The Magic of Things

"Brunooooo, Oh my gosh!", yelled the dog walker as she went running inside the woods trying to get a hold of his leash as it slipped out of her hands.

" Bruno, please...please hold on, are you listening?", Ella followed him tracing the extended segment of his red leash. The dog had run deeper into the dark woods, than she could think of and the leash was the only sight of his presence from afar. Just then a blazing book caught her eye. What was it? She looked around to see if anyone was around. No one. She witnessed a big fat golden book flying in the air, literally held by a white bright trail of light on one side and a golden blaze of lightning on the other side. She couldn't believe her eyes. She moved further with very small steps towards it hoping she could touch the book and bam....she fell about 3 feet away and fainted.

" All this just for your stubbornness! Why couldn't you just wait and take the book later......?", Imo's eyes glared at her opponent red with anger. Her ears were slightly pointed and facing upwards on her otherwise normal human face and body. Her eyes changed their color into a grayish red tinge turning back to grey once they saw Ella on the ground. There was an innocence in her voice but an assiduity that reflected through her appearance.

" What do we do now? Ohhh......umm.... I shouldn't have done this!", , said another voice which was even more innocent, sweet and considerate. "Imo! please help. I know the professor might blame me, but right now we've got to save her!", said Lily as she was almost about to cry. Lily had little wings attached to her back and she was dressed like a fairy. Her face showed a purity of love and kindness, like no other.

"Why are you sitting here, Bruno? Would you mind coming with me, this fellow has been harrassing me since......"

"Sure! I will but I think Ella was finding me and I can't really figure out why she's sleeping in here?"

Their voices woke Ella, as they tried to sniff her.

"Hey, seems she was just a little tired. Here she's up....Good morning Ella!", her eyes widened further and nor could she believe her ears now! How could she ever hear two dogs talking? What is happening? she almost fainted again.

"Ohhh Lord, here we go again!" Bruno exclaimed.

"Seems like she..... she's not well, might be her tummy! she's been telling my mommy that her tummy had been giving problems and she made us miss our walk for that, yesterday"

"I sniffed her through, doesn't seem like her tummy though, maybe something else, maybe she wanted the day off to meet her frienddddds?"

" No it wasn't my friends! I just had a headache.....wait! I can hear you guys"

"Oh well, here she comes again! You can rest for sometime, Bruno here and I can go chase squirrels and come back till then! I assure ya, we'll be fine won't we, champ?" He said looking at Bruno. She looked at the great Dane intently. She couldn't fathom this fact! How could she communicate with dogs? "I can understand you'll...." This little discovery of her new superpower was exciting.

" Hey bruno, did you see any golden book hanging in the air?"

"AAAHHHH, HAhHAhhhahaa , Champ, I think we need to leave her for a while, she needs to sleep for a bit while we get some more time to chase the squirrels.....what do you say?"

" Please, just listen to me. If you'll can help me, I promise I'll offer to take you'll for a walk twice everyday for the entire next week. Just pleaseeee!"

" Seems like we got a deal here! Squirrels, here we come!" exclaimed the great Dane in his crazy happy voice.

They told her there was nothing there and that she had been sleeping on the ground in the woods for an hour. She couldn't believe them. Her memory told her otherwise. She could recollect seeing the book hanging in the air for a few minutes before she decided to touch it. And when she did feel the top of the metallic cover of the gold book, she was thrown away and fainted immediately. She took the dogs back to their house walking back to her house. She could hear many dogs speak as she walked. It felt awkward but funny listening to their conversations. Her facial expressions did not show any fixed expression. She didn't know whether she should have be happy or sad. It was a weird feeling. She went to bed perplexed trying to think back in the day. She fell into a nice slumber within a period of a few minutes. She had left her window open. She was being observed by Lily who looked at her smiled and then flew away.

-----

"You did this to her! ", said Imo stern as ever, with an eternal frown on her face, dressed like a tomboy.

"No, we both did! Any ways the professor has told us to solve this now and we have got to do it together. Maybe she has got one of our powers...I'm sure it will be mine. A fairy's powers are as gentle as beautiful flowers of the first spring-light, soft, fragrant and blossoming by the rays of the first sunlight....." she smiled with grace, in her cute pink outfit talking as if shes's lost in her own beautiful world of gardens. She smiled looking at Ella and stroked her hair. "Poor thing, she went through so much all because of us. But when fairies are here,...."

"Who are you'll? How did you'll enter my house?" she said shouting at the sight of girls in her room turning towards the door of the room which was locked from inside.

"Honey, is everything alright in there? I heard you shout! Are you fine?" It was Ella's dad who got alarmed as he heard her yell. He was extra protective of Ella ever since she had lost her mother. He used to overhear Ella talking to her mother almost every night before she went to bed. Even though, he was a strict policeman, he was extra soft on the inside. He knew Ella was stronger than he thought, but always wished to be there for her.

"Nothing dad! I' was just a bad dream. Don't worry", she signaled them to keep quiet as she reassured her dad.

" Can you see us?", asked Imo.

"Of course, you think I'm blind?" Lily smiled, almost about to begin laughing, encouraged by hearing Ella's words. Imo looked at Lily with another frown and now irritation piling up, as if she wanted to just go away.

"Ella, the fact that you can see us is because we are allowing you to, Hi, I'm Lily, I am a fairy. And this is Imo she is an elll.." she said in a sweet voice revealing her wings that flapped around her back gracefully.

"Thanks, I can introduce myself, I'm Imo, an elf! Now if we're done with introductions, you have to come with us", Ella could feel the annoyance in her tone.

" Imo, for once be gentle! She's bound to be surprised..."

"Look you got us into this mess, you very well knew that we didn't have to reveal our magic to the outside world. How could you?", Imo almost threw a fit of rage on Lily now.

" Imo, we need to take her to the Professor, she might have other powers too.."

"What do you mean?"

"She can see us even though I'm not allowing!"

" Oh noooo......how did this happen? We erased her memory right? How can this? Ok wait, Ella can you hear dogs talk?" Ella observed them peacefully......she nodded to Imo's question.

Her room's window overlooked the street and just as she began to reply to Imo, Peter saw Ella talk to nothing. He was her best friend from childhood and they shared everything. He tried to hide behind a tree looking at Ella talk to just nothing. He tried to wonder why Ella was behaving so awkwardly. He could think of no reason why she was stressed enough to talk to herself staring at a space in front of her bed as if there was something standing there. His eyes tried to find something but his mind was a hundred percent sure there was no one inside the room other than Ella. He approached the front door and met Ella's dad.

" Ok look, I think you have got some powers from after you touched the big golden book....."

"The book.....yeah.....I saw the book hanging in the air, and it was being pulled from both sides....."

"She might be having mighty Fairy power!" exclaimed Lily excitedly, smiling dreaming of the possibility of a new fairy entrant to their family. She went back into her dreamy world again. "I can dress you in a white ball gown and your beautiful pink wings and the diamond tiara resting on your black smooth long hair....."

"Shut up Lily! We have to convince her to come with us to the Professor. Let's focus on that, will you?" in her characteristically harsh tone.

"i'm not going anywhere. Please leave my house, the both of you I don't know you'll. I will be going to the woods again today to find that book"

"I told you, we won't be able to convince her!"

"Ella, please come with us just this one time, we won't disturb you again ok?", Lily tried to persuade her, knowing that Ella might for once listen. Her faith was very strong while her habit of getting lost into a mysterious imaginary world, even stronger.

"Ok wait, but we can't go through the front door....how do you'll expect me to go?"

"Lily you go first, I'll get her"

Ella saw Lily become a tiny bee and then invisible and then she flew away in the air through the window. Ella couldn't believe it. She almost fainted again. Imo held her elbow and took off into the air in a white blaze.

"And her name is?"

"Professor, she's Ella and I think she's got Fairy power!" Lily had a huge smile on her face, she acted as if Ella was an addition to her fairy family and she was extremely proud for having accidentally given Ella her power. She no more felt regretful of her actions.

"How do you know that? She could've got elf power too!", argued Imo sharply as she looked to the other side and frowned.

"She can talk to dogs, Imo, elves lack that power!" replied Lily.

"Imo, you two cannot use magic outside at all. You both are banned from using magic anywhere from now on!" said the Professor sternly. He appeared authoritative, but respectful of his students. He cared for his students and nurtured their talents although also protected them from the evil powers. He was the librarian of this school and very experienced at the appropriate use of power. His powers were very strong but also very judiciously used and this quality of his made him trustworthy among the fairies and the elves as a keeper of their powers, as a person who protected them from the alternate human world.

Ella was lying on the table in the library where she was surrounded by Imo and her brother, Lily and Roxy and the professor as they wondered when she'd wake up. When she'd wake up and when they'd get a chance to witness her powers. They were very eager to know whether their little accident had given her the power of a fairy or an elf or perhaps, a triling as the professor supposed.

Ella awoke to a beautiful sky above blue like she had never witnessed before, surrounded by five people two of which she was briefly introduced to. She sat up as her consciousness came to power.

"Ella, welcome to the Magical Bureau!" said the Professor. "You were brought here after a little accident and you seem to have taken some powers from these two. We need you to understand that you have been given magical powers, the use of which you will be taught slowly by the girls, but before that we need to warn you of never using these powers outside of this library."

Ella saw a ladder coming towards the Professor and she pointed her finger at it.

"Not now, ladder. Wait there, I'll come and take it from you" , the ladder nodded. It was as though the Professor brought a non-living thing alive. He explained about his world to Ella as the others heard him intently.

The professor inducted her into his world of magical things. But was Ella interested? Seemed like she was. But could she manage her human and magic worlds at the same time? She would have to decide soon.