‘Where are you taking us?’ Hansel wailed as Mouse finally slowed down to a trot. Sparks bounded up alongside the duo, panting heavily, which did not please him in the slightest. Sparks was not a dog who liked getting out of breath. Eventually, Mouse stopped altogether and Hansel let go of his reins. Who would have thought a horse that used to be a mouse could run so fast?

They were out of the market now, he realised, surrounded by small, peculiar-looking houses with doors and windows so tiny that Hansel had to crouch down to look inside.

‘Is Cinders in one of these houses, Mouse?’ Sparks asked, sniffing the air and trying to get a whiff of his best friend. Mouse squeaked wildly, pointing a hoof down a dark alleyway and flicking his long pink tail with impatience.

‘I’ll go,’ the dog offered, although it was more that he didn’t trust Hansel to get the job done than because he was feeling especially brave.

Slowly, he padded down the alleyway, keeping as low to the ground as he could. At the end was a small wooden door, half the height of the door to their cottage at home, perhaps even a little smaller than that.

‘Cinders?’ he growled softly. ‘Can you hear me?’

‘Sparks?’ a voice piped up from behind the door. ‘Is that you?’

‘Cinders!’ the dog yelped with joy as a pair of eyes he would recognise anywhere peeped at him through the letterbox. ‘It is you!’

Truly, Cinders could not think of a time she had been happier to see her doggy pal.

‘I knew you’d find me,’ she said, wiping away a little tear of happiness. ‘I knew you’d be hunting high and low.’

‘Um, yes,’ Sparks replied with a woof. ‘That’s exactly what we were doing, definitely not eating sandwiches and hot dogs in the marketplace. Now, open up and let us in.’

‘Bit of a problem there,’ Cinders sighed and tried to poke her finger through the letterbox. ‘I’m trapped in here! I followed a goblin home and now he’s cast a spell on the house so I can never leave. He wants me to stay here and wish up piles of gold for him forever.’

Sparks barked with incredulity. ‘What on earth were you doing following a goblin back to his house?’ he asked. ‘You know better than to follow strangers.’

‘He said he had a restaurant and that you were there already,’ she replied, somewhat embarrassed. ‘He said he had sausages.’

Sparks gave a sage, doggy nod. ‘Well, in that case, I completely understand.’

But, understand as he might, he had no idea how to get Cinders out of the enchanted house. He pulled on the door, rattled the letterbox and even tried to climb in through the window. But nothing worked.

‘Make way for Hansel!’

Cinders and Sparks looked up to see Hansel charging down the alleyway at full speed.

‘I’ll break down the door if I have to!’ he bellowed. ‘Move out of the way, Sparks – I’m coming through!’

‘Oh, no,’ Cinders groaned. She covered her eyes with her fingers and then peeked between them just a tiny bit.

Before anyone could try to stop him, Hansel leaped into the air with a triumphant cry – and bashed right into the little wooden door.

It did not budge.

‘That was a very good try, but the only way for anyone to get in or out of the house is to say the goblin’s name out loud,’ Cinders explained, and Hansel rolled over on the ground, looking really quite sheepish. ‘But I’ve no idea what it is.’

‘Could it be John?’ Sparks asked. ‘I feel like there are a lot of Johns in the world. Or have you tried Nicholas? Good solid name is Nicholas.’

‘I reckon it’s Jeff,’ Hansel offered, rubbing his foot. The door was much harder than he had anticipated. ‘Or Jimmy.’

Cinders was trying very hard not to get annoyed, but the goblin could be back any minute and, if he found Sparks, Hansel and Mouse outside his house, they were going to end up trapped right alongside her, and every minute she spent trapped in this house, she was most definitely not on her way to Fairyland.

‘I know, why don’t we split up and look for the goblin?’ Sparks suggested, seeing a very familiar look on Cinders’s face. ‘Me and Mouse can go back to the market, Hansel can hang out around here and, when we find the goblin, we’ll just ask him his name. Then we all come back here and – bingo bongo! – you’re free.’

‘That’s a very good idea,’ Cinders said, clapping with joy. She really was so happy to see her friends. For a split second, she’d begun to worry that no one would find her, that she’d never see Sparks or Hansel or Mouse or her family ever again, and that she would never complete her quest to Fairyland. It had not been fun, even for a split second.

‘What does he look like?’ Hansel asked her. ‘Tall? Short?’

‘He’s a goblin,’ she said. ‘So he’s short … like a goblin.’

‘Handsome?’ Sparks asked. ‘Or not so much?’

‘I don’t think goblins are renowned for their good looks,’ Cinders answered. ‘He’s a goblin; he looks like a goblin. Little, long grey beard, very big, pointy hat.’

‘Sounds pretty cool to me.’ Hansel sniffed.

Cinders closed the letterbox for a moment and rolled her eyes.

‘Shall we get this mission started?’ she said through the door. ‘He’ll be back any minute.’

‘We’ll find him, Cinders, I promise!’ Sparks shouted as he raced away with Mouse. ‘I’ll be back faster than you can say sausages.’

‘Sausages,’ she whispered, watching them go.

Hansel got to his knees, still quite sore from trying to break down the door, but mostly worried about his friend. ‘It’ll be all right,’ he whispered back. ‘I promise.’

‘What will be all right?’ asked a voice behind him.

Very slowly, Hansel turned round to see a short man with a long grey beard and a very big, pointy hat that he immediately thought looked very cool. The goblin!

‘Um, the price of milk,’ Hansel replied, thinking as fast as he could. ‘I was just explaining to the young lady of the house that my farm can deliver all your daily dairy needs for half the cost of whatever you’re paying your current milkman.’

Cinders held her breath. Would the goblin believe him?

‘Half-price milk, you say?’ the goblin replied. ‘What about yoghurts? I love yoghurts.’

‘Oh, yes,’ Hansel said. ‘Those too. All I need to get you set up is your name, address and phone number. But most important is your name – definitely need that.’

‘Hmm.’ The goblin stroked his beard as he considered Hansel’s story. ‘Why don’t I write it down for you? Do come inside.’

‘Hansel, no!’ Cinders yelled, but it was too late. The goblin had already opened the door and shoved poor Hansel inside. Now he was trapped in the enchanted house alongside his friend.

‘I don’t suppose you’ve got any magical powers, have you?’ the goblin asked, looking the boy up and down. Cinders reached out to grab Hansel’s hand and gave it a squeeze.

Hansel shook his head, feeling somewhat frightened and very foolish. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘In that case, I might call my friend Frank the Bear and see if he’s feeling peckish. Always going on about eating pesky kids is Frank,’ the goblin said before grabbing Cinders’s latest load of wished-up gold. ‘I want ten more bags before I get back!’

And, with that, he

was

 

 

            gone.