Genre: Fairy Tale / Fantasy
Target Audience: Children & Families
Status: Complete
Published: 3 Chapters
Efi Mouse Girl is a fairy tale about courage, family and adventure.
After Efi and her little brother fall from the roof, they must find their way back home — before Christmas Eve begins.
A wintery mouse story for young children to fall asleep to.
Reading Time: approx. 10 minutes
Efi Mouse Girl I: The Mäuserichs
Under the roof of a house lives a family of mice: the Mäuserichs. Papa Mouse and Mama Mouse live there with their daughter Efi and her little brother. Usually, Efi goes to rodent school with all the other squirrels and rats, but because tomorrow is Christmas, she is on holiday. She can hardly wait to play “Mouse, Don’t Get Cross” on Christmas Eve and sing songs like “In the Christmas Mouse Bakery.”
Eagerly, she helps Papa Mouse decorate the fir-tree branch, while Mama Mouse lets her help bake cheese biscuits. Like every Christmas, Efi is looking forward to the presents. Not her own, but the joy of giving something to her parents. This year, she found a glittering stone that shines in a thousand colors when the light catches it, and so that no one will find it, she has hidden it deep inside her backpack.
“Dinner will be ready soon,” Mama Mouse calls. “Go and bring your little brother inside.”
Efi puts on her button hat, tucks her sewing needle into her belt and pulls her backpack over her little blue dress. Through a narrow gap, she climbs from the gutter onto the roof, where her little brother is happily playing ball. He goes to kindergarten, and even though he is so small, she has her paws full keeping him out of trouble.
“Come on, little brother. Dinner will be ready soon,” Efi says.
“But I want to play with you,” he replies, defiantly kicking the ball.
“Once we’ve eaten, and if it isn’t too dark, I’m sure I’ll have time for you.”
Delighted, her little brother throws his short arms into the air, because he rarely gets the chance to play with her.
A shadow, large and threatening, sweeps across the ground.
“Run!” Efi cries.
A crow dives toward the Mäuserichs with its claws outstretched. Startled, her little brother runs away, balances along the narrow gutter, falls from the roof and the crow swoops after him.
Efi rushes to the edge of the roof and looks down into the garden, but from up here she cannot see either of them.
Gathering all her courage, she jumps, and because mice are so small and light, the wind carries her gently downward. She lands softly in a pile of leaves, and as she fights her way through them, Efi checks her surroundings.
The bicycle shed looks empty.
No sign of them near the caravan.
The sandbox looks deserted too.
There—beside the well!
The crow is flying above a thorn bush, beating its wings and pecking at something.
Brave as she is, Efi draws her sewing needle and confronts the bird. “Hey, you! Leave my little brother alone!”
Surprised, the crow looks up and clacks its beak in amusement. “It is cold and I am hungry. You are not a clever mouse if you stand between me and my meal.”
Annoyed, Efi plants her paws on her hips and says:
“I’m exactly as clever as a mouse needs to be—and even a little cleverer! I get the best marks at school, and even though I know you eat mice, I cannot let you devour my little brother!”
But the crow turns away and continues pecking at its prey in the thorn bush.
Efi knows how much these birds like shiny things, so she rummages through her backpack and pulls out the carefully hidden present for her parents.
Black eyes follow the glittering stone.
When she throws it in a high arc, the feathered monster greedily flies after it.
Quickly, Efi grabs her little brother and drags him along, and before the crow can swoop down on them again, the Mäuserichs squeeze through the gap beneath the cellar door.