Kaspar the Baby Monkey

Kasper lived with his mother deep in the jungle. He loved to travel through the trees, swinging from limb to limb. He learned to do all kinds of tricks in the treetops and swinging from his toes was one of his favorite things to do. One day Kasper was swinging through the trees and found some old ruins almost hidden in the undergrowth.

“I’m going to look for some shiny rocks for my mom,” he said and dropped to the ground. It didn’t take him long to find a pebbled path that meandered through the ruins and Kasper got really excited when he saw all the shiny rocks. He couldn’t wait to tell his mom that he had just found zillions of shiny rocks because she loved shiny rocks more than anything.

“Wow! This is going to be the best present I’ve ever given mom,” Kasper hollered in his excitement. He ran to and fro and had his hands full of shiny rocks in no time. He was heading for the trees when a sunbeam hit a shiny rock at the base of a weathered ruin that flashed darts of red fire.

“What’s that?” Kasper hollered and ran to see what he’d found. He reached down and picked it up.

“This rock is pretty but it’s shaped like a funny-looking lizard,” he sighed. “I’ll take it too. Mom might like it.” With both hands full of shiny rocks and one that looked like a funny-looking lizard Kasper headed for the tree tops. It was a good thing he had taught himself how to swing from his toes because he couldn’t use his hands.

“Mom! Mom!” he yelled when he got home and dropped to the ground. “I found zillions and zillions of shiny rocks!”

“How exciting!” his mom told him. “I love shiny rocks! Let me see what you’ve found.”

Kasper dropped the rocks on the ground beside his mom and the funny-looking red lizard stuck out like a sore thumb. His mom picked it up.

“Oh, Oh, Oh,” She cried when she looked at it. “This won’t do at all!”

“What’s wrong?” Kasper asked. “It’s a funny-looking lizard but its pretty when the sun hits it.”

His mom shook her head. “It’s a bad thing, Kasper.”

“How can a shiny red rock be a bad thing?”

“I know where you found this,” she told him. “A long time ago when I was about your age, my mom and I lived near a city. The humans would come out every day and bring food so we would stick around. One day I decided to explore the city and saw a big shiny rock just like this that sat in a large open area. The humans visited it every day and put their heads on the ground in front of it.”

“That doesn’t sound like a bad thing,” Kasper told her.

“This isn’t a rock. It’s a miniature statue of that red ruby dragon and the red ruby dragon is mean and evil. You have to take it back where you found it.”

“How can a rock be mean and evil?”

“I heard two humans talking one day and one told the other that he always asks the red ruby dragon to increase his strength when he battles their enemies. And that’s not all. I once heard about a human who was thrown out of the city for some bad thing he had done. He was so angry that he asked the red ruby dragon to curse the city and everyone in it. A day later the earth shook so hard that the city walls fell down. My mom was so scared she grabbed me up and ran and ran and ran. She didn’t stop until we reached this corner of the jungle.”

“What’s a curse?”

“It’s when you say some magic words and all kinds of bad things happen,” his mom told him and handed him the red ruby dragon. “You take this back where you found it first thing in the morning.”

“I think it’s pretty,” Kasper replied. “Can I keep it? I don’t know any magic words.”

His mom thought for a minute. “Since you don’t know any magic words, it can’t do bad things,” she told him. “I’ll let you keep it.”

“Thank you! Thank you!” Kaspar said and dashed off to show his red ruby dragon to his friends, leaving his mom to shake her head at his antics. Unfortunately for Kasper, the first person he ran into was a big bully and his worst enemy in the whole world, Jason, The Terror.

“Whatcha got?” asked Jason, the Terror, baring his teeth and waving his arms.

“Nothing,” Kasper told him, clutching the red ruby dragon to his chest.

“I want it,” Jason said and jerked the red ruby dragon out of Kasper’s hand.

“That’s my magic dragon!” yelled Kasper.

“Not anymore,” Jason told him and bounded away to admire his new toy.

Terrified he was going to lose his red ruby dragon, Kasper remembered his mother’s story about the curse and yelled the first thing that came into his mind. “Yabba yabba yabba! Dabba dabba dabba. Red ruby dragon! Bite that mean Jason!”

Jason turned around and laughed. The red ruby dragon wiggled in Jason’s hand and he looked down. Two flashing red ruby eyes looked up at him and the dragon’s mouth opened, displaying a mouthful of sharp teeth.

“Yikes!” Jason yelled. He threw the red ruby dragon at Kasper and ran away.

Kasper picked up his red ruby dragon and held it close. “You really are a magic dragon!” he said and headed home as fast as he could run. “Jason, the Terror, won’t bother me anymore! Just wait ’til I tell mom!”

Copyright 2020, Katharine Giles
www.thearcheradventures.com