Olivia twiddled a dial beside the nozzle. “You turn this for different colors,” she explained, and squeezed rose-pink icing onto a cake.
A little vole wearing blue sneakers came over. “Olivia, I ran out again,” he said, sheepishly.
The hamster smiled. “Percy Littlepaw!” she said. “That was your third bag! Never mind, you can share mine.” She turned to the girls and whispered, “Percy’s my best friend. He loves icing so much, I think he must be eating it all!”
Percy started scampering off with the icing, then gave a shout. “Look out!”
Splat!
The new sign above the door was smeared with splattered cake!
“Who did that?” wondered Olivia, turning around.
“Heeheehee!”
Jess looked around, but couldn’t see where the giggling came from, then...
Splat!
“Hey!” cried Percy as a cake hit him right in the face.
Percy wiped pink icing from his cheek and giggled as he licked his paw clean. But then the animals shrieked and scattered as more cakes zoomed over. Splat, splat, splat!
The flying cakes covered everything with bits of sponge and icing.
Jess and Lily glanced at each other in amazement. Someone was throwing cakes! But who?
Chapter Three
Creatures from the Witchy Waste
Olivia and Lily helped Percy tidy up, while Jess searched nearby bushes, looking for whoever was throwing the cakes. But she couldn’t see anyone.
“Who spoiled our competition?” wailed Penny Nibblesqueak.
“And ruined our cakes!” said her sister Jenny, sadly.
Jess turned anxiously to Goldie and Lily. “Do you think Grizelda is behind this?” she whispered.
Grizelda was a witch who wanted Friendship Forest for herself. She kept looking for ways to force all the animals to leave. First, she’d used her smelly helpers, the Boggits, to try to drive the animals out. When that had failed, she’d kidnapped four baby dragons and made them help her instead. But so far, Lily, Jess, and Goldie had always managed to defeat her.
“It could be Grizelda,” Goldie said, looking anxious. “Maybe she has a nasty new plan?”
Lily hugged her. “If she does, we’ll stop her somehow,” she said. “Won’t we, Jess?”
Jess nodded. “We’ll do anything to protect Friendship Forest!” Then she gave a cry. “There, under that table! I saw a paw! Look, there it is again!”
A dirty paw appeared and threw a bowl of yellow icing.
Crash!
The bowl broke, splattering blobs of icing all over the grass.
“It could be another dragon!” cried Mrs. Nibblesqueak. “Quick, little ones, get into the bakery!”
The animals ran for cover, but Lily, Jess, and Goldie darted over to the table and peered underneath. Four grubby looking creatures with bold expressions stared back at them. There was a black bat with stained wings and a scruffy tie around his neck, and a warty green toad, covered in slime. Next to them were a crow with messy, smelly feathers and a rat with dirty, clumped fur. And their paws were all covered in cake!
“Stop that!” cried Lily. “You’re making an awful mess.”
The filthy creatures giggled with glee.
“But we love making a mess!” said the bat. “It’s so much fun!” He turned the table over, tipping cakes everywhere.
The toad jumped into the splatters of icing with a chuckle, while the rat scuttled over all the pretty tablecloths, leaving sticky pawprints everywhere. The crow hopped around excitedly as it helped the bat gather up more cakes to throw.
“Where did they come from?” asked Jess, ducking under a flying jam sponge cake.
“Probably the Witchy Waste,” Goldie said grimly. “It’s a gloomy place, near Grizelda’s tower. It was once a beautiful water garden, with ponds, waterlilies, and willow trees. Then the naughty Witchy Waste creatures turned it into a big mess. It looks like a landfill now.”
“That was horrible of them,” said Lily.
“They’re not really horrible,” Goldie explained. “They like it that way—they just love messes!”
“Look!” Jess pointed to something floating through the trees toward them. It was a yellow-green orb. She knew exactly what that meant. “Grizelda’s coming!”
They backed away as the orb exploded into smelly sparks.
The sparks cleared, revealing a tall, bony witch. Her green hair whipped around her head like squabbling snakes. She was wearing a purple tunic over tight black pants that were tucked into boots with skinny high heels.
“So you interfering girls are back,” she sneered. “But you won’t win this time! I have a new plan to take over Friendship Forest! Ha!”
She beckoned to the messy creatures from the Witchy Waste.
“These are my new helpers,” she said. “Don’t meddle with them if you know what’s good for you.”
The bat flapped onto her shoulder.
“This is Peep,” said Grizelda, “and here comes Masha.”
Masha the rat was wearing a crumpled straw hat with a droopy flower stuck into the band. She coiled her tail around the witch’s leg, grinning.
“Snippit!” Grizelda called.
The scruffy crow, whose waistcoat had a button missing, flew to her other shoulder.
Grizelda nodded at the slimy toad, who straightened her necklace and waddled over. “I’m Hopper,” she croaked.
Grizelda laughed. “You girls won’t be able to stop my new helpers. They’re going to make the forest so messy that all the animals will have to leave. Then Friendship Forest will be mine!”
She raised her hands. Purple sparks shot from her fingers and crackled around each Witchy Waste creature.
Then, with a final cackle, Grizelda snapped her fingers and disappeared in a burst of smelly yellow sparks.
“Thank goodness she’s gone,” said Jess.
“What were those purple sparks?” wondered Lily. “Do you think they’re one of Grizelda’s nasty spells?”
Goldie nodded. Her tail was twitching anxiously.
“Sparks made by Grizelda are sure to do something horrible,” Jess sighed. “We’d better watch out!”
Now that Grizelda was gone, the animals began to come out from the bakery. Olivia was shaking icing from her rose crown.
“Squeeeaak!” Peep the bat flew straight toward her. He flapped his wings over the little hamster, and the girls gasped as the purple sparks reappeared and crackled all around her.
“Heeheehee,” giggled Peep the bat. “This will be fun!”
Jess looked at Lily in alarm. “Oh no! That bat did something to Olivia!” she said. “But what?”
Chapter Four
Peep in the Night
Peep gave a high, squeaky giggle and turned to the Witchy Waste creatures. “Heeheehee, let’s start messing up the forest, just like Grizelda said we should!”
The four messy animals disappeared into the trees.
Everyone gathered around Olivia. Her little ears were shaking and her eyes were wide and scared.
“What were those sparks?” she asked in a trembling voice.
Goldie hugged her. “We don’t know,” she said gently. “But everything will be okay, we promise.”
“I’m afraid the competition is canceled,” Mrs. Nibblesqueak announced.
All the little animals looked sad, but everyone joined together to clean up the mess of cakes and splattered icing. Jess and Lily were so busy that they didn’t realize how late it was until Goldie said, “It’ll be dark soon. You should go home.”