Bertil’s Upside-Down Discovery
Anaya wants to find a waterfall, and Bertil is certain he knows the way. But an upside-down map leads them toward something too small, secret, and wonderful to be on any map at all.
✨ Make a Storybook FreeA MayaLili Original · ages 6-9 · free to read and print
“Waterfalls?” said Bertil. “My specialty!” Anaya looked up. The little owl wore a green scarf and had a leaf stuck over one ear. “I’d like to see one before we go home,” she said, unfolding her map. Bertil swooped onto a low branch and took charge. “Follow my feathers.” He turned the map upside down. “Are you sure?” asked Anaya. “Entirely. Look—this tree is pointing the way!” “That’s the waterfall.”
The whole story
“Waterfalls?” said Bertil. “My specialty!” Anaya looked up. The little owl wore a green scarf and had a leaf stuck over one ear. “I’d like to see one before we go home,” she said, unfolding her map. Bertil swooped onto a low branch and took charge. “Follow my feathers.” He turned the map upside down. “Are you sure?” asked Anaya. “Entirely. Look—this tree is pointing the way!” “That’s the waterfall.”
They passed a stump shaped like a teapot, three sleepy snails, and a mushroom wearing a pinecone hat. “Excellent landmarks,” Bertil announced. Then the path ended beside a bog. No waterfall thundered. No silver spray sparkled. One bubble rose from the mud. Plop. “A very quiet waterfall,” said Anaya. Bertil checked the map. He checked the bog. “Perhaps it’s having a rest.” Anaya’s boot made a long, impolite squelch.
“I think I want to go back,” Anaya said. Her legs ached. Mud freckled her trousers. The biscuit in her pocket had become crumbs. Bertil lowered the map. “I may have followed the waterfall’s roots.” Anaya turned the paper around. “Oh,” he whispered. She offered him half her biscuit crumbs. He brushed mud from her coat with one soft wing. Then Bertil tilted his head. “Wait. Do you hear somebody hiccupping?”
Not hiccups. Water! Bertil fluttered along the dry path, stopping whenever Anaya stopped. Behind a curtain of ferns, something went blip-blip-blip. A spring bubbled between pale stones. Tiny ripples wobbled across its sandy bowl, and a thread of water slipped away beneath the moss. Anaya knelt on the path. “It’s like the forest left a tap running.” Bertil peered at the map, carefully this time. “There’s nothing here.” “But there is,” she said.
Anaya found a blue pencil in her backpack. In the map’s empty patch, she drew a little pool and its wiggly stream. Above it she wrote: BERTIL’S SPRING. “For me?” “You heard it first.” Bertil’s feathers puffed until his scarf almost disappeared. They sat listening to the little blips. The waterfall could wait for another day. “May I guide us home?” Bertil asked. Anaya handed him the map. “Certainly.” Then she gently turned it around.