Free Changeling by Delia Sherman Page A

changeling.
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I’d always known how I’d come to live in New York Between. Astris had often told me the story of how a Kid-napper from the Bureau of Changeling Affairs had chosen me out of all the little girls in New York Outside to be the official changeling of Central Park. She hadn’t said a word about the fairy changeling left behind in my place, and I hadn’t asked. I was more interested in hearing about me.
    Carlyle’s mind-voice broke into my shock.
    Just look at them , he was saying. Like two peas in a pod. What are the chances, do you think, of finding them in two different realities and bringing them together? I should get points just for that.
    â€œYou should be disqualified, you mean,” yelled a bogeyman in the front. He was kind of mauve, with huge red eyes and the usual mouthful of nasty teeth. He wasn’t on any of the lists I’d learned. Someone must have made him up.
    â€œYeah,” a dog-headed bogeyman said. “That one on the right, she’s not even mortal.”
    Not mortal? Carlyle scoffed. She smells mortal. Her parents treat her like a mortal. She’s growing up and getting older. That’s what mortals do, isn’t it?
    The bogeymen weren’t impressed. There were cries of “Cheat!” and “Not fair!” and “What does Eloise say?”
    Eloise scrambled to her feet and stood on the tips of her little black Mary Janes, holding Skipperdee over her head with both hands. “Here’s what I say,” she screeched. “BEAR PILE!”
    And she dove into the crowd of bogeymen headfirst.
    A bright green bogeyman unhinged his jaw and roared. Carlyle shifted into a raven and flew at him, scaly claws spread.
    This seemed like a perfect time to escape—if only I could find the way out.
    â€œI do not like this dream.”
    My fairy twin had transferred her attention from the chandelier to the storm-tossed sea of bogeymen. Her arms were crossed and her head was sort of tucked down in the collar of her jacket, like Skipperdee in his shell. I could hardly stand to look at her. Was my face really that round and piggy? And was my voice really that ugly? I mean, next to the silver music of most fairy voices, I knew my voice was flat and coarse, but inside my head it didn’t sound nearly as bad as hers.
    A small red bogeyman came hurtling over my head, bounced against the cage of naughty children, and flew back into the scrimmage.
    â€œThere’s got to be a door,” I said. “Bogeymen can’t walk through walls.”
    â€œBogeymen do not exist.”
    â€œThen we’ve got nothing to worry about, do we?”
    â€œMy therapist says that dreams, however subjectively frightening, have no objective reality. It would be irrational to be frightened.”
    I glared at her. She didn’t notice. I walked to the back of the stage. Just as I had thought, the little space behind the cage of naughty children was big enough to squeeze through. Once I got past them, I could jump down off the stage and crawl along the wall, checking the mirrors as I went to see if any of them opened or transported me somewhere. It wasn’t the best idea in the world, but it was the best one I could come up with.
    The fairy changeling appeared beside me. “Can you read kanji?”
    â€œCan I read what ?”
    â€œKanji.” She pointed to one of the mirrors. “There is a sign over that door, but I cannot read it. It is Japanese, or possibly Chinese. Japanese is written in Chinese characters called kanji.”
    She started to tell me more about kanji, but I interrupted her. “You can see doors ?”
    â€œYes. There are three, one in the center of each wall.”
    I believed her, of course. If she said she saw a door, there was a door. Without being able to see the sign, I didn’t know where it led, but anywhere was better than where I was. Unfortunately, I was going to have to bring her with