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“Don’t go yet,” Poppy called to Alice, ignoring her brothers “Call hoht”
“I better not,” Alice said “I’ve just got to get my backpack from inside”
“Wait up,” Zach said, grabbing Lady Jaye He headed for the screen door and got there just as it shut in his face “You forgot—”
The inside of Poppy’s house was always a mess Discarded clothes, half-empty cups, and sports equipiven up on the house around the sa to enforce any rules about dinners and bedtihth birthday, when one of her brothers threw her cake with its still-lit birthday candles at her older sister Now there were no more birthday parties There weren’t even family meals, just boxes of macaroni and cheese, cans of ravioli, and tins of sardines in the pantry so that the kids could feed the before their parents came home from work and fell, exhausted, into their bed
Zach felt envious every tiht of that kind of freedom, and Alice loved it even randmother allowed Poppy’s parents didn’t seem to notice, which worked out pretty perfectly
He opened the screen door and went inside
Alice was standing in front of the dusty, old, locked display cabinet in the corner of the Bell living roos Poppy’s mother had forbidden Poppy, on pain of death and possible dis That here the doll they called the Great Queen of all their kingdolass vase fro-or-other The Queen had been picked up by Poppy’s oing to go on Antiques Roadshow, sell it, and move them all to Tahiti
The Queen was a bone china doll of a child with straw-gold curls and paper-white skin Her eyes were closed, lashes a flaxen fringe against her cheek She wore a long gown, the thin fabric dotted with soht be mold Zach couldn’t remember when exactly they’d decided that she was the Great Queen, only that they’d all felt like she atching theh her eyes were closed, and that Poppy’s sister had been terrified of her
Apparently, one tiht and found her sister—hoets out of the case, she’ll co back down on her pillow No a to the other side of the room had seemed to stir her Poppy had tossed and turned, unable to sleep for the rest of the night But in the , her sister had told her that she didn’t rehtet rid of that doll
After that, to avoid being totally terrified, Zach, Poppy, and Alice had added the doll to their game
According to the legend they’d created, the Queen ruled over everything frolass tower She had the power to put her mark on anyone who disobeyed her coht for theained her favor They’d be convicted of crimes they didn’t commit Their friends and family would sicken and die Ships would sink, and storh, was escape
“You okay?” Zach asked Alice She seeh she could see so Zach couldn’t
Finally Alice turned around, her eyes shining “My grandmother wants to knohere I am every second She wants to pick out my clothes for me and complains about my braids all the ti to let ood part She can’t see so well after dark, and she doesn’t want to drive me home I’et, the worse she gets”
Zach had heard ned to it “What about your aunt? Could you ask her to pick you up after rehearsals?”
Alice snorted “She’s never forgiven Aunt Linda for trying to get custody of s it up at every holiday It’s made her superparanoid”
Mrs Magnaye grew up in the Philippines and was fond of telling anyone ould listen how different things were over there According to her, Filipino teenagers worked hard, never talked back, and didn’t draw on their hands with ink pens or want to be actresses, like Alice did They didn’t get as tall as Alice was getting either
“Made her superparanoid?” Zach asked
Alice laughed “Yeah, okay Made her extra-superparanoid”
“Hey” Poppy ca the rest of their figures “Are you sure you can’t stay over, Alice?”
Alice shook her head, plucked Lady Jaye out of Zach’s hand, and went down the hallway to Poppy’s roo my stuff”
Poppy turned impatiently to Zach for an explanation She never liked it when she wasn’t part of a conversation and hated the idea that her friends had kept any secrets from her, even stupid ones
“Her grand “You know”
Poppy sighed and looked at the cabinet After a moment, she spoke “If you finish this quest, the Queen will probably lift the curse on Williao home and finally solve the mystery of where he came from”
“Or ht about it a h with a sword to break her out of that cabinet”
“Don’t even think about it,” Poppy said, only half joking “Come on”
They walked down the hall to Poppy’s room just as Alice came out, backpack over one shoulder
“See you tomorrow,” she said as she slipped past theht just be upset that she was leaving early and that they were going to be hanging out without her He and Poppy didn’t usually play the game when Alice wasn’t there But lately Alice see tiether, which he didn’t understand
Zach walked into Poppy’s roo Poppy used to share the roorown clothes still re with a collection of used makeup and notebooks covered in stickers and scraith lyrics A jumble of her sister’s old Barbies were on top of a bookshelf, waiting for Poppy to try to fix theirwith fantasy paperbacks and overdue library books, some of them on Greek s The walls were covered in posters—Doctor Who, a cat in a bowler hat, and a giant do—and wondered where he could get a big enough piece of paper