“Trevor!” Hudson called. To Bonnie and Charlotte he said, “I’ll see you all later.”
“Probably,” Charlotte said. “Although you never can tell when sudden blindness will strike.”
Really, she was too weird.
Before Hudson had gone more than a couple of steps away, he heard footsteps on the sidewalk behind him.
“Hey, Charlotte,” a guy said, “can your dad really do magic?”
Hudson glanced over his shoulder and saw Andy and Caidan, two of the popular guys in the eighth grade. Both were grinning at Charlotte in a way that was supposed to look nice but somehow didn’t.
“Of course he can do magic,” Charlotte said. “That’s what wizards do.”
Andy looked Charlotte up and down, taking in her oversize sweater. “Well, then, maybe the next time he’s doing tricks, he can make you disappear for good.”
Andy and Caidan both laughed, then pushed past Charlotte and went down the sidewalk toward the school. For a moment, Hudson wanted to yell at them and tell them they didn’t need to be jerks. He didn’t, though. It wouldn’t do any good and would just make Andy and Caidan mad at him. Hudson kept walking without saying anything.
And then regretted it for the rest of the day.
2
SCHOOL WENT NORMALLY enough. No wizards, dragons, or giants put Hudson’s bravery or stupidity to the test. If there was magic lurking around, Hudson didn’t notice it. The biggest news of the day was that some guys from room 10 challenged a few guys from room 12 to a basketball game in the park an hour after school ended. Everybody was going to watch it, even the girls.
Of course, only the popular guys were playing. Guys like Andy and Caidan, who lived the deluxe version of life while everyone else struggled along with the regular edition. They were tall, athletic, and good-looking enough that it didn’t matter what sort of jerk-wad things they did; the girls still liked them.
By the time school ended, Hudson had forgotten about his window-washing plans. When he got to the spot where he usually met Bonnie, she wasn’t there. Instead, one of her friends handed him a note from her.
It read, Hudson, I decided to start working right away. I got soap and water from the school bathroom, and I’m at the parent pickup line washing windows.
What? Hudson’s stomach lurched. It was one thing to ask strangers for money in an intersection where no one recognized them. It was completely different to ask for money at school, where the entire eighth grade would openly mock him for it.
He hurried over to the parent pickup line to explain this subtle difference to his sister. There she was at the back of the row of cars, bouncing around cleaning windows with a sign taped to her jacket that read SICK KITTEN FUND-RAISER.
Bonnie saw him, smiled, and waved at him.
He slunk over, self-conscious with every step. “What are you doing? We can’t do this at school.”
Bonnie dunked her squeegee into the bucket, then slapped the sponge side onto the nearest car window. A stream of water dripped down the glass. “Here is better because Mom doesn’t like me to go near busy intersections.”
“No, actually, here isn’t better.” He looked over his shoulder to check for disapproving teachers. He didn’t see any—not yet.
“I’ve already made ten dollars,” she told him happily.
“I don’t want you to get into trouble,” Hudson said.
“Aren’t you going to help?” she asked.
That’s when he saw a group of popular kids coming his way. Andy and Caidan were walking with Isabella Stanton, the undisputed prettiest girl in the eighth grade. She had starlet blonde hair and a way of blinking her blue eyes that sort of hypnotized you into staring at her. Someday, maybe when Hudson was older, or cooler, or stuck in an elevator with her, he would talk to her.
As though Isabella felt his stare, she turned and glanced in Hudson’s direction.
He turned away quickly. Bonnie was holding the squeegee out. “You wanna do a few cars? I can give you my sign.”
He couldn’t. Not when Andy, Caidan, and Isabella were watching him. He might as well make a sign that read FREAK and attach it to his forehead until high school graduation.
Hudson stepped away from his sister. “No, I have stuff to do. Go home as soon as you’re done.”
He felt bad about leaving her, but he didn’t stay around to hear more protests. He turned and hurried back across the parking lot.
When Hudson reached home, Sunshine still lay limply in the bowl. Just to prove he wasn’t a horrible brother, he took her to the sink and tried to get her to drink some water.
His mother would yell at him if she knew he had left Bonnie at the school to walk home by herself. Then again, she’d yell even more if she knew Bonnie was panhandling at school. If one of their mom’s friends got her windshield cleaned … or if the teachers doing traffic duty caught on …
Stupid cat.
Sunshine didn’t drink any water, just let out a few pitiful meows. The minutes plodded by, and Bonnie still didn’t come home. A hard ball of worry formed in Hudson’s stomach. The line of cars picking kids up at school had to be gone by now. What was Bonnie doing? Probably something that would get both of them in trouble. He should have just given her all his money.
Finally, Hudson’s worry propelled him toward the door. He would go find his sister—had to. Just as he grabbed his jacket, Bonnie burst in the door. She was breathlessly excited, her eyes shining.
He was so relieved, he nearly hugged her. Instead, he tossed his jacket on the couch. “What took you so long?”
“I got caught.” Still smiling, she dropped her backpack and bucket on the floor. “My teacher came by, but she has a cat of her own, so she was real nice and gave me twenty dollars. Then she told me to go on home.”
Twenty dollars? Third-grade teachers were a soft bunch. Hudson chuckled and followed his sister into the kitchen. “So how much did you make?”
“Thirty-three dollars.” Bonnie leaned over the bowl and gave Sunshine a kiss on the top of the head. Sunshine opened her eyes but didn’t move. Didn’t even meow.
Hudson added the sum out loud. “Thirty-three plus the twenty I’m giving you and the eighteen you already have … that’s seventy-one dollars. I bet it’s enough to see a vet.”
Bonnie stopped petting Sunshine and straightened up. “I don’t have the money anymore. I gave it to Charlotte for this.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a dented and scratched compass. “It’s magic.”
He blinked at her. “You did what?”
“It’s a magic compass. Charlotte promised.”
Hudson put his hands on his hips. “Wait—you gave your money to Charlotte?”
A flash of hurt passed over Bonnie’s expression. “She’s just keeping my money until Sunshine is better and I return the compass.” Bonnie held out the compass for him to see. “Charlotte had to make me trade something for it. Magic is expensive.”
It could have been worse, Hudson realized. Bonnie could have lost more than her money. Someone could have grabbed her and kidnapped her, because apparently she didn’t have a lick of common sense.
Hudson put his hands out, palms lifted in exasperation. “Why were you even talking to Charlotte?”
The smile dropped from Bonnie’s face. She clutched the compass defensively, as though Hudson would grab it. “Charlotte stayed after school to finish an assignment, so we were both walking home at the same time. I told her about Sunshine, and she said I could use the magic compass as long as I promised to return it when I’m done.”
Yeah, and Charlotte probably had a great deal on magic beans, too.
“In Logos,” Bonnie went on, “there’s a plant called catflower that makes sick cats better. The compass will take me there.”
“Let me see it.”
Bonnie reluctantly handed him the compass. It was a worn gold color, completely scuffed, with a few dents and deep scratches. A knob stuck out of one side, making it look like it had started i
ts life as a pocket watch. Instead of letters indicating north, south, east, and west, there were four lines. One of the lines read THE LAND OF BANISHMENT. The needle pointed firmly there. Hudson turned the compass to his left and then to his right, but the needle didn’t budge.
He flipped the compass over. “This is a piece of junk. It doesn’t even show directions, and the needle is stuck.”
Bonnie grabbed the compass back and examined it more closely. “Maybe it doesn’t work for you because it’s magic.”
She turned the compass with the same results.
“If that compass was really magic,” he pointed out, “why didn’t Mr. Fantasmo get a bunch of catflower and become a vet instead of a magician? Vets make way more money.”
Bonnie tilted her chin down, a miniature teacher. “’Cause he got kicked out of Logos when he refused to work for the new tyrant king. He tells that story every time he does his tricks.”
Hudson tried again to show her the logic. “Then why doesn’t Fantasmo hire someone else to get catflower for him?”
Bonnie bent over the kitten, petting its fur reassuringly. “Charlotte said only people with pure hearts can travel safely in the kingdom of Logos. Unicorns pick them up and take them wherever they want to go. Everybody else has to look out for the trolls and stuff. I’ll be all right, though, because I have a pure heart.”
And, unfortunately, she also had a gullible mind. Only Hudson didn’t come out and say that. He just sighed. “Charlotte lied to you. Magic doesn’t really exist. It’s all tricks and pretend.”
Bonnie gripped the compass and set her jaw.
“You don’t believe me?” Hudson picked up the phone from the countertop and held it out. “Call and ask somebody: Mom, Grandpa, your teacher. I’m sorry, but Charlotte took advantage of you.”
Bonnie stared at the phone for a moment, then looked down at the compass. Her eyes puffed up with tears. “Charlotte promised. She said when I pull the knob up, I’ll go to Logos. I only came home to drop off my backpack and to tell you so you wouldn’t worry.…”
Hudson gently took the compass from her hand. Maybe he hadn’t done the right thing by letting her walk home by herself, but he would fix his mistake. “Yeah, well, I’m going to talk to Charlotte. Don’t worry, I’ll get your money back.”
Hudson put on his jacket. The last image he saw as he went out the door was Bonnie, her shoulders slumped as she cradled the mixing bowl.
Hudson walked quickly, his feet making an angry rhythm down the sidewalk. Charlotte had gone too far this time. It was one thing to come up with stories about magic; it was another to use them to take money from little kids. He turned the compass over in his hand, squeezing it.
Charlotte’s house came into view. He could see her lying on her stomach in the grass, sorting through the clover again. Pull up the knob and he’d be in a magical kingdom, huh? What kind of compass had a knob on it, anyway?
Hudson jerked up the knob with his thumbnail. A few angry words had been heading toward his lips. These stopped, faltered, and completely toppled off his tongue.
He no longer stood on his street. He was on a meandering dirt path in the middle of a thick forest. Huge trees towered over him, their leafy canopies nearly crowding out the sky. He had seen autumn trees with their yellow, orange, and red leaves. This forest not only had those sorts of trees, but it also had purple, light blue, and dark blue ones. The place looked like a rainbow had fallen to earth and toppled color everywhere.
Hudson let out a startled scream. He blinked and then blinked harder in case the last time hadn’t worked. He checked behind him. The trees there looked as though they’d sprouted out of a box of Crayolas. He had landed in freaking Candy Land.
This couldn’t be real. It was an illusion of some sort, a trick. A really good trick, since Hudson could even smell the forest. He was surrounded by the scent of trees, bushes, and soil. Every once in a while, he caught a whiff of something flowery. “Hello?” he called.
He heard nothing except birds chirping to one another. Even that sounded strange. The chirps had a trilling noise to them like someone playing a piano.
“Charlotte?”
No answer.
Hudson turned in a circle, searching for anything familiar. “Hey, Charlotte, where are you? How did you do this?”
The wind blew through the trees. It made the forest seem like a parade, with thousands of leaves fluttering like colorful confetti. Don’t panic, he told himself. This isn’t real.
Hudson stepped over to a blue bush, whose featherlike leaves swayed in the wind, and he ran a finger along a leaf. It felt as soft as velvet. He drew his hand away quickly. A magic trick couldn’t have turned his neighborhood into a forest. He shouldn’t be able to see, smell, or feel this place if it didn’t exist. His heart beat faster, half with excitement and half with fear. The compass had really done something, had taken him somewhere new. Charlotte hadn’t lied about the compass’s magic. Cool. Beyond cool. Magic was real. Logos actually existed.
Why hadn’t Charlotte shown people this before? She should have taken a few people here so everyone would know she and her father weren’t crazy. As soon as Hudson got home, he was going to talk to her about it. And apologize.
He looked down at the compass still gripped in his hand. The phrase LAND OF BANISHMENT had disappeared from the face. The settings now read FOREST OF POSSIBILITIES, SEA OF LIFE, GRAMMARIA, and GIGANTICA. The needle pointed to FOREST OF POSSIBILITIES. Apparently, the compass pointed to where you were instead of telling you directions.
He glanced around at all the bushes and trees. How would he find catflower in this place, and more important, how would he get back home once he had? Charlotte had probably told Bonnie these details, but Hudson didn’t know them.
He’d pulled the knob up to get here, so pushing the knob down might take him back. He wouldn’t try it yet. First he would find catflower. Since he didn’t know what it looked like, maybe he should just pick every type of flower he saw. It would take a while, but hopefully he’d end up finding the right plant.
A thudding noise from somewhere in the forest interrupted his thoughts. It sounded like several footsteps. Not human footsteps—larger, heavier, probably scarier. Behind the curtain of trees, something was moving around. He couldn’t tell exactly where. The sound seemed to echo around him.
“Hello?” Hudson called.
No one called back.
Come to think of it, magic and being in the land of Logos probably had its drawbacks. He suddenly remembered all the fairy tales he’d read—stories about dragons, witches, and giants.
Hudson heard a grunt of some sort, low and grumbly, like something was hungry. The noise brought him to the immediate and urgent conclusion that he couldn’t stay here, not even to find catflower. He pushed the compass knob back down.
Nothing happened. He still stood on the dirt path in the forest.
Hudson lifted up the compass knob and pushed it back down a second time. Still nothing.
The noise came again. More footsteps were rustling through the forest. He considered running off the path and hiding, but he still wasn’t sure where the noise had come from, and besides, who knew what strange creatures lived in this place? Maybe multicolored lions and bears were skulking around behind the trees, waiting to pounce. Maybe they already had him in their sights.
Hudson’s gaze darted around the trees, searching one side and then the other. What was he facing? He tried to remember everything Mr. Fantasmo had said about Logos. There was that bit about King Vaygran, the tyrant, taking over. Charlotte had mentioned giants, although if one of those was lumbering around, Hudson probably would have noticed it by now.
What else? Oh yeah, trolls. Monstrous trolls lived in Logos. You always had to be on your guard against them. What sounds did trolls make?
Hudson had no way to defend himself. He didn’t see even a stick or rock lying on the ground that he could pick up and use to ward off an attack.
He turned the
compass over in his hand, fumbling as he looked for instructions, anything that would help him. The only words on the compass were the settings on its face: FOREST OF POSSIBILITIES, SEA OF LIFE, GRAMMARIA, and GIGANTICA.
Another grunt echoed through the forest. Probably trolls. Time to panic. He pushed the knob up so hard it popped off and fell to the ground.
He stared at the place the knob had been. Shouldn’t magic compasses be built better than that? If he had any chance of making this thing work, he needed all the pieces. He dropped to his knees and searched the ground, looking for a glint of gold. He ran his hands frantically over dirt and bits of dried leaves, all the while cursing magic compasses.
Hudson heard another low, rumbling noise, this time directly over his shoulder. He wouldn’t become troll dinner without a fight. He spun around, swinging his arm as he did. His fist didn’t connect with anything. The noise hadn’t been a troll. Two unicorns stood on the path behind him, their heads lifted too high to be hit by the arc of his swing.
Hudson let out another startled scream. He was getting quite good at those. He put his hand to his chest and sat back down on the ground, too relieved and surprised to speak.
One unicorn was a gray color—not the gray of rocks or dirty sidewalks. It was the soft gray of morning mist. The other unicorn was the tawny brown of glistening honey.
The gray unicorn took a step back and turned to the unicorn beside him. “Did you see that, Nigel? That human tried to strike me.”
“Most uncivil,” the tawny unicorn agreed. Both spoke with a sort of British-sounding accent.
Hudson got to his feet, gaping at them. “You can talk?”
The gray unicorn tossed his mane, warily keeping an eye on Hudson. He still spoke only to the other unicorn. “What sort of incantation do you suppose the boy was performing on the road a moment ago?”
The tawny unicorn leaned his head toward his companion. “I don’t think that was an incantation. It sounded distinctly like cursing to me.”