//------------------------------//
// The Golem of Sweet Apple Acres 
// Story: Granny and the Golem 
// by My Little Scribbler 
//------------------------------//


Granny and the Golem
Chapter 2: The Golem of Sweet Apple Acres


As the sun rose to signal the morning of the second day of the harvest, the leaves sprung up on the zap apple trees in a flurry of sparks. As the older family members got to work preparing for the harvest, Granny Smith was already preparing for her own job.
Pokey Oaks was at the door to the apple cellar, carefully unscrewed the screws on the old lock. The lock popped out with a loud squeak, clattering on the ground. He picked up the new lock and carefully slid it into the door. Before he could insert the screws, there was a loud clatter of metal tools behind him. He turned around to see Granny Smith spilling the gardening tools she had balanced on her back. She let out a huff of irritation with a trowel in her mouth.
“Granny Smith, what in tarnation are ya doing?” asked Pokey Oaks.
Granny Smith spat out the trowel. “When I’m done singing to the water and collecting the herbs I need for the jam, Bug-a-Boo asked me to come over and help her with her gardening.”
“Gardening? But I thought Bug-a-Boo lives in Cloudsdale.”
“Oh, did I say Bug-a-Boo? I meant Red Embers.”
“But doesn’t her family make charcoal?”
“Uh, gardening’s just a side hobby. Bye, papa!” She picked up her bunny costume, her watering can, and the rest of her gardening tools and she galloped away, leaving Pokey Oaks to stare off confused.

Outside of the Sweet Apple Acres property was an old abandoned watermill made of cobbled together stone masonry. After lunch, the three fillies met up outside the watermill with supplies in hoof: Granny Smith carrying the shovels, Red Embers carrying wires and string, and Bug-a-Boo had rods of wood. The three fillies dumped their supplies onto the ground next to the riverbank.
“Okay, so what do we do next?” asked Granny Smith.
Bug-a-Boo pulled out her book from her saddlebag. “According to the book, what we need to do is first build a skeleton out of the wooden sticks.”
“Great, and we can build the golem inside that there abandoned watermill,” said Granny Smith.
Red Embers balanced the sticks on her back as she and her friends approached the watermill. As they closed in on the broken-down mill, they could see the eroded and moss covered stones in great detail. Its waterwheel lay in pieces in the river, leaving various rusted pipes and gears to stick out like the broken arm joints of a wooden doll. They walked into the watermill through the missing door only to find themselves enveloped in darkness.
“It’s so dark,” complained Bug-a-Boo, “I can’t even see my hoof in front of my face.”
“Hold on, I can provide some light.” Red Embers’s horn glowed a bright orange as she conjured a small flame at the tip of her horn like a burning candle. The small flame lit up the watermill, revealing a building that was empty except for the various rodents and overgrown plants that call it home.
Granny Smith and Bug-a-Boo pried open the shades, allowing sunlight to flood into the room.
Red Embers dropped the sticks onto the floor, the impact releasing cockroaches from the floorboards.
“Ew, yuck,” shouted Red Embers, dancing over the swarm of insects.
Bug-a-Boo hovered over the cockroaches. “It’s okay, little friends.” The cockroaches stopped in front of her, looking up at her intently and letting out soft chirps in response. “We’re only here for a few days and if you stay out of our way, we promise to be careful and not to step on you.” She reached into her saddlebag and pulled out a bag full of sugar cubes and dropped it in front of the cockroaches. The cockroaches eagerly picked up the bag and carried it back into the dark recesses of the floor.
“Yuk, I don’t want to work in a building full of bugs,” complained Red Embers.
“Don’t worry,” said Bug-a-Boo. “They told me you will not even know they’re there.”
Red Embers gave a worried glance to the floorboards. “I’ll believe it when I see it.”
“It’ll be okay,” said Granny Smith as she picked up the sticks of wood. “Anyway, we need to get this thing built before the zap apples come.”

Days went by as the Apple Family worked to prepare for the zap apple harvest. Everyday, after Granny Smith finished her chores, she would meet her friends at the watermill, working on the golem. On the fifth day of harvest, the zap apples magically appear on the trees as scheduled. As the Apple Family was harvesting the apples, the fillies were finishing their golem. It was suppose to resemble a pony, but it was more like a lopsided mud ball created by a blind manticore hanging upside-down. The head was drooping to one side with one of its two pieces of coal for eyes were drooping with the rest of the face. Each leg was anything but symmetrical with lumpy proportions. String was half-heartedly embedded into its head and rear to give it some semblance of a mane and tail. 
“Is this really a golem?” asked Red Embers.
“It’s a little rough around the edges,” said Bug-a-Boo.
“Try explaining that to an art teacher.”
“Well, so long as it still works,” said Granny Smith, “it will have to do. So, how do we bring this thing to life?”
“First, we take the earth diamond and shove it into it’s mouth,” said Bug-a-Boo. She picked up the green diamond and she shoved it into the statue’s mouth. “Next, I need to write the word of power.”
Red Embers stared at her as if she was crazy. “What’s that suppose to mean?”
“To bring the golem to life, we need to write an ancient word into its forehead.” Bug-a-Boo picked up a stick and slowly drew three characters into the golem’s forehead.
“What’s that funny looking writing mean?” asked Granny Smith.
“It reads ‘emet’ which means ‘reality’ in the ancient language. Next we hold onto the other diamonds. So I’ll get the air diamond. Red Embers, you can have the fire diamond. Granny Smith, you take the water diamond.” The girls took their respective diamonds.
“Now, I’m suppose to say the spell by facing the east and reciting the spell from the book.” The foals got into position, standing in front of the golem and facing away from each other in the cardinal directions.
Bug-a-Boo held up her diamond in one hoof and slowly and carefully, she said the magic words. “Oh yenih akem ih akel akem!”
“Is that it?” asked Granny Smith, craning her neck around.
“Yeah, the golem should be coming to life by now. Let me repeat it again. Oh yenih akem ih akel akem!”
Bug-a-Boo looked up at the golem but it still remained still.
“Oh great,” said Red Embers, frustrated, “we wasted our time for nothing.”
“No, no, we must have missed a step,” insisted Bug-a-Boo as she flipped through the pages of the book. “Just give me a minute to retrace my steps and we...” A loud scream echoed through the air, radiating from the farm. The fillies ran out of the watermill to see several figures running around in the distance. However, it quickly became obvious that something was going on outside.
“Are those the diamond dogs?” asked Red Embers.
“It can’t be,” said Granny Smith. “It’s the middle of the day. Surely they wouldn’t attack us during the day.”
“Well, those zap apples are pretty good,” said Bug-a-Boo. “Maybe they really wanted them so bad that they opted for a full frontal assault.”
“WHAT!” Granny Smith ran back into the watermill, hopping up and down in front of the golem with anxiousness. “We got to get this thing working. Oh, why didn’t the spell work?”
“I don’t know,” admitted But-a-Boo. “We all have the diamonds. We’re all standing in a circle. I was facing east while reciting the spell...oh, I see what I did wrong.”
“What!” shouted Granny Smith.
Bug-a-Boo stared intently at the writing on the golem’s forehead. “I was suppose to write ‘emet,’ but I instead wrote ‘met.’ What a funny little mistake. I really should have—“
“WILL YOU HURRY UP AND FIX IT!”

Sweet Apple Acres was in chaos as diamond dogs swarmed around the farm. One of the dogs used a lasso to tie down Sew n’ Sow like a bull.
“Oh, this is no way to treat a lady,” shouted Sew n’ Sow as the dogs tied her legs together.
A group had Happy Trails and Prairie Tune tied up and had them dumped outside of the Everfree Forest. It was not long before their mother was unceremoniously dropped next to them, bound and gagged. The last one standing was Pokey Oaks who stood outside of the door to the apple cellar with a pitchfork out and trained on the diamond dogs.
Razor stood in front of the defiant stallion with a pack of a dozen diamond dogs standing behind him.
“Step aside,” he said, “or else we’ll bury you like a half chewed bone.”
“You can have it over my dead body.”
“Oh don’t be so dramatic. Just step aside and let us in.”
“I will not.”
“Fine. Be that way. Barker, get rid of this nuisance.”
Barker approached Pokey Oaks with his spear raised and cocked toward Pokey Oaks.
Pokey Oaks raised his pitchfork toward the spear, an unimpressive show of resistance against a spear with jagged edges on the tip of the blade like a broken bone. He stood there, waiting for Barker to thrust his insidious weapon, but Barker instead exhaled a long cloud of halitosis into Pokey Oaks’s face. With just one whiff of the noxious fumes, he dropped his pitchfork in pain. He tried to scamper off away from the fumes but he toppled over instead, gasping like a fish before collapsing unconscious.
“Very good, Barker,” said Razor. “Now get into the cellar and get me those tasty zap apples.”
Just as the diamond dogs were about to break in, they were distracted by the sound of odd footfalls. The dogs spun around to see a large pony made of mud fast approaching with three fillies riding on its back. The diamond dogs watched in stunned silence at the odd pony-shaped object.
The golem abruptly skidded to a halt before the diamond dogs, nearly tossing off its passengers and coming to a stand still like a statue.
Granny Smith leaped off of the golem. “You mangy mutts, get your claws off my family or you’ll be sorry.”
After an awkward pause, the diamond dogs broke into fits of laughter.
“You’re trying to threaten us?” said Razor with a laugh. “You can do nothing against us.”
Granny Smith pawed the ground with her hoof and lowered her head like a bull. “Oh, you’ll see. Golem attack.” She stood there, expecting the golem to charge or at least make a sound. But nothing happened. “I said, golem attack.” Still nothing. “Hey golem, what’s wrong with ya?”
“Why isn’t it attacking?” asked Red Embers.
“I don’t know,” said Bug-a-Boo as she frantically flipped through the pages in the book.
“Enough,” shouted Razor. “Barker, get rid of these fillies.”
The three fillies stood in helpless shock as the smelly diamond dog approached them, holding up his clawed paws.
Barker grabbed Red Embers by her horn, painfully lifting her up by her head.
“Ow, let go of me,” shouted Red Embers.
“I’d like to see you make me?” said Barker. The horn began to grow hot in his paw. The heat grew more and more intense until he released his hold as if he had touched a hot burner. “Owowowow.” He clenched his paw in pain, seeing the light horn-shaped burn on his skin.
Granny Smith spun around and with her hind legs, she gave him a swift buck into the junk.
Barker let out a howl of pain as he clutched his battered family jewels in pain.
“What are we going to do?” asked Bug-a-Boo.
“Boo, go and get the golem out of here,” said Granny Smith. “Red and I will keep him busy for as long as we can.”
Bug-a-Boo flew up to the golem and pulled on its ear with her teeth (which is made of tree bark), but the golem would not move. “Come on, move.”
As the golem’s head was pulled aside, its mouth flopped open to reveal the green diamond inside.
Barker stood up from the grass and noticed the diamond sparkling in the golem’s mouth. “Wait, that’s one of my diamonds.”
“What are you talking about?” demanded Red Embers. “We found those diamonds in the Everfree Forest.”
“And that is where I’d dropped them. Give them back, you thieves.”
Red Embers scrunched up her face in concentration, causing her horn to glow with magic. From her horn, a little puff of flame shot out, barely singeing Barker’s foot.
“Why you little...” Barker picked up Red Embers by the scruff of her neck as if she was a newborn.
Red Embers flailed her legs wildly. “Let me go.”
Barker pulled out a knife from his vest and pressed it against Red Ember’s throat.
Granny Smith turned around and looked at Bug-a-Boo in desperation. “What are we going to do?”
“Oh,” said Bug-a-Boo. “I just remembered. We are supposed to keep the other diamonds nearby. The golem must be out of range.”
“And where are my diamonds,” demanded Barker. “I’m growing tired of this. Take me to my diamonds NOW or I’ll kill this little fire bug.”
Red Embers scrunched her face as she tried to conjure up more fire, but she was having a hard time concentrating while being dangled by the scruff of her neck.
“Okay, we’ll do what you say,” said Granny Smith.
“Then the both of you lie down on the grass and put your hooves behind your back.”
Bug-a-Boo and Granny Smith did as they were told, allowing Barker to tie down Red Embers and Bug-a-Boo with rope from his pockets. Barker reached into the golem’s mouth and yanked out the diamond with a soft crack, spilling dirt onto the grass. “Now, take me to where my diamonds are.”
With one last worried glance on her bound friends, Granny Smith reluctantly turned around and walked toward the watermill, Barker following behind her at knifepoint.