A/N: This is a story I wrote in 8th grade that I recently found. I enjoy it, and I hope someone else will too. The first two chapters are old stuff, but after that it will be new and exciting stuff fresh off the mind of an insane college student. Please review and tell me what you like and don't like about this. Thanks!

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The young girl stepped off the last step of the city bus and waved to the driver as he drove down the street. She turned and walked into a building that looked old, worn down and not at all safe. Gargoyles peered down from the top of the tall building with stone eyes making the scene look even more eerie. Sophi felt right at home.

She stood in the marble-floored hallway as she soaked in how beautiful it was inside compared to it’s grim outer structure. A woman sat behind a desk that was wooden with a glass top and some odd things strewn about it’s surface.

“Hi Ms. Gentry,” the girl smiled as she greeted the woman.

“Good morning, Sophi,” the woman who was obviously a librarian handed the girl four books that she had been researching in for the past two weeks.

“Thanks for holding these for me all this time. I should be finished here today.” Sophi looked at the titles to makes sure the titles: Zabadith, Myths of Zabadith, Sorcerer of Zabadith and Zabadi were all there. “I should be going today,” the girl confided.

“Be careful dear.”

“You know me,” Sophi said with an aggravated tone.

“I know you to be the kind who isn’t very careful and the kind of person who usually charges the bull.”

“Funny.”

Sophi found a table that was open and laid her things down. She opened the book titled, Zabadith, to a page she had marked the day before. Taking the book and a handful of change she photocopied and laminated the page that contained a great map to and through Zabadith, plus great instruction on how to get through the gates. She opened a neat book and tucked her map gently in the back. She then flipped past about 46 pages of notes she had made solely on Zabadith and the Zabadi and little bit on Zabadians and their languages. She wrote about 13 more pages on anything that she though might help her in Zabadith, the home of Zabadians which was ruled by the presiding Zabadi, Rabehethos. She closed the cover of the last book and thought to herself, finally done.

Sophi wasn’t the one to cut corners so she reread her work. Zabadith, home of all the fantastical myths of Earth.Blah, blah, blah. Vampires and werewolves are constantly at war with each other. Blah, blah, blah. The Zabadi is always a human, not born for Earth. He will always find himself in need of Zabadith, and then in need of not leaving. Blah! Rabehethos, currently 180 years, is the Zabadi. Blah, blah, double-blah. She was done. Good and done.

Outside again she waited for the bus to take her home. While she waited she reread her notes on Zabadians for the hundredth time. She read about Ciditians from the swamps of Cidati, Dilopians from the Dilopan Mountains and the rest of the folk that call their home Zabadith. Most of her notes were on the Zabadi himself. She wished to be granted an audience by him.

Sophi entered her house and immediately turned to go into the hallway that led to her tiny bedroom. She gathered a few things she had stashed in the top drawer of her dresser. Things like another notebook for sketches and her colored pencils, matches, a compass, some eating materials like the government issue MRE’s, hiking boots which she put on, she also got a book she had bought on vampires, werewolves, other demons and creatures (for nighttime reading, of course), and placed them in her backpack.

“Sophi, is that you? You were supposed to have done your chores… and Jacie’s,” her mother yelled from across the house.

Sophi entered the living room where her little brother, who was about four years younger than she, was lounging watching TV like he always did. Jacie turned around and stuck his tongue out at Sophi. “Jacie is eleven years old, he can do his own chores now.” Her mother scowled at her as she walked into the room. “If I’m not back in a couple of weeks you can sell my stuff,” under her breath she added, “to further spoil that little brat.”

“Can I have your stereo,” Jacie asked, as if he really didn’t care what the answer was, he knew he was going to get it no matter what.

“Oh, if you mean the one I paid for with the money I got from baby-sitting for a summer and a half, No.”

“Let your little brother have your stereo,” her mother ordered.

“But all four of the stereos you bought him still work,” Sophi argued. Her mother gave her an evil look. “FINE!” Sophi ran out of the house not looking back as she headed straight toward the place that would get her away from her wretched family.

A lush forest loomed out in front of her. But just before the forest was a large boulder with loopy, swoopy looking words that, in her opinion, looked like some weird form of Gaelic. She strained herself to remember a nonsense riddle on how to get some supplies to get through the gate.

‘Look up, look down, look through,’ popped into her head. Above her hung a hot pink pouch with maroon, glittery dust in it. Near her feet was a walking stick in the shape of a snake. ‘Look through?’ she asked herself. Then she saw a fist sized hole in the boulder. Reaching in, she found a bright purple box. Inside the box was a note that in bold letters read: GOT A QUESTION? ASK THE SNAKE.

“What snake?”

“Down here,” the walking stick said. It had come alive and was now a neon green, living, breathing, and talking snake.

“You’re a snake,” Sophi stated, mystified.

“Nah, really. I wouldn’t have guessed.”

“Just then she remembered something in her notes about smart alec sticks and talking snakes at the gate, but she had got that from the book Myths of Zabadith so she didn’t think it was real.

“So how do we get into Zabadith,” Sophi asked.

“Don’t you know anything?!?!?!” A blank look crossed Sophi face. “Fine, I’ll get us in. But I had better get a raise from this. Snakethins Guild is going to hear about this mess.” The snake flickered from real to stick a few times in anger. “Hey dumb girl! Draw a circle in merrithan so I can start the ritual.”

“I’m not dumb,” Sophi yelled at the snake. Sheepishly, she asked, “what’s merrithan.”

“The after-dust of a thousand Snakethins.”

“Huh?”

“It’s in the bag in dumb girl’s other hand.”

Sophi looked down at what was in her other hand. It was the bag that, until recently, had hung above her head. She looked in it again. Sure enough, it was maroon powder. She wanted to ask how a neon green snake could turn into maroon dust after he dies, but thought better of it. She began emptying her bag in a circle around herself.

When the dust finished it’s 360, the snake started chanting in an unfamiliar language. The air in front of Sophi began to ripple like a wall of water, in a deep purple color and she felt herself being flung forward. Now the deep quivering purple color totally surrounded her, it made her so dizzy she had to close her eyes. When she opened them she found herself in a different place, although she could still see a forest not to far away, but that forest was made of colors she had never seen before. There was a building about ten feet away that looked all too odd.

Sophi looked down at the snake and realized that it was again a walking stick. She proceeded to the building to get a better look at it. It wasn’t a very tall building but it’s length compensated for it’s height. It seemed to be made of logs and stones. The trees it was made from were colored fuchsia, and the stones were emerald. The path leading up to the stairs was lined with medum sized bloue rocks. On either side of the stairs, near the top, were large, mean-looking, stone lions. A huge steel door the color of rotting bananas swung on large orange hinges. Above the door was the same kind of twisty writing that was on the boulder.

“Hey snake,” Sophi whispered.

“What?”

“What’s that say,” Sophi asked, pointing to the writing.

“Yacouli qe yer wascuar Zabadi.”

“In English.”

“Residence of the beloved ruler Zabadi.”

“Really? Cool!” Sophi sped up the path and then slowed as she went up the stairs. She had been suddenly overcome with a sense of foreboding. She heard something. It was low and soft, it sounded like the burble of a distant plane heading down the tarmac. She stepped up another step and then another. Suddenly both of the stone lion’s heads turned toward her and their eyes glowed red. She notice their lips rolling up and the rumbling grew lounder. The statues were growling at her!

They leapt….