Welcome to the second week of the Spring Writing Challenge!
You all did so well with your stories last week! There were so many interesting and unique ways you interpreted the prompt. It’s now the second week, so it’s time to do it again! Will your story take place in the past? In space? Underground? Whatever you decide, we can’t wait to see how you use this prompt.
So, without further ado, here’s your next prompt!
Week One Prompt – The Setting Prompt
Write a story that takes place in a
Forbidden Garden
Wait…what’s a setting prompt?
A setting prompt is a prompt that takes place in a specific setting. It doesn’t matter who’s there, what happens, or what’s said. The only thing that matters is that your story must take place in a forbidden garden.
Before you start writing, we have some important rules for you to follow.
Writing Rules
1. Please keep the content of the stories you post to a PG rating. Please avoid real curse words. Violence/fighting should be limited and purposeful. Please do not include any spice.
2. Your story must be 1,000 words or less, and must contain the prompt to be counted for the challenge. You’re not required to post it in order to “win” the challenge, but if you want it to count for your team, your story must be posted by Sunday at 11:59 PM ET, and you must include your team name.
Remember to scroll all the way to the bottom of the page and post your story as an “answer” to this question. 🙂 You’re all doing such a great job!
Happy Writing!
Team 1! Sorry if there are typos or grammar mistakes, I’m posting this a minute before the deadline haha <3
When my brother became king, he sealed all entrances to the palace garden. He put his best guards around the perimeter and ordered anyone who strayed close to the entrance to be arrested.
My brother was only in that garden for minutes on the fateful day he watched my parents die, but his eyes are now hollow, his once chocolate brown hair streaked with gray. He told me, and I honestly can’t recall if he has spoken to me since, that he would die before letting another person set foot in that garden.
I pull my hood tighter around my head as the frigid wind bites my cheeks. I have no desire to be the reason for my brother’s death, but my need for answers is becoming suffocating.
Tonight, the moon hides behind the clouds, helping me stay undetected. I zig-zag between the shrubbery that once lined the path to the garden. The guards around the perimeter have become more lax with the rotations since no one has yet tried to break in.
I hide behind a bush and count sixty seconds between when a guard disappears around the corner and another one comes into view. I try to relax my muscles while I wait for the next thirty-second gap. When no guards are in view, I run towards the garden hedge and push off the ground to jump. In the split second I’m in the air, I realize the hedge is taller than I remember. I ungracefully land somewhere in the middle, grasping wildly for purchase.
I’ve almost managed to make it almost to the top when the next guard rounds the corner. My traitorous body freezes in fear, fingers going slack. The guard doesn’t see me until he’s right below my perch. I watch my presence register on his face, but manage to keep my grip. I swing my legs over to the other side as the guard opens his mouth to sound an alarm.
I hit the ground ungracefully, rolling onto my back. Then I’m up and running. I’m not sure if the guards will try to chase me, but I’m not taking any chances.
As a child, I found gardens tedious and stuffy due to the parties of that sort my parents hosted here. Now, I wished I’d spent more time in the garden as I blindlessly race through it.
After putting a good distance between me and where I climbed over the wall, I pause to catch my breath. The palace garden is essentially a maze, somewhere designed for people to become lost in.
For the first time, the layout seems sinister, not romantic. A chill creeps down my spine as I take in my surroundings. The tall hedges are healthy and pruned, even though my brother had the gardeners relocated after his declaration. The leaves are so green they appear black, and instead of the colorful flowers I remember, glowing silver blossoms adorn the hedges.
What happened here?
The flowers start to slowly grow, their petals reaching toward me. I back away, blinking. And that’s when the music registers.
I’d thought it was the wind in my ears as I ran, but there’s a haunting melody floating through the air. It seems to grow louder after I acknowledge it.
Ignoring the fear in my gut, I start following the sound. I’m here for answers, and this impossible song seems like a good start.
I always try to be brave, but this garden is haunting. Vines strewn the ground, and some are splattered with red. All I can think about is my parents and how they spent their last moments here. Was it quick? Were they scared? I feel nauseous.
The music is now so loud it’s almost deafening. It doesn’t occur to me to think about how I know exactly which path to follow, and how the music seems to be tethered to me, reeling me in.
Suddenly, I come to a clearing. In the center, was something that tugged at a childhood memory. A wishing well.
I approach the well in a daze, ears ringing and eyes stinging from the blindly bright flowers. I came here as a child several times, but only made a wish once.
“Careful,” my parents had said. “The well can only hold so many of your wishes before it takes in return.”
I lean over the edge, a terrible feeling crawling up my throat, causing my earlier nausea to return. The water in the well is splashing about, and there, in the waves, I can make out the resemblances of my parents’ faces.
I reel back, horrified. My legs give way, but the well is pulling me closer again. I fall against its rim, shutting my eyes so I can’t see the water.
In one terrible moment, the melody morphs into a voice.
“Elora. I’ve been waiting for you.”
Poppy watched out the window as Master Shamus rattled away in his carriage. As the most renowned healer in the wizard town of Fernwood, he became so busy that he had taken her on as an apprentice last season to lighten the load. Now he had been summoned by an ailing noble, and she would be alone in the closed shop for the entire day.
Which was exactly what she was waiting for.
“Let’s go, Foxglove,” she beckoned her orange tabby from the windowsill once the carriage was out of sight. He obligingly trotted after her, darting around her boots.
She tiptoed to the back door, on which was written “Wizard’s Garden.” One of the first rules laid down when she arrived was that the garden was forbidden. She had bothered, nagged, and pestered, but the healer wouldn’t budge. She, of course, had immediately resolved to sneak in at the first opportunity.
She paused as she reached for the door, wondering if it was locked. But it swung wide open, revealing the most breathtaking and exotic collection of plants she had ever seen. Tall trees whose branches were heavy with golden apples, vines that wove a tapestry on the stones, roses as big as her head, and blooms of every color of the rainbow. She stood, staring into the beauty before her, when she noticed a warning sign.
“Do not smell, do not touch, and, whatever you do, DO NOT EAT.”
She had never seen any of the plants before, and wondered if they were all poisonous. She quickly dismissed the idea, because why would a healer need so many poisons? As she ambled down the stone path with Foxglove close behind, she spotted plaques before each soil bed that named and briefly described the specimen. One said that it was the main ingredient in love potions, one made a memory draught, and another had a skull and crossbones and a warning that ingestion caused instant death. Poppy kept her distance from that one.
Poppy stopped in her tracks as she caught sight of the most beautiful flowers she had ever encountered. They resembled golden roses with an unearthly shimmer. Entranced, she bent to smell their fragrance. As she exhaled, she gasped when her feet rose from the ground. Her eyes darted to the plaque: “Rising Roses.” She laughed at the ridiculousness of it, somersaulting lazily through the air and gliding over the flowerbeds.
The spell ended as she hovered over a patch of neon lilies. She dropped onto her back, wheezing from the impact and throwing out her arm to get her bearings. Her hand landed on a flower, which blew a puff of blue pollen. She jerked her hand back, but it had been stained vibrant blue.
“Oops,” she said faintly, scrubbing it on her sweater. The color remained, unaffected by her attempts to turn it back to its usual olive.
So distracted was Poppy that she hadn’t noticed Foxglove’s own adventures in the garden. He had been content to explore beside her, but had lost interest during her delay in the lily bed. He was now prowling about as the Biblical lion, seeking what he may devour. He discovered a patch of green that smelled and looked identical to the catnip that Poppy sometimes gave him as a treat. Pleased, he took a sniff and purred in content.
Poppy spotted him at this moment. “Foxy, no!” she cried, but the cat was already taking a bite of the voluminous leaves. He decided that this was even better than the stuff Poppy gave him. He was just about to take another bite when Poppy came crashing through the flowers.
“Foxy, don’t–”
Foxglove paused, annoyed. “Meow,” he replied, as he inflated with a poof to the size of a small cart’s wheel and began to roll away. Poppy snatched him with her mismatched hands and sprinted to the door of the garden. She ran up the stairs two at a time to her room and locked the door behind her.
She deposited the protesting, rotund cat on her bed and stopped to catch her breath with her hands on her knees. Why did she ever go into that cursed garden? She gazed hopelessly at her blue hand and inflated cat, racking her brain for a remedy.
The plaques! Poppy ran back downstairs, crept down the path to the culprit plant, and read the inscription.
“Puffer nip,” she read. “Used to repel annoyances such as stray cats. Effects recede within two to three hours.”
Sounds of thuds and yowls from the stairway made her hurry back inside. Foxglove had tried to follow her and was now rolling helplessly across the floor in an orange ball. Sighing, Poppy scooped him up, and froze as she heard carriage wheels approaching. She again sprinted upstairs, stowed the cat in her closet, and deliberated how to hide her blue hand. The door downstairs slammed, and she shushed the complaining cat and listened as a familiar set of footsteps came closer and closer.
A knock sounded on the other side of the door. “Who is it?” she called, buying time.
“It’s me, Poppy,” Master Shamus replied good-naturedly. “I brought you a few things.”
“One moment,” Poppy procrastinated. Tucking her hand behind her surreptitiously, she strolled in feigned calmness to the door. She opened it to her teacher, whose eyes sparkled through his spectacles. He held out a package wrapped in paper. She took it carefully and placed it on the dresser, carefully concealing her colorful hand.
“Aren’t you going to open it now?” asked Master Shamus innocently.
“Oh,” Poppy stammered, “well, I…”
Master Shamus only chuckled. “It’s all right. Anyway, what do you say we take a look in the garden later?”
Team A
“There once was a forbidden garden. Guarded by an old troll with green, wrinkly skin. When the little children knocked, she would yell- you cannot come in!” Finn huffed and knocked over the troll he set up on the table and it went hurtling to the floor with a thump.
May, a tot with those cute, spiky, toddler-wisp pigtails on top of her head, bent down and picked up the doll, petting its head. Then she put it in her mouth.
Finn sighed.
“May, give me that back.” he said, holding out a hand.
May shook her head no and her mouth hardened into a pout.
“Mine.”
“No, it’s mine. I need something to be Old Lady Crandall.”
“Mine.”
His little sister could be so stubborn.
“Fine. You can play with it. See if I care.”
“Finley.” His mother’s admonishing, but gentle voice carried over from the kitchen where she was cooking. “Be nice to your sister. She’s little.”
“Okay.” He got down to May’s height. “Sorry I was mean.”
“It okay.” She gave Finn a hug and he hugged her back. He couldn’t be cross at her for long. May didn’t understand his frustrations.
His mother set their pasta dinner on the table and Finn was asked to clear up his creation to make room for his plate. He did- tearing down the Lego fence and removing the dandelions he’d placed to represent the neighbour’s flower garden.
He gathered those in his hands.
“You can have them.” he said, and his mother, a slender blonde woman, set his plate on the table, picked up his sister and settled her into her high chair, and then accepted them.
Pasta was good, like usual. Finn liked it very much. What he didn’t like was the way Old Lady Crandall had looked at him as he walked past this morning on his way to school. He always stopped by her fences and always stood on his tippy toes to peek over the fence into her garden. It was real lovely in there- roses and buttercups, stone walkways, even a pond.
He liked the pond, with its splashy fountain and huge koi. He’d sometimes see frogs over the fence too. Most often, he saw Old Lady Crandall. She looked like a prune and she had a voice that scratched when she yelled. She yelled whenever she caught him watching her. She made Finn feel worse than dirt or an ant on the road.
“Finley, what’s wrong? You seem upset.”
“Sorry.”
His mom smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“It’s okay to have feelings.” she said with a smile.
“Old Lad- Mrs. Crandall hates me. Today she forbid me when I asked to see her fish and garden.” Tears began to spill over, so his mother reached for her napkin and began to dab at his face, cradling him close.
“Maybe I should talk to her.”
“No.” He pleaded with his eyes. “She’ll be more mean when I walk past to school.”
“We’ll see about that. How about we go talk to her together?”
“I don’t know.”
“Some people are mean for lots of reasons. You got upset at May because you were having a bad day. Maybe she’s feeling bad because of her day.”
“Or years.” Finn muttered, a bitter note seeping into his little voice.
His mother patted his head and then directed him to eat his dinner.
The next day was a Saturday, and Finn wasn’t going to school. He was almost glad because he wouldn’t have to see Old Lady Crandall again, but then he remembered Mom’s words. Yes, they were going to see her and talk to her. Big gulp.
He put on one of his Sunday shirts just in case, and brushed his hair real nice. If she thought he was a good boy, could he see the fish?
Only one way to find out.
Finn put on a determined gaze and waved good-bye to his Dad and little sister May. Then he took his mother’s hand and they both walked down the street. Finn’s mom had a soft, warm hand, and a basket of cookies in the other. She said cookies could help anyone remember their manners, and Finn believed her. Unless some people were too cranky for cookies.
His breath hitched as they came into sight of her house, and he had a vivid picture in his head of her scowling face, but she wasn’t in the forbidden garden today.
She must be home.
Finn and his mom came up the driveway beside her car. She was home. Finn gripped his mom’s hand tighter and hid behind her once they were on the doorstep.
The doorbell chimed a beautiful sound, like church bells. What Finn was worried about was the shrill noise that would remind him he was a terrible boy. So, when the door began to open, he wished he was invisible and shut his eyes too, hoping it would work.
“Hello, Mrs. Crandall.” His mother said.
“Cheryl. Your boy’s been trying to ruin my flowers.” She said, fixing Mom and the cookies with a harsh stare that made Finn quake in his sneakers.
“I thought Finn could explain himself if you’d give him a moment.” Mom said, holding out the basket of cookies.
The old lady took them.
“Fine. Speak up, young man. Yes, I see you there.”
Finn stepped out from behind his mother. His eyes threatened to fill with tears.
“I like your garden- I wanted to visit.” He said, and then the tears came.
“Oh. Oh.” The old lady almost dropped the cookies, but managed to bend down a little, so she was looking into Finn’s face.
“You really should have just asked.” She said. “I’m so sorry. I thought you were one of the boys who threw toilet paper at my house last Halloween.”
Finn looked up into the old lady’s face and wiped away his tears.
“It’s okay.” he said.
Then they walked into the garden together.