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Huge Disclaimer: none of this is really my material. I got almost every single idea from other commenters who shared fantasy clichés on a forum which I cannot now find. This short story is the ward of kingdompen.org, though it has been fashioned by my hands. I hope you enjoy reading and ‘get a kick out of it’.
Key of Magic
a short story by Levi PierpontA long, long time ago on a planet very close to ours, a poor old lady in a nursing home sat in her rocking chair knitting. A nurse came in and asked her if she would like to eat, but she grumpily reminded her that she didn’t like to eat unless there was a full moon.
Her hair was all silvery gray and tied up in buns, where she kept her knitting needles tucked in so the nurse wouldn’t steal them. (The nurse really liked to knit.)
One full moon, she sneaked into the cafeteria for her usual full-moon feast, when she was greeted by all the other people from the nursing home.
“Happy birthday!!!” They all yelled, jumping up from hiding places.
“Ahhh!!!” The old lady screamed and ran back to her room. She could wait till the next full moon to eat.
Later that night, she laid in bed watching the door for any sign of movement. She had a plan: if someone came in and decided to scream that again, she would gouge their eye out with a knitting needle. Those things are lifesavers, they are. the old lady thought.
Soon, something interrupted her thought. She found herself staring up at a covering of trees. She was outside, and she didn’t know how she got there.
“Hello?” She called, her rickety voice screeching.
“Oh, hi!” A man dressed in a long robe caught her attention.
“Who… who are you?” She asked. This was the first time in her life that she felt the need to ask a question.
“I’m a monk with the nunnery up there on the hilltop.”
“Oh, um, well, hello. But aren’t you supposed to be quiet? Like a monk? And did you just say that was a nunnery? Aren’t you a monk?” The old lady’s head spun with questions now.
“No, no… Silly you. To join a nunnery, you must take a vow of cheerful chattering.”
“Oh… makes sense,” The lady decided to drop the question of the nunnery for now.
“Here, meet Bob and Bill. I’m Tim.”
“Where are Bob and Bill?” The lady asked, confused.
“Here we are!” Two men dressed in robes jumped from behind bushes.
“Oh, uh… Okay…”
“What’s your name?” Tim asked, and I was very happy he asked this question for I would not have ever known if he hadn’t.
“Uh… Lucy…”
“Well, hello, Lucy! How do ya do?” Their odd way of speaking in sync continued.
“Hey… I just thought of something,” Tim spoke.
“What is it?” Bill asked.
“Yes, what is it, sister?” Bob added.
“Maybe you came to our world because you’re supposed to kill the evil vampire!”
“Oh, why… yes of course,” Lucy felt she had realized her life’s purpose.
“He’s a very evil vampire… But you’ll need the Key of Magic to get into his castle!”
“Where’s the key of magic?” Lucy asked, willing to take the job, if only to get away from this strange association of monks.
“The zombies have it,” all three monks answered in unison.
“Zombieeees?” Lucy asked, backing up.
“Uh huh. But don’t worry, they’re peace-loving zombies. They’ll probably help you fight the vampire,” Tim explained. At this, the four (Lucy, Bob, Bill and Tim) began walking along the little path that led to the zombies. After a moment, Lucy spoke.
“Maybe I should learn magic, you know, if I’m going to kill a vampire.”
“Oh, no!” Tim yelled.
“You can not learn magic,” Bill insisted.
“Magic is very evil,” Bob added.
“Long ago, our late very good king banned magic,” Tim went on.
“And he killed all the sorcerers who practiced it!” Bill explained.
“Isn’t that a little-“ Lucy started.
“No, it wasn’t harsh!” Bob said. “Those sorcerers had it comin’ to um.”
“Oh, I see,” Lucy gave in.
“So you won’t learn magic?” The monks asked.
“No, I guess not…” Lucy said sadly. She always wanted to know magic.
“Ah, here we are!” Tim exclaimed, pointing to the entrance to the village. “See ya later!”
And with that, all three monks of the nunnery ran off, leaving her to the peace-loving zombies.
“Greeeeeeetingsssssss,” a zombie greeted, holding out his hand to shake hers and missing her by a few feet.
“Oh, hello, what is your name, mine’s Lucy…” Lucy stammered.
“Robert… he’s Billy…. She’s Timothy.”
“She? Timothy?” Lucy asked, pointing to a zombie woman.
“Uhhhhh-huuhh…” The zombie stammered. “Let’s go kill the king… Ur, I mean vampire…. eeeeviiiiiil vampire….”
“Yup! Let’s go!” Lucy exclaimed, leading Robert, Billy, and Timothy down the path, which happened to have yellow bricks. They all began to sing, until they came over the hill and saw the castle.
“That’s… that’s terrible,” Lucy trembled. The castle was huge and painted a dismal gray. There was a moat with alligators at every bridge, and skeletons placed strategically to scare people away.
“No, don’t worry, that’s not the vampire’s house,” Robert explained.
“Yeah, that’s the witch’s house. We’ll get her next time.”
“Oh, good,” Lucy let out a sigh. “I was really worried.”
Finally, they came to a huge house that looked sort of like a house in a movie that Lucy had been forced to watch in the nursing home called Emma.
“Nice house,” Lucy exclaimed.
“Yeah,” Timothy added, combing her hair to look good for the battle. “We helped him build it when he was a good vampire.”
“I see…”
Soon they arrived at the door.
“Here, try the key,” Robert said.
“I thought you had the key!” Lucy yelled, letting her old self come out. “Why are you so disorganized, ROBERT?!”
“Sorry…” Robert stammered. “Go get the key, Timmy,” Robert jabbed Timothy in the side.
“Okay…” Timothy gave in. Meanwhile, Billy and Lucy had a deep conversation about destiny and finding one’s life purpose.
“I’m baaaaack!” Timothy cried, holding out her hand with the key.
“Oh, neat, looks like a knitting needle,” Lucy explained.
“Hmm… cool. Try it in the door,” Robert commanded.
After two hours of each of them trying the door, they all concluded that the key didn’t work. That’s why it was great that the vampire came to greet them when he did, because they would have just turned around and given up on killing him.
“Oh, hello, how are you?” The vampire asked Lucy.
“Great, how about you?”
“Not so bad, yourself?”
“Pretty good.”
“What’s your name?”
“Joe. You?”
“Lucy. You?”
“Already said.”
“Oh yeah. Anyhow, we’re here to kill you.”
“Yeah!!!” The zombies confirmed.
“No… don’t do that!” The vampire cried. “I don’t want to die!”
“I thought all vampires wanted to die, though!” Timothy explained.
“But I love my life. You see, the trick is to bask in the sun as often as you can.”
“Figures. But you’re still evil!” Robert yelled.
“No, no, no. I’m just misunderstood.”
“Yeah, right,” Billy added.
“Well… yeah, you’re right, I am actually evil.”
“See! I told you!” Billy yelled.
“No, no… You see, when I was born, my siblings all left me because I wasn’t like them. I had to live on the streets for a very long time. Then I became a monk at the nunnery on the hill, and my life changed.”
“But they were the ones who said you were evil!” Lucy screamed.
“Yeah, of course. That’s because they stole the Key of Magic from the king before he died, and I tried to get it back. They betrayed me because I wanted to do good, and then snuck the key off to these zombies. The key doesn’t work for my house because it’s the key to the king’s treasure chest!”
And then they all went off to steal the treasure chest from the witch in the castle and open it up with the knitting needles, and Lucy lived happily ever after (or, at least until she died twelve months later because of a heart attack at a certain person’s surprise birthday part) in that strange world.The End
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