14

LIBRARY TIME

“I’ll take nettles,” Gorse said.

“I’ll take quilts,” said Tansy.

“I’ll look up correspondences,” said Will, shutting the library door carefully behind them.

Thornmallow looked around. The library had walls of books. There were books on the windowsills and books stacked two- and three- and four-deep on shelves. Where there were no books, single pieces of parchment littered the floor, covered with crabbed writings and odd diagrams with arrows pointing up and down and around great circles.

Nettles. And quilts. And correspondences. What did they mean? And where did they mean to start? Thornmallow couldn’t move. He stood, amazed.

As if she knew exactly where to go and what to do, Gorse headed for a particular wall of books and began pulling down volumes, two at a time. Tansy gathered up books from a great plum-covered chair near an oriel window. Will shuffled through leaves of parchment as if they were cards in a deck.

“What are you all doing?” Thornmallow asked at last, no longer caring if they knew how stupid he felt.

“Finding out, of course,” Gorse said in an exasperated tone.

“Finding out what?”

For a moment they all looked so puzzled at his puzzlement that Thornmallow drew in a deep breath. At last he let it out and said, “Look—I know I’m new here. Why, I didn’t even know there was a library. So how can I help it if I don’t know why we are looking up nettles and quilts and … and … correspondences?”

Gorse shook her head as if appalled at his ignorance, but Tansy dropped the books back onto the plum-colored chair. Dust flew up and then settled gently back down on the cushion.

Crossing the room, Tansy explained in a singsong voice, chanting a verse as if she were in class:

Correspondence is the key

To making dreams reality.

First you must repeat the name;

Then make the magic be the same.

“Get it?” she asked in a normal voice.

Dismally, Thornmallow shook his head.

“Thorn … mallow,” Tansy said in a quiet but determined way. “Now do you get it?”

“No.”

“Why do you suppose that’s your name, stupid?” Gorse called.

He turned and glared at her. “Because I’m supposed to be prickly on the outside,” he answered sharply. “Or so everyone keeps telling me.” His chin began to quiver and his eyes shone with tears.

Tansy smiled. “And squishy within. Just like a thornmallow. You are like your name, and it is like you. They correspond.”

“Like Tansy is named Tansy because she has such a sunny disposition,” said Gorse. “And Willoweed because he manages to plant himself anywhere. Just like willoweed.”

“And Gorse is …,” Tansy began.

“Small and prickery,” Gorse finished, as if proud of it.

“So,” Will said, “if we understand what a nettle is, all its properties and uses, then we will understand all about the wizard Nettle—what he is.” His busy fingers kept at the parchments. “And we’ll be able to take away his nettlesome nature.”

“Make him squishy within?” asked Thornmallow.

All three spoke at once: “Exactly.”

“And if we learn all about making quilts,” Gorse added, never looking away from the bookcase, “we’ll also learn how to un-quilt the Beast.”

“It all sounds too easy,” Thornmallow said. “And The Voice we heard is not going to be overcome with easy magic. Besides, if we thought of it, why didn’t the magisters?”

“Probably because it is too simple and too easy,” Gorse said. “Have you ever noticed how grown-ups try to complicate everything? Make it harder than it is? Like grown-up food, with too many sauces.”

“And grown-up clothes, with too many buttons,” added Tansy.

“And grown-up manners,” Will said. “With too many shoulds and shouldn’ts.”

Thornmallow nodded. It all made sense in a way. But something still was troubling him. “WAIT!”

They all looked at him.

“Thornmallow isn’t my True Name. Nor is Henry. No auras, remember? Distinctly flat. I mean—Nettle can’t be the wizard’s True Name. He’d never let anyone know it. So if we don’t know his True Name, what good are all these correspondences anyway?”

Will dropped the parchments to the floor and sank down next to them. Gorse turned from the bookcase, looking grim. Tansy’s hands flapped like broken wings.

“He’s right, you know,” Tansy said at last. “Why didn’t we think of that?”

They shook their heads slowly.

Tansy added, “Without knowing Nettle’s True Name, we might as well not even try.”

The library seemed to reflect their depression. The light appeared to dim, and the walls became as somber as the leather bindings of the books. The words not even try hung in the air, heavy as the smell of the Beast.

“NOT EVEN TRY?” For the first time since coming to Wizard’s Hall, Thornmallow raised his voice. “NOT EVEN TRY?” He remembered his mother’s face at the window.

“Magister Hickory didn’t mention Nettle knowing the True Names of the magisters. So if Nettle managed all he did without knowing them, why can’t we?”

No one answered.

“Gorse, you take nettles as planned. And Tansy, quilts,” Thornmallow said. There was a new power in his voice.

The library lights shot back up to full strength, and the walls brightened again to an off-white.

“Right—and I’ll continue with correspondences,” Will agreed. “I’ve already located a bit about it on one of these parchments.” He scrabbled through the crackling amber-colored sheets. “Here!” He pulled one out of the pile, smiling triumphantly.

“And what about you, Thornmallow?” asked Gorse, clutching a brown book to her chest. “What will you do?”

“I don’t really know yet,” Thornmallow admitted.

“Well, at least you can try to help me,” Gorse said. She winked and held out the book. “Chapter two seems to have lots about nettles in it. See what you can make of it.”