Fortune's Magic Farm by Suzanne Selfors (rainbow fish read aloud .txt) 📕

Walnut stared wearily at the far wall. “We can talk about that later.”

“Later?” Isabelle couldn’t take it any longer. All her life, her questions had gone unanswered. She wanted to know! She gripped the edge of the stool angrily. “Why did you bring me here if he doesn’t want me? Why did Sage say that I might be the last tender?” Her voice rose with frustration. “Why won’t anyone tell me anything about my parents?”

Walnut slowly removed his gloves and rested his hands on his knees, looking at Isabelle with a mixture of melancholy and confusion. “I’m not sure where to begin. There is so much to be told.”

Just begin somewhere, Isabelle wanted to shout. “How about telling me why Sage brought me here?”

“Very well.” He lifted a bucket from the floor and set it onto the table. Reaching in, he scooped out a handful of dirt. “Do you know what this is?”

“It looks like dirt.”

“Exactly so. A tender couldn’t do his or her job without dirt. It’s one of the most important things on this planet.”

Isabelle had never considered dirt important before. It was just something that she tracked in on her boots, or something that turned to mud in the rain. And Mama Lu was always yelling, “Get that dirt out of here, ya dimwit!”

“Sage brought me here because of… dirt?”

“I’m getting to it.” He held out the handful of dirt. “Each evening before going to bed, a tender should always give thanks to the dirt.”

Isabelle furrowed her brow. “Mama Lu said we should give thanks when she gets her cheese delivery. She says, ‘Thank God for the cheese.’”

Even though it wasn’t a joke, Walnut’s face lit up and he chuckled. But Isabelle didn’t feel like laughing. He still hadn’t answered her question. Dropping the dirt back into the bucket, he continued. “I tell you this because while the rest of the world may have grown to hate dirt, you must always, always revere it. For once Nesbitt and I have passed on, you, Isabelle Fortune, will be the last tender. And if there is any hope for magic to return, it lies with you and you alone.”

“With me?” She anxiously slid off the stool. “I don’t know anything about magic. Are you sure there aren’t any more tenders? Have you looked everywhere?”

“We don’t need to look. The Fortunes have always been the only tenders. There is no reason to believe that any other tenders exist outside the family.” He motioned for her to sit again and she did. “You see, there once was a time when magic was as accepted as, well, as cheese is accepted. While this Mama Lu person gets her cheese delivered by a delivery truck, the people of long ago had their magic delivered by a sorcerer. Sorcerers were powerful manipulators of magic, and as it happens with most things, some of them went bad.”

“Cheese stinks when it goes bad.”

“So does magic, figuratively speaking. The people turned against it and the sorcerers died off. Well, some were murdered. Some just drifted away.” He leaned forward. “The very last sorcerer, a good sorcerer, upon realizing her fate, cast a spell over her farm to protect it from the hostile world. Her farm is this very farm we live on today. Thanks to her spell, our farm looks like solid mountain and feels like solid rock to outsiders. In fact, whenever a group of climbers come this way, they walk right overhead.”

“That’s amazing,” Isabelle said, imagining looking out the window and seeing a group of people trekking across the sky.

“Before she departed, the last sorcerer entrusted the care and keeping of her magical plants and creatures to her gardener, a man named Wilhelm Fortune. He was the first tender, my dear. Your distant relation.”

“The one with the green hair?”

“The very one.”

“And she never came back? The sorcerer?”

“Never.” Walnut leaned even closer, his green eyes twinkling with candlelight. “But we have always believed that one day she will return, and magic will take its rightful place in the world again. So we tenders continue to do what we do best, while keeping the farm a secret from the world.”

The table lightly shook and some dirt fell from the ceiling. “What’s happening?” Isabelle asked.

“It’s another Supreme Gyrocopter,” Walnut said. “Flying overhead. Don’t worry. The dome will protect us.”

“How does Mr. Supreme know about the farm?”

“Ah.” Walnut’s face fell into sadness. “That is the reason your grandfather is so angry. It’s time I told you about your mother.”

But just as Isabelle’s heart revved up with expectation, Rolo flew in and dropped something on Walnut’s head.

After bouncing off Walnut’s head, a wooden spool landed on the table. The raven landed beside it. Walnut examined the spool. “Oh, I see that Sage is out of thread. I’m not sure how much I have left.” He hurried across the depository and opened a basket, searching through its contents.

Mrs. Wormbottom owned a spool of thread. She shared it with the other tenants when they needed to mend holes in their shirts or pants. Why would Sage need thread? “I thought Sage was doing a security check,” Isabelle said.

“He is. Aha, I found one.” Walnut offered a new spool to Rolo but the bird turned away. “What? Not big enough? It’s a big hole, is it?”

Rolo nodded.

Walnut sighed. “Oh dear, that’s terrible news.”

So what if Sage had a big hole in his pants? No way was that as important, or as interesting, as finding out about her mother. Isabelle fidgeted impatiently, wishing that the bird would just take the spool and fly away. But Rolo waited while Walnut rummaged through another basket.

“Terrible, terrible,” Walnut mumbled. “Bigger and bigger holes. We never get a moment’s peace around here.” He presented an enormous spool, bigger than a marmot. Rolo hopped excitedly in place. “Isabelle, this spool is too heavy for Rolo to carry. Will you take it to Sage? I’ve got to get these seeds into