by Anne Nesbet
Finally the baker dusted the flour off his hands and said, “She may be a wicked thing sometimes, our Linny, but seems like she’s our door out and back, if you see what I mean. She could take a trader down to the Plain, y’ know, and bring back all the various wonders—”
“Except that she’s never leaving Lourka again!” said Linny’s mother, with a sobbing gulp of a laugh. “How can you even suggest—no, I absolutely forbid it.”
The silence that followed that was a very complicated silence. You could almost hear the thoughts of these people going in different directions all over the place.
Sayra raised her head off her mother’s shoulder and said, “What about those people and their awful war? Linny said she’d come back to them, didn’t she? They’re holding her crown for her, and she’s the Girl with the Lourka.”
The older people in the village shifted their weight from foot to foot or scratched their arms inside their elbows. They were still (even after all of these marvels) made a little nervous by anything that linked girls and lourkas. Even though that had been the first thing Linny had said, and Sayra and Elias had said something like it, too: “The story has changed.”
Weren’t the three of them living proof of that?
The people of Lourka had been as trapped in the rut of the old story as they were lost in the wrinkle separating their village from the world.
Linny had had a long time to think over how it all must have happened, long, long ago. “The first Girl with the Lourka—the one they painted those pictures of—went down to the Plain, and the people here called that being taken off to Away, and they told the story that way for so long that it came true, of course, the way stories do up here, and that’s eventually what happened to poor Sayra.”
All right, makes sense. Even the eldest elders in the village could see how that might have happened, because anyone who lives in the wrinkled country knows how a story can sometimes surprise you by becoming real.
“Well, anyway,” said Linny. “I can’t go anywhere until I fix this.” And she pulled the damaged lourka out of its grubby, tattered bag to show them all.
Some people still flinched for a moment, it’s true, to see a lourka in a girl’s hands, but the story had changed, the story had changed, and soon the lourka was being passed from hand to hand—even Sayra took it for a moment! Even Elias’s mother!—and being not just pitied for its bangs and scrapes, but also (which swelled the heart of Linny, after all this time) admired.
“Child did this without a master’s guiding!” said one of the oldest lourka makers. “Never seen such a thing.”
“I’ll help you mend it, Linny,” said Linny’s father. “Or I’ll watch you mend it, maybe. Doesn’t seem you need much help from me.”
“But I learned everything by watching you,” said Linny, her heart pounding and melting, both at once, under her thin ribs. No moment was ever as sweet as this: her own father, pleased to have her fixing her lourka. Welcoming her not just home, but into the workshops, where she had always been so unwanted!
Surely if that story could change, so could the story of the broader world, all that struggling between the wrinkled and Plain sides of the river.
“And what’s this?” said Linny’s father, running a finger over Sayra’s sash, tied now like a headband, bright and bedraggled, about Linny’s ears.
“Her wrinkled crown,” said Sayra, with mischief back in her leaf-green eyes. The only thing still half-transparent about Sayra was that winged blossom of hers, and it fluttered now, up from her hair, and did a dance above their heads.
“It started the story that brought us all home,” said Linny.
“And now let’s get some sweaters on you tired young people,” said Elias’s mother. “Getting chilly out here!”
But none of them wanted to go home to their separate houses, on a day as extraordinary as this. So they made a fair of it, right there on the village green. The various households brought out food of different kinds, and someone built up a fire in the old stone ring, and the whole village sat around and laughed and ate together.
As the shadows lengthened across the green, even Sayra’s mother finally began to believe that Sayra was truly back, and let her leave her arms (though not her sight) for a few minutes.
Sayra and Linny ate nutcake after nutcake, and smiled at each other like fools.
Then Elias leaned over them from behind and said, “Hey, what d’you think they’re all talking about?”
And when Linny followed his pointing finger, she could see that some sort of conversation was winding its way through the grown-ups. They were gathering in little groups and getting into earnest discussions and then reshuffling themselves again.
“They don’t seem mad or anything,” said Sayra, licking sugar off her fingers. “I wouldn’t worry about it. You know, I don’t think I ever had one single thing to eat, when I was off in Away. What kind of strange place is that, where you would never have a nutcake and not even notice?”
“I’m not worried about what they’re saying,” said Elias. “I’m curious.”
Then the smith banged some pieces of iron together, and the crowd pulled itself together around Linny and Sayra and Elias.
“Linny,” said Linny’s mother. “Linny, dear. They’ve been telling me I am wrong.”
“Wrong about what?” said Linny, feeling a little embarrassed.
“About keeping you here forever,” said her mother, with a flash of a smile. “Though it seems reasonable enough to me.”
“She did tell those people she would go back,” said Sayra. “Didn’t you, Linny?”
“My Girl with the Lourka,” said her mother. “Who I came all the way up here to find!”
“Tell her our plan,” said the baker. “Go ahead, spill!”
“You see,” said Linny’s father, stepping forward. “As the good baker said earlier, you’re nothing less than our door, after a fashion. And we mean to make use of that, and to stand by you, too.”
He took a deep breath.
“When your lourka’s repaired and your body rested, child, it will be high time for you to go back down to Bend, don’t you think?”
“And Angleside, too,” said someone else from the crowd.
“Yes, to the wrinkled places and to the Plain,” agreed her father. “Sounds like both have need of you, their Girl with a Lourka.”
“But you won’t be alone this time,” said Linny’s mother.
“Hey!” said Elias. “She wasn’t always alone the first time.”
He turned around so he could look right at Linny, and he smiled a quite nice, not very lummoxy smile.
“I know I wasn’t much help the first time,” he said. “But I’ll come with you again, if you go back down.”
“Me, too,” said Sayra. “I’d like to see what the Plain looks like.”
Linny gulped. “But your mother,” she said. Actually, she could have been speaking to any of them. What mother would let go of her child twice in a single year? None of these mothers.
“Now you’re not understanding what we mean,” said Linny’s father. “Linny, we mean all to go with you, since you can bring us back again, when the time comes.”
“All of us, everybody,” said her mother, and the crowd was full of nodding heads.
“Except maybe me and the sheep,” said Elias’s father. “But maybe even them!”
“And the horses and the kitties and the little flying birds!” said one of Linny’s twin brothers.
“Don’t be silly,” said the other brother. “The birds won’t come all that way.”
“There will be drums and lourkas—think how lovely the noise will be!” said Linny’s mother.
“And bright, bright banners,” said Sayra’s mother in a whisper. “No parade without banners!”
“Down from the wrinkled hills,” said Linny’s father. “To see the other places and explain how things are up here to those who don’t know.”
“A real wrinkled fair, we can sho
w them—not their lourkas made of boxes!” said one of the oldest lourka makers.
“And to find my sister, Mina,” said her mother. “She’ll have people who’ll join us, I’m sure.”
Linny looked from face to face and couldn’t even think of a single word to say. All those years spent chafing up here, and now, when the talk was of leaving again, she found herself feeling, for the first time in her life, truly at home.
“You’ll be the Girl with Lourka then, for sure,” said her father, and he laughed. “The Girl with the whole village of Lourka!”
Fireflies, laughter, the Half-Cat’s purr, a thin thread of smoky tang from the fire, and someone picking out odd notes on a lourka, not so far away.
Linny breathed it all in, too happy for words. Then there was hope, after all! How lovely and how strange.
The stories will change, she thought to herself. The stories will change, and the world will change—
The wonderful world, both wrinkled and Plain!
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This story took shape during a hard and happy year. The people of HarperCollins have my awe and affection, both. Rosemary Brosnan, who blends kindness and wisdom in everything she does, was this book’s first friend. Alexandra Cooper, an editor’s editor, showed me a thousand ways it could be made better. Annie Berger kept everything on track. Alexei Esikoff and Laaren Brown went through the manuscript with sharp eyes and fine-toothed combs, and Heather Daugherty and Jen Bricking made a truly magical cover. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart. I’m grateful also to Andrea Brown and Taryn Fagerness.
I owe more than I can say to the friends who, through thick and thin, kept me walking, talking, and plotting. Dartmoor, Tilden Park, Mount Tamalpais, and Clouds Rest know our feet well. My love and gratitude go to Roo Hooke, Sharon Inkelas, Will Waters, Bill Roberts, and the stalwart members of the Berkeley Marina Dog-Walking Society.
Linda Williams introduced me to the glorious, cold water of Lake Tahoe. My colleagues at Berkeley were incredibly nice about the blue hair. Kristen Whissel and Mark Sandberg went many extra miles on my behalf: you guys are the best.
Jenn Reese, Christine Ashworth, Sally Felt, Yvonne Jocks, and Kristen Kittscher joined forces to make writing every day no matter what seem like a perfectly natural and possible thing to do.
Joan Balter taught me a great deal about the making of lourkas, although I think she thought I was asking about violins.
In France I benefited every single day from the positive spirit, intelligence, and general gutsiness of Hannah Konkel. Having Andrew Kahn and Nicholas Cronk as neighbors was a rare gift and a joy. Sisters, cousins, my father, siblings-in-law, nieces, godsons, and a nephew kept life lively everywhere.
My daughters—Ada Naiman, Eleanor Naiman, and Thera Naiman—are as musical as Linny and as stalwart. Bob Naiman makes the world a better place in every way. Eric Naiman is the best cook I know, and one of the world’s most generous souls. Yes, Soushka is a good dog.
Sheila Engh, Kate Landis, and Michelle Oakes couldn’t stay to see this book appear, but I feel very lucky to have known them.
This book is dedicated, with love and affection, to Isa Helfgott and Jayne Williams.
BACK AD
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PHOTO CREDIT GREGORY FREIDIN
ANNE NESBET teaches classes on silent films and Russian novels at UC Berkeley. The author of The Cabinet of Earths and A Box of Gargoyles, she lives near San Francisco with her husband, three daughters, and one irrepressible dog. You can visit her online at www.annenesbet.com.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com.
BOOKS BY ANNE NESBET
The Cabinet of Earths
A Box of Gargoyles
CREDITS
COVER ART © 2015 BY JEN BRICKING
COVER DESIGN BY HEATHER DAUGHERTY
COPYRIGHT
THE WRINKLED CROWN. Copyright © 2015 by Anne Nesbet. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
www.harpercollinschildrens.com
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Nesbet, Anne.
The wrinkled crown / Anne Nesbet. — First edition.
pages cm
Summary: Twelve-year-old Linny embarks on an epic quest to save her best friend and discovers that she is the link between the magical and logical halves of her world.
ISBN 978-0-06-210429-8 (hardcover)
EPub Edition © October 2015 9780062104328
[1. Fantasy. 2. Magic—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.N437768Wr 2015 2014047814
[Fic]—dc23 CIP
AC
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15 16 17 18 19 PC/RRDH 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
FIRST EDITION
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