Chapter 9

That was when it happened. Tyla reached his hand up to his mask and ripped it off for the first time in front of the Grade Fives. Everyone gasped in astonishment – for Tyla, was not a he! Tyla Weatherbury was an elf with long, dark red hair with beads. Because of the shade of her mask, you could not see that her right eye was purple and her left eye was teal.

"Give us back Carmin and our queen!" she screeched. "Tyla, you put that mask right back on your face." warned Queen Crystalia. "No, no I won't Gran! I'm not afraid to show who I really am!"

The room was silent. No one knew Tyla was Queen Crystalia's granddaughter. The silent atmosphere was broken as the flamy queen shrieked.

"I should have just killed you when you walked in here!" There were sparks around her horn and in seconds, a vibrant orange light shot at the queen. Nutsy peaked out from behind Hayden and screamed, "NOOOOO!" she flew out in front of Queen Crystalia. The spell hit her square in the chest and the limp body of the little dryad fell to the ground.

'Nutsyyy!' Tyla cried out. Tears started streaming down her cheeks as she fell to her knees by little Nutsy. She looked up, puffy eyed, to Monarch Flamory. "How could y-you! My little Nutsy is g-go-gone! FOREVER! Because of YOU!"

The Grade Fives were surrounding Tyla. Monarch Flamory and all the other flamies were all laughing so hard that they were almost crying just as much as Tyla. Then one of them looked up and hissed, "Um, Flamory, you didn't kill Crystalia. You killed the cupboard dryad!" Monarch Flamory stopped laughing and looked at Nutsy. She frowned and you could then see more sparks appearing around her horn. The same spell that hit Nutsy was flying towards Queen Crystalia.

Seconds before disaster struck, she fought and broke free of the flamy grasping her. Waving her wand, she, all the Grade Fives (Carmin too), Tyla and the little body of Nutsy were all sitting in front of the crystal orb in the library. It was silent, until Rais said, "Why did you act so furious when Tyla took off his… her mask?"

It took a while for Queen Crystalia to speak, and when she did, she explained, "Ever since ninety twenty-one, women have not been allowed in the Choconin Army. Apparently, they were not strong enough – and if there was one, and she were to be caught…" as she drew her finger swiftly across her throat "But after my coronation in two thousand and eight, I found that most of the male leaders were disappearing and no other men wanted to take on the job after that. As there was no army, the flamies started taking over. There was no Forest of Living Gums then, so they were getting into the kingdom easily. "The Sparklimmarians were being killed! Along with Tyla's parents. Until, one day, I was out, trying to find the flamy leader of that time, Monarch Salvo, when I saw a five-year-old Tyla," she nodded towards Tyla, who was still crying over Nutsy, "shoot a flamy straight in the chest with a toy arrow."

"I kept an eye on her for another couple of weeks and somehow, she came face to face with Salvo. Tyla lifted her toy bow and arrow and within a millisecond, Salvo was just ash on the ground. That was the first time someone had got rid of the flamy leader, and so, secretly, Tyla, my grand-daughter, a girl, became the leader of the Choconin Army!"