The Chestnut King: Book 3 of the 100 Cupboards by N. D. Wilson

Author:N. D. Wilson [Wilson, N. D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 978-0-375-89320-9
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2010-11-14T06:00:00+00:00

Henry sat at the dining room table. It was nice being out of the dim attic, being entirely out of Endor or any smell of Endor. Sunlight poured through the broken windows. The white curtains, brightened by the sun, stroked the breeze as it climbed into the room. The room echoed with the sound of water splashing down the stairs. The ceiling dripped.

He was wet, extremely wet, and so were Henrietta and Zeke, but he still kept his feet up off the floor, where sea-water rippled an inch deep. Beo had splashed around in it so madly that they had finally let the dog out the front door. That had calmed things. Henry struck his last match, lit a paper, and threw it onto the table in front of the others. It whitened and shrunk. Henrietta pulled her shortened curls straight and let go. They bounced back up to the top of her head.

“What is it?” she asked. “The sun?”

Zeke scratched his cheek and watched the paper soften and gray until only a rectangle of ash was left. The rectangle grabbed on to the breeze and rolled toward Henry, disintegrating as it went.

“It looks like the ball the old man had,” Zeke said. “The man who crawled out of the floor.”

Henry nodded. “The Blackstar. But why is the picture hidden in the papers? The faeries might be able to tell us. At least I hope so.”

“You think that picture is going to help us find it?” Henrietta asked.

Henry shrugged. “I don’t know. But the words mean something, and someone put them there for a reason.”

Zeke glanced at the seawater running across the floor and straightened, stretching his back side to side like he did before a pitch. “Your dad wants us to take these papers to the faeries?”

Henry braced his feet against the table legs and tipped back in his chair, brushing the ash off his lap and into the water. “Try for the Faerie Queene and then the Chestnut King. That’s what we do.”

“But we’re supposed to wait a day?” Henrietta asked. “Where? There’s no house. There’s nobody.”

“The Horned Horse,” Henry said. “We’re supposed to wait there. I don’t know where it is.”

“It’s on the square.” Again Henrietta pulled at her hair and felt it bounce. “Una took us. I don’t know where you were. Maybe playing baseball.”

Henry thumped his chair flat. “You don’t have to keep doing that. Pulling your hair. It’s not going to make it longer.”

Henrietta dropped her hand. “Do you realize how short I’m going to have to cut it now? It’s ridiculous. I’ve got these straggles on the sides and it’s super short on top.”

Zeke smiled. “Next time, Henry, try to cut it even.”

Henrietta snorted. “Next time, Henry, don’t cut it at all.”

“I’ll work on that,” Henry said. “I really will. How’s your neck?”

Henrietta turned around and lifted up her short hair. “It doesn’t hurt.”

Both Henry and Zeke leaned forward. A thin black scab ran across her neck where the sword’s edge had parted her skin.

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