A Burning Question
There was a lot of activity going on in the forest, as the owls
flew all over the place, inviting all the animals to gather for a
general meeting. Everyone was in a hurry to get to the clearing.
They were running, walking, flying and crawling as fast as they
could. It was, after all, a very important meeting: They had to
decide what to do about their dragon. Now, the problem was not
that they didn't like the dragon, quite the contrary, they were
all very fond of him. He was friendly, he was always willing to
help, and, since most of those who have never met a dragon are
afraid of dragons, he was quite useful when it came to keeping
strangers out of their forest... no, the problem certainly wasn't
that they didn't like the dragon. The problemwas that their dragon
was allergic to flowers, and so he kept on sneezing wherever he
went.
Now,
for you and me sneezing may not seem like that big a deal, but
these were dragon-sneezes, and those are something completely
different because, as you know, dragons spit fire, and almost all
the animals in the forest had been caught, at least once, right in
front of a dragon-sneeze. It was true that most of them had
learned a long time ago to avoid standing in front of the dragon
whenever they talked to him, but the dragon had good manners, and
so he insisted on turning his head to face whoever he happened to
be talking to. And besides, even if the other animals had been
able to avoid being in front of the dragon while he sneezed, that
still would have done nothing to keep their houses from being
burned down, or to eliminate the possibility that the dragon could
someday accidentally torch the whole forest by sneezing while he
was standing too close to a bunch of dry leaves. And the fact was
that, having tried it for a couple of months, they knew that
having someone follow the dragon, night and day, carrying a bucket
of water to put out the fires before they could become a big
problem, was not a very effective solution.
So far the animals knew they had been very lucky, mostly
because most flowers were in bloom during the spring, so most of
the sneezing took place at a time when the forest was not too dry,
so the fire couldn't spread. During the fall, when the danger was
greater, the flowers were not quite so plentiful, though the few
that did bloom during that time were a source of concern, because
by then the whole forest was usually covered by a thick layer of
dry leaves that could catch fire with the slightest spark.
All the animals knew that the dragon meant no harm, that he
just couldn't help it. Being allergic to flowers was part of who
he was, and none of them wanted to see the dragon leave the forest
because of that. They knew better than to get mad at the dragon
for something he couldn't help, but they all agreed that they
really needed to find a way to help their dragon stop
sneezing.
Everyone had a different idea about what they could do, but
they where nowhere near an agreement. The mole had gone so far as
to suggest the possibility of getting rid of all the flowers in
the forest. After all, living underground and being almost totally
blind, the mole couldn't see the use of having flowers around, but
that idea was immediately rejected by all the other animals,
particularly by the bees. The animals may have had a problem with
the dragon-sneezes, but the flowers were part of the forest, they
were the main source of food for quite a few of them, and besides,
they were very beautiful and made most of them smile and feel
happy whenever they saw them.
All the animals were yelling and arguing, except for the little
field mouse, who was more than a little intimidated by the bigger
animals, and quite busy trying to avoid getting trampled on as
some of the others began pacing around the clearing, as if that
were to help them come up with a better idea. Suddenly one of the
owls noticed that the mouse, who was now hiding under the remains
of a fallen tree, rubbing his tail where the bear had stepped on
it, hadn't said a word since the beginning of their meeting. After
struggling for a while, as he tried to get the other animals to be
quiet, and once he had managed to calm the mouse down, because,
like any mouse, he really didn't like the idea of being noticed by
an owl, even if it was in the middle of a meeting that had brought
all the animals in the forest together, the owl asked the mouse
for his opinion.
With a very shy little voice the mouse said...
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To The Rescue Of The Singing Flowers
The old king was troubled. For the past three nights something
strange had been happening in his gardens and he could not explain
it. The gardens housed the crown's most precious treasure: the
singing flowers. Obviously, being flowers, they couldn't be kept
inside a vault, however, because they were so precious to the
king, they had always been heavily guarded. And yet for three
nights someone had been breaking into the garden and each night
another flower disappeared. There had always been numerous guards
deployed through out the grounds to protect them, and even those
had been doubled each time a flower was lost, but none of them had
caught as much as a glimpse of the intruder.
It
was almost as if the flowers were vanishing into thin air.
It was a serious situation, as the king knew that the singing
flowers could never be replaced if they were to disappear
altogether. There were no wild singing flowers left anywhere in
his kingdom, and he had never heard of singing flowers living
anywhere else. So, while the singing flowers had once been
plentiful, those that were planted in the royal gardens were in
fact the only ones that were left.
Not knowing what else to do, the king decided to call a council
of the country's wisest men, but none of them was able to provide
him with an answer. In fact, for all their wisdom, the wisest men
couldn't even come to an agreement as to who, or what, was
stealing the flowers, and they certainly didn't seem to know how
whoever was stealing the flowers had managed to get past the
guards each night.
Another week went by, and the flowers kept on vanishing. Ten
flowers had disappeared, and now there were so many guards
patrolling the gardens that even seeing the flowers was getting to
be increasingly difficult. In addition to that, the remaining
flowers seemed to be so afraid that they no longer sang, and the
only song the king could hear as he walked through his garden was
that of the birds (of course, no one knew for sure if the flowers
had stopped singing because they were afraid of the thief, or if
they had stopped singing simply because, with so many people
patrolling the gardens, the flowers actually feared that one of
those guards that were supposed to protect them would accidentally
stomp all over them).
At one point the king even tried asking the singing flowers
what was happening, figuring that if anyone knew the answer it
would be the flowers themselves, but of course, the fact that the
flowers could sing certainly didn't mean that they could speak, so
that plan never got very far.
However, the old king had a son, and since the flowers had been
in the garden ever since the young prince could remember, he could
hardly imagine a garden devoid of singing flowers. After ten
nights, when he was beginning to fear that all flowers could
eventually vanish, the prince asked his father for permission to
watch the gardens himself, without the presence of any of the
guards. Since there didn't seem to be that many options available
to him, the king reluctantly agreed. It didn't seem like a
dangerous assignment at the time, and considering the fact that
having as many guards in the garden as he could possibly fit into
it hadn't been any help at all, the king decided that they should
try it. They had nothing left to lose.
The young prince did all he could, but as midnight grew nearer
he felt as if something were causing him to fall asleep. He
couldn't help it, suddenly he was so tired that he could barely
keep his eyes open. At least he was grateful that there were no
guards watching the gardens that night. Falling asleep in their
presence would really have been an embarrassment. He hadn't known
how difficult staying up all night would be. Somehow, in the back
of his mind, the prince knew it was not a natural sleep. It was
much too powerful for that. He simply couldn't take it any more,
so he decided that he would take a short nap, while he remained
next to the flowers.
He knew that he had said that he would stand guard all night,
but the prince told himself that at least, while he slept next to
the flower-bed, by keeping an ear to the ground he would be able
to hear anyone approach. However, as soon as his head touched the
ground, he heard something else, something he had not expected to
hear: He heard the voices of the missing flowers, coming from
beneath the earth and singing a very sad song. He realized that he
had found the flowers, or at least he had discovered where they
were, but he still needed to find a way to reach them...
