Free All That Glitters (Avalon: Web of Magic #2) by Rachel Roberts

and danced all around them. Kara clutched her jewel and imagined her hair beautiful again, the most beautiful hair ever!
    “Hair today, gone tomorrow,” Adriane chuckled. Her golden stone brightened as she held up her wrist.
    Kara’s jewel blazed to life with bright light. “It’s working!”
    Suddenly more dragonflies popped into the room, filling it with color and motion. They swooped, picking up strands of hair, weaving it around the girls and their magic.
    Kara concentrated super hard, feeling the power rush from her toes to her fingertips. The dragonflies themselves glimmered, their bright colors blending with the glow from the gems until the light was so intense that all three girls had to shut their eyes.
    There was a burst of brilliance. Then the glow faded.
    They all opened their eyes.
    Kara just gaped. Festoons of hair were strung from the window and from the light fixtures, hooked over the skylight, and tangled on the trees.
    And the hair wasn’t blond—wasn’t just blond—anymore. It was streaked with every color of the rainbow. Green, red, blue, purple, aqua, and pink glistened along the strands.
    “Well, it seems to have stopped growing,” Adriane announced.
    “What do we do now?” Kara sputtered. “You can’t leave me like this!”
    “You’re right,” Adriane agreed. She opened a drawer and held up a pair of scissors. “Ready?”
    Kara was speechless. She turned away and closed her eyes. “Not too short, okay?”
    As Emily grabbed a big handful of brightly colored hair, Adriane started cutting. The dragonflies snatched up wads of loose hair, weaving and braiding in graceful motions, then flying out through the skylight, trailing glittering rainbow strands behind them.
    “What do you think?” Emily finally asked, trimming the last bits of hair out of Kara’s eyes.
    Kara cautiously faced the mirror. Her hair fell just past her shoulders, like before, but it was still streaked with every color imaginable—blue, red, green, yellow, purple . . . “Oh, man . . .” she breathed.
    “It’s unique,” Adriane said, appraising Kara’s new do. “Definitely you.”
    “I have rainbow hair!” Kara exclaimed, horrified.
    “You’re welcome,” Adriane said.
    “What am I going to tell everyone?” Kara wailed. “You have to fix it!”
    “Kara, we can’t keep messing around with magic until we know what we’re doing,” Emily said. “I think we’re lucky we did what we did.”
    The dragonflies were dragging the last unattached scraps of multicolored hair up through the skylight.
    “Just tell everyone you got some new highlights,” Adriane suggested.
    “From where!” Kara screamed. “The circus?”
    “You’ll think of something,” Emily said. “But no more magic! Okay?”
    “Yeah, okay,” Kara said glumly. Keeping a magic jewel secret was one thing; rainbow hair was something else.
    She watched as Adriane, Ozzie, Emily, and Storm left the sunroom. She turned to see Lyra gazing at her. Her fur was perfectly restored, thick and gorgeous and just the right length.
    “Well, at least one of us got it right,” Kara said.
    “Thank you.”
    “For what?”
    “For helping me.”
    “I didn’t do anything except make a total mess.”
    The cat licked her shoulder and walked out the door, lustrous fur shining in the moonlight.
    Kara sighed. She had wanted magic and she sure had gotten it. At least it wasn’t a complete disaster. She had helped Lyra. Kara had to smile. Somehow that seemed to make everything better.



K ARA CAREFULLY CHECKED herself in her locker mirror. Her hair was tucked neatly under a pink beret. Cute, she thought. Too bad I’ll have to wear it till like . . . forever!
    “Kara, come on , we’re late!”
    Kara turned to see Molly charging toward her. “Assembly, remember? Everyone’s there already.”
    “Oh, yeah, I forgot. Let’s go, Mol.” Kara adjusted her blue blazer, linked arms with Molly, and headed down the hall. She could get lost in the crowd for a