A Wounded Name (Fiction - Young Adult)

by Dot Hutchison

  At the shore, the bean nighe nod from their silver basin, heaping bags of cloth between them. There’s so much there, so much fabric soaked in blood and poison, so much death, but I asked them my question already, and the void doesn’t care who else drowns within it. It’s only ever hungry. They slap the clothes against the washboards, the suds clinging to their bare arms.

  The morgens dance and laugh and play around the island, and Mama sits like a queen on its shore, the skeletal fronds of the willows still heavy with dried flower crowns around her. Her pale skin glows in the moonlight, surrounded by a wealth of night-purple hair and bruise-colored eyes, only the beginnings of the legacy she gave to me.

  I could escape.

  Not the way Dane wants—I’m as bound to Elsinore as my parents before me—but the way Mama does. She escaped and left the path open for me to follow.

  Her wedding dress whispers secrets as I cross to the midpoint of the lake, to the frozen chain that leads to the island and the dance and the laughter. The chain sways when I step on it, and I sway with it, the edges of the skirts soaking up the dark water with every foot of progress. The metal burns my feet, so very cold, and delicate fractals break across the surface as the fabric and the skin drag across the ice that would try so hard to form.

  Once upon a time there was a star that blazed within my chest and the heat suffused me, melted the ice that tried to form, but now there’s a great, devouring nothingness in its place and the ice still can’t form.

  The lake is just as hungry.

  Mama steadies me as I land upon the island, and my bones shake with the toll of the bells of the City of Ys. She pulls a wreath of dried roses from the weeping trees and places it carefully upon my head, twining tangled locks of hair through the weave to anchor it there. The bells toll and the bean sidhe sing and my feet move in their familiar pattern around the corona of dead flowers, skirts spinning and twirling like the star that used to dance and murmur.

  There’s a city that waits and waits and waits beneath the lake, where thousands of candles burn like stars in the night sky and the bells toll the hours in dozens of cathedrals to float through the darkness and stillness and silence. There’s a city that drowned and now it waits, waits for another to fall so it may rise, but it gave away a key and the tide came in.

  The morgens dance, but Mama doesn’t, she just floats a short distance away and watches me with my eyes. I reach out to her, and our fingers barely touch, she’s too far away, farther even than the dried crowns that hover over the rippling surface that reflects back a million billion stars and galaxies, a million billion points of other pains. I stretch and then I’m falling and she catches me, the lake catches me and cradles me and whispers mine, and in the terrible emptiness there’s an echoing cry of mineminemineminemine.

  “Welcome home, Ophelia,” murmurs my mother, and water soaks through a million secrets and carries me deeper into the darkness, but there, in the distance, thousands of candles burn, candles in windows and streets and the hands of women who laugh and dance and play and left fear and grief far behind.

  Sound rushes to my head, a throbbing, panicked beat, an iron band across my chest, but Mama takes my hand and leads me closer to the lights that flicker and weave, and the sound bursts with a great cry.

  The rest is silence.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Quite simply, this book would not be in your hands right now without the chances extended to me by the fabulous Sandy Lu, Agent Extraordinaire, and my brilliant editor, Andrew Karre, who was honestly in favor of putting in more puns. They took a risk on me, and not only are they a joy to work with, but they took my words and helped me craft them into something so much better. I will be forever grateful to both of them and to the amazing teams at L. Perkins Agency and Carolrhoda Lab. A huge thank-you goes to my family. They’ve put up with any number of quirks and neuroses over the years (like walking into a room only to realize I’m talking out loud to my characters) and have always been relentlessly supportive, even when I didn’t feel like I was accomplishing anything. With silly cakes and clipped-out articles, ridiculous over-the-top story ideas and mocking sales strategies just to make me laugh, they’ve been there every step of the way.

  Thank you to the crew at work, not just for being excited for me but also for listening to me prattle on about everything. Also to those at the Archer Road CFA—aka my Writing Cave—for babysitting the girl writing novels in the corner and keeping me well supplied with caffeine and enthusiasm. Veronica, Christine, and Margaret were my first readers in this, so huge thanks for their feedback, especially Veronica, who listened to me endlessly on every neurotic worry and project detail for the last eight years and is probably the only one who’ll ever understand why family trees crack me up. Older gratitude goes to the Ros and Guil gang: Betty-Jane, JD, and Jeff. We drove everyone else (and one another) crazy, but our endless debates and questions are really the genesis of this book, especially the Wine and Laundry Night discussions with Jeff that sparked a lifelong fascination with Ophelia.

  I think all modern writers owe a huge debt to their teachers, but there are a few I’d like to mention by name: Dr. Robert Carroll, who saw promise in a ten-year-old’s awful stories and cheered me on long after I was out of his classroom; Tammy Meyers, who taught me how closely writing and drama are linked; Anne Shaughnessy, who had us in stitches with Falstaff and Hal and in awe with As You Like It, our first realization that Shakespeare was allowed to be fun; Robert Wentzlaff, who not only gave me a chance but also taught me so much about dreams and achieving them; Ted Lewis, who taught me that novels and plays spring from the same impulse; and Dr. John Omlor, my honors thesis adviser, who was the first person to tell me to Do Something with my writing. From all of you I learned more than I can possibly say, and I’m forever in your debt.

  Every day I am awed and humbled by the amazing YA community, the genuine fellowship that exists among authors, readers, bloggers, and aspirants. The advice, enthusiasm, and support, the no-holds-barred cheering for everyone’s accomplishments, the open arms with which they welcome everyone transforms a nerve-racking time into something wondrous. A particular shout-out goes to Tessa Gratton, who’s always ready with a hugely inappropriate (i.e. awesome) Hamlet joke—the Bard, I think, would be proud.

  And finally, to you, because readers are the ones who make all of this possible. Thank you.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Dot Hutchison has worked in retail, taught at a Boy Scout camp, and fought in human combat chessboards, but she’s most grateful that she can finally call writing work. When not immersed in the worlds-between-pages, she can frequently be found dancing around like an idiot, tracing stories in the stars, or waiting for storms to roll in from the ocean. She currently lives in Florida. This is her debut novel. Visit her online at www.dothutchison.com.

  DOT HUTCHISON has worked in retail, taught at a Boy Scout camp, and fought in human combat chessboards, but she’s most grateful that she can fi nally call writing work. When not immersed in the worlds-between-pages, she can frequently be found dancing around like an idiot, tracing stories in the stars, or waiting for storms to roll in from the ocean. She currently lives in Florida. this is her debut novel. Visit her online at www.dothutchison.com.

  Front cover image: © Brooke Shaden.

  An imprint of Carolrhoda Books

  A division of Lerner publishing Group

  241 First avenue North • Minneapolis, MN 55401

  www.lernerbooks.com

  www.carolrhodalab.com

  Printed and bound in U.S.A.

 

 

 
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