Twire nodded. “That’s right,” she said. “I pick up Aidan’s scrap metal every day. Yesterday I brought it back here, sorted it, and began to melt some pieces down.”
Prilla watched as Vidia leaned over Twire menacingly. “And you’re sure you didn’t find anything unusual mixed in with the metal?” she asked. “Think carefully, love. The crown might have been in a black velvet pouch.”
At this, Twire started. “Velvet?” she said, her face brightening. “Yes! Yes, I did find some velvet in the pile.” She smiled and patted Vidia on the back. “You see,” she said encouragingly, “we’re on the right track. We’ll figure this out.”
“Oh, cut it out!” Vidia snapped impatiently. She shook Twire’s hand off her back. “Just tell me what you did with it!”
Twire sighed. Vidia was a very negative fairy! Twire flew toward a tiny door in the wall at the far side of the workshop. Vidia and Prilla followed.
“Well, I didn’t know it was a pouch,” Twire explained as she flew. “I didn’t feel anything inside it. But Queen Ree’s crown is just about the lightest and most delicate thing ever made. That’s probably why I thought it was a piece of unwanted fabric.” Twire shrugged. “I was sure I could use it for something. But it had a few rust stains on it. You know, from being tossed around with the metal.”
Twire pulled open a small, square door in the wall. It opened onto a metal chute that dropped down and away into total darkness. “I tossed it down the laundry chute with my other laundry,” she said.
VIDIA TOOK OFF so suddenly, Prilla had to fly her fastest to catch up. So fast, in fact, that when Vidia paused for a moment on the Home Tree’s central staircase between the third and second floors, Prilla bumped into her and fell over backward.
“Oof!” Prilla cried. “Watch where you’re flying!” Vidia shouted. She threw Prilla a dirty look before flying on toward the first floor, where the laundry room was.
Prilla followed. “Well,” she called after Vidia, “at least Twire didn’t melt the crown down!”
“That’s right,” snapped Vidia over her shoulder. “She didn’t melt it down. No such luck.”
Prilla shook her head as she and Vidia flew to the laundry room. At the bottom of the staircase, they turned down the hall that led to the kitchen. Then, dodging the cooking-, baking-, and dishwashing-talent fairies, they flew through the kitchen and into another hallway. At the far end was a swinging door with a small round window.
Pushing through the door, Vidia and Prilla found themselves in the Home Tree laundry room. It was a huge room with towering fifteen-inch ceilings. The whitewashed walls and overhead lights made it seem like the brightest and cleanest room ever. Busy laundry-talent fairies and sparrow men flew this way and that. Some carried baskets of dirty laundry to the rows of washtubs, where other fairies were scrubbing away. Some pushed balloon carriers—carts kept aloft by fairy-dust-filled balloons—full of wet laundry. Still others stood before long tables, folding clean laundry.
Hundreds of laundry chutes carried laundry down to the laundry room floor from the workshops and bedrooms on the floors above. The dirty laundry fell into baskets. Each chute was marked with the floor number and room it came from.
Vidia and Prilla found the laundry chute labeled 3G. It was the chute that led down from Twire’s workshop. A laundry fairy named Lympia was standing under it, sorting through some clothing in a basket. Prilla asked her if she had worked at the same chute the day before. When Lympia said yes, Vidia launched into her questioning.
“Did you find anything…unusual in Twire’s laundry yesterday afternoon?” she asked pointedly.
“What do you mean, unusual?” Lympia replied. She eyed Vidia suspiciously. Like the queen’s helper fairies, Lympia didn’t trust Vidia. “Prilla, what’s this all about?” she asked.
“We’re on the trail of the missing crown,” Prilla explained. She gave Lympia a rundown of what they had found out so far. She told her how Rhia had taken the crown to Aidan’s workshop and how it had been accidentally picked up by Twire. And then how Twire had dropped it down her laundry chute without knowing it.
“Are you sure you didn’t find a black velvet pouch mixed in with Twire’s laundry yesterday?” Prilla asked Lympia.
Lympia started. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “Well, yes, I did find a velvet something-orother. But what does that have to do with anything?”
Vidia sighed. “The crown was inside the pouch, precious,” she said, sounding annoyed. “Honestly, if anyone had bothered to look inside the thing, I wouldn’t be in this mess!”
Rolling her eyes at Vidia, Lympia turned again to Prilla. “I was going through Twire’s laundry, sorting it into lights and darks,” she explained. “When I found the piece of velvet, I put it aside. It couldn’t be washed in the laundry, you see. It had to be cleaned specially.”
Prilla nodded. That made sense. “So where did you put it?” Prilla asked.
There was a long pause as Lympia thought it over. “You know,” she said at last, “I really couldn’t say.”
Vidia smirked. “Well, that’s fine,” she said in a falsely casual tone. She shrugged. “Tomorrow at my hearing, I’ll just say that we traced the crown as far as the laundry room. But then we hit a dead end. Because Lympia really couldn’t say where she had put Pixie Hollow’s most prized possession!” Vidia turned as if to fly away. “This is a waste of time.”
Lympia’s glow flared. “No! Wait!” she called.
Vidia stopped in her tracks and turned around.
“Let me try to retrace my steps,” Lympia suggested to Prilla. “Maybe that will help me remember what happened to the velvet pouch.”
So Vidia and Prilla followed her to the balloon carrier storage area. “Yesterday afternoon, after I sorted Twire’s laundry, I picked up a balloon carrier and put the laundry inside,” Lympia said. She pulled out one of the carriers to show them. “The light clothes were in one basket. The darks were in another basket. And I laid the velvet pouch in the bottom of the carrier.”
They followed her as she pushed the balloon carrier over to the washtubs. “Then I put Twire’s lights in the wash,” Lympia went on. “I left the basket by the tubs.”
They followed her to the sinks. “Here I scrubbed some of the stains on one of the darks.”
They followed her back to the washtubs. “I put Twire’s darks in the water. I left the basket in front of the tub while I cleaned them.”
They followed her to the balloon carrier storage area. “Then I brought the balloon carrier back here,” said Lympia. She tied up the one she had borrowed again. “And I took a break while the wash was soaking.”
Lympia put a hand to her forehead. “I guess I forgot to take the velvet pouch out of the carrier before I returned it,” she said sheepishly.
LYMPIA HAD NO idea who had used that balloon carrier next. But she did have one more piece to add to the puzzle.
“Yesterday lots of laundry-talent fairies were washing and folding tablecloths for the queen’s Arrival Day party,” Lympia remembered. “They loaded all the clean tablecloths and napkins into balloon carriers. Then the celebration-setup fairies came to pick them up.” Lympia shrugged. “Maybe one of them took the carrier with the pouch in it—hidden under the clean laundry?” she suggested.
Prilla thanked Lympia for her help. Vidia was already halfway across the room, headed for the door.
“Hey, Vidia! Wait up!” Prilla called as she chased after her.
Vidia waited outside the laundry room for Prilla. “We’ve been at this all morning!” Vidia fumed. “And we’re no closer to finding the crown!”
Prilla smiled. She patted Vidia on the back. “Sure we are,” Prilla said encouragingly. “We’re hot on the trail! We’re putting all the pieces together! We’re solving the mystery!” Prilla’s blue eyes twinkled. “And you’ve got to admit—it is kind of fun.”
Vidia pursed her lips and squinted at Prilla. Then, without a word, she turned and zipped off down the corridor. But
before she did, Prilla thought she saw a tiny twinkle in Vidia’s eye, too.
They tracked down the celebration-setup fairies in the tearoom. When they weren’t setting up for a big party, they helped the kitchen fairies with the setup of meals. As Prilla and Vidia entered the tearoom, some were setting the tables for lunch. Others were carrying dishes and trays out of the kitchen and placing them on a buffet table.
Prilla’s stomach growled. She knew that she might not have the chance to eat for the rest of the afternoon. So she helped herself to a strawberry angel food cupcake from the buffet.
Then, her mouth full, she spotted Vidia already talking to Nora, one of the celebration-setup fairies. Prilla flew over in time to hear Vidia’s question.
“Excuse me, honey lamb,” said Vidia. She turned on the sweetness. “But did you find a black velvet pouch when you were setting up for the party yesterday? It was mixed in with the tablecloths.”
Nora was laying out forks and knives on one table. Without even looking up, she replied, “You mean the velvet pouch with the crown inside it?”
Vidia and Prilla couldn’t believe their ears. Did Nora know where the crown was? And if she did, why hadn’t she said anything at the emergency meeting?
Vidia spoke first. “Yes! Yes!” she cried. “The one with the crown inside it! Nora, where is it?”
Nora looked up. She was taken aback by the excitement in Vidia’s voice. “Well, we took it out of the pouch and tossed it in the back room with all the other crowns,” she said casually.
Now Vidia and Prilla were really confused. “What other crowns?” Prilla asked.
“The crowns for the party,” Nora replied. She put the spoons down on the table in a pile. Then she flew away and waved for Vidia and Prilla to follow. “Come on. I’ll show you.”
Nora led them out of the tearoom and into the dining hall, where the party would have been the night before. A balloon arch still framed the doorway. The tables were still draped in gold and lacy spiderwebs. Everything was ready for the party that hadn’t happened.
In the far corner of the dining hall was a small door marked storeroom. Nora flew directly to it and opened the door. Then she stood to one side to let Vidia and Prilla go in first.
The room was dimly lit by natural light from one small window high on the wall. At first, Vidia and Prilla could only just make out the rough outline of items in piles on the floor.
Then, as their eyes adjusted to the light, the forms became clearer.
There before them were stacks and stacks of shiny, glittering crowns—and every one of them looked exactly like Queen Ree’s!
“THEY LOOK GOOD—almost real. Don’t they?” Nora said proudly. She pointed to the crowns piled in the storeroom.
“What?” Prilla replied. Her head was spinning.
“What do you mean, ‘almost real’?” Vidia asked.
Nora picked up a crown from one of the piles. “Well, they’re fakes, of course,” she began. “For the Arrival Day party, we had them made to look just like Queen Ree’s real crown. Yesterday evening we were going to put one at each seat. Each fairy could wear it during the party and take it home as a party favor!” Nora smiled and put the fake crown on her head. “Good idea, huh?” she added.
Vidia and Prilla said nothing. They just stared at the fake crowns with wide eyes. So Nora went on.
“But when the queen announced that the real crown was missing”—Nora shot a quick glance at Vidia—“and the party was called off, we left them here.” Nora took the crown off her head. She put it back on a pile. “Now we’re not sure what to do with them.”
Vidia sighed. “Well,” she said, “I’ll tell you the first thing to be done with them.”
Nora looked at Vidia. “What?” she said.
“We’ll need to go through them all and look for the real crown,” Vidia replied.
Now Nora looked confused. Prilla explained everything—from Rhia’s dropping off the dented crown at Aidan’s to Lympia’s leaving the crown in the pouch in her balloon carrier.
Nora’s eyes widened in shock. “But that means…” Her voice trailed off as she put the pieces together. “The crown in the velvet pouch…the one we tossed in here…”
Prilla and Vidia nodded. Yes, the queen’s real crown—an irreplaceable work of art from the earliest days of Pixie Hollow—was here. It was somewhere in this dark, dusty storeroom.
How in the world would they find it, mixed in with hundreds of fake crowns that looked exactly like it?
“Nora,” Prilla said at last, “who made the fake crowns? Who figured how to copy the real thing so well?”
“Dupe,” Nora replied. “You know, he’s one of the art talents. He spent a lot of time getting it just right.”
A short while later, a gloomy Dupe stood in the storeroom, in the middle of piles and piles of crowns. Prilla, Vidia, and Nora had just filled him in on the problem.
“Well, I worked so hard trying to make the fake crowns look just like the queen’s,” Dupe said to the fairies in a sad tone. “And now we’re all wishing I hadn’t done such a good job.”
Poor Dupe! He had worked hard on the crown party favors. Then the party had been called off. Now it looked as though the crowns might never be used.
But Vidia wasn’t in a sympathetic mood. She wasn’t looking forward to their task. Sifting through all the fake crowns would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. “So,” she said impatiently to Dupe, “is there a way to tell the real crown from the fakes?”
Dupe nodded. “There is,” he replied. “But not by looking at them.” He picked up a crown. “You see the delicate metalwork? These rows of moonstones? The large fire opal in the center?” He pointed out all the crown’s beautiful features. “When I crafted the fake crowns, I used tin scraps and fake jewels for all of these things. But with a lot of fairy dust and some special magic, I glossed over all the imperfections. There is no way to tell that they aren’t real.”
The fairies looked carefully at the crown Dupe was holding. It was true. None of them would have guessed that it wasn’t the real thing.
But when Dupe said the word “imperfections,” Prilla had an idea. “Wait!” she said. “What about the dent? There was a dent in the real crown that Rhia wanted to have fixed. Can’t we just look for the crown with the dent?” Prilla asked Dupe. “That one will be the real one, won’t it?”
Dupe shook his head. “I’m afraid not,” he said. “I copied the real crown exactly—dent and all.” He pointed to a dent on the fake crown he was holding. “Of course, in time the magic will wear off,” he went on. “The fake crowns will look like what they really are: just some scraps of metal with hunks of quartz and colored pebbles stuck onto them.”
But that wouldn’t happen for months. They needed to find the real crown now!
“There was only one part of the real crown that I wasn’t able to copy,” Dupe added.
The fairies’ faces brightened as Dupe went on.
“When it’s placed on someone’s head, the real crown magically changes its size to fit the wearer perfectly,” he explained. “My magic wasn’t strong enough to do that. All of the fake crowns are size five.”
As it turned out, none of them had size 5 heads. Prilla and Nora were both size 4. Dupe was a size 6. Vidia was a size 31/2.
At that, Vidia laughed scornfully. “Let me get this straight,” she said. “We have to try on all these crowns? Until we find one that magically fits our heads?”
Dupe nodded. “Oh. And one other thing,” he said. “There are some words you need to say when you put the crown on your head. The words trigger the real crown’s magic.”
Vidia eyed him warily. “What kind of words?” she asked. She sounded almost afraid to hear the answer.
Dupe cleared his throat. “You have to say:
“Pixie Hollow,
Mother Dove—
The world we cherish,
The one we love.”
Vidia cringed in disgust. “Ugh!�
�� she cried. “That’s got to be the sappiest thing I’ve ever heard!”
Prilla clapped Vidia good-naturedly on the back. “Well, Vidia,” she said, “it may not roll off the tongue now. But it will in a few hours—after you’ve said it a few hundred times!”
AT FIRST, VIDIA refused to try on any of the crowns. There was no way she was going to say the magic words. Instead, she made herself comfortable on a flour-filled burlap sack in one corner of the storeroom. She sat there stubbornly, with her arms crossed, watching Prilla, Nora, and Dupe try on crowns and say the verse.
But before long, Vidia grew impatient—and bored. She realized that the search would move along faster if she helped.
“For goodness’ sake,” she snapped. “Can’t you go any faster? At this rate, we’ll be here all night!” She hopped off the flour sack.
Vidia picked up a crown. She placed it on her size 31/2 head. Too large, it slipped down and covered her eyes.
Then, in barely a whisper, Vidia said the magic words.
“Pixie Hollow,
Mother Dove—
The world we cherish,
The one we love.”
It pained her to say those corny lines. To make matters worse, nothing happened. Nothing at all. No change. No magic. The crown remained as ill-fitting as ever.
Vidia sighed, took off the crown, and tossed it into the fake pile. Then she picked up another crown and tried again.
This went on through the evening and into the night. It was slow going. At midnight, the unsorted piles still towered higher than the fake pile.
Hours later, as the first light of the new day peeked through the high window, Vidia paused in her search and yawned. She looked around at the others. Dupe was slumped against a box, sound asleep. A crown was perched on his head. Nora’s eyes were also closed. She had stretched out on the floor right in the middle of the unsorted crowns.
Vidia and the Fairy Crown Page 3
