The moon was full but illuminated nothing, and the deathly Silent Island was as black as sin. The belugas in the restless harbour were calling out to their Emperor, their dirge crawling over the land.

Lady Syrenna sat up in her bed of leaves and moss and clenched her fists. The belugas could be heard all over the Island, and they had been keeping her up all night long!

"Bloody belugas!" She yelled before she got out of bed and grabbed her sword. She stormed through the night-covered paths of her forest on her way to yell at the belugas in the bay.

As she burst through the edge of the forest, she heard something and stopped in her tracks. It was a weird, gurgling, vibrating kind of sound. Her eyes nearly popped out. She knew what it was... HORNY TOADS!

"OH MY GOD!" Screamed Syrenna as a shower of horny toads fell all around her. They were full of green slime and oozing spots, falling to the ground like hard raindrops! Syrenna's eyes bulged in shock, and she ran to a nearby giant oak tree to shelter herself from the toad storm.

"I think it must be witches!" She cried, sitting as closely as she could to the warm bark of the living tree.

"That's right," replied a voice close by, "They are witches. They come here every night. We don't know where they come from, but they fly here from a faraway land, a land supposedly more real than this place, and cause mayhem to the Silent Island."

"Now why would they do that?" Wondered Syrenna, putting her index finger to her chin, "That must be the reason the belugas are crying."

"That's right, my dear. That's right." The voice said softly. And when Syrenna turned around to see where the voice came from, she was astonished to find that it was a tree!

The tree was talking to her! She backed away quickly, instinctively reaching for her Sylver Vyne Sword. The tree blinked at her with huge green eyes. Syrenna calmed herself and pulled her hand away from the hilt.

A horny toad hit her shoulder and latched on tightly, then proceeded to vigorously hump her. She punched it and ripped at it but it didn't budge. The tree reached down a long branch and squeezed the toad. It buzzed and squirted its oozy goo. The tree pulled harshly and it came free, taking a layer of Lady Syrenna's skin with it. She thanked the tree as blood ran down her arm.

"What is your name, kind tree?"

"I am Silzar. I am an Ent."

"Wow! I thought your kind had hibernated so hard you turned into regular trees!"

"No, my people still roam the lands. At least, they did before these terrible little creatures came and made the nights unbearable. Can you help us to be rid of these wretches?"

"Yes, but I must get my friends to help us." As Syrenna turned to head off to go and get Ivanova and the Emperor, someone appeared on the path ahead. It was a giant witch!

And was she ever a giant! She was so enormous Syrenna was almost fooled, thinking it was a sort of hippo. The teeth that seemed to come out of its mouth were not teeth but warts! And what she thought were the hippo's giant ears was actually one big witch hat!

The witch laughed maniacally as she beckoned to a row of black heads just visible from the nearby hills. Everything was so dark - all Syrenna could see were silhouettes.

Syrenna edged a little forward, and the tree took her by the arm.

"No, no," the tree cautioned. "It's dangerous. They're evil little things."

Syrenna agreed and gave the tree an evil face, as she looked at her arm that was oozing with goo.

"Oh sorry," the tree laughed, "There's toad goo all over my branches."

The Ent wiped his gooey branches on the mossy grass.

"Gross," it said.

Moving through the darkness, Syrenna could see that the silhouettes were not just heads but bodies as well. They looked like miniature versions of the giant witch. Syrenna gasped in amazement. There were about fifty of them! And all of them now had bright burning torches.

Syrenna wondered why the commotion still hadn't aroused Ivanova and the Emperor. The belugas were so loud and the frogs were like hail on the ground. Everything was incredibly noisy! She began to get worried, and ran as fast as she could through the dense forests to the harbour where the Emperor was. She had no idea anyway where Ivanova lived.

"She lives in the dark," Syrenna thought, hoping a clue would come to her.

She pulled her sword free as she came to the road that led to the Emperor's domicile. She glanced behind her and saw ten of the little witch beasts right behind her. They advanced upon her. She sliced two of them in half, but two more came. She hacked the heads off of them. The remaining six flew at her with their fingernails scratching in the air. She swung and stabbed until they were all twitching on the ground.

Syrenna turned and started down the road when all of a sudden the scattered limbs and heads of the witches began to wiggle. Each scattered part became a whole new witch. Instead of ten there was now thirty! Syrenna growled, blood running from her scratches. She spat at the nearest witch and then kicked it hard into the bushes. She turned and ran down the road. The witches were right on her heels flying and cackling as they threw toads at her.

Syrenna, not paying attention, and looking at the cackling witches, slammed right into the great door of the Emperor's home. She fell to the ground but picked herself up, and she pounded on the door as she sliced at the witches. The door creaked and opened.

"Gah, what is going on? I am concentrating on my thread!" Yelled the Emperor Beluga with pouty lips and sharp eyebrows. Standing up on his tippy toes to see out his door's spyhole, he saw the predicament Syrenna was in, and pulled her into his lovely house beneath the sea.

Syrenna quickly explained what was going on, and they sat in the centre of the round golden vestibule, looking up to the skylights, watching the witches now pounding at the glasses.

"I don't want them to come in! They'll make everything dirty!!" Screamed the Emperor, "I will not have my house dirty!"

So he waved his hand to bring Lady Syrenna to the lavishly decorated door behind his closet of thread and soft material.

"In here we go! We shall go up the creaky stairs and find Ivanova as fast as possible!"

Once they emerged from the small door at the very top of the staircase, the Emperor raised his little hands and had his black crows come to distract the witches as they fled for Ivanova.

"Eat the witches, I say! Eat them!!"

After a moment of chaos, the Emperor and Syrenna ran as fast as their toes could take them. As they swiftly passed through the long grass and dense rose bushes that stood on the black hills, they looked back to where the witches were... It was not a happy sight.

"MY CROWS!" The Emperor cried, "They ate the witches and the witches have taken their form... the witches are still alive, and they now have wings!!!"

"Damn witches! Why can't they be like the ones from my homeland?!" Syrenna said to herself.

The witches flew fiercely towards them, cackling and cawing evilly. The two Royalties slid down a slime-covered hill, stepping and squishing toads as they ran.

"Where does Ivanova live!?" Syrenna screamed.

The Emperor shrugged, "The dark, the dark!"

Syrenna thought for a moment as they leapt over a fallen tree trunk. "Ivanova loves the dark so only the darkest place on the Island must do."

"Where's the darkest place!?" She asked the Emperor. He looked around and then pointed to the east. They both whirled around and dashed off in the direction.

But then the witches were upon them, using the beaks of the crows to peck at them. Then the Emperor had a most wonderful idea. He stopped running and began to sew. He sewed and sewed as fast as lightning until before him was a huge net. As the crows flew at them he flung the net high in the air, catching them. He told Syrenna to hold onto the net tight as they were lifted high in the air.

The witches squawked ever so loudly and the two Royalties held as tight as they could to the net. The Emperor took out his giant cat-o-nine-tails whip and began lashing at the black hags, making them scream and fly faster and faster.

Syrenna used her forest song and called out to Ivanova in the dark east and Ivanova rose up and showed her face to the night. Syrenna yelled out, "Ivanova! We need your silver fire!!"

Ivanova, astonished to see at the strange spectacle right before her eyes, nodded and raised her hands. In between them flared a ball of silver flames. "Bombs away!" She cried out, throwing the fireball straight into the centre of the net of black witches.

As the Emperor whipped and whipped harshly, he positioned the witches to fly over the sea and with a yell of "LET GO NOW!" he and Lady Syrenna let go of the net as the strong fire shot at the witches. The two Royalties dropped to the black shimmering ocean, and onto the backs of waiting beluga whales.

The fire burned and burned the witches alive. They could not regenerate, being burned so often. An eternal fire. Unable to be extinguished by wind or water. And they burned and burned until they were microscopic ashes, being separated and mixed into the deep sea... forever and ever.

The sun rose up and caused the ashes to combust to nothing. From the faint new light, they could make out a larger witch shape above the space where the ashes blew away, but before any of them could do a thing about it, the shape flew off, chasing the fleeing night.

"That is a problem for another day," Emperor said. "Let us have breakfast now."

Syrenna replied, "I think I would like some cr�pes. How about you?"

The Emperor answered, "An egg."

Ivanova stood on the beach, alone, glancing between the two Royalties wandering off to eat and the belugas frolicking where the witches had all burned to death.

"Am I still drunk?" She wondered aloud.

The End