The oldest street in the Old Town of Horsmarlonerpool is called Pepperpot Street. It’s so old, that people have forgotten why it’s called Pepperpot Street. Some say that long, long ago, it’s where you could buy spices like pepper, and some say its because whenever you walk down it, you sneeze.
But even through Wilson and his sister Kennedy DID sneeze whenever they walked down the street, they were sure that it was because of the spices.
Anna and Pietro were the best of friends. The sort of friends who would do anything for eachother, even if it wasn’t their favorite thing to do.
There was one day, for example, that Anna wanted to swim in White Star Lake - but Pietro thought it was waaaaay too cold. But he didn’t say anything, because it’s what she wanted to do, and in the end - when they’d got up Lomberstack Mountain and got in the lake and got used to the water - they had one of the best days ever. In fact, Pietro was having so much fun, that he didn’t want to get out.
Every time it was getting close to her birthday, Maggie went to bed at night and dreamt about the presents she might be getting.
She would get one from her mummy and daddy, and she would get one from grannie and granddad, too, but the present she secretly looked forward to the most was from Uncle Nathaniel.
Uncle Nathaniel was fun, and, well he was a little bit odd. He lived in the countryside in an underground house with a crooked chimney that poked out above the grass. He liked to invent new and wonderful contraptions, like a washing machines that turned all your clothes into hats, and a pen that could only write words beginning with the letter ‘g’.
The airport was one of the most exciting places in the whole of Horsmarlonerpool, because it’s where everybody went and found the planes that would take them on holiday.
You could fly to faraway seasides, where the sand was soft and warm - and if you added some water from the sea you could build tall, spiraling castles with special rooms and moats and bridges and flags.
Or, you could fly to snowy mountains, thousands of miles to the south, and you could ski as fast as you liked, so you could join in the biggest snowball fight of all time.
To the south of Horsmarlonerpool, over the Bridge of Spires, are the meadows.
The meadows are fields which are perfect for playing in. They go for miles and miles, and in the summer are full of tall grass.
Zak had told his Mummy and Daddy that he was going to the meadows to walk his pretend dog Enzo. It was only a pretend dog, so Mummy and Daddy couldn’t see it, but to Zak, Enzo was very real. He was small, with short, soft brown and gold fur, and four little legs, and a happy little friendly happy face, and a tail that was nearly as long as his body! And when that tail wagged, you felt the wind in your face from the force of it.
The River Gurgleglug runs right through the middle of Horsmarlonerpool.
By the time it reaches the town, it’s so wide that you can sail boats on it, and swim in summer, and ice-skate in winter. It’s so wide, that the town has two bridges to cross it - the Bridge of Spires, and further along to the West, the Twisty Bridge
