“Where is she?” Bella wondered to Ivy and Clara. Her friends peered over the princess’s shoulder into the empty stall. “Ben obviously already took her out.”
But as she said that, she noticed Glimmer’s magical rainbow-colored rope hanging limply on the stall wall.
“C’mon,” Bella said. “Let’s find them.”
Bella turned away from Glimmer’s stall, and her friends followed her back down the aisle. She ducked down a side hallway and headed for the storage area. The princess twisted the golden knob on the door and sighed with relief. The dark-haired boy had a white, comfy-looking cushion hanging over his arm.
“Hi, Bella,” Ben said with a smile.
“Hey, Ben,” Bella said. “These are my friends Ivy and Clara.”
Both girls smiled and gave little waves.
“We went to say hi to Glimmer,” Bella continued, “but she wasn’t there. Did you already take her out?”
Ben frowned. “Bella, I was here getting Glimmer’s stuff. I haven’t taken her out yet.”
“You haven’t?” Bella tried to swallow the panic that was rising in her throat. “Someone else must have. Glimmer’s not in her stall! Where’s your uncle?”
“Uncle Frederick took your dad’s unicorn out for a ride,” Ben said. “The other stable hands haven’t arrived yet.”
A small whimper escaped Bella’s lips. The giant room seemed as if it was tilting. Bella felt as though she had eaten way too many pieces of chocolate cake and might throw up. If Frederick wasn’t here and neither were the other stable hands . . .
“Glimmer’s gone,” Bella said in a whisper.
Ben’s face paled. He put down the cushion, sidestepped around the girls, and headed into the hallway. “No,” he said. “I saw Glimmer a few minutes ago. She can’t be missing.”
Ben, with the girls right behind him, hurried to Glimmer’s stall. He stood before the stall entrance, mouth slightly open. His brown eyes seemed to darken as he picked up the rainbow rope and held it in his hand.
“Princess Bella,” Ben said, bowing his head. “I must alert my uncle and the royal guards at once. Glimmer must have been kidnapped somehow. She was under my watch, and this is all my fault.”
“No!” Bella said. She blinked back tears. “No one could have taken her! The magic rope won’t allow it.”
But what if Queen Fire somehow—No! Bella pushed the thought out of her mind.
“You and your friends should return to the castle,” Ben said. “We will find whoever took Glimmer, Bella. I promise.”
“I’m not leaving,” Bella said. “Glimmer is my unicorn. I’m going to help find her.”
Ben opened his mouth, as if he was about to argue, then closed it. “All right,” he said. “When I go tell my uncle, he’s probably not going to let me to come back.”
“Why?” Clara asked. Her voice jolted Bella. She’d almost forgotten her friends were there.
“Because the princess’s unicorn was captured under my watch,” Ben said. “I’ll likely be banished from Crystal Castle and sent home.”
Ben started away from Glimmer’s stall. His shoulders slumped, and he hunched forward as he walked. Bella squeezed her eyes shut, pressing her fingertips to her temples. Glimmer missing was too awful to think about, but she couldn’t abandon Ben. He had been nothing but kind and helpful to her since his arrival. Bella couldn’t stand the thought of him getting in such huge trouble that he would be banished from Crystal Castle forever.
“Ben, wait!” Bella called. “The monitors! We didn’t watch them.”
Slowly Ben turned back to Bella. “Monitors?”
“Frederick didn’t teach you?” Bella asked, a flutter of hope in her chest. “Come back. Look.” She pointed to a pearly button on the stall wall. “This will show us everything that’s happened in Glimmer’s stall in the last day.”
“Wow,” Ivy said. “Press it! Press it!”
“If we find out who took Glimmer,” Bella said, “maybe we don’t have to tell anyone. Ben, you don’t deserve to get in trouble.”
“But Bella, I do,” Ben said. “Thank you for trying to help me, but I have to tell Frederick.”
“Stop, you two!” Clara said. “We’re wasting time! Bella, pull princess rank this one time and Ben has to listen to you. But only once.”
Bella looked at Ben and shook her head. “I don’t have to. Please, Ben? Try it my way first, and if we can’t find Glimmer soon, you can tell your uncle.”
Ben finally nodded. “Okay. But we only have until Wednesday morning’s debut.”
Without another word to Ben, Clara, or Ivy, Bella reached above her head and pressed the pearl button with her pointer finger.
“Royal monitor of unicorn Glimmer,” Bella commanded. “Use your shine and use your shimmer. Show us the past, a day sped up fast. So we can see where Glimmer might be.”
Instantly an image projected onto the wood. As if they were looking into a mirror, Bella and her friends gazed into the monitor’s screen. It showed the previous morning, speeding through Ben feeding and watering Glimmer, taking her out of her stall to meet with Bella, tucking her in for the night, and then Glimmer eating dinner and falling asleep. But soon Glimmer woke and paced back and forth in her stall. Hours flew by of the pacing unicorn, who only stopped when Ben visited her this morning.
Then it happened. Everyone gasped.
“Monitor, rewind and slow down, please!” Bella commanded.
The screen faded to black. Then a clear image of Glimmer appeared on the wall. The purple unicorn poked her head out of the stall and looked from side to side, up and down the aisle. She put her muzzle over the snap-lock of the enchanted rope, and several moments later, the rope fell to the side of the stall.
Glimmer took in a deep breath, her nostrils flaring. She walked slowly out of the stall and down the aisle, and headed for the back exit. With a push against the wooden door, Glimmer squeezed through, and strands of her silky tail were the last of her caught on camera.
Bella dropped her hand from the button. She put her hand over her mouth, stifling a sob.
“Oh, Bells,” Ivy said, grabbing her friend into a hug.
Bella started crying. Giant tears splashed onto Ivy, and sobs made Bella’s stomach hurt. Clara rubbed the princess’s back, and Bella fought to get her emotions under control. She was so upset that she wasn’t even embarrassed to be crying in front of a boy.
“I—I’m so glad no one took Glimmer,” Bella managed to get out a few minutes later. “I was afraid Queen Fire or someone had captured her. But—” A fresh wave of tears fell from Bella’s eyes. “Glimmer ran away. She doesn’t want to be my unicorn. All of this time I thought that she was happy, but she wasn’t. Glimmer left to get away from me.”
“Bella, that can’t be true,” Ben said. His voice was soft. “I’ve spent so much time with you and Glimmer. She loves you as much as you love her. She would never leave you willingly.”
“She did,” Bella cried. “The monitors don’t lie.”
She slumped against Glimmer’s stall. Clara, Ivy, and Ben sat around her.
“I think Ben’s right,” Ivy said. “Bella, think about how Glimmer acted last night. She was pacing and up almost all night.”
Clara nodded, patting Bella’s hand. “Something was wrong or upsetting Glimmer.”
“I must have done something yesterday to upset her,” Bella said. “Or maybe Glimmer’s felt this way since we’ve been Paired, and she finally couldn’t take it anymore.”
“It has to be something else,” Ben said. “We have to find Glimmer and figure out what’s going on.”
“I’ll be worried until she’s back in the stable,” Bella said. “I want to start looking right away and keep it a secret. But once we find Glimmer—if we find her—I want her to be able to be free of being my unicorn if that’s what she wants.”
“Bella, let’s find Glimmer first,” Clara said. “Once she’s safe and Ben’s clear from getting into trouble, then we’ll find out why she left.”
Bella stood on shaky legs. Her heart actually hurt from fear for Glimmer’s safety and the pain that her own unicorn didn’t want her. Just because Glimmer might not love me doesn’t mean I don’t love her, Bella thought. I’m so scared for her, and I won’t sleep until I find her. I wish Glimmer knew how much I love her.
“If we’re going to keep this a secret,” Ben said, “we have to act as though everything is normal. If my uncle comes to Glimmer’s stall and asks where she is, I’ll tell him that she’s with you, Bella.”
“I’ll tell my parents and Frederick that Glimmer’s with you if they ask,” Bella replied.
Planning to return Glimmer to safety helped to dash away some of her sadness. Instead of focusing on Glimmer’s decision to leave, Bella decided to put everything she had into finding her unicorn. Once Glimmer was safe, then Bella would deal with letting go.
“I want to help,” Ivy said.
“Me too,” Clara added. “What can we do?”
“We have to start looking without appearing to anyone as if we’re searching for anything,” Bella said. “What if we all take sections of the castle grounds and search until it gets dark? If Glimmer escaped the grounds, then tomorrow we can map out sections of the kingdom to search.”
“Don’t forget school,” Ivy said, frowning.
Bella groaned. “I forgot that tomorrow is Monday. Okay, after school we’ll all meet up at the Snapdragon Garden.”
“Are you sure no grown-ups will be there?” Clara asked.
“Positive,” Bella said. “Yesterday I heard one of the gardeners tell my mom that the snapdragon flowers were especially mean this week. She told my mom to be extra careful if she walked through the garden, and Mom said she wasn’t going to chance it.”
“Oh,” Clara said, her voice squeaky. “Okay.”
Clara must have been picturing the towering flowers that filled Snapdragon Garden. They were beautiful, but their looks were deceiving. The flowers used their petals to nip at anything that got too close. The flowers couldn’t breathe fire like real dragons, but smoke did come out of their mouths when they opened them if they were in a bad mood.
“We only have to go there if we don’t find Glimmer today,” Ben said. “She might be wandering close by.”
Despite her churning stomach, Bella gave Ben a tiny smile. “I hope so.”
“We need to get in touch with each other if we find her,” Ben said. “Did everyone bring their crystal?”
Everyone nodded and reached into their pockets. They all took out smooth, quarter-size clear stones. The stones, nicknamed Chat Crystals, allowed the friends to send messages to each other.
“Let’s cast a spell on them to vibrate and change colors depending on our message,” Clara said.
“How about purple if someone finds Glimmer,” Bella said. “Red if there is trouble and we need to get back to the stables immediately, and yellow if there’s a possible trace of Glimmer and we need to help that person follow the lead.”
“Perfect,” Ivy said.
Bella held her crystal flat on her palm as her friends did the same. “Crystals, until dusk tonight, please change colors according to my words,” she said, putting a spell on the crystals. Once she had finished, everyone tucked away their crystals.
The friends mapped out sections of the grounds and agreed to meet at the back of the stables at dusk. Ivy, Clara, and Ben gave Bella encouraging smiles before they all went their separate ways around Crystal Castle. Bella hoped the plan would work!