Changeling Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  Neef’s Guide to Supernatural Beings

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Meeting Peg

  As I watched, the pool kind of sucked itself up and swirled around and turned into an old bogeywoman. She was short and onion shaped from the layers and layers of ratty, wet skirts and shawls she had on. Her nails were long and black, and her thin gray hair dripped over her head and shoulders like a string mop. She had a round, pale face and round, muddy eyes, and a smile like a row of green knives. That, and the way she was looking at me as if I were a double-dipped chocolate ice cream cone, told me that she rode with the Wild Hunt.

  “Hello there, dear. You can call me Peg Powler. I was at your Changing. You were too little to remember me, but I remember you. You, if memory serves, are called Neef.”

  My first thought was that when Astris found out I’d been talking to Peg Powler of the Wild Hunt, she was going to kill me, or at least put me to sleep for a hundred years.

  My second thought was that if I could get myself out of this, she’d never have to know.

  FIREBIRD WHERE FANTASY TAKES FLIGHT™

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  Published by the Penguin Group

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  Registered Offices: Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  First published in Great Britain by Hodden Children’s Books, 2006

  First published in the United States of America by Viking,

  a division of Penguin Young Readers Group, 2006

  Published by Firebird, an imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 2008

  Text copyright © Delia Sherman, 2006

  Map copyright © Sam Kim, 2006

  All rights reserved

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA IS AVAILABLE

  eISBN : 978-0-142-41188-9

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  FOR

  Masako Katagiri, Ellen Kushner,

  and Ophelia Goss

  Who were, are, and will be

  CHAPTER 1

  FAIRY GODMOTHERS ARE ALWAYS RIGHT.

  Neef’s Rules for Changelings

  “Wake up, Neef. Spring cleaning today. Cobwebs to sweep, mice to relocate, turtles to wake up and polish. And you have to clean your room.”

  I groaned and put the pillow over my head.

  A cold, wet nose touched my forehead and flipped the pillow away.

  “None of that, now,” Astris said. “If you don’t get cracking, the bogles will come visit, and then where will you be?”

  “Asleep,” I said. “Go away, Astris.”

  The covers slithered off my shoulders. I made a grab for them, caught something long and whiplike instead, let it go again. Fast. I haven’t pulled her tail on purpose since I was very little. Astris hates having her tail pulled even more than I hate waking up. She says it’s not respectful to pull my fairy godmother’s tail.

  Astris is a white rat and very beautiful. She has fur like a powder-puff, eyes like polished rubies, and long, delicate whiskers. I swear she says as much with her whiskers as she does with words.

  “Finally,” she said, as I sat up and yawned. “Come right down as soon as you’ve dressed and had breakfast. I want to get a start on those turtles.” She surveyed my room, her whiskers severe. “This place looks like a hooraw’s nest. We’ll have to get the Blockhouse brownie in to help you organize it. Again.”

  I knew my room was a mess. It always is. It’s hard to keep a place neat when the only furniture is a curtained bed and an old chest. The walls are mostly taken up by pointy stone windows, so there’s nowhere except the floor to keep my leaf collection and my rocks, not to mention the mortal magazines and papers and stuff I’ve picked up in the Park.

  Astris hopped off my bed and disappeared down the stairs. I got up and sifted through the chest looking for something I could wear. Everything I had was suddenly too tight, too short, or both. Much as I hated spring cleaning, at least it meant I’d be getting new clothes. I wiggled into some green leggings and a shirt that used to be floppy, tried to drag a comb through my frizzy hair, gave up, and dug around until I found my silver knife and fork. Then I took Satchel down from its hook and climbed back onto my bed.

  “Toast and jam, please,” I told it. “Apricot jam. And apple juice.”

  Satchel is my magic bag. It’s brown leather and has brass buckles and its own ideas about a proper breakfast for spring cleaning day. When I lifted its flap, I found a glass of orange juice (I hate orange juice) and a plate of eggs and sausage, which I wasn’t in the mood for. But I ate it anyway. In the New York I live in, mortals don’t call the shots. The Fairy Folk do.

  Ordinary mortals think New York Outside is the only one there is. They’re wrong. There are at least two New Yorks, and probably more, sharing the same space, but not exactly the same reality. I live in New York Between.

  Things that are invisible Outside are visible Between. Every tall building, for instance, has its mountain spirit that Outsiders can’t see. But we can. Our bridges and tunnels are swarming with trolls and demons of all sizes and colors. Our streets are crowded with sidhe from Ireland, kitsune and tanuki from Japan, devi from India, and an assortment of giants and demons and frost spirits and will-o’-the-wisps from all over the world. Some of the more human-looking Folk cross to New York Outside for fun and adventures, but ordinary mortals can’t come to New York Between unless the Folk bring them.

  This happens more often than you’d think. Mostly the visiting mortals don’t remember much. I remember—but then, I live here.

  I’m a changeling. A Kid-napper from the Bureau of Changeling Affairs brought me here when I was little, leaving a fairy that looked just like me behind in my bed. It’s a great honor to be the Central Park changeling. Other neighborhoods in New York Between have a bunch of mortal changelings, but Park Folk aren’t all that comfortable with mortals and only take a changeling because it’s traditional. So I was the only mortal around.

  I’ve spent a lot of time
thinking about why I was stolen and brought to Central Park. Before I was big enough to understand that questions were against the rules, I used to pester Astris about it. Her answers were either silly (“Because you have curly hair”; “Because you like cookies”) or too vague to be useful (“Because you’re good for us”; “Because we can”). Finally I got the message and stopped asking.

  After I’d finished my eggs, I went down the spiral stair to the kitchen, where Astris had a row of what looked like mud-covered rocks lined up on the floor. Every once in a while, one would poke out a wrinkled head, blink, yawn, and retreat again. I knew how it felt.

  “Hand me down the turtle wax,” Astris said. “And fetch some water. I swear, they’re even muddier than usual this year.”

  There’s no running water in Belvedere Castle. Hauling it from the Turtle Pond is my main chore. It’s no joke, especially on bath day. The bucket is wooden, and heavy even when it’s empty. I have to lug it across the terrace to the edge of the cliff overlooking the Pond, attach the bucket to the rope, drop it into the water, and pull it up again without spilling. Plus, I have to be careful not to disturb the fish, or I’ll get in trouble with the Water Rat.

  The Water Rat is a Fictional Character. A writer made him up, but he was so real that he took on a life of his own. He loves messing about in boats, and spends the whole summer either fixing his rowboat or sculling it around the pond having picnics and talking to the fish and the turtles and insulting the ducks that nest in the reeds.

  Today, he had the boat turned upside down on the grassy bank and was painting the bottom sky blue.

  “Hullo there, youngster,” he called up to me. His white polo shirt and baggy chinos were neat as always, but he had a streak of blue paint across his muzzle. “You haven’t picked up any fish in that bucket of yours, by any chance? Spring cleaning or no spring cleaning, I don’t like my fish disturbed in spawning season.”

  “No, Mr. Rat,” I called back politely.

  “That’s a good girl,” he said. “Busy time of year, isn’t it? When things have calmed down a bit, look me out and I’ll take you for a nice row. We’ll pack a basket, trade stories. Have I told you about the time Mole and Toad and Badger and I turfed the Wild Wooders out of Toad Hall, back in the Old Country?”

  “Yes, Mr. Rat. But I’d like to hear it again.”

  “Excellent,” he said cheerfully. “Come when you like. Bring Astris. A few of those wonderful golden biscuits of hers would be very welcome. And a new story, if you have one.”

  All Folk love stories. They love to hear them nearly as much as they love to tell them. I’ve heard stories from Japan, Brazil, Ireland, Russia, Kenya, Jamaica—just about every country in the world whose Folk have followed the mortal immigrants to New York. Astris, who is a native New Yorker, specializes in New York stories like “The Sewer Maintenance-Worker’s Wife” and “Little Red Baseball Cap.” The stories are as different as the Folk who tell them, but the one thing they have in common is morals. “Don’t be greedy” is a popular one, and “Don’t ask too many questions,” and “Don’t be too curious,” and most important of all, “Don’t break the rules.”

  I love the stories, but I could live without the morals. They all boil down to Don’t. Don’t do this. Don’t talk to that. Don’t turn around and look when you hear a strange noise. Don’t turn over stones to see what’s under them. Don’t swim in Harlem Meer or walk on Sheep’s Meadow without a Shepherd. Don’t ride on any black animal with flaming eyes. Because if you do, you’ll be sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. Once I asked Astris what happened to all the mortals who hadn’t disobeyed all those Don’ts and she just looked at me, her whiskers confused.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I never thought about it. Perhaps they went straight to living happily ever after.”

  Well, I thought about it. And what I thought was that nothing happened to those mortals—nothing at all.

  Which was what was happening to me. Like Radiatorella with no ball to go to, I was stuck fetching water and cleaning my room forever and ever.

  The Water Rat went back to his painting and I hauled the bucket, sloshing, back across the courtyard. When I got to the kitchen, Astris had brushed the worst of the mud off the turtles.

  “Thank you, pet,” she said, dipping her scrub brush into the water. “There’s more to do today than I’d thought. I’ve been talking to the mice. There are six families to pack and move to the Shakespeare Garden, and the ghosts in the basement are stuck in the cobwebs again, and the squirrels need help getting those nutshells out of the attic. I can’t spare the time to go to the Blockhouse. We’ll have to leave your room until tomorrow.”

  This is the kind of news that sounds better than it actually is. No brownie didn’t just mean not cleaning my room today. It meant entertaining baby mice and calming hysterical ghosts or, if I was really lucky, shoveling nutshells out of the attic. And I’d still have to clean my room tomorrow.

  “Why don’t I go get the brownie by myself?” I said.

  “No,” said Astris, scrubbing briskly. “Unsupervised adventures are for big girls.”

  “But I am big, Astris. Just look at me!”

  She looked. Her whiskers expressed a familiar combination of impatience and worry, moving into surprise as she took in my too-short leggings and my too-tight shirt.

  “So you are,” she said slowly. “Still, the North Woods. It’s not safe up there. Maybe the Pooka can go with you.”

  On any other day, this would have been fine. The Pooka is a lot more fun to be around than Astris, who tends to turn everything into a lesson on Folk lore. He’s a trickster and a shapeshifter. When he’s not being a man, he’s being one of those flaming-eyed animals it’s dangerous for mortals to ride. But he’s my fairy godfather, so I can ride him whenever I want.

  Today, though, I was feeling itchy and restless. I wanted to be somewhere I didn’t always go, doing something I didn’t always do. I wanted an adventure.

  “It’s spring cleaning day,” I said. “He’s probably busy. Please can I go alone? It’s not like the Blockhouse is hard to find. All I have to do is follow the brownie’s path up to the crest of the hill, and I’m there.”

  “Well . . .” said Astris. Her eyes darted from me to the turtles to the swarm of excited mice piling candle stubs and candy wrappers and moldy bread by the kitchen door. “All right. But go straight there and come right back. Keep on the main path to the Blockhouse. Don’t look to the left, don’t look to the right . . .”

  “And whatever I do, don’t wander from the path,” I finished for her. “Do I look like Little Red Baseball Cap?”

  Astris fixed me with her ruby eyes. “The North Woods are dangerous, Neef. The Wild Hunt lives in the North Woods. Just because the Hunt doesn’t ride by daylight doesn’t mean all the Hunters are asleep.”

  I was about ready to jump out of my skin with impatience. “I know, Astris. I can take care of myself. You taught me how to say ‘I am under the protection of the Genius of Central Park’ in about a million languages, remember?”

  “So I did,” Astris said. “But the Genius’s protection only covers you from consumption and grievous bodily harm. There are other ways the Hunt can hurt you. Don’t talk to anyone you don’t know. And if you meet a stranger, call the Pooka immediately. Do you have the hair to summon him with? Do you have Satchel in case you get hungry? Oh, dear. Maybe I should come with you after all.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’ll be fine. Bye!” And I was out of there before she could change her mind.

  The stones of the courtyard were warm under my bare feet, and the air smelled of damp soil and green things growing. The big mulberry tree in the Shakespeare Garden was bright with tightly furled buds. Down by its roots, the fairies Mustardseed and Peaseblossom were trying to talk some primroses into unfolding early so they could have new skirts. I waved and shouted, but they didn’t even hear me.

  The shortest way to the North Woods lies straight across Central Park
Central. On warm, bright days, the huge lawn is usually thick with Folk playing complicated games or spreading their wings to the sun. Today it was deserted except for a team of corn spirits drifting slowly along the grass, combing it smooth with their long fingers. Hoping they were too focused on their work to see me, I tried to sneak across behind them, but as soon as my foot touched the grass, they yelled at me to get off.

  One of the things I hate about Folk is that they notice you when you don’t want them to.

  The path took me east to the Obelisk, then turned north toward the Metropolitan Museum. Some adventure. This was the path I walked nearly every day on my way to the Museum to learn art and mortal languages. Sometimes I went on to the nearby Reservoir to swim with the nixies and undines. I’d never been allowed to go further north than that, not alone.

  Today, the Reservoir embankment showed signs of spring cleaning, all draped with waterweed airing in the sun. I scrambled up and threw a pebble into the water. A sleek-headed nixie surfaced and shook her long green hair out of her eyes.

  “What do you want?” she snapped.

  “Hi, Algae,” I said. “I’m going to the North Woods to fetch the Blockhouse brownie. By myself.”

  “You nearly brained me with a rock to tell me that? Go away! Some people have work to do.” Algae flicked her tail and disappeared.

  Folk are like that. Bother them when they’re busy, and they’ll bite your head off. The nasty ones do it literally.

  Beyond the Reservoir is the East Meadow. From here, the most direct route to the North Woods is by way of the Mount. It is not, however, the safest way to go. The Mount is surrounded by woods and haunted by ghosts and forest demons and ogres and enchanted snakes. Even under today’s bright sunshine, the trees looked extra dark and gnarly, totally un-spring-cleanable.

  I decided that Astris would want me to take the long way around.

  It was a long walk. By the time I got to Harlem Meer, my feet were like lumps of hot tar. I got an apple from Satchel and cooled my toes in the water while I ate it. It just wasn’t fair. At the very least, I should have met an old woman at the crossroads or a magic bluebird or a fairy musician offering to sell his fiddle in exchange for something I shouldn’t give up. The most exciting things I’d seen today were teams of veelas and squirrels and dryads cleaning the dead wood out of the trees and encouraging the baby leaves to grow. Boring.