The Magic Mirror of the Mermaid Queen by Delia Sherman

Author:Delia Sherman
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Children's Books
ISBN: 0670010898
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2009-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

The next night, I was standing in Central Park Central between Astris and Mr. Rat, listening to the Lady hand out prizes for the scavenger hunt. The winner was the silver earring, with a pocket mirror (un-magical) and a shiny quarter as runners-up. The winners got to keep what they found, plus their choice of what everybody else had collected.

It was a beautiful night. The trees were beginning to turn, the ground beneath them scattered with the first of a dragon’s hoard of gold and ruby leaves. The moon was gigantic in a sky so clear and black I could see stars. Jack and his chilly relatives had touched the wind with the promise of frost. Astris had given me a new dress made with wool from the Sheep’s Meadow flock. I was as happy as a rat in a garbage bag.

And then Astris started chittering. “He’s here again. The Mermaid’s Voice!”

I looked past a flock of fauns to the Lady’s granite throne, where the Lady, crowned with leaves, was glaring at the shiny-vested mortal who had threatened the Park on the last full moon. I remembered Airboy had said that the changeling’s name was Oxygen, and he wasn’t really ready to be a Voice. Now that I’d been around mortals, I could tell he wasn’t grown up yet—maybe Stonewall’s age. He was nervous.

“Hail, Green Lady of Central Park,” he said. “Have you considered the Queen’s offer?”

The Lady laughed angrily. “You call that an offer? Sounded a lot like a threat to me. Yeah, I’m thinking about it, and I’m not done yet. Get lost, Fish Boy.”

“That’s the Lady,” Astris said, voice sad, whiskers admiring. “Proud as the rocks underfoot and twice as hard.”

In other words, the Queen was a pigheaded idiot. And I seemed to be the only one who thought it was a problem.

When Oxygen was gone, Astris grabbed Mr. Rat and plunged into the dancing. I ran up to the Castle and climbed into bed, where I shut out the stars with the curtains and the music with my pillow.

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