Season of the Sandstorms Read online

  Here’s what kids have to say to

  Mary Pope Osborne, author of

  the Magic Tree House series:

  WOW! You have an imagination like no other.—Adam W.

  I love your books. If you stop writing books, it will be like losing a best friend.—Ben M.

  I think you are the real Morgan le Fay. There is always magic in your books.—Erica Y.

  One day I was really bored and I didn’t want to read … I looked in your book. I read a sentence, and it was interesting. So I read some more, until the book was done. It was so good I read more and more. Then I had read all of your books, and now I hope you write lots more.—Danai K.

  I always read [your books] over and over … 1 time, 2 times, 3 times, 4 times … —Yuan C.

  You are my best author in the world. I love your books. I read all the time. I read everywhere. My mom is like freaking out.—Ellen C.

  I hope you make these books for all yours and mine’s life.—Riki H.

  Teachers and librarians love

  Magic Tree House® books, too!

  Thank you for opening faraway places and times to my class through your books. They have given me the chance to bring in additional books, materials, and videos to share with the class.—J. Cameron

  It excites me to see how involved [my fourth-grade reading class] is in your books … I would do anything to get my students more involved, and this has done it.—C. Rutz

  I discovered your books last year … WOW! Our students have gone crazy over them. I can’t order enough copies! … Thanks for contributing so much to children’s literature!—C. Kendziora

  I first came across your Magic Tree House series when my son brought one home … I have since introduced this great series to my class. They have absolutely fallen in love with these books! … My students are now asking me for more independent reading time to read them. Your stories have inspired even my most struggling readers.—M. Payne

  I love how I can go beyond the [Magic Tree House] books and use them as springboards for other learning.—R. Gale

  We have enjoyed your books all year long. We check your Web site to find new information. We pull our map down to find the areas where the adventures take place. My class always chimes in at key parts of the story. It feels good to hear my students ask for a book and cheer when a new book comes out.—J. Korinek

  Our students have “Magic Tree House fever.” I can’t keep your books on the library shelf.—J. Rafferty

  Your books truly invite children into the pleasure of reading. Thanks for such terrific work.—S. Smith

  The children in the fourth grade even hide the [Magic Tree House] books in the library so that they will be able to find them when they are ready to check them out.—K. Mortensen

  My Magic Tree House books are never on the bookshelf because they are always being read by my students. Thank you for creating such a wonderful series.—K. Mahoney

  Many years ago, I journeyed overland from Greece to Nepal. On my trip, I traveled from Damascus, Syria, to Baghdad, Iraq, riding in a van through the desert. Just before sunset my traveling companion and I came upon a tea tent in the middle of nowhere. There, an old man and his great-grandson served tea to the few travelers who passed their way. The man and the boy invited us to share their dinner and camp near their tent. I’ll never forget their kindness, nor the brilliant sunset over the desert—nor the cold starry night that followed. It has been a joy to return to these memories while writing Season of the Sandstorms, and I hope I can revisit the country of Iraq someday.

  Text copyright © 2005 by Mary Pope Osborne.

  Illustrations copyright © 2005 by Sal Murdocca.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Random House Childrenߣs Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

  www.randomhouse.com/kids

  www.magictreehouse.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Osborne, Mary Pope.

  Season of the sandstorms / by Mary Pope Osborne; illustrated by Sal Murdocca.

  p. cm. — (Magic tree house; #34)

  “A Merlin mission.”

  “A Stepping Stone book.”

  SUMMARY: Guided by a magic rhyme, Jack and Annie travel to ancient Baghdad on a mission to help the caliph disseminate wisdom to the world.

  eISBN: 978-0-375-89456-5

  [1. Time travel—Fiction. 2. Magic—Fiction. 3. Brothers and sisters—Fiction.

  4. Baghdad (Iraq)—History—Fiction. 5. Iraq—History—Fiction.]

  I. Murdocca, Sal, ill. II. Title. III. Series: Osborne, Mary Pope.

  Magic tree house series; v #34. PZ7.O81167Se 2005 [E]—dc22 2005000836

  Random House, Inc. New York, Toronto, London, Sydney, Auckland

  RANDOM HOUSE and colophon are registered trademarks and A STEPPING STONE BOOK and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc. MAGIC TREE HOUSE is a registered trademark of Mary Pope Osborne; used under license.

  v3.0

  To Paul Caringella,

  a scholar in the

  House of Wisdom

  Cover

  Title Page

  Dear Reader

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Prologue

  1. The Golden Age

  2. Nowhere

  3. Mamoon

  4. Ships of the Desert

  5. Bandits!

  6. Sandblasted

  7. Behind the Third Wall

  8. Room of the Tree

  9. House of Wisdom

  10. Before the Moon Rises

  More Facts About Baghdad

  About the Author

  About the Illustrator

  Special Preview of Magic Tree House #35: Night of the New Magicians

  Away, for we are ready to a man!

  Our camels sniff the evening and are glad.

  Lead on, O Master of the Caravan:

  Lead on the Merchant-Princes of Baghdad.

  —James Elroy Flecker

  One summer day, a mysterious tree house appeared in the woods. A brother and sister named Jack and Annie soon learned that the tree house was magic—it could take them to any time and any place in history. They also learned that the tree house belonged to Morgan le Fay, a magical librarian from the legendary realm of Camelot.

  After Jack and Annie traveled on many adventures for Morgan, Merlin the magician began sending them on “Merlin Missions” in the tree house. With help from two young sorcerers named Teddy and Kathleen, Jack and Annie visited four mythical places and found valuable objects to help save Camelot.

  On their next four Merlin Missions, Jack and Annie were told they must travel to real times and real places in history and prove to Merlin that they could use magic wisely. They have just returned from a successful mission in the city of Venice over 250 years ago, and now they are waiting to hear from Merlin again….

  Jack put his math homework aside. He opened the drawer beside his bed and pulled out a small, handmade book. For the hundredth time, he stared at the title on the cover:

  10 MAGIC RHYMES FOR ANNIE AND JACK

  FROM TEDDY AND KATHLEEN

  For weeks, Jack had kept the book hidden in his drawer, wondering when he and Annie would be able to use its magic again. The book’s ten rhymes were to be used on four missions, and each rhyme could be used only once. Jack and Annie had already used two rhymes on a mission in Venice, Italy.

  “Jack!” Annie rushed into Jack’s room. Her eyes were shining. “Bring the book! Let’s go!”

  “Where?” said Jack.

  “You know where! Come on!” Annie called as she ran back downstairs.

 
Jack quickly put Teddy and Kathleen’s book into his backpack. He pulled on his jacket and took off down the stairs.

  Annie was waiting on the front porch. “Hurry!” she cried.

  “Wait! How do you know it’s there?” Jack said.

  “Because I just saw it!” Annie shouted. She hurried down the porch steps and crossed the yard.

  “You saw it? Actually saw it?” yelled Jack as he followed Annie through the chilly afternoon air.

  “Yes! Yes!” Annie yelled.

  “When?” shouted Jack.

  “Just now!” said Annie. “I was walking home from the library and I had this feeling—so I went and looked! It’s waiting for us!”

  Jack and Annie raced into the Frog Creek woods. They ran between the budding trees, over the fresh green moss of early spring, until they came to the tallest oak.

  “See?” said Annie.

  “Yes,” breathed Jack. He stared up at the magic tree house. Its rope ladder dangled above the mossy ground. Annie started climbing up. Jack followed. When they got inside, Jack pulled off his backpack.

  “Look, a book and a letter!” Annie said. She picked up a folded letter from the floor, and Jack picked up a book with a gold cover.

  “Baghdad,” Jack said. He showed the book to Annie. Its title was:

  THE GOLDEN AGE OF BAGHDAD

  “A golden age?” said Annie. “That sounds cool. Let’s go!”

  “Wait, we should read our letter first,” said Jack.

  “Right,” said Annie. She unfolded the paper. “Merlin’s handwriting,” she said. She read aloud:

  Dear Jack and Annie of Frog Creek,

  Your mission is to journey to Baghdad of long

  ago and help the caliph spread wisdom to

  the world. To succeed, you must be humble

  and use your magic wisely. Follow these—

  “Wait, what’s a caliph?” said Jack. “And what’s Merlin mean—‘spread wisdom to the world’? That’s a big responsibility.”

  “I don’t know,” said Annie. “Let me finish.” She kept reading:

  Follow these instructions:

  Ride a ship of the desert

  on a cold starry night.

  Ride through the dust

  and hot morning light.

  Find a horse on a dome,

  the one who sees all,

  in the heart of the city

  behind the third wall.

  Beneath birds who sing

  in the Room of the Tree,

  greet a friend you once knew

  and a new friend to be.

  Remember that life

  is full of surprises.

  Return to the tree house

  before the moon rises.

  —M.

  “This sounds pretty easy,” said Annie.

  “No, it doesn’t,” said Jack. “All these instructions are so mysterious. We don’t know what any of them mean.”

  “We’ll find out when we get there,” said Annie. “But first we have to get there. Make the wish.”

  “Okay,” said Jack. He pointed to the cover of the book. “I wish we could go to the golden age of Baghdad,” he said.

  The wind started to blow.

  The tree house started to spin.

  It spun faster and faster.

  Then everything was still.

  Absolutely still.

  Jack felt hot. He opened his eyes. Burning sunlight was flooding into the tree house. He and Annie were wearing long robes tied with cords. They wore white head cloths and pointy slip-on shoes. Jack’s backpack had turned into a leather shoulder bag.

  “We look like characters in that book Aunt Mary gave us,” said Annie, “Tales from the Arabian Nights.”

  “Yeah, like Aladdin and Ali Baba,” said Jack.

  Shading their eyes from the bright sunlight, Jack and Annie squinted out the window. They had landed in the spiky crown of a palm tree. It was the tallest tree in a clump of palm trees. Thorny shrubs and sparse green grass grew under the trees. A small spring bubbled up from the ground. Surrounding the clump of trees were miles and miles of scorching sand.

  “This doesn’t look like a golden age to me,” said Annie.

  “Yeah, and where’s Baghdad?” asked Jack. He picked up their research book and opened it to the first page. He read aloud:

  From 762 AD to 1258 AD, the Arab world had a golden age. During that time, a ruler known as a caliph (say KAY-liff) governed an empire that stretched for thousands of miles. The capital of the Arab empire was the city of Baghdad, an important center for learning and trade.

  Jack looked up. “So the caliph is a ruler,” he said, “and he probably lived in Baghdad.”

  “Yeah, but how do we get there?” asked Annie.

  “Patience,” said Jack. “Remember on our last mission, we learned that we have to do things in order, one thing at a time.” He read the first part of Merlin’s instructions.

  Ride a ship of the desert

  on a cold starry night.

  Ride through the dust

  and hot morning light.

  “I wonder what a ‘ship of the desert’ is,” said Jack, looking up.

  “Well, whatever it is, I’m sure we’ll find it eventually,” Annie said slowly, as if she were trying to sound patient. “We could just sit here and keep an eye out for a big boat. Or …”

  “Or what?” said Jack.

  “Maybe we could use one of Teddy and Kathleen’s magic rhymes.”

  “Not yet,” said Jack. “Merlin said to use our magic wisely. We just got here. We used two rhymes on our last mission. And we only have eight left to divide between three—”

  “Okay, okay—” Annie broke in. “We can only use a rhyme when there’s absolutely nothing else to do, right?”

  “Right,” said Jack.

  “So …,” said Annie. “What do you think we should do?”

  “We could start walking,” said Jack.

  “Walk where?” said Annie. “Which way is Baghdad?”

  Jack looked out the window. Beyond the palm trees there was nothing but sand and sky. In the distance were lonely dunes. The desert was eerily silent.

  “We could, uh …” Jack couldn’t think of anything else they could do. “We could look in the rhyme book,” he said. Jack pulled the book of magic rhymes out of his pack. He and Annie read down the table of contents together.

  “Make a Stone Come Alive,” read Annie. “We did that on our last mission. We can’t do that again.”

  “It wouldn’t help, anyway,” said Jack. He looked at other rhymes. “Bend Iron,” he read.“We’ve already done that, too.”

  “Turn into Ducks,” read Annie. She looked at Jack.

  “No,” he said.

  “Mend What Cannot Be Mended,” read Annie.

  “Nothing needs mending,” said Jack.

  “How about this one?” said Annie. “Make Helpers Appear out of Nowhere.”

  “Well …,” said Jack. “Maybe …”

  “Come on, it’s perfect,” said Annie. “That’s where we are—nowhere. And we could sure use some helpers.”

  “Okay,” said Jack. “I’ll read the line Teddy wrote. You read Kathleen’s line in her selkie language.”

  “Okay,” said Annie. She turned to the page with the rhyme. She held the book out to Jack.

  Jack read in a loud, clear voice:

  From far beyond, send helpers here!

  Then Annie read:

  Hah-ee-by, hah-ee-keer!

  The second that Annie finished the rhyme, wind gusted in from the desert, blowing a cloud of sand through the window. The wind shook the palm trees. Sand blew into Annie’s eyes. “Oww!” she said.

  “Get back!” cried Jack.

  Jack and Annie jumped away from the window. They pressed themselves against the wall and covered their faces. Gritty sand kept blowing into the tree house.

  “It’s a sandstorm!” said Jack.

  The hot sand piled into drifts all over the floor
. Then the wind died down as quickly as it had started. The palm trees stopped shaking.

  Jack and Annie looked out the window. The air was thick with grainy dust, making it hard to see. But the sand was still.

  “I think it’s over,” said Annie.

  “I hope so,” said Jack. “Why did our magic rhyme cause a sandstorm instead of sending us helpers?”

  “I don’t know,” said Annie. “Maybe we said it wrong.”

  Jack brushed the sand off their research book and looked up sandstorms in the index. He found the right page and read:

  The season of the sandstorms begins in the desert in mid-February and continues all spring. Winds can blow as fast as 40 miles per hour. Sandstorms can easily cause travelers to lose their way in the desert.

  “I don’t understand,” said Jack. “We don’t need to lose our way. We need to find our way.”

  Just then the sound of bells came from outside.

  Jack and Annie looked out the window. Through the haze, they saw four riders perched high on the humps of camels. The riders wore brightly colored robes. Behind them a dozen more camels were tied head to tail and loaded down with saddlebags. As the camels swung from side to side, bells tinkled from around their necks.

  Annie grinned. “Helpers!” she said.

  Annie stuck her head out the tree house window. “Hey!” she called.

  “Shhhh!” said Jack, pulling her back in. “Don’t let them see us up here! It’s too hard to explain the tree house. Let’s go down.”

  “Good point,” said Annie. She handed Merlin’s letter to Jack and started down the rope ladder. Jack grabbed his shoulder bag. He put the letter inside, then added their research book and rhyme book. He slung the leather bag across his chest and climbed down.