Sam and I looked at each other, and immediately we both knew something strange had happened. The tunnel beyond the mirror was like an icebox, freezing, opaque walls that revealed nothing about the world beyond them, and yet clear enough to allow bright light to guide our way. The great water-melon-buffalo had become a gigantic apricat, orange and squishy. The apricats that remained, our tiny guides who had helped us from the tunnel beneath the tree into this one of ice and snowflakes had somehow become little watermelons. The greatest and strangest change though was that of my friend and I. The person I was staring at was a spitting image of me, and when I looked at the clothing I was wearing and my hands and feet I could see that I was in Sam's body and that he was in mine.

"What's going on, Jess?" Sam asked, and yet my lips moved and said the question for him.

"I don't know, Sam," I said, yet as my mind thought the words it was my reflection who voiced them.

"Everything is reversed here… At least most things…" replied one of the little melon creatures.

"What do you mean?" both Sam and I asked, together this time, our minds and voices in sync.

The giant apricat motioned with its head toward the mirror glass that we had passed through.

Turning to look in that direction, both Sam and I discovered it was not our mirror image we saw. This time the glass was acting more like a window, revealing the wooden version of the orange-a-tan knocking on the mirror and trying to work out how to get in. The puppeteer's wires scratched at the surface causing us all to shudder. It sounded just like nails on a blackboard, the screech horrific.

"Hurray up!" called the apricat. "Climb up board the sleigh!"

Sam and I turned away from the mirror glass as spiderweb cracks began to form across the surface. Before us was a simple wooden sled painted festive red, the hefty apricat tied to the front by leather reins covered in jingly bells. Behind the pastel-orange fruit was the trio of buffalo calves.

We rushed up to the very festive vehicle and noticed red hats with white trimming and pompoms, one that had Jess stitched on the front, the other bearing Sam's name. We put on our hats, climbed aboard the sleigh and Sam, looking like me took up the reins.

"How do we make you go?" asked Sam, the words coming out of my mouth.

"Just jingle the bells and shout out our names," said the apricat.

"But what are your names?" I asked, still surprised to hear my reflection say them.

"My name is Yllib," said the lead creature.

"I'm Ybbag," said the first calf, green striped.

"Call me Yddam," said the next water-melon-buffalo.

"I'm Yllit," said the next one back, headed toward the front of the red sled.

Lastly, the littlest of the calves announced her name was Yvvil.

"Well then, on Yllib… On Ybbag… On Yddam… Go Yllit… And Yvvil… Get us out of here…" my lips spoke as Sam thought the words.

The leather reins cracked, once and then again, and we were off.

Slowly at first, the curved blades on the wooden contraption cutting into the frosted glass of the tunnel creating shavings that resembled snow. The five fruit creatures, bit by bit built up speed and then we were dashing through this odd tunnel of freezing temperatures. I looked over at my friend and noticed my body was going from pink to white with a tinge of blue. Looking down at my Sam hands I could see the skin there was doing the same.

"What do we do about the cold?" I heard my reflection say as I considered the dilemma we faced.

The speed at which we were traveling was making the world around us act like the best (or maybe the worst) fan or air conditioner. It was getting colder and colder the faster we went. Then we headed down a ramp and got fast still. Little icicles were forming, miniature snowflakes on the tips of our noses and upon our eyelashes. One of the flakes, as minute as the tiny thing was, I swear I saw it wave at me, the one that was hanging from my reflection's nose. Before I could be certain it released its grip and vanished from my sight, only to be replaced by another.

"Here," my lips said, shivering. "We can huddle together beneath this quilt."

At the bottom of the sled, in the footwell, Sam and I discovered a thick blanket, crocheted in wool dyed green, red, and a pure white. It was warmer than having no blanket at all, but still, beneath it we shivered as down the slope we travelled faster than ever before. The wind whistled in our ears, passing through the jolly hats we wore, and then one by one the bopping pompoms caught the sharp breeze, and the hats were stolen from our heads.

"Hey!!" both Sam and I cried out.

We turned to look behind us and made to catch the hats, only the scene behind us caused us to be too distracted.

The wooden orange-a-tan had grown gigantic, over twelve feet tall and wide, and the puppeteer's puppet versions of our classmates had shrunk to much smaller versions of themselves. The whole scene could have been thought of as comical if it were not so frightening. The chorus of voices were so incredibly close, and yet we have no idea they had bridged the gap so swiftly. Facing them we could only just hear that eerie chant.

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string

My dear puppet on a string

The only benefit of traveling so swiftly along the frozen glass was that the wind we were creating kept the puppeteer's wires from latching onto us, and the sled. We could see them flailing about like loose spiderweb strands. In the far distance, at the very rear of the orange-a-tan, resting upon its gigantic heels was the puppeteer himself, a looming giant, covered in flakes of snow, each flake trying to free itself, but just as it struggled, it became like wood, poorly painted, a second-rate imitation of its former, beautiful self.

"On Yllib… On Ybbag… On Yddam… Go Yllit… And Yvvil… Go as fast as you can and get us to safety…" my lips spoke as Sam cracked the reins again and urgently thought the words.

It was then that the poor gigantic apricat, Yllib, tripped, a very un-cat-like thing to do. The five fruit-animals who faithfully pulled us along became like a ball of snow, tumbling chaotically over and over and dragging us along behind it.

"Hold on, Jess," my lips said, and I clung to the front of the sled, the quilt, and my friend.

And then with a crash we suddenly joined the fruit-animals and overhead and feet we went, the tunnel becoming a blur of light, the scenes behind, in front, and all around us becoming confusing. Over and over and over we went until at the bottom of the slope we stopped.

Glass shaved snow blocked our view, but it sounded like the orang-a-tan flew straight over the top of us and carried on further down the tunnel's length. A muffled chanting of the puppeteer's eerie promise fading as we tried to break free of our icy prison.

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string…

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children…

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string…

"What do we do now?" asked Yllib.

"We go, right?" asked Yllit.

"Was that right you wanted to go?" asked Yddam.

"Well, we had better decide quickly…" said Yvvil. "Can you all hear that?"

Now that we were not hurtling along at a ridiculously fast speed, there was not as much wind, and the temperature felt like it was warming up. What little breeze that was there seemed to come from the direction where the orange-a-tan had gone. In the distance, in that direction, we could hear a scraping sound and that dreaded chant, slowly growing louder.

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string

My dear puppet on a string

"Well… We cannot go forward, and we cannot go back…" my voice told us.

"So let us go up," I suggested, my reflection voicing the option.

I pointed toward the top of the tunnel where I had spotted an opening and a rope ladder.

It was up very high.

"How do we get there?" asked Yllib.

"Throw me up there and I'll grab hold of the ladder," said Yvvil bravely.

"But who will be strong enough to throw you up so high?" asked Yllit.

"We can both try, together," said my lips.

"We can use the blanket like a chute and catch you safely if you miss," said my reflection, my thoughts spoken by them.

"If we are going to do it, we must do so now," said Yddam.

So, we grabbed the crocheted blanket from the melting snowball and gave it a shake. The littlest and lightest water-melon-buffalo rolled into place as my friend and I each grasped two of the blanket's corners and then as the fruit-animals counted down, we, Sam and I, got into a rhythm.

"Five… Four… Three… Two… One…"

I flicked my corners, and the little round fruit tumbled out.

"Quickly… Try again…" begged Yddam.

"We don't want to become wooden," added Yllib.

Yvvil rolled back onto the blanket, and we took up our corners again.

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string

My dear puppet on a string

The orange-a-tan was so close we could clearly hear the chanting now.

"Five… Four…" counted the fruit-animals.

"We go on three…" suggested Yvvil. "We don't have any more time to waste…"

Both Sam and I could see the logic of that. As the next number was loudly announced by the water-melon-buffalo and the apricat, the blanket corners flicked in perfect unity and the littlest and lightest of the water-melon creatures sailed up into the air. This was our one chance, and, in my mind, I feverishly prayed that it would work. Yvvil tumbled through the air, up, up, up, and then she grabbed hold with her mouth the lowest rung of the rope ladder. It budged, but then she let go and fell, yelling and cursing all the way down until we caught her safely in the blanket again.

"I'm sorry," she murmured… I was so close, but there is now no more time to try again…"

"Three cheers for Yvvil!" cried Yllib… "Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!"

"Why?" asked the little melon. "Why do you tease me so, apricat?"

The great orangey blob was dancing about and then motioned with his head upwards.

We all looked up and that was when we saw the ladder that led to the trapdoor above us was twirling down, in fact it was so close it almost hit Sam upon the head.

"Gather everyone into the blanket," my lips said, stating Sam's order. "And now wrap it all up as a bundle and I will race it to the top."

"Will it be too heavy for you?" I asked, through my reflection.

It was strange to watch myself shake my head, but I could see the look of determination in my reflections eyes was all Sam. He would not fail because he knew he could not fail.

I held the lowest rung of the ladder as everyone else went up the ladder. Step by painfully slow step.

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string

My dear puppet on a string

The orange-a-tan and all my classmates were there before me as I took to that rope ladder, two rungs at a time. I could feel the puppeteer's presence, could sense his puppet strings searching for me. Faster and faster I went, three rungs, then four, and all the while the rope ladder became stiff. The strings had claimed it, and it would not be long before those same strings changed me.

"Come on Jess," squeaked the voice of one of the little apricats.

It sounded like they had changed back since leaving the tunnel and the world beyond the mirror. I dared for only a second to look down and found our wooden orange-a-tan had snuck up on me. He lazily stretched out one of his great wooden hands. In that very final moment before I was caught and pulled back down to my sorrowful fate, friendly hands, teeth, and hooves reached down and pulled me through to safety.

"Thank you," I said, both grateful and relived. "Thank you, Sam, thank you Yllib, thank you Yddam, thank you Ybbag, thank you Yllit, and especially thank you brave little Yvvil…"

"You are so funny, Jess," laughed my friend Sam.

"Why?" I asked, confused.

"In the tunnel beyond the mirror everything was changed and reversed," Sam continued. "Now that the water-melon buffalo is again a water-melon buffalo and not a great big and squishy apricat, its name is no longer Yllib…"

"It's not?" I said, surprised.

The stripy bull with the funny horns dipped his head, taking a bow toward me.

"Madam Jess, my I introduce myself to you as Billy the Bluebottle Bull," he said.

"And we," said the apricats. "Are Gabby, Maddy, Tilly, and Livvy."

"And we," said Sam. "Need to keep moving…"

At that very moment the trapdoor pushed open, and Tammy's head popped out. A very wooden and very large version of my classmate's head. She took in a very deep breath and then she began to shout…

Puppet on a string

My puppet on a string

I will teach you to dance

I will teach you to sing

And then all the children

Who like to run

I shall catch with my strings

Make each one join the fun

Puppet on a string

My dear puppet on a string

And that was when I felt tiny little wires wrap around my hands and feet. The change was coming and it seemed as though there was nothing that I could do.

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