Kali 4 - Kali and The Fountain Of Youth

Kali looked again at the strange, crumpled note and what was written upon it.

 

Earlier that day, outside the wizard’s house, she had found a human baby in a wicker basket, a grey blanket wrapped round it and the note pinned to the blanket.

 

At first, she’d assumed, as one would, that the baby had just been abandoned by a human mother but then she’d read the note,

 

“Dear Wizard”, it had said,

 

“My name is Maximillian Ortega. I was captain of the HMS Saturn; leader of an expedition to find the fabulous fountain of youth. Unfortunately, the fountain and its magical youth restoring properties were so addictive to I and my crew that several of us drank too much becoming not just young but children. At the time of writing this letter I am a 5 years old boy but when you find me I may be considerably younger.

 

Please, if you can use your magic to help me then I desperately need your help; I need you to undo the fountains magic, to return me to my real age.

 

PS.

 

Beware the other crew members. They may come to get me, to silence me because they don’t want anyone else to know the fountains location. Don’t let them take me, please. They may look like children but their hearts are hard inside”

 

“Very strange”, said Minerva, her Owl friend and mentor, reading the note as well, “Personally, I’ve never understood the human obsession with youth; we Owls have no desire to return to the egg, in fact we greatly value age and experience and the wisdom that comes with them”.

 

“Well, there are times, I wouldn’t mind being a puppy again”, thought Kali, remembering, as she flicked through her book of spells, her Puppyhood before her owners had abandoned her in the forest and Minerva had taken her under her wing, “But regardless…we have to do something to help this baby; we can’t just leave him on the doorstep, can we? Who would take care of him?”.

 

But just then Kali stopped at a page upon which was written,

 

“Aging spell- Guaranteed to add wrinkles and turn your hair grey”.

 

“That looks like the spell we need”, she said and then, waving the wand that she always wore hung by a chain from her collar, the canine wizard started to recite the spell.

 

“Words of power, magic rhyme; turn forwards the hands of time; turn this child, quick as you can, from an infant to a man”.

 

However, just as she had finished speaking the words of the spell, Kali and Minerva heard gun fire ring out and a bullet went whizzing past the dog wizards whiskers, almost knocking Minerva from her perch.

 

“Good heavens”, said the Owl, “What was that”.

 

But then, looking out of the window of the wizards house at the forest beyond, suddenly Kali and Minerva saw lots of children emerge from behind the trunks of trees; little boys but all dressed in pirate costumes and armed with child sized cutlasses, pistols and blunderbusses.

 

“Hand over the baby, dog”, said one of the boys, speaking gruffly but in a voice that hadn’t broken; scowling meanly and aiming his pistol at Kali’s nose, “And no one will get hurt”.

 

“What do we do now?”, said Kali, turning to Minerva, a look of desperation in the border collies large coppery brown eyes.

 

“Well in my day, when children misbehaved”, said Minerva, sternly,“We put them over our knee and gave them a good spanking”.

 

Kali sighed, “That doesn’t help much, Minerva.  Not when they’re little children who are armed to the teeth”.

 

Just then, however, on the page opposite the aging spell, Kali noticed another spell that drew her attention,

 

“Young at heart spell”, it said, “Guaranteed to restore the inner child in anyone”.

 

“Hmm?”, thought the dog wizard, “Perhaps an aging spell isn’t the answer after all”.

 

“Alright”, said Kali, calling to the leader of the band of pre-adolescent pirates outside, tying a handkerchief to her wand and waving it like a white flag of surrender, “I agree to your terms on one condition”.

 

“Condition?”, asked the boy, “What condition?”.

 

Kali started to recite the words of the young at heart spell,

 

“Innocence and joy and gentleness restore. Make old men young at heart once more”, she said, pointing her wand at the children.

 

And the moment that the dog spoke these words, the strange flint like hardness in the little boy’s eyes faded and, looking at the gun in his hand, he wondered why he was holding it.

 

“Uh?”, asked the boy, “What am I doing here?”.

 

Then, noticing the change, Kali saw her opportunity, saying, with a smile,

 

“You came to see a magic show of course”.

 

“Magic?”, asked the boy, bewildered.

 

Kali pointed her wand towards the sky and bright fireworks of red and blue, green and yellow shot out of the wand, exploding with a loud bang and raining down like bright fire fountains .

 

The boys who had, until then, had the grim faces of cut throats now gasped and smiled with pleasure, their eyes filled with wonder as they looked up at the fireworks.

 

“Wow”, said the leader of the boys looking up at the sky, astonished.

 

But then, just at that moment, Kali’s other spell started to work; the baby within the basket growing rapidly larger and older until, in only a matter of seconds, flattening the whicker basket beneath it, it had turned from a little infant into a tall and full grown man.

 

“Oh, thank goodness”, said the man, “I thought for sure I’d just get younger and younger until I’d disappear altogether”.

 

“Well I’m glad you didn’t”, said Kali, “Because now you can be a father”.

 

“Father?”, asked the man.

 

Kali pointed a white paw towards the crowd of little boys outside who had put down their weapons and were happily watching the magic light show in the sky.

 

“I think that’s what they need now”, said Kali.