The Crimson Skew (38 page)

“Y
ES, YES, YE
S!”
Shadrack exclaimed, looking over Sophia's shoulder. “That's it! You've done it!”

Sophia beamed. “It worked.”

“Of course it worked,” her uncle said affectionately. “You've been practicing for two months.”

Miles, sitting in the armchair of the map room in the basement, raised his teacup to toast the accomplishment. “Well done, Sophia.” He did not lift his eyes from the book he was reading.

“You could at least pretend to be impressed,” Shadrack said dryly.

“Give me exploration maps over memory maps every time. You know my thoughts on the subject.” He wet his thumb and turned the page.

“Well,
I'm
impressed,” Theo said with a grin, getting up from his seat across from Miles. “Can I read it now?”

Sophia looked shocked. “I only just started. It's nowhere near done.”

“But it's an excellent foundation, Sophia,” Shadrack said with pride. “Your memories are crystal clear.”

“Theo's . . .” Sophia considered. “Are not.”

“I was wounded. I was asleep half the time,” Theo protested.

“It will help when Casanova visits and we can add what he remembers,” she said diplomatically.

Her memory map of the journey to the Stone Age, the realm of the three sisters, was coming along well. She had, as Shadrack reminded her, spent months perfecting the techniques that he had taught her in the fall. Having gratefully abandoned his post at the ministry and resumed his work at the university, Shadrack had much more time for mapmaking and map-teaching. And Sophia, of course, jumped at the chance. Every day when she returned from school, she read the manuscripts Shadrack left for her and practiced the exercises he laid out. Each night before bed, she practiced the map-reading that she had learned with Goldenrod and Bittersweet, studying the remnants of the world around her: leaves and stones, bark and soil.

Sophia settled into these routines, but there was a difference. With map-reading, it seemed that every day brought
with it a new discovery. Finally, in January, she had begun to create her own map.

She was pleased with the process. It was an act of recollection, for it drew on all the sights and sounds and emotions she had experienced; and so making the map became a way of reliving them. At the same time, it was an act of creation; she felt herself infusing each sight, sound, and emotion with meaning and fullness. She loved it.

“Well, Shadrack,” Miles said, finishing his tea and putting his book down with an impatient air. “I came here because you said you'd found a map, not because I wanted to watch Sophia practice mapmaking.”

“Fine, yes, my rude friend,” Shadrack said, walking around the table, opening a tin box and removing a folded packet of worn paper. “I bought it at the dreck market.”

“Aha!” Miles exclaimed, eyes widening. He took the folded paper eagerly in hand. “And what does it show?”

“A city—a city on an island, in the far western Baldlands.”

“Where the Eerie are from?” Sophia asked.

“A bit farther south.”

Miles spread the map out on the table, and the four of them gathered around it, scrutinizing its contents. It was drawn by someone with a talented but untrained hand. The streets were tight and narrow, and a network of dots fell over the city like a constellation of stars. Sophia pointed at them. “What are these?”

“The legend is torn, as you can see,” Shadrack said. “They could be anything. Since they are enumerated, I would guess they are all places of one kind.”

“Or they could be numbered, like steps,” Sophia suggested.

“Here is what caught my eye.” He indicated the notation in the corner, beside the compass rose.

Theo read aloud, “1842. Believed lost in 1799.”

“So the map was drawn in 1842?” Sophia speculated.

“And was the map believed lost, or was the
city
believed lost?” Shadrack wondered.

“I recognize this shape!” Miles exclaimed, drawing his finger around the island. “I have never been there, but it is thought to be uninhabited.”

“Exactly,” Shadrack said triumphantly.

“And it might not be?” asked Sophia.

Before Shadrack could answer, Miles thumped his fist on the table. “Fantastic!” he cried. “I will plan an expedition at once.”

“I thought you might want to,” Shadrack said calmly. “But I would recommend we wait until the summer, or at least the late spring. Travel across the continent in this weather would be unpleasant, to say the least.”

“Nonsense, man,” Miles exclaimed. “The snow is no obstacle.”

“What about the school year? Sophia will not want to miss her classes, Winnie will want to but
should
not, and Nettie's father certainly won't consider letting her leave before summer.”

Sophia seized her uncle's arm. “You mean we're all going together?”

“Of course.” Shadrack smiled.

“Yes, yes, yes!” She practically danced.

Theo laughed. “This is going to be a long winter of waiting.”

“Can't she take her books with her?” demanded Miles, with an air of impatience.

Shadrack sighed. “You have no conception of the scholarly life, Miles. It depresses me. I can't understand how you have made it this far as my friend.”

“I simply ignore everything about you that is irritating.”

Sophia and Theo glanced at one another with knowing smiles, anticipating one of the two old friends' epic and long-winded squabbles. Quietly, they left the table and made their way to the stairs, climbing up to the first floor. Mrs. Clay was writing letters in the study, and she waved her pen at them briefly as they walked by. They climbed again, to the second floor, and ended in Sophia's room, where the window overlooked the rooftops of East Ending Street.

“Secret chocolate?” Sophia asked.

“Absolutely.”

Sophia opened her wardrobe and drew out a box, sent to her by Mazapán, their friend in Nochtland, and delivered by the pirates. She pulled out two chocolate spoons and handed one to Theo.

Perching before the window in unspoken agreement, they looked out over the city of Boston and ate their chocolate spoons. A companionable silence fell over them. The snow that had been waiting all day in the clouds overhead began to fall, filling the air with white dust and an air of possibility.

I am grateful to the librarians, booksellers, and readers who have followed Sophia and Theo so far on their adventures. You've made me reluctant to end the journey! A special thanks to bookseller extraordinaire Kenny Brechner, for indefatigable enthusiasm and erudition.

Viking and the Penguin Young Readers Group have carried this surprising voyage to its happy conclusion. I am grateful to Ken Wright, Jim Hoover, Eileen Savage, Dave A. Stevenson, Stephanie Hans, Janet Pascal, Abigail Powers, Krista Ahlberg, Eileen Kreit, Julia McCarthy, Jessica Shoffel, Tara Shanahan, Amanda Mustafic, Zarren Kuzma, and the sales team (especially Jackie Engel and Biff Donovan) for ensuring that these stories made their way from sketchy lines in my head to beautiful books in readers' hands.

Sharyn November, were it not for your passionately offbeat (and excellent) taste, this trilogy would never have made it onto paper. From that first conversation we had, in which the shared favorites tumbled out by the handfuls, I've felt fortunate to have found such a like-minded reader and thinker.

Dorian Karchmar, thank you for the impeccable sensibility you bring to writing and the wisdom you bring to everything else about the process.

And, as ever, I could not have finished this book without the judicious comments of early readers. To my parents, my brother, and Pablo—thank you for leaping into every stage of this story and cheering me all the way. Mamá and Papá, I've noticed that you always keep my books in view on the coffee table. Thanks for treating all my scribbles, even the abysmal ones from when I was ten, as if they deserve pride of place.

Alton, knowing you will read a manuscript the moment I hand it to you persuades me, all the time and every day, that I'm doing something worthwhile. These stories are always somehow at their best in your imagination—thank you.

This book is dedicated to Rowan, who may someday actually read it. In the meantime, you are filling the world with words far more lovely, fantastical, funny, and profound. Thank you for the constant inspiration.

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