The Wizard's Map by Jane Yolen Read Free Book Online

didn’t mean to go
splah
on you.” She didn’t mention that he’d been crying earlier, because it wouldn’t have helped to bring it up. He didn’t mention it, either.
    â€œWe should go downstairs and tell them Molly’s not here,” Peter said.
    â€œThey’ll have guessed by now.”
    It was such a sensible answer, Peter just nodded. “But where is she?” Peter said. “I mean, Michael Scot touched her and then they just ... disappeared.”
    â€œMagic.” Jennifer said the word with more confidence than she felt. “And the only way to get her back is with the same.”
    â€œDon’t be a nitwit. We don’t have any magic.”
    â€œWe have the map,” Jennifer said. “And the cards. They are part of riddles. The Minor Arcana. I’m sure of it.”
    He looked at her oddly.
    â€œYou promised to trust me.”
    â€œThen we have to think this out carefully. Figure out what each item means.” Peter looked down at the map.
    â€œCarefully and quickly,” Jennifer added unnecessarily.
    Peter counted on his fingers. “The map. The cards. The turban. Maybe the doll. What else?” Jennifer nodded at each item. “Oh no!”
    â€œOh no, what?”
    â€œI forgot. I have this key.” She pulled the key from her pocket and gave it to him.
    He looked at the tag. “What’s a summer hoose?”
    â€œI think it means summer house. You know—a garden house. Not to live in, but to read in or to play in.” Quickly Jennifer told him how she had gone into the back garden while he’d been trying out the croquet set, and how she’d gotten lost in the strange forest.
    â€œ...which was much bigger than it should have been.” She tried explaining what she hadn’t understood herself, making a complete mess of it.
    Peter looked dubious.
    But the moment she mentioned following the white cat, they both looked at the upper left-hand comer of the map. The puss in the box wasn’t white. It wasn’t any color at all.
    â€œStill,” Jennifer said, “that’s one more corner that seems to have some connection with this ... thing.”
    â€œI think,” Peter said, “that’s not quite right. I mean, I think this has more to do with the Patience games than the map.”
    â€œPatience!”
Jennifer said. “That’s it!”
    â€œThat’s what?”
    â€œMother said in the car on our way here that we needed patience.”
    â€œShe meant something else, Jen.”
    â€œMaybe.”
    He nodded. “OK—maybe.”
    â€œAnd we have patience now. Or rather, we have the game.”
    â€œActually,” said Peter, “it’s not just one game, but a whole lot of them.”
    â€œOK—a whole lot of Patiences. And they seem to relate somehow to the map. And Michael Scot wants the map and will trade us Molly for it. So.”
    â€œSo...”
    â€œI think we need to
play
the games. Like Gran was doing downstairs.”
    â€œJen—Molly is missing. We have to do more than just play cards.” The crack in his voice had returned.
    â€œMom and Pop and Gran and Da are downstairs doing the ordinary things,” Jennifer said patiently. “Like calling the police and searching the house and the garden. We can’t help Molly that way. But we are twins—which Gran thinks is out of the ordinary. So what we’ve got to do is not the ordinary, but the extraordinary.”
    â€œLike playing Patience?”
    She nodded. “We did The Star first, right?”
    â€œAnd it was easy.”
    â€œLook.” She pointed to the star on the map. “I think that’s new. It’s brighter than the rest. I don’t think it was on the map until yesterday, after we played the game.”
    â€œYou can’t prove that, Jen.”
    â€œYou can’t
not
prove it,” Jennifer said.
    â€œSo what does it