree trunk. “It’s got to fall soon!”
“Not if we can get it first,” Kirsty muttered, fluttering her wings faster than ever. She, Rachel, and Tia were closing in on the petal, but just then, Kirsty heard a loud shout.
“Hey! What’s that up there?”
Kirsty glanced down to see a bunch of nasty goblin faces glaring up at her. She’d been spotted!
The three fairies flew up to the petal, grabbed hold of it, and tried to pull it away from the tree. But it was stuck to a twig.
Rachel could see that one of the goblins was pointing Jack Frost’s wand up at them.
“I think we should try this wand out,” he said to his friends. “Anyone know any good spells?”
“Just make something up!” another goblin advised. “Say something that sounds magical.”
“Let’s try shaking the petal loose,” Tia urged quickly. “I don’t like the sound of this!”
The three fairies jiggled and shook the soft, smooth petal until it suddenly broke free from the twig.
“Let’s go!” Rachel cried.
But before they could fly away with the petal, the goblin with the wand started chanting.
“Pesky fairies, that’s enough! I conjure up a …” he paused, his face turning doubtful. “What should I conjure up?” he asked his friends.
“A wind that’s rough!” shouted a goblin with mean eyes.
“No chance,” Tia spluttered. “I’ve never heard such an awful spell!”
“It might be an awful spell, Tia,” Rachel said anxiously. “But I think it’s working!”
The three fairies all cried out in alarm as a stream of icy wind flooded from Jack Frost’s wand straight toward them. As it reached the fairies, it swept them high into the air.
“Hold on tight to the petal!” Kirsty shouted, but the wind whipped the words from her mouth, and then ripped the petal right out of her hands.
Rachel and Tia found it impossible to cling on to the edges of the petal, too, and the three fairies were thrown into the branches of another tree.
They watched helplessly as the wind carried the tulip petal up and away from them, higher and higher. Soon it was just a dot in the sky.
Kirsty leaned against the branch she’d landed on, trying to catch her breath. She wondered what they should do now. The petal was gone, and they couldn’t possibly fly after it in such a storm.
After a few moments, the spell wore off and the wind died down.
“Are you two all right?” Tia asked Kirsty and Rachel. The girls nodded, and
Tia sighed with relief. “That wand is more powerful than I’d thought,” she said. “Where did it send my petal?”
The three fairies scoured the sky, hoping to catch a glimpse of the orange petal, but they couldn’t see any sign of it. Then Rachel noticed that the goblins on the ground were acting strange. They were running in circles, staring at the sky. She glanced up to see what they were looking at, and saw the petal way above them. It was floating down from a great height, drifting back and forth on the breeze.
“Look! The goblins spotted it!” Rachel cried to the others. “Quick!”
The three fairies zoomed toward the falling petal, hoping to catch it before it fell into a goblin’s hand. But once again, the goblins saw them coming.
“Cast another spell!” they urged the one with the wand.
Kirsty braced herself as he pointed the wand up toward the fairies and shouted out another spell.
“Let’s have an icy gale again. Blow, wind, blow, when I count to ten!”
Then he stood there, looking pleased with himself, until one of the other goblins nudged him. “Go on, then!” he yelled. “Count to ten, you fool!”
“Oh, yes,” the first goblin muttered. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven-eight-nine-ten!” he counted at top speed. Then, “Go!” he shouted with a loud cackle.
Rachel braced herself, waiting for the freezing blast of wind to strike a second time. She could hardly look, knowing she was about to be swept away all over again.
But then, to her surprise, she heard Kirsty and Tia giggling. Rachel looked at her friends, and then followed their gaze to see what they were laughing at. They were watching the goblins.
Once again, an icy wind was streaming from the wand, but this time it wasn’t blowing toward the fairies. The goblin hadn’t realized that he was pointing the wand in the wrong direction, so the wind that he’d meant for the fairies was actually blowing right at him and his goblin friends!
“Help!” they cried, as the windstorm swept them up and sent them tumbling along the ground. “What’s happening?”
Kirsty cheered. She and her two friends swooped down to the magic petal, which had just landed on the grass. Tia waved her wand, shrinking the petal to its Fairyland size. Then she whizzed up into the air with the petal in her hand, doing a figure eight in delight. “It’s wonderful to have my petal back!” She beamed. “Thank you so much for helping me, girls!”
“Any time,” Rachel said, smiling. “We’re happy to help, Tia.”
“I’d better take my petal back to Fairyland now,” Tia said. “My sisters will be so pleased!” She flew above Kirsty and Rachel, showering them with orange fairy dust and turning them back into girls again.
“Thanks again,” Tia sang. “See you soon!”
“Good-bye, Tia,” Kirsty called, as the little fairy disappeared in a shimmer of orange magic.
“That was fun,” Rachel said happily as she and Kirsty headed back through the orchard.
“Yes it was,” Kirsty agreed. “But I hope the goblins don’t get any better at casting spells. I don’t like that they have a magic wand to use now.”
The girls left the orchard and headed along a path toward the hotel. As they walked past a large flowering bush, they heard angry voices. Curious, they peeked into the bush — and saw all of the goblins tangled in a heap!
Kirsty and Rachel looked at each other and burst out laughing. “It’s going to take them a while to get out of there,” Kirsty giggled.
The two friends were crossing the lawn toward Blossom Hall when Rachel suddenly stopped walking and nudged Kirsty. “Kirsty, look,” she said, pointing at one of the flowerbeds. “Those tulips look a little perkier than when we were here earlier.”
Kirsty turned to see. Her friend was right. The tulips were all standing up proudly now, looking much brighter and healthier than they had before. She grinned. “Tia’s magic must be working already!” she said in a low voice. “And look at the orange ones. They definitely weren’t there before.”
“They’re beautiful,” Rachel said.
“There are still lots of bare patches in the garden, though,” Kirsty pointed out. “I really hope we can find the other magic petals soon.”
Rachel nodded. “One thing’s for sure,” she said, linking arms with her friend. “We’re in for a very exciting week!”
Special Delivery
A Window Seat
Goblins Get a Ride
Petal Pandemonium
Ice Magic
Petal Perfection
“I love Blossom Hall!” Kirsty Tate sighed happily as she finished off a delicious bowl of fruit and cereal.
She was sitting on the sunny terrace of the hotel restaurant with her be
st friend, Rachel Walker, and their parents. The two families were spending spring break at the beautiful old mansion that was now a hotel. The sky was blue, and the pink-and-white cherry trees in the gardens were in full bloom.
“It’s so pretty,” Rachel agreed.
“Did you find the Fairy Garden yesterday?” Mrs. Tate asked.
Rachel and Kirsty nodded.
“It was magical!” Rachel said. She and Kirsty grinned at each other.
The two girls shared a very special secret. On their first vacation together, they had become friends with the fairies. And yesterday, they had met Tia the Tulip Fairy in the hotel garden, and they started a whole new fairy adventure!
“What do you two want to do today?” asked Mr. Walker.
“We’d like to explore inside Blossom Hall,” Rachel said eagerly.
“I can’t wait to look around,” Kirsty added. “Mom, can we please —”
“Yes, you can leave the table if you’re finished.” Mrs. Tate laughed.
“All the more bacon and eggs for me!” Mr. Walker joked as the girls got up.
Laughing, Rachel and Kirsty left the restaurant and headed down one of the winding hallways. They looked at the pictures on the walls.
One of the pictures showed a pretty village green. “That’s Blossom Village, isn’t it?” Kirsty said.
Rachel nodded. They had driven through the village to reach Blossom Hall.
“This is Blossom Hall a long time ago,” Rachel remarked, pausing in front of another print.
Next to the picture of Blossom Hall was an oil painting of a field sprinkled with wildflowers: scarlet poppies, golden buttercups, and blue cornflowers.
“It’s a good thing they’re only painted flowers,” Rachel sighed. “All of the real flowers are dying now that the Petal Fairies’ magic petals have been stolen!”
The girls had learned that Jack Frost was causing trouble for the fairies again. He had sent his goblins to steal the seven magic petals. Without the petals, flowers in Fairyland and in the human world could not bloom properly. The Petal Fairies had tried to get their petals back, but when their magic collided with Jack Frost’s icy spell, the petals spun out of sight into the human world. Jack Frost had sent his goblins to bring them back, but Rachel and Kirsty were determined to find the petals first and return them to Fairyland, where they belonged.
“At least we found Tia’s tulip petal yesterday,” Kirsty said. “I wonder if we’ll find another magic petal today.”
“I hope so,” Rachel replied.
The girls arrived in the hotel lobby, a spacious room with stained glass windows and a large wooden table that held a pretty flower arrangement. Just then, the main doors opened and a man in a blue uniform came in, carrying an enormous basket of flowers.
“Hello, Bill,” said Jenny, the receptionist. “Can you put the flowers in their usual spot, please?”
Bill went over to the table, removed the old basket of dying flowers, and put the new one in its place. Rachel thought the flowers were beautiful, especially the huge poppies. Their silky petals were rich shades of red and orange, which contrasted with their jet-black centers.
Bill walked over to the reception desk and began to discuss the next week’s order with Jenny. Rachel and Kirsty could see that he had Petal Perfection Flower Shop printed on the back of his uniform.
“That’s the flower shop in Blossom Village,” Kirsty said to Rachel. “We drove past it on our way here.”
“We’ll do our best, Jenny,” Bill was saying, “but we’re having a lot of problems lately. Our flowers are dying very quickly — and we don’t know why!”
Kirsty sighed. “It’s because six of the seven magic petals are still missing,” she whispered to Rachel. “New flowers won’t grow, and the ones that have already bloomed don’t last very long at all.”
Rachel nodded sadly.
Bill took out his notebook. “I’ll go and get the rest of the order from the hotel manager,” he said, hurrying off.
Rachel stared at the flowers Bill had just brought in. She could see that some of them were already wilting, even though they were fresh from the flower shop. Suddenly, her heart skipped a beat. “Kirsty,” she whispered, clutching her friend’s arm, “I just saw some red fairy sparkles shoot out of the basket!”
“Oh!” Kirsty looked thrilled.
The two girls hurried over to the flowers. As they reached them, there was another shower of crimson sparkles, and a tiny fairy zoomed out from the middle of a scarlet poppy.
“Oh, girls, I’m so glad to see you!” Pippa the Poppy Fairy exclaimed. Pippa danced through the air toward Kirsty and Rachel. She wore a floaty scarlet dress, a matching headband, and tiny ballet shoes decorated with poppies.
“Hello, Pippa,” Kirsty said excitedly. “Do you think your magic petal’s here?”
Pippa’s glittering wings drooped a little. “No, it’s not here,” she said sadly. “But I know where it is!”
“Tell us, Pippa.” Rachel encouraged the little fairy.
“Well, I was in the flower shop in Blossom Village, looking for my petal,” Pippa explained. “But I was so busy looking that I got swept up in this basket of flowers and carried out of the shop!”
“So that’s how you ended up here,” said Kirsty.
Pippa nodded. “And I’m glad you and Rachel found me,” she added, “because I didn’t know where I was going. But I’m sure I saw my magic petal just as I got carried out of the shop. I have to get back there as soon as I can!”
Kirsty and Rachel glanced around cautiously. The lobby was getting very busy as people passed through on their way to and from breakfast.
“Let’s go over to the window seat and come up with a plan,” Rachel suggested.
Pippa nodded and dived into Rachel’s pocket. Then the girls hurried over to the large bay window and sat down on the velvet cushions.
“Look at my poor poppies,” Pippa said, peeking out and pointing at the basket of flowers. Rachel and Kirsty could see that the delicate blooms were already starting to droop.
“My magic petal helps the poppies and all the other red flowers grow. I must get the poppy petal back, so the red flowers can bloom again!”
“The tulips are beautiful,” Kirsty remarked, gazing at the orange flowers, which were bold and bright. “That’s because we found Tia the Tulip Fairy’s petal yesterday.”
Pippa nodded. “All of the magic petals must be safely back in Fairyland before all the flowers will be able to grow properly again,” she pointed out.
“We’ll find them,” Rachel said in a determined voice.
“Don’t forget that the goblins have a wand full of Jack Frost’s icy magic to help them,” Pippa said with a shiver. “We must be careful, girls.”
Kirsty nodded, but just then a movement outside the window caught her eye. She turned to look. There was a big, green goblin running at full speed across the hotel courtyard!
“Look, it’s a goblin!” Kirsty gasped.
The goblin was running toward a white van parked outside the hotel. Petal Perfection Flower Shop was painted on the side of the van in curly green letters, and its back doors were wide open. As the girls and Pippa watched, the goblin skidded to a halt and waved his arms. A whole band of goblins raced out of the bushes! One of them was carrying the glittering icy wand that Jack Frost had given them.
“There are lots of them!” Pippa whispered anxiously as the goblins began climbing onto each other’s shoulders to get inside the van.
“They’re looking for the magic petal,” Rachel replied.
Pippa shook her head. “It’s still at the flower shop. I’m sure of it,” she said.
“Look at what the goblins are doing now!” Kirsty whispered, frowning.
All the goblins had climbed inside the delivery van. The girls and Pippa couldn’t see them, but they could see flowers flying out of the open doors of the van. Daffodils, tulips, and other flowers came hurtling out, landing in a messy pile in the court
yard.
“Oh!” Pippa cried, clasping her hands together. “How can they treat those beautiful flowers like that? We have to stop them!”
“Yes, and quickly, too,” Rachel added anxiously. “Before the delivery man sees them!”
Quickly, Pippa snuggled down inside Rachel’s pocket again, and the two girls jumped up. But they were too late! Bill was already at the hotel door, waving good-bye to Jenny.
“I’ll take your order straight back to the shop,” he was saying. “Good-bye!”
Kirsty and Rachel glanced at each other as Bill stepped outside. They rushed into the courtyard after him and were just in time to see him picking up the flowers that were scattered on the ground.
“What happened here?” Bill muttered. “The wind couldn’t have blown the flowers out of my van. I must have knocked them over when I got the hotel’s order out.”
The girls watched as Bill carefully loaded the flowers back into the van and closed the doors. They couldn’t see a single goblin.
“Do you think the goblins jumped out before Bill got here?” whispered Rachel.
“I don’t know,” Kirsty said, frowning.
Bill climbed into the van and, with a cheery wave to the girls, he drove off.
“Kirsty!” Rachel cried suddenly. “Look at the back of the van!”
Kirsty’s heart sank. There, grinning at them from the back windows of the flower truck, were the goblins! They were making faces at Pippa and the girls, sticking their tongues out and wagging their fingers behind their ears. As the van pulled away, they waved good-bye, looking very happy with themselves.
The Petal Fairies Collection Page 2