Chapter One: Wishing Mushroom

I wish to escape. Escape to a magical adventure. Anywhere, but here. Sophiya tore through the forest. Her lungs were burning, and her chest was heaving, but she didn’t care. She just needed to get away.

This seemed far enough. She collapsed on the ground, water soaking into her pants.

She closed her eyes and sucked in a lungful of that peculiar smell of the forest right after a rainfall.

Then, as she slowly opened her eyes, that sunlight broke through the clouds and fell on a perfect amanita. 

It was rosy red and dotted with white spots. The stalk was thick and sturdy, showing no signs of rot.

Her grandmother’s voice drifted into her mind. 

Be careful what you wish for, but if you must, wish it on a mushroom.

Slowly, she dragged herself over and knelt in front of it.

“I wish…” She paused, wondering if the old stories were true. 

Sophiya didn’t truly believe that wishing on a mushroom would make her wish come true, but she figured it was worth a shot.

She leaned over the mushroom and whispered, “I wish to escape to a magical adventure. One where I might find the truth.”

A rope of wind wound through the forest and twisted through the trees, tugged on her clothes, and toyed with her hair.

Sophiya sighed. She supposed she had been expecting it to work more than she was ready to admit.

And that was when it happened. It was so fast, her brain could barely comprehend it.

But one moment, she was standing up, then, with a flash of yellow and green followed by red and white, plus some sound effects her mind added, she was gone.

Gone from the forest.

Where she was, she had no idea.

Chapter Two: Shrunk

Sophiya coughed and groaned. She was lying on her back. 

Why am I lying on my back?

Slowly, she dragged herself to her feet, every muscle in her body moaning at her every move.

As her eyes slowly adjusted to her surroundings, Sophiya felt she must be dreaming.

She felt as though she were in a castle. The walls were a pale white, bordering on light brown. The roof was red. There were several holes in it.

Who makes a roof with holes? 

There was not a person in sight, nor were there any doors.

Well, this just went from bad to worse.

Sophiya had no idea where she was, and clearly, there was no one there to help her.

“Well, what do I know?” she asked aloud, just because the never-ending silence was starting to get on her nerves.

She almost missed the sound of her older siblings arguing, but then quickly blew that thought away with a deep breath, as one would do to an irritating gnat buzzing around your ear. 

She looked around her for something, anything, useful, but came up empty.

Sophiya almost wished she had a phone. Almost.

“It’s okay. I’m going to be fine!” 

She looked around her surroundings and finally sat down. “I’m going to be fine,” she repeated to herself over and over.

But the longer she sat in the desolate place, she realized that she wasn’t going to be fine. She was hungry, thirsty, and cold.

And that incessant smell of mushrooms that kept nagging her nose and making her want to vomit wasn’t helping either.

While she loved mushrooms in the wild, she did not like the taste and smell of them.

I have to get out of here, or I’m gonna go crazy! She thought.

“Snap out of it and think, Soph! Okay… uh… maybe I can break the walls or something like that!”

A better idea not presenting itself, she got to her feet and tentatively pushed a finger against the wall, unsure if that would trigger some kind of weapon to come and destroy her or not.

But to her surprise, it felt like silicon. And maybe a bit slimy. It almost reminded her of…

Her hands flew to cover her mouth in shock, before she thought better of it and wiped them with the disinfectant wipes she always carried in her pocket.

“I’m inside a mushroom!” she shrieked, her voice reverberating off the walls.

“This is impossible. I must be dreaming! Someone pinch me!” 

She pinched her arm. “Ouch!”

Later, she would realize the irony. She had wanted to escape her home to a magical adventure. Here it seemed she had gotten her wish, and yet all she wanted was to get home.

“Please… someone… anyone…?”

There was a sudden creak, like a cranky door that got woken up because someone needed to open it to get water in the middle of the night.

Sophiya stood up and pressed herself against the wall.

If someone were coming in, there would be no room for her to hide. That also meant the same for the other person, too, if she thought about it, but panic can dispel all thoughts in a heartbeat.

She held her breath.

And then the ground erupted.

Chapter Three: Agarius

Perhaps “erupted” is a bit dramatic. No lava or ice shot out of the ground. In fact, it wasn’t even a thing that shot out of the ground. 

Rather, it was a human—maybe.

Yes, he looked like a human. He had human-looking brown hair and human-looking limbs and body. 

It was the eyes that made Sophiya question whether or not he was a human. They were sea green in the sunlight, but turned amber in the shade. They were also not quite the normal human shape. 

Like my eyes, she realized with a start.

Well, it was the eyes that threw her off, as well as the wings on his back. And his size. He looked about her age and was the same size as she was right now, so about 1/20 of  Sophiya’s normal size.

The boy shot out of the ground, spraying dirt into her eyes.

“Hey!” she spluttered, forgetting to be afraid. She blinked hard. Her eyes stung worse than when they had gotten seawater in them.

The boy turned around, looking utterly frightened. But when he saw her, his expression melted into one that was more shock than fear. Well, okay. There was maybe, like, a cup of fear in his expression. But other than that, it was mostly shock. 

And is that a glimmer of relief, too? 

Sophiya had always been rather good at reading people’s expressions and intentions, but this boy was almost harder to read than ancient Greek. 

(Which she had never studied, despite Roslind’s incessant urging. She had tried to read her sister’s books once (which were all in ancient Greek, for some strange reason), but she might as well have been asking the dirt to turn into a unicorn.)

“Um, hi?” Sophiya squeaked, fear finally seeping back into her body and making her throat close up. She stepped back a tiny bit until her back hit the wall.

The boy said nothing, studying her. He tilted his head and looked at her face. His feet were hovering just above the ground, and his wings hummed quietly.

“What’s your name? Do you live here?” Sohpiya asked after a moment, deciding that if this boy wanted to hurt her, he probably would have done so already.

He gave her a confused look. “Ei! Don’t you know you aren’t supposed to be here?”

Sophiya shook her head, red blooming on her cheeks, like tiny roses. Until… “Then are you allowed to be here?”

The boy huffed and glared at her, but didn’t answer. His lips were pressed in a fine line, and though he seemed calm and perhaps a bit rude, his eyes were darting frantically around the mushroom, as though searching for an escape route. Of course, if he wanted to leave, then he could have just flown straight up. But as mentioned before, panic can dispel all rational thoughts in a heartbeat.

He’s just as scared as I am. And he’s not supposed to be here either.

“What’s your name?” Sophiya ventured to ask, fear slowly leaking out of her body like someone had poked a pin into the wall of her usually full reserve.

He didn’t answer.

Sophiya sat down on the floor and placidly folded her hands into her lap.

She tilted her head up at him, and a frown tugged her lips. There was something vaguely familiar about this boy, though she just couldn’t put her finger on the reason why.

“What’s yours?” he shot back, finally.

Having nothing to lose, she answered, “Sophiya.”

“I’m Agarius,” he admitted begrudgingly.

“Why are you here if you aren’t allowed to be here?” Sophiya often asked questions like that: ones that people usually weren’t comfortable answering.

Agarius squirmed a bit under her scrutinizing eye and finally mumbled, “It doesn’t matter; you got here first.”

Sophiya frowned, feeling nonetheless enlightened.

“Are you a fairy?”

His face turned red. “No! I am not a fairy! I am a pixi! Honestly, you’d think people would be able to tell the difference.”

“I’m sorry, didn’t mean to offend,” she muttered. Agarius’s attitude was starting to get on her nerves.

Agarius glanced up. “We should probably get out of here.”

“Why?”

“B-”

“Ei! Who’s in there! Come out here! Now!” a demanding voice shouted, rattling the walls and possibly Sophiya’s eardrum too.

“Oh, goody,” Agarius muttered, sounding like he’d rather be buried underground with a thousand scorpions than stuck in the mushroom with Sophiya.

“Who’s that?” Sophiya whispered, eyes going wide in fright. 

“The queen’s guard.”

“That’s good, isn’t it? They can get us out!” 

Agarius shot her an annoyed look. “They won’t help us! We’re not supposed to be here, so if they catch us, they’ll just throw us in the dungeon! And then-” He started rambling on about all the things the queen would do with them, and Sophiya blocked him out.

After 55 seconds, she couldn’t take it anymore and opened her mouth to tell him to go be quiet, but bit her tongue when a loud pounding sound came from outside.

They both jumped.

“We need to get out of here.” He looked her up and down. “Can you fly?”

“Can I fly?” she spluttered. “No! I can’t fly! Don’t you think if I could, I would have left this place already?!”

“You could have–” 

But she never found out what she could have done, because that was when a puffball mushroom came soaring through the open roof and exploded at their feet, making the air heavy with spores.

They were both blown off their feet.

Once again, who makes a roof with holes?!

“Puffballs!” Agarius cried, at the same time Sophiya shouted, “We have to get out of here!”

“How did you get in here? Can we escape the same way?”

“Maybe if we could see anything!” 

Sophiya walked forward like a zombie, holding her arms in front of her until she crashed into Agarius. 

“Hey, watch it!” he complained, but Sophiya didn’t have time to apologize. A plan had just hit her. Hopefully, in time to keep a puffball from doing the same.