Chapter 2

"Have you heard the rumor?" one of the moms asked Aunt Amy in the wardrobe room.

"What rumor? she said as she worked on my tunic for my role in Sleeping Beauty.

"There will be a transgendered child attending the middle school next year," the mom said.

"Oh really?" Aunt Amy said before she told me to stop fidgeting.

"I swear I'm dealing with Meg," she said as she put another pin in the tunic.

"What would you think would happen if that child took class here?" the woman asked my aunt.

Pointe Shoes

Editor's note: Pointe Shoes is a sequel to My Summer With Meg and Our Nutcracker Adventure.

I've always been mesmorized by watching Meg dance.

This night was no different.

Classes were over for the evening. Meg liked to go into an empty studio and dance for a few minutes, making up her own choreography as she went.

"Get off your little butt and join me Collin," she shouted as she was making a dance up to Kelly Clarkson's "Break Away."

Chapter 9

The moon lit up the boar tracks pretty well on the trail through the woods.

"This wild boar is a pretty big fellow, maybe the biggest I've ever tracked," Artemis whispered.

"How do you know?" Lysander asked.

Artemis knelt to the ground and pointed.

"Look how large they are, and how deep, my little one," the goddess replied.

Lysander asked why she called him little one, when in mortal size, she wasn't that much taller.

Chapter 7

"How did I get myself into this mess?," Lydia thought as she struggled to get loose from the chains that bound her to a pillar.

Meanwhile, she was being circled by a hulking figure claiming to be a king named Aron. He laughed and told the young girl she would someday be his bride.

"Tall and creepy is not my type," Lydia replied, not showing the her enemy her fear.

He slapped her. It hurt.

It hit home the words her mother told her. There would be times when Lydia would find an opponent who would be her equal in strength.

Author's note: This is the third in a series, with the Spangled Leotard and Little Miss Firecracker.

My Momma has never been one to back down from a fight.

"Come on Sam, let's wake Mommy, Santa came!" were the words she heard that awakened her from her short slumber.

Chapter 2

The small village of Erastus came alive during the Feast of Artemis.

"Your son is in God's hands now," the doctor told her as she sat by her son's bedside.

Author's note: This story takes place during the last half of the American Civil War. The war has already turned against the South. The casualty rates have devestated families in many Southern communities. A draft has been instituted. Unless a family held a large number of slaves, every male able to hold a rifle was suddenly called to fight for the Southern cause. As the war drug on, boys as young as 13 and men as old as 65 were expected to fill the already depleted ranks of the Army of Northern Virginia.