Quarto's bored day

One morning, Taran and Morrow and Srune went with Daddy to visit Grandma Weathercolour. They left quite early, and when Quarto woke up, he was very disappointed. So Mummy put the baby in the backpack, and she and Nenya and Quarto went out to work in the garden. Mummy was busy weeding at the side of the house, when she saw something and called Quarto over.
"Quarto, come look at this," she called - "you might want to pull this one." Quarto looked, and there was a small plant he hadn't seen before, the color of old brass and shaped as a single stem with a bell or a flower on the end - he couldn't quite tell which. So he reached out to touch it, and it felt like metal. He looked at Mummy, who smiled and said, "go ahead and pull it."
"Is this something you planted?" he asked, suspiciously.
"No, but I am quite sure it will be all right. I'll come with you."
Now very suspicious indeed, Quarto gave a small tug with the hand holding the strange plant. He heard a distant, deep chiming - like a very deep doorbell - and the ground at his feet began to move. Frightened, he grabbed Mummy's leg; Nenya had come over and was holding the other one. After a moment the rumbling stopped, and he saw a set of shallow steps leading down from where he had been standing.
"oh, is that what you meant that you'd go with me?" he asked Mummy.
"Why don't you go down and see?" she answered.
Carefully he stepped down, once, twice - he looked up to see Mummy, the baby in the pack on her back, Nenya on her hip, looking down at him. "Want to hold my hand?" she asked.
"Nope. I'm Ok" he said and walked forward. He rested his fingertips on the wall beside him as he went down, and gradually the walls got harder and harder, until he stopped and looked up at Mummy again. "I just noticed that the walls are stone - and look, they're turning lighter!" Mummy smiled and nodded ahead. "Oh, look, there's a light up ahead - it's like there's a fire or something!"
"Do you want to go ahead and see?"
"Oh, that's alright. I'll stay with you." And Quarto kept the fingertips of one hand on the wall, the hand by Mummy casually by his side, as he walked beside her down the last few steps into the cave.
And what a cave it was! The walls were red, raised flowers and leaves and patterns in silver all over them; the ceiling was so tall Quarto could hardly see it, and there were red drapes which went from somewhere up in the darkness down right to the floor. There were gold cords and tassels holding the drapes back, and Quarto could see that there were pillars behind the drapes. Between the pillars were big, dark spaces; and along one wall was a tremendous fireplace, taller than Mummy, even, with a fire taking up almost all of the back of it - but even though the fire was so big, and it was a warm summer day outside, the cave was a little bit cool.

"Hello, neighbor" called Mummy; and then Quarto saw that Nenya was carrying a big bouquet of flowers from the garden. Mummy had a cloth bag, which bulged with interesting shapes.
"What's in that bag, Mummy?" Quarto whispered.
"Just some things from the garden, for our new neighbor" said Mummy.
"Oh."
Just then, a low rumbling coming around one of the pillars made Quarto look up. There, in front of him, almost as high as Sextus on Mummy's back and almost as tall as Mummy herself was the largest head he had ever seen.
It was clearly a dragon head, and Quarto swallowed, twice. Then Mummy smiled and said,"I hope you can use some tomatoes and zucchini, because we have plenty this year," and the dragon smiled, and big as it was, suddenly everything was normal again.

"Why yes, thank-you." it said. "I haven't had time to put in my garden this year, so I do appreciate it. And this must be Quarto."
Quarto blinked, and looked up at Mummy, just as the dragon added,
"I wonder if you'd like to play me a game of chess?"
"Ooh, yes!" Quarto grinned, and the dragon delicately lifted an enormous chess board and a round table over in front of a large, soft chair by the fire. Quarto, using both hands, could just move the pieces; the dragon used the tip of two claws to move one. Mummy sat down in another chair, and read a book while the little ones had a nap, and Quarto had one of the funnest chess games he remembered. The dragon was a very good chess player, and was good at teaching little boys. Quarto learned so much he almost didn't notice who won or lost.
As soon as he finished, Mummy said they had to go home so she could get dinner on - but the dragon invited them to come again, and Mummy said Daddy would love to visit his library, and they all smiled and Quarto looked forward to playing chess again.

going out of order

This is just a note to state: I've been trying to put these down in order, and it's just too long since they've been told. So I'll just put them down as they come up, with the occasional retrospective.
-N

Moving house

Something I have perhaps forgotten to mention is that the geography I have described does not apply to these first few stories; this is because the first few stories happened when the Weathercolors were living in a little cottage right next door to their Starflower Grandparents' house; it was a lovely place, but after Sruhn was born, it was simply too crowded. Grandma Weathercolor heard they were looking for a nice spot to set up an expandable cottage, and found the lovely meadow just the other side of the woods from her house for them. "Besides," she said, "I hope it's my turn to have grandchildren nearby for a while." So Mummy and Daddy applied all the spells to keep everything in place, and made sure the magic helicopter was fully charged, and then they all climbed aboard - Mummy, Daddy, Taran, Morrow, and baby 'Srune - and Daddy applied the levitating spell to their little house, which was attached to the helicopter with a tow line, and Mummy helped Taran navigate... and they very carefully lifted off, with Nana and Grandpa Starflower waving from below, and headed off to a new life of regular adventure in a very different part of the world.

When they arrived, Grandma Weathercolor was there to help them guide the house to a landing; Taran was very tired, because even though Morrow had helped drive for a while, still, two hours is a long time for a four-year old to drive - even with magical assistance. 'Srune was his usual happy self, looking out the window and enjoying the ride - a good thing, since Mummy was busy the whole time, helping navigate and lending assistance, keeping vagrant breezes and stray birds from causing a catastrophe. They brought the house gently down on the spot they'd chosen, and then Mummy and Daddy anchored it, physically and magically.

Over the next few days and weeks, they turned it into an expanding cottage; they also set up the garden and the lawn, and various other bits and pieces...

The Magic Helicopter

When Taran got up the next morning, he knew what he wanted to do with his birthday wish. He told Mummy and Daddy, and they both agreed that it was a particularly fine and appropriate idea. He thought about the wording for a couple of minutes, then went ahead - since this was a perfectly friendly wish, freely given, there was no real worry about dangerous consequences. And so Mummy packed Taran and Morrow each a picnic lunch, and Taran wished: he said, "I wish I had a magic helicopter-spaceship, with controls in front just the right size for me, and space in the back for Mummy and Daddy, and doors and a special navigation system and everything.
There was a brief moment of sparkle in the air, and sure enough, there was a magic helicopter-spaceship. It looked much like a helicopter, though a bit smaller than usual; the front seats were Taran and Morrow sized, while the back seats were grownup sized, with a space underneath when you lifted the seats for storing things like picnics and camping bags.
There were two sets of controls, both Taran and Morrow sized, and a lovely big navigation screen and a voice pick-up in between - the helicopter-spaceship was voice operated! There was a long set of instructions taped to the dash, mostly reassuring Mummy and Daddy that this was a safety patented helicopter-spaceship, and that any children (or others) riding in it were guaranteed protection by the special magical bubble which surrounded it, and which would prevent any injury coming to anyone inside of it, even to bumps and bruises from rough landings- land as hard as they would, nobody would be even scratched.
Well, it was a Saturday, so as soon as their chores were done they all climbed in and took off - they had a lovely outing; they went up to a little pool in the mountains, and picnicked beside it. They hiked around and splashed in the water, and generally had a wonderful time. Just before sunset, they all packed up and flew up to just the right spot - and watched the sunset. Then they set the controls to auto-pilot, as Taran and Morrow were getting very sleepy, and Mummy and Daddy each carried one of them, and they headed home. Just before they went to bed, Taran said, "Mummy, that was a good idea, wasn't it?"
"Yes, darling, that was an absolutely marvelous idea."

The birthday wishes

One day, when Taran and Morrow were 4 1/2 and 2 3/4, respectively, they were out digging in the garden and they found a package. It was wrapped in bright paper - which was very strange, since they had, as I said, just unearthed it; it was entirely undamaged, a cheery yellow with a sparkly orange ribbon, not even ripped a little. In fact, it looked just like a birthday present - Taran was especially aware of this, since Morrow's birthday had just been a few weeks before, and he was eagerly looking forward to his own. Tied to the ribbon, tucked under the bow, was a note, which read: "For Taran, Morrow, and any others. With much love, from Grandma Weathercolor."
So Taran and Morrow brushed the rest of the dirt off of the package (which hardly seemed to have any on it at all) and took it in to Mummy.
"Well, children, it looks like your Grandma Weathercolor was quite serious when she said she'd make it up to you for not being able to come to either of your birthdays this year," Mummy said, hopping up and down. "You take one side, Taran, and you take the other side, Morrow," she said - and she had them each pull on one side of the ribbon. Then she lifted off the lid, and inside, just fitting the bottom of the box, were two cards. The first one said, "Good for one wish, for Taran Weathercolor, with love, for his birthday." The second one said, "Good for one wish, for Morrow Weathercolor, with love, for her birthday."
"What does it mean, 'and any others'?" asked Taran.
"I suspect it means in case you have any brothers or sisters," Mummy answered. And she put the box up on a shelf in the kitchen. "So, are you going to make your wish, or do you want to wait and think about it?"
Taran and Morrow both opted to think about it, so they handed their cards back to Mummy, who put them up in the box for until they were ready. The rest of the day, as they were playing, they discussed various options; but when they went to bed that night, neither had yet decided what to wish for.

How the Taran and Morrow stories got started

One day, I was speaking to my children - the two who were verbal at that point - and I decided to make up a magic story about them - so I asked them to choose 'adventuring names.' We had recently read Lloyd Alexander's Prydain Chronicles, and even more recently read Natalie Babbit's wonderful Search For Delicious, and so the names they chose were Taran and Morrow, respectively. Each successive child has had their adventuring names chosen for them by a council of the older siblings, with final veto power held by the parents (Mummy and Daddy Weathercolor). Other characters (who correspond mostly, though not exactly, to real-life relatives) have been added as convenient. Mummy's maiden name is Starflower; hence Auntie Cornelia (Mummy's closest sister, both in geography and in chronology) is Cornelia Starflower.
Because this is an ongoing story, with episodes generally being produced on the spot for various occasions, plot discrepencies will sometimes arise. They will be corrected or ignored, depending on the mood of the author at the time.

Oh, yes. The children, from oldest to youngest, are: Taran, Morrow, Quarksrune ('Srune for short), Quarto, Nenya, Folio, and the baby. The family lives in a magical house, only a couple of rooms big from the outside, but with a set of magical doors such that a bit of work creates as many rooms as they wish, all opening off of the living room. They have a small garden, a play yard, and a tool shed out the back, near the garden. Their home is set in the middle of some fields, close to the magic forest, which covers most of the land to the west, and through it lies the house of Grandma Weathercolor, a formiddable lady with many skills and a wonderful sense of humour; the source of many adventures for the children, as well as some of the most facinating (magical) gifts they recieve for birthays and other occasions.
To the north are some foothills; a short hike through these takes one to Auntie Cornelia's door - she is often away on quests of her own, so it's best to call first, though.