Tales from the Vault

Forrest Diggory and the Land of Milrod

Well, it took me long enough, but late last night while sitting in the silent house of the sleeping kids I was babysitting, I went through some old notebooks and pulled a bevy of stories from the vault. And trust me, they are good (meaning in this case: bad).

This story I wrote for a co-op creative writing class when I was around 14, the time I finally started to develop my own voice and crank out things worth more than a passing glance. Fortunately for us, this story does not fit into that category. The poor piece of work never even received a name, to match its unfulfilled promise. I obviously had halfway decent ideas—as evidenced by the two pages of notes stapled to this story—I just....didn't do any of them.

But let's get started.

Present day commentary in bold.

*Chapter 1*

When he opened his eyes, he was aware of only two things.

One—he wasn't dead. Yet.

Two—he had just watched his best friend vaporize into thin air.

But let's back up.

This story begins on Forrest's first day of grade nine, when his head teacher, Mr. Sow, summoned him into his office. Forrest arrived thinking he was in trouble, probably for slacking off in class last year, but as usual, Darius Sow surprised him.

"This is a big year for us, Mr. Diggory." Mr. Sow leaned forward, chin in his hands, eyes curiously bright beneath his eyebrows. "A very big year. I'd just like to congratulate you."

Forrest lifted one eyebrow in question.

"For making it this far," Mr. Sow clarified. "I know you had a rough start, with the, um, death of your parents, but, well, coming here gave you a fresh start, you know? You're full of potential."

Let us pause for a second here. Mr. Sow is supposed to be the horrendously clichéd "caring-mentor-who-actually-is-evil-and-turns-on-you" archetype. Well, this guy ain't giving off any caring vibes. He's already creepy.

Potential. Forrest had been alive for fourteen years, and for thirteen of them he had heard about his potential. Mr. Sow stared expectantly. Forrest shifted uncomfortably in his chair. (Let's throw in as many adverbs as we can, shall we?)

"Potential for what, professor?" he asked, his voice loud in the great corridor.

"Well, anything, really." There was a particular glint in Mr. Sow's eye, making Forrest suspect that "anything" was actually something quite specific. "You're one of a kind, Forrest."

This caught Forrest off guard. (Why?? When you've supposedly been hearing about your great "potential" for all but one year of your life??) He had never been anything special, not even to look at. He was smaller than most kids his age and had dark gray eyes always partially hidden by brown hair. (It's not a story till we get our "I'm so ugly" hero, am I right.) But before he could ask any more questions, Mr. Sow fumbled through a dismissal, and Forrest found himself out in the hallway with the office door clanging shut, feeling more confused than he did when he first went in.

You and me both, Forrest.

The only people he trusted enough to relay this conversation to were Tatum and Max, two kids who mysteriously showed up at the orphanage the same night he did thirteen years ago. They did not think much of Forrest and Mr. Sow's conversation. "That's just him being his strange self. You know that," Tatum said knowingly over dinner, adjusting her glasses.

Forrest was unconvinced. "Yeah, but haven't you ever suspected he might treat us differently than the others?"

Tatum chewed her lip, deep brown eyes thoughtful. Then she shrugged in dismissal. "He probably feels bad for us because we've been here the longest."

"Would Mr. Sow really feel bad for anyone but himself?" Max pointed out.

Okay, what the heck. This guy, in the notes, is the "caring mentor who turns on the kids." So what the heck. He's creepy and narcissistic? What was I even doing? I probably didn't know.

Their debate was cut short by the evening bell ringing, meaning the boys and girls had to split up and go to bed. Unlike all the other boys, who slept in an enormous dormitory, Forrest and Max shared a small but cozy private room in the attic, compliments of Mr. Sow. Max brought up the subject of the conversation once more as they changed for bed. "What are you so worked up about, anyway? Did he say anything unusual?"

"No. Not for him, anyway." Forrest sighed. Even he didn't know why that glint in Mr. Sow's eyes was nagging him.

Um, because the guy is creepy as all heck.

It was stuffy in the attic that night and thunder rolled in great waves across the sky. Max snored loudly, only his sandy blond hair visible over the blankets. Forrest was nearly asleep when a strange clattering alerted him. Crossing the room, he peered out the window into the garden below.

Yellow light caught in the raindrops on the window, offering a distorted view. Forrest vaguely made out a tall cloaked figure, bent against the rain and wind, hurrying to the barn. Lightning temporarily illuminated the yard and Forrest recognized the figure as Mr. Sow.

"A big year," he muttered to himself as Mr. Sow slammed the door and ducked out of sight.

So, that's the end of chapter one. Considering all the crap I wrote before age fourteen, this story is Pulitzer prize-worthy. Overly clichéd, sure, and written with an obvious influence by Percy Jackson and Cornelia Funke, but this was before I read Harry Potter or LOTR. Besides Narnia, I had never experienced good, solid world-building. So, it could be a lot worse.

After this first chapter, in which literally nothing happens, I had a lot of plans. The following day, Forrest and Max break into the barn where they find a book of spells. Through this book, they discover they actually have the ability to use magic, and they cast spells for fun and wreak all kinds of havoc. Eventually, another teacher named Mr. Wood finds out what they're doing and they get in trouble. Mr. Wood tells them the truth—Forrest, Max, and Tatum are the children of wizards. Their parents were kidnapped by an evil society (of which Mr. Sow is a part, surprise surprise), and Mr. Sow has been grooming the three kids with private rooms, extra favors, etc., so that when their magical powers become evident, he can use them for evil as well.

The three kids take it upon themselves to sneak out of the orphanage and save their parents. They end up spending the night with these elderly, eccentric wizard sisters in a weird house, where the kids find a magic ball that can A) tell the future, B) connect them to the evil world, and C) give them a clear view of their parents. Because my characters have a tendency to make idiotic decisions, they decide to keep the ball, believing that it will help them find their parents. The next day they continue on their journey, encounter a band of mean trolls, and are saved by a hunter named Gladion—a Ranger's Apprentice-type who accompanies them to a mythical creature land called Milrod for completely unspecified reasons. They stay at a mythical creature hotel (which was going to be awesome actually), where Gladion discovers the ball and gets all mad at these moronic kids, and the ball somehow attracts evil to the land and a battle breaks out before the kids destroy the ball and restore order.

I called this book one in a series—pretty ambitious considering that I wrote a few sentences of chapter two before the whole thing petered out. That's right, everything you just read was my idea for the story, outlined in two pages of notes. I never actually wrote the rest of it. I stopped bringing it into class and instead read my story about partisan soldiers in Nazi-occupied Poland—which I wrote for three years and was a masterpiece by the time I finished it at age 17, if I do say so myself, but this was when it was in its pathetic first-draft state. Then my teacher got sick halfway through the semester and never came back and we just played trivia games in class for the rest of the year.

And the part about poor Max vaporizing into thin air--I have no idea what that was supposed to be about. 

So that's the second installment of Tales from the Vault. Hopefully the next one will be a little less long-winded. I uncovered so much gold last night, I don't know which one to post next....