Rescue Princesses #4: The Stolen Crystals Read Free Page B

see the pandas.”
    Listening carefully, the girls crept toward a gap in the trees. The sound of cracking and rustling came from up ahead. Jaminta smiled. That would be the mother panda, pulling down bamboo to feed herself and her baby.
    A sudden tug on her pocket made her check the rock crystal. It felt heaviersomehow. Maybe she was just tired from all the climbing. It couldn’t really be heavier than it was before.
    Together, they tiptoed into the clearing and looked around. They were very high up the slope now. Mist had rolled down from the mountain peaks and it hung over the grass like a magic spell. On the far side next to a rocky outcrop sat two furry black-and-white shapes, one big and one small.
    Clarabel gasped. “Look! There’s the little cub with his mother!”
    “The cub is so cute!” said Emily, admiringly.
    “He’s lovely, isn’t he!” agreed Jaminta. The panda cub looked up at the sound of her voice, his ears twitching. “I come up here to see him all the time. Now that he’s older, he loves to climb and play.Sometimes his mother leaves him here while she goes to gather more food.”

    “Have you given him a name?” asked Lulu.
    “No, I haven’t,” said Jaminta. “Maybe we can think of one together.”
    The mother panda swung around, looking in the direction of their voices. Then she went back to chomping long stems of bamboo again.
    “I think they’ve gotten used to me,” added Jaminta. “They don’t seem to mind me being here at all.”
    The mother panda ambled into the forest and the sound of shaking bamboo trees came from her direction.
    The princesses watched the little cub bound back and forth underneath the rocky outcrop. Then he climbed up a tree, pulling at the trunk with his little paws. Halfway up, he lost his grip and slid backdown, landing on the ground on his furry white bottom.
    The princesses giggled.
    The cub gave up on the tree trunk and started trying to climb up the rocky outcrop instead. Higher and higher he went, until only his little black legs could be seen below the rock jutting out of the hillside.
    The princesses crept closer to watch him, and a sudden weight in her pocket made Jaminta check her rock crystal again. Why did it feel so strange and heavy? She glanced at the other princesses, but they hadn’t noticed her worried look.
    “I didn’t know pandas could climb like that,” said Emily.
    Just then a noise rang out across the clearing. It was a lovely sound, so high and sweet that for a moment Jamintathought one of her friends had started singing.
    She looked all around the clearing. “What is that sound?”
    But the other princesses were staring right at her.
    “It’s you, Jaminta!” said Lulu. “It’s coming from your pocket.”
    The sound grew louder and even sweeter, rolling around the clearing and into the forest. Feeling like she was dreaming, Jaminta reached into her pocket and pulled out the lump of crystal. It shook as her fingers closed around it, and she knew that it really was this strange, rough gem making the noise. She lifted it up to the light and the sound changed into a sequence of musical notes that rang out like a chiming bell.
    There was a silence after the last note died away.
    “That was really strange!” cried Emily.
    But before Jaminta could speak, a deep cracking noise broke through the still air. A huge chunk of stone fell off the rocky outcrop and crashed to the ground. A cascade of smaller stones followed, and dust rose from the earth below.
    The princesses stared in horror at the broken rock.
    “Oh no! Where’s the cub?” Jaminta cried. “That’s where he was climbing!” She started to run toward the rock, her feet flying across the misty grass.

“Wait, Jaminta! What about the cub’s mother?” called Emily. “Will she mind you going near her baby?”
    But Jaminta kept running, her heart pounding. She’d watched the little panda grow every week since the springtime, and she couldn’t stand the thought of