Princess Minna: The Unicorn Mix-Up

THE UNICORN MIX-UP

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More ROYALLY EXCITING ADVENTURES to look out for:

THE ENCHANTED FOREST THE BIG BAD SNOWY DAY THE BEST PRINCESS

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THE UNICORN MIX-UP

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First published in the UK in 2022 by Nosy Crow Ltd The Crow’s Nest, 14 Baden Place, Crosby Row, London, SE1 1YW, UK Nosy Crow Eireann Ltd 44 Orchard Grove, Kenmare, Co Kerry, V93 FY22, Ireland Nosy Crow and associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Nosy Crow Ltd. Text copyright © Kirsty Applebaum, 2022 Cover and inside illustrations copyright © Sahar Haghgoo, 2022 The right of Kirsty Applebaum and Sahar Haghgoo to be identified as the author and illustrator respectively of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved ISBN: 978 1 78800 975 1 A CIP catalogue record for this book will be available from the British Library.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of Nosy Crow Ltd. Printed and bound in China.

Papers used by Nosy Crow are made from wood grown in sustainable forests.

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 www.nosycrow.com

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FOR DENNIS K. A.

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Chapter One This is Minna. She is a princess.

Princess Minna is very good at

lots of things.

She is good at taming unicorns, kissing frogs and fighting dragons.

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Sometimes, she can tell if there

is a pea under a mattress just by lying on it. One tiny pea can make a princess toss and turn all night.

But you don’t get many peas under mattresses these days.

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Princess Minna lives in

Castle Tall-Towers with the King, the Queen and a wizard called Raymond.

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When all is well in the kingdom,

lots of grey doves sweep and

swoop around the towers

making soft cooing noises. They make the whole castle smell like tutti-frutti ice cream.

When all is not well in the kingdom, big seagulls fly up from the coast and scare the doves away.

Then they flip and flap around

the towers, making screechy

squawking noises.

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They make the whole castle smell like old seaweed.

There are also blackbirds at Castle Tall-Towers. They don’t make the castle smell of anything.

No one takes much notice of them.

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One morning, Princess Minna woke up feeling very tired.

She had not slept well at

all.

Perhaps there was a pea under her mattress.

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But, no, she thought. It

couldn’t be that. You never find peas under mattresses anymore.

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Flip! Flap!

Flap! Flip!

Princess Minna looked out of the window.

Screech!

Squawk!

Squawk!

Screech!

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Oh dear. The seagulls were back and the doves were nowhere to be seen.

All is not well in the

kingdom, thought Princess Minna. I’d better go and tell the others.

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Princess Minna’s bedroom is right at the top of this tower here.

It takes her a very

long time

to get downstairs.

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She ran down and down

and down

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down and down and down and down and down and down

and

until she reached the dining room, where everyone else was having breakfast.

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Princess Minna was even

more tired now, and very out

of breath. “All is not well,” she huffed and puffed. “The doves have gone and the seagulls are back!”

“Oh

dear,” said the Queen.

“That explains why my tea has feathers in it.”

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“Oh

dear,” said the

King. “That explains why my porridge smells of seaweed.”

“Oh

dear,” said Raymond, magically.

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“Never mind,” said the King. “I’m sure Minna can sort it out.”

Hurrah! thought Princess Minna. She loved sorting out the

kingdom. What would it be this time?

A unicorn in need of taming?

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A frog waiting to be kissed?

A dragon looking for a fight?

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“Please be quick, Minna,” said the Queen. “The King and I have invited Lord and Lady Welling-

Tunboot round to play musical

statues this afternoon.”

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“It’s been planned for weeks,” said the King. “But we won’t be able to do it if the castle is full of seagulls…” “…and then where will we be?” said the Queen.

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Princess Minna was already on

her way. She ran out of

Castle Tall-Towers towards the town, shooing a few blackbirds away as she went.

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Chapter Two The townspeople loved Princess Minna. They were very pleased to see her.

They brought out their babies

to be kissed, because princesses

always like kissing babies.

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They quickly baked

some sponge

cakes with cream

in the middle, because princesses

always enjoy a

nice piece of sponge cake with cream in the middle.

They climbed wobbly ladders to

pin up bunting, because princesses

always feel

happy when there’s bunting out.

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Princess Minna was really

very

tired now, but she still managed to kiss a few babies, eat

some cake and admire the bunting.

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Afterwards, she pointed towards the castle. “Look,” she said. “All is

not well in the kingdom. There

are seagulls flying around the towers and the doves are nowhere to be seen.”

The townspeople looked. They saw the seagulls. They scratched their heads and wondered what could be wrong. Everything seemed perfectly fine.

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Suddenly there was a crash!

“Help! Help!

We have a

unicorn emergency!”

Everyone turned round.

It was Little Tommy Turret from Turret’s T shop.

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You can buy tea in Turret’s T shop. You can also buy towels and trombones and trousers and tulips and everything else you can possibly think of that begins with T. But you can’t buy pterodactyls

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there even though it sounds like you should be able to.

But back to the

unicorn emergency.

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“A wild unicorn is trampling through the T shop!” shouted Little Tommy. “Please, Princess Minna, can you tame it?”

Princess Minna smiled.

This must be the reason for the seagulls.

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She just needed to tame the

unicorn and all would be well in the kingdom once more. Taming

unicorns was one of her special

skills.

Surely she wasn’t too

tired for that!

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Princess Minna strode over to Turret’s T shop.

“Throw me my trusty

sword,”

she called.

The townspeople were confused.

Princess Minna only ever called for 32

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her trusty

sword when she was

going to fight a dragon, not when she was going to tame a unicorn.

But someone threw her a trusty

sword anyway. Princess Minna caught it with one hand.

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There was a clang as the sword

banged against the unicorn’s horn.

There was an

aargh as the unicorn swished its tail into Princess Minna’s eyes.

There was an

ouch as the unicorn stood on Princess Minna’s toes.

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