First 5 Pages December Workshop - Manning

Name: Katharine Manning
Genre: Middle grade contemporary fantasy
Title: THE GREAT WOODS

Chapter 1

It began with the fireflies, as magic often does. Jenny was in the field behind her grandparents’ house with her younger brother, chasing fireflies. She spied a good one, low-flying and lackadaisical, and followed it past the shed and into the darkening woods.

“Jen-ny!” Billy’s voice echoed through the trees. Jenny laughed, but left him behind. She left them all behind – her grumpy grandparents and their stuffy old house, her parents a million miles away in Evanston. Her eyes were on that flashing yellow light and her ponytail sailed behind her like a flaming banner. It was Maine in early July and the day had been humid and heavy. It felt so good to run in the cool night air, the ground soft under her feet.

The light flashed to her left. She lifted her jar and leapt toward it, but missed. She was past the tree line now, scanning the forest. She pursed her lips, her special blue jar clasped tight in both hands. Had she lost it? She took a few more steps. It flared beyond a low bush a few feet away. She grinned and crept closer. She was so close, she almost had it.

With a sharp inhale, Jenny launched herself over the bush. She came down with a yelp and a thud, missing the firefly and tearing her skirt. Darn. It was her favorite skirt, long and soft, purple with silver thread running through it. Her mom said it was too ratty and needed to be thrown out, but Jenny didn’t mind that it was a little threadbare. Well, maybe Gran would stitch it up for her.

Jenny brushed herself off and got to her feet, tucking the jar in her skirt pocket. She was farther into the woods than she’d thought. She’d have to get back or she’d be in trouble. Gran told her and Billy the woods were off-limits the day they’d arrived.

It sure was pretty in there, though. The sun was going down and it made the green leaves look almost yellow. They waved like butterflies in the light evening breeze. Jenny inhaled the forest smell, pine needles and honeysuckle, and tried to hold it inside. Maybe she could stay for a minute longer.

The woods here were different from the ones back home. They seemed older somehow. The trees were gray and knotted. As she walked, the light seemed to turn gray, too, as the leaves got thicker overhead. Purple star flowers nestled in the roots of a tree that split in two and grew over itself like crossed fingers. Jenny bent to get a better look, but heard a rustling in the bramble to her right. She looked over, expecting a squirrel, maybe, or a chipmunk. To her shock, there was a person, where no one had been before. She was small, maybe the size of a kindergartener. A firefly flashed near her face, though, and it was that of an old woman, deeply lined and craggy. She had messy gray hair that fell in thick ropes past her shoulders and clothes that blended with the branches and leaves around her.

Jenny goggled at her, mouth open. The woman spoke in a low and croaky voice. “Ah, ye came. Knew you would, knew you would. Best go now, can’t wait.”

Jenny straightened, looking down on the little woman. Jenny wasn’t tall – she was the second shortest in her sixth grade class – but this woman was really short. Some people were like that, she knew. There were illnesses that could make people small. Maybe she was even a child. Wasn’t there some disease that made kids look old? She thought her mom had seen someone like that at the hospital once.

Jenny fingered her horseshoe necklace as she thought, and bit her lip. “Who are you?”

“Name’s Magda,” she said. “I’m a Keeper. Elf, you call it. Must come now, ‘e’s hurt.”

An elf, did she say? Jenny thought small people were called dwarves, but maybe she had that wrong. And someone was hurt? She should probably get Gran. Jenny glanced back at the house – the boring old house where nothing ever happened and no one did anything.

“He needs you, no time to wait,” the woman said, and her dark eyes shone with determination.

Jenny dropped her necklace. She’d go. Just to see, just for a minute. Someone needed her help. She wouldn’t go far, and then she’d come right back. Billy wouldn’t even miss her. She gave her necklace a quick kiss for luck and ran after.



She was fast, this small one. She glided over tree trunks and through bushes. Jenny stumbled along, trying to keep up. Branches caught her face and she felt a sharp sting on her cheek. She didn’t pause, though, or even slow down. She couldn’t, Magda urged her on so insistently. “Come, now! Almost there, almost there.”

“Where are we going?” Jenny called out to her, panting.

“Going to Kharoun,” she answered. “Old nag. Never stays where he’s supposed to. Got ‘imself caught.”

“Who?” Jenny’s voice came out higher than usual.

“You’ll see, you’ll see. Move along. Got sap in your legs, eh?” She made a sound like a car engine sputtering that Jenny realized after a moment must be laughter.

It was getting dark, the outlines of the leaves harder to see. Jenny slowed. She was going too far. Billy must have noticed she was gone by now, and maybe he’d even told Gran and Grandpa. She was going to be in such trouble. Jenny’s stomach hurt at the thought of it. She had to go back. This little woman and whatever help she needed – well, she’d have to figure it out on her own.

Jenny turned. The forest, though, was indecipherable. They weren’t on a trail, and all Jenny could see were trees and more trees. She didn’t even have a flashlight. What was she thinking following a stranger into the woods?

She turned back toward Magda. It took a second to find her picking her way through a honeysuckle bush, and then Jenny’s attention was drawn beyond Magda. There was a light shining. A clearing, maybe. The moon must be up. Was that it? Were they there? Jenny stepped warily closer.

She neared the edge of the clearing. There was light from the moon above, but also, strangely, from the ground. There seemed to be something on the ground. Magda halted by a fallen tree, but Jenny kept moving, curious, toward the light. As she passed the tree, she saw it clearly - a horse. A beautiful white horse was lying on its side with its back to her. It was radiant in the moonlight. Just as Jenny was forming the thought - how pretty, a horse - the creature lifted its head to look back at her. And Jenny saw, in that moment, that it was not a horse. A long, spiraled horn rose tall and majestic from its shining white mane, and Jenny saw, for the first time in her life, a unicorn.



With a sharp intake of breath, Jenny stumbled. Her vision went momentarily dark as her brain struggled to make sense of what she was seeing. She grabbed the fallen tree to steady herself, grateful for its solidity, the rough and familiar feel of it.

Magda scampered onto the trunk to Jenny’s right. “That’s him, Kharoun,” she said. She tugged Jenny’s hand, then hopped down and scurried to the unicorn.