Wizardmatch

by Lauren Magaziner

  Dial Books for Young Readers

  Penguin Young Readers Group

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC

  375 Hudson Street

  New York, NY 10014

  Copyright © 2018 by Lauren Magaziner

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Magaziner, Lauren, author.

  Title: Wizardmatch / Lauren Magaziner.

  Description: New York, NY : Dial Books for Young Readers, [2017] | Summary: Twelve-year-old Lennie Mercado’s grandfather, the current Prime Wizard of Pomporromp, is retiring and decides to host a tournament for Lennie and her cousins to compete to win his title, land, position, castle, and unlimited magical powers, but when Poppop introduces new rules to eliminate sibling rivalry, Lennie decides the games are unfair and makes plans to sabotage the event.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017012731| ISBN 9780735227781 (hardcover) | ISBN 9780735227804 (ebook)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Magic—Fiction. | Contests—Fiction. | Families—Fiction. | Sibling rivalry—Fiction. | Fantasy.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.M2713 Wi 2017 | DDC [Fic]—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/20170127311 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Jacket art © 2018 by Natalie Andrewson

  Jacket design by Dana Li

  Version_1

  To Michael, my brother, bestie, and inspiration. Our deep friendship, our playful rivalry, is the bond I treasure most in this life. This book was always yours.

  And to Stacey, my editor, pillar, and visionary. Every book we do together is magic. Thank you for each adventure.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  The Pomporromp Family Tree

  An Ill-Conceived Decision

  Preparing for Poppop

  A Special Invitation

  Pomporromp Castle

  Family Reunion

  Playing Favorites

  Opening Ceremonies

  After

  When It Rains, We Train

  Introducing . . . the Champions!

  The Borderlands

  The Deepest Darkest Secretest Cave of Secrets (DUM DUM DUMMMM!)

  A Very Interesting Idea

  The Pool of Pudding

  Consequences

  Student and Teacher

  Ooey Gooey Icky Sticky Double-Dog Dare

  A Plan

  AFTER HIM!

  The Garden of Goulash

  Done

  Last Chance

  The New Prime Wizard

  Invincible

  All That, and a Bag of Chips

  The Decision

  Acknowledgments

  An Ill-Conceived Decision

  Mortimer de Pomporromp—the oldest, most powerful, most celebrated wizard in his entire family—had the sniffles.

  He groaned as he rolled over in bed, his back cracking and muscles aching as he reached for the staff propped up against his nightstand. With one tap of that magical stick against the floor, Mortimer could summon a whole factory of tissues. Which was just what his runny nose needed.

  Almost, almost . . .

  He stretched out his arm. His fingers closed around the staff, and his nose twitched. Already, it was too late to summon a box of tissues—they’d never reach him in time. He banged his staff on the floor just before . . .

  “Ah—Ah—ACHOO!!!!!!!!!” Mortimer sneezed. Only instead of snot, chocolate pudding came flying out of his nostrils. It sailed across the room and landed with a splat all over the floor.

  Footsteps clomped up the stairwell to his bedchamber; moments later the door burst open, and his assistant, Estella, blew into the room, waving a piece of parchment in the air. “Mortimer de Pomporromp, what in heaven’s name is this preposterous memo you just—”

  “WATCH,” Mortimer cried, trying to warn her. But it was too late: Estella slipped on the puddle of pudding-snot, flipped backward, and landed flat on her back.

  Mortimer cringed as his assistant lay in the goop. It was sticking to her corkscrew curls, crusting on her brown skin, and was most certainly going to stain her lilac pantsuit.

  “I’ve always wanted a booger bath, thank you,” Estella said drily.

  “Be thankful I had time to bewitch it!”

  Estella glared at him as she wrung out her hair. “Yes, I’m thanking my lucky stars.”

  Mortimer turned to look out the window. It was a soggy, stormy day, filled with the crackles of lightning and the rumblings of thunder. Just like the stormy rumblings inside his soul. Of course, it wasn’t coincidence; he controlled the weather with his magic . . . but still.

  “This crazy memo!” Estella said. “Are we going to discuss it?”

  “Woe is me, I’m sick!” Mortimer complained. “Life is horrible! Awful, just awful! Dreadfully appallingly grievously monstrously tragically shuddersome. Beastly and ghastly and rotten—”

  “Stop being so dramatic,” Estella said, and she whacked him with a pillow. “You just have a head cold.”

  “WOE!” Mortimer wailed. He thrashed beneath his fuzzy blankets and held on to his stuffed animal for comfort, which—despite being filled with cotton—was a much better companion than Estella in times of distress. True, Estella was a loyal assistant, but in the twenty years she’d been by his side, she remained rather unconcerned with his emotional turmoil.

  “All your complaining won’t get you out of talking about this.” She laid the parchment on his chest. To Estella, please inform my children (Lacey, Tracy, Stacey, Macy, Philip #1, Philip #2, Philip #3, and Bob) that I am stepping down from the post of Prime Wizard, Earl of Pomporromp, Viscount of Netherly. I will host a Wizardmatch competition among my grandchildren to find the next successor. It was written in his own handwriting, smudged a bit because he was a leftie.

  “ARE WE GOING TO DISCUSS THIS OR NOT?” Estella said.

  “Alas, the end of my days is near!” Mortimer moaned. “I see a bright light!”

  “Shall I turn off the lamp above your bed?”

  “Not that bright light! The other one! The deadly one! I shall never recover!”

  Estella sighed. “You say that every year when you get a cold. And every year you recover just fine.”

  “Will you plan my funeral, youthful Estella?”

  “Mortimer, you are fine. Other than being melodramatic and ridiculous—”

  “My dear! Do not speak ill of the ill!”

  Estella sighed and sat on the side of his bed. “Are you sure you’re ready to pass on your powers? It’s a big decision to step down, and I don’t want you to take this lightly.”

  “Lightly! Lightly! Why, it’s the heaviest decision I’ve made in my life! Nothing shall compare to this incessant skirmish between my brain and my heart! Why, the inner agony I’ve had t
o endure—”

  “Mortimer!”

  He waved his hand. “Estella, I came into my position at the age of twelve. Most of my grandchildren are between the ages of seven and fourteen. I could wait to hold Wizardmatch. But I don’t want to. Whoever is going to be the next Prime Wizard of Pomporromp is going to need at least ten years to study under me. I want to leave enough time for years of thorough training . . . and time enough to retire somewhere south and warm before my bones become brittle and frail and infirm—”

  “Mortimer,” she said with a sigh. Then she rested a hand on his own. “This isn’t just because you’re feeling sick, right? This is something you truly want to do?”

  “This is no snap decision, Estella.” He puffed his chest out. “Sir Mortimer de Pomporromp, Prime Wizard, Earl of this castle, Viscount of Netherly does not make hasty decisions.”

  “If you say so,” Estella said, unconvinced.

  But it didn’t matter what his assistant thought—he knew in his bones (his nearly infirm bones) that it was time to have another Wizardmatch. Time to put his grandchildren through the ultimate test. The one winner would take it all: his land, his title, his castle. And most of all: his unlimited magical powers.

  Mortimer tugged on his floor-length beard and said, “May the best kin win.”

  Preparing for Poppop

  Once again, Lennie Mercado was practicing magic.

  “Okay,” she said to her reflection. Her brown eyes stared back at her, twinkling with determination from behind her glasses. “Sixteen seconds. You can do this.”

  She took a breath so deep that her lungs smarted, and she watched as her image in the mirror went from hazy . . . to completely invisible. Chills prickled on her skin, and her head felt tingly, like someone had cracked an egg on her skull, and the yolk was running down her neck.

  One, she counted to herself, two, three, four, five . . .

  “I can do it!” she said through gritted teeth.

  Six, seven, eight, nine, ten . . .

  “COME ON!” she cried, feeling the beads of sweat on her forehead. Her magical energy was low, and her whole body was aching.

  Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen—

  Lennie visibled again, popping back into view. Loose strands of hair were matted to her clammy forehead, and she was panting as though she’d just run a marathon.

  “AUGH!” she aughed. Fifteen seconds was her record, and no matter how hard she tried—and she did try—she just couldn’t beat it.

  Lennie plopped down on a beanbag in the corner of her room, thinking of that awful thing her mom kept saying to her every time she caught Lennie practicing her powers. Her mom had told her that there was only so much she could do to extend her magic. At some point, she was going to max out. Even her mom (who was thirty-nine and, like, super old) could only hold her invisibility for thirty seconds.

  But Lennie practiced her hardest anyway. Even if she had to train for years before she even gained another second of invisibility, she’d do it. She’d do anything.

  Lennie glanced out the window, scanning the redwood trees in her backyard, just in case Poppop Pomporromp decided to sneak in through the back door. She had gained one second since she’d seen him last summer, and she hoped he’d be impressed with her.

  Except . . . Poppop was rarely impressed with anything but himself. Unlike Lennie (and her mom, and her brother, Michael), Poppop wasn’t limited to just one fifteen-second power. He was the Prime Wizard of the family, which meant that he was special.

  With just a tap of his staff, Poppop made spaghetti dinners dance on the table like synchronized worms. He levitated objects around the house. He once conjured a four-story tree house in the backyard in just a blink. And turned their living room into an ice-skating rink in the middle of July. He was the only person in the whole family who had no limitations on his powers. Lucky him!

  Lennie squinted. But nothing did pop out of those redwood trees. Except a squirrel. And a chipmunk. And a possum . . .

  Okay, nothing unusual was popping out of the redwood trees.

  Squish.

  The noise came from behind her.

  Lennie whipped around toward the source of the sound—her mattress. There was nothing there. But her pillow looked a bit smushed.

  “Michael!” Lennie shouted, reaching for a ball of socks and throwing it toward the pillow. “Get out of here!”

  He flickered into view. He was sitting on top of her pillow, right where it was indented. He chortled, like invisibly sneaking into her room was the cleverest thing he’d ever done.

  Lennie wasn’t really in the mood. Yesterday he’d smashed a water balloon onto her head and never actually apologized for that. And he lied to Mom and Dad when Lennie tried to tell them about it. Just looking at him now, smirking at her, made her flush with annoyance.

  “Go away!”

  “What’s the magic word?”

  “Please?” she said impatiently.

  “Nope.”

  “Abracadabra?”

  “Nope.”

  “I do not have time for this,” Lennie groaned. “And besides, I told you not to come in my room without asking!”

  Michael held up a hand. “No, no, no. You said you didn’t want to see me in your room again,” he said. “So now you see me . . .” He went invisible again. “Now you don’t!”

  Lennie tried to stop herself from laughing, which turned into one extraordinarily loud snort. She could feel her anger from yesterday thawing.

  “What are you doing?” Michael asked.

  “I could ask you the same question, Mr. Room Intruder,” Lennie said, glancing out the window again. Still nothing. “I’m looking for Poppop.”

  Michael crawled to the edge of her bed and hung upside down off the side. His hair wasn’t very long—jet black, stick-straight, and silky, just like hers—but in this position it almost touched the floor.

  “Does Poppop have to come over? He smells like earwax,” Michael complained.

  “But it’s always so fun when Poppop does his magic!”

  “Fun? Or BORINGGGGGGGG.”

  “Uh . . . fun,” she said firmly.

  Michael stuck out his tongue. “But then he naps for like ten hours in the afternoon and snores like an elephant! And then I’m doing nothing while we wait for him to wake up.”

  “Then spend time with me!”

  “EW! GROSS! NEVER!” Michael shouted.

  Lennie rolled her eyes. “Okay, I guess you’re uninvited to play with me. I take it back,” she said, doing that sneaky reverse psychology thing her dad always pulled on her.

  “Fineeeeeee,” Michael said. But then his eyes lit up. “Invisibility standoff! If you win, you can make me do whatever you want for a whole hour. If I win, you have to do what I want.”

  Lennie grinned. “You realize I’ve been practicing every day for the past year.”

  Michael shrugged.

  “And I always last two seconds longer than you.”

  “Sounds like you’re chicken!” he taunted.

  Lennie hopped on the bed and sat pretzel-style, facing her brother. “You’re on.”

  “READY, SET, GOOOOOOOO!” Michael shouted.

  She and Michael both vanished at the same time. And the odd sensation returned. Like a wave of chills traveling from the top of her head down to the tips of her toes. She held her breath and concentrated.

  Her veins felt like they were pulsing. She wished she were Poppop—this would be so easy for Poppop. There wasn’t anything he couldn’t do. He could be invisible forever if he wanted to. And he never drained of magical energy. Unlike Lennie, who was feeling especially exhausted at that very moment. She had a second or two of invisibility left, and she could feel her skin begin to prickle. Invisible sweat formed again on her invisible brow.

  She looked at M
ichael . . . his form was slowly becoming translucent, the outline of his body wiggling like jellyfish tentacles.

  She let out a breath, and her skin flickered back into view.

  “AHA!” Michael shrieked. “I WIN! YOU LOSE!”

  “WHAT?!” Lennie said. “ARE YOU KIDDING? You went visible way before I did—”

  “KIDS! DINNER!” Lennie’s dad called.

  “LAST ONE TO THE TABLE IS A BIG LOSER!” Michael shouted, and he dashed out of her room, elbowing his way past her.

  She tried to shove him back, but she was eating his dust. So she strolled to the kitchen coolly, pretending like she didn’t care that she’d lost . . . or that Michael shouted, “I WIN! YOU STINK!” at her as she sat down.

  Lennie reached for the dinner her dad had cooked, but he waved a spoon at her. “Wait until Poppop arrives!”

  “Why would you call us down for dinner if you won’t let us eat?” Lennie said, her mouth watering from the smell of garlic and chili peppers in the kitchen.

  “Poppop will arrive any minute,” her mom said, looking eagerly at the window for her own father to arrive. Then she turned to Lennie’s dad. “Smells delicious, honey! Thanks for cooking.”

  Lennie’s dad always cooked whenever Poppop Pomporromp was supposed to arrive because Poppop couldn’t get enough of her father’s sisig. It was his favorite—and Lennie’s favorite, too. She put her chin on the table and stared over her empty plate, practically drooling.

  But then, when her parents’ backs were turned, she took a bowl of rice and hid it in her lap.

  Michael wasn’t as sneaky. He lunged across the table, grabbed a spoonful of the pork, and shoveled it into his mouth.

  “Michael, we said to wait!” Mom groaned. “Look at how polite Lennie’s being!”

  Lennie rolled the rice between her palms, morphing it into a little rice ball under the table. When her mom turned again, she popped it into her mouth.

  “LENNIE ATE SOMETHING, TOO!” Michael tattled in a singsongy voice.

  Lennie kicked Michael under the table.

  “AND NOW SHE KICKED ME!”