Prisma Glitterdust's Arc

Chapter 1 of 9

Prisma Glitterdust had baked fifty tea cakes, and not one swamp troll would eat them. She stood in her cozy house at the edge of Hemlock Swamp, tiara straight, gown swept clean of mud. Beside her sat the finishing school room she had built with her own hands. Two long tables. Fresh chalk. Empty chairs. She wanted to teach the swamp trolls sparkle and grace. She had wanted it for a year. But the trolls kept their distance. She pushed open her door and stepped onto the porch. Down the muddy path, three trolls froze mid-slouch. They watched her tiara catch the light. "Come learn with me," Prisma called. "I teach posture, table manners, the joy of a clean gown." The biggest troll wrinkled his warty nose. "You smell like flowers," he grunted. "You don't belong in this swamp." He turned and dragged the others into the reeds. Their backs vanished. Prisma's smile cracked. She sat on her porch step. Her pet slug crawled onto her knee, its glittery collar winking. It left a shining trail down her gown. Prisma stared at that trail. It was slow. It was sparkly. It was, she realized, very swamp. An idea rose. The trolls hated her because she seemed foreign. Fussy. Too clean for the mud. So she would stop fighting the mud. She would meet them inside it. Prisma carried her silver-flecked plant to the porch rail, where its leaves threw sparks of light across the water. Then she knelt in the wet path. She dipped both hands into the black muck. She smeared it up her arms and across the front of her gown. Her tiara she left on. That part stayed. When the trolls returned at dusk, they expected the clean princess. Instead they found her sitting cross-legged in the mud, letting her slug race a beetle. She laughed when the slug lost. Real mud caked her elbows. The big troll stopped. "You're... dirty," he said. "I'm dirty and I sparkle," Prisma said. She held up her muddy arm. Bits of her slug's trail still glittered through the grime. "You can be both. Watch." She stood, mud dripping, and dipped into a graceful curtsy. It worked even filthy. Maybe it worked better. The small troll behind him snorted a laugh. Then she crept closer. She copied the curtsy, wobbled, and giggled. The big troll scowled at her, but he did not leave. He crouched at the edge of the path. "Show me the dirty way again," he said. By dark, six trolls sat in the mud outside Prisma's house. They practiced curtsies. They asked why her plant sparkled. They ate her tea cakes with muddy fingers. Prisma had her first students. But her school room stood empty and clean inside, and the trolls would only stay in the mud. Now she had to get them through her door.