Welcome to Story Quest, a weekly podcast where we bring your stories to life!
In this episode we bring Emma’s story – Magic Girls Save The Wood!- to life.
If you have a story idea, you could be like Emma and have it turned into a Story Quest. All you have to do is send us your story idea here. We know you have the best imaginations and together we can create the most brilliant stories!
That’s just what Emma did. You can watch the story they suggested come to life below, plus they tell us all about the inspiration behind the story at the end.
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Read along to Magic Girls Save The Wood! Here
You can read along to the story while you listen. Just follow the text below. Don’t worry if you find a word tricky – you can pause the video whenever to give yourself more time
In a dark corner of the blackest wood, at midnight, in a swirl of stardust a tall willowy girl stood in front of a cave, and cast her wand towards the sky – “furta colores ex mundo! furta colores ex mundo!” she chanted, and the wind whipped up, the foxes and rabbits of the forest pricked up their ears in fright and ran to their burrows… a grey mist sprung up. A mist that began to spread and spread and spread across the night sky…
This story has a lot of magic in it. You might not know it but lots of people have magical powers – they just tend to keep themselves – and their powers to themselves. Well some do. And talking of magic, let me introduce you to The Magic Girls! You’ve not heard of them? Where have you been? Under a rock or on Mars or something? They’re only the most famous girl group in the WORLD!
The Magic Girls were EVERYwhere – online, on tour, on the telly, in apps, they were famous the world over with millions of fans. Everyone knew the lyrics to their songs. People said going to their concerts was a magical experience and they were right.
You see the Magic Girls had a secret, although it was one sort of right there in the open. They, like the mysterious figure at the start of our story – they all had magical powers!
Lily was the lead singer – she had sparkling green eyes and contagious laughter. Her magical power was that she could conjure up flowers and make them bloom with a single touch. At the end of every concert thousands of roses would fall from the ceiling, and the fans would leap to catch them excitedly – they thought it was just an effect, but actually, it was Lily.
Ruby was on guitar with her fiery red hair and a mischievous grin, and she could conjure up delicous treats, sweets, and chocolate – cakes and bon bons. No wonder the fans thought the concerts were magic – when they sang the song “Lollipop Rock” lollipops and sticks of rock would rain down. Sounds like that might have actually hurt a bit – having a stick of rock falling on your head but the fans LOVED it.
Finally, there was Bella on keyboards – with her mysterious purple cloak and twinkling stars in her eyes – her magical power was that she could talk to animals and understand their secret languages. That one didn’t come in handy so much during concerts but, still, it was a cool thing to be able to do.
Their fame was at its peak – the Rainbow Tour was underway and no one could talk about anything else. But one morning things changed. It all started when Ruby looked out of the window, yawning sleepily.
“Everythings so GREY…” she said.
“Yeah I hate winter too – its so cold.” Said Bella.
“Uh… Bella – it’s SUMMER?”
“Oh yeah right” – Bella got things mixed up sometimes.
“And I mean REALLY GREY – like NO COLOURS?”
The three girls looked out of the window. It was true – it wasn’t just a gloomy day, everything was literally GREY.
“Where have all the colours gone?” Said Lily.
“And look at us! We’re grey too!” wailed Ruby. A mist had seemed to rest over everything and not one colour could be seen. Well. Apart from the grey.
They rushed to the Stadium where the Rainbow Tour was set to play that evening – and all the decorations and the lights, and all the costumes were grey grey grey.
“How can we have a RAINBOW tour if everything is grey! It’ll be a disaster!” wailed Bella.
I think it’s sort of a bigger problem – I mean the world isn’t just about us and our tour. We have to do something!” said Lily, sensibly.
Ruby looked thoughtful. “But what’s happening?
Lily narrowed her eyes. Maybe it’s not WHAT but WHO”.
“Dina!” they said together.
Now you’ve already met Dina – I wonder if you can remember, she was the girl chanting into the mists at the start of the story. And Dina, as you might have guessed was also a Magic Girl. Well sort of.
“She’s doing it just to hurt us – because she left the band in a strop!”
“…and then we got famous…”
“We’ll have to find her. This MUST be down to her.”
But how?
Bella, who, as I said, could talk to animals called on the birds of the sky – they had seen Dina in the forest but not for a few days – it wasn’t much but it was a start. Once there the foxes and rabbits told Bella how they’d seen Dina casting spells in front of the cave – spells with strange words and how the grey mist had sprung up. Ruby had an idea.
Don’t you remember, she LOVES lemon sherbert. I’ll tempt her out in no time.”
With a wave of her hand the smell of sherbert filled the air – a sweet sharp tang in the breeze slipped between the trees and who should come tiptoeing out of the darkness but Dina – she jumped in fright when she saw the girls but then shouted angrily.
“Doh! I should have known it was YOU!” she said. “Enjoying your tour? I hear Rainbows are VERY last year…” then she cackled in laughter.
Ruby swished the sherbert winds away angrily. “Why would you be so mean – the whole of the world has been hurt – everything’s so grey and cold now!”
“Well it’ll make you feel like I do then. So there!” And with that she sprinted away with the girls in pursuit – all the way to the strange cave where Dina slipped inside into the blackened depths. The girls followed. Dina was snatching a box from the dark corner – what could that be? They tried to grab at her but she was quicker and dodged past her in
“There’s something in that box, perhaps it can help!” panted Ruby, running as fast as she could.
But Dina was getting further away. What could they do?
“I’ve got an idea!” yelled Lily and she cast her spell and made the most delicious purple flowers fall in Dinas path. These flowers were more than just pretty… They had the rarest most delicious nectar of any flower on earth and who loves nectar? You’ve got it. BEES!
Within a moment there was a buzzing and a SWARM of bees gathered in the forest and went after Dina – she tried to run faster but there were just too many…
“Call them off… Call them off!” she pleaded. Lily relented and waved her hands and the flowers and bees disappeared. Dina sunk exhausted – Ruby grabbed the box and ripped open the lid. And POW! Dazzling colours exploded from the box where they had been hidden – vibrant hues filled the sky painting the outside world in every colour. They grey mists had gone and the world was colourful once again. They’d done it! They’d saved the world!
When the dust had settled and Lily had helped Dina with a few bee stings, she asked her friend why she’d caused such mayhem.
“It’s alright for you, your powers were always so cool. What was my power? To make things change colour? What sort of a skill is that – OH I fancy having blue socks today not white socks. Wowee, how impressive NOT. So I practiced and practised and found a way to steal colours from the world, I wanted to make everyone sad like me.”
Bella looked bemused, “But the fans LOVED you in the band – you made our outfits change in time to the music, can’t you remember how much fun it was?”
Dina shrugged. Maybe she had forgotten the good times and just got caught up being jealous.
“Would you take me back?” she asked, meekly.
The girls looked at each other and then launched themselves into a group hug. “Of course! But no more stealing colours – it’s not just the tour you would have hurt – a world without colours was horrible for everyone!”
And so that’s what happened. Dina joined the band again (she was a brilliant drummer, so the girls could throw away their drum machine) and The Rainbow Tour went on to wow the world. Everyone loved the falling flowers and raining candy treats and the amazing colour changing outfits – and Bella could tell you that even the birds who flew over the stadiums were enjoying the music too – and even the humble sparrows agreed the world was a better place with colours – and The Magic Girls in it!
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