Free Green by Laura Peyton Roberts

chair.
    "Do you want to go back to the cottage?" Lexie asked sympathetically.
    "Yes. Let's," Bronwyn urged. "We're done here, unless you're not finished eating, Lil?"
    I hadn't touched a bite since I'd heard "spotted pisky." I found it hard to believe I would ever be hungry again. Making our excuses to Sosanna and the council, the three of us set off across Green Field, back to the keeper's hut.
    "You guys don't have to come in," I said, dragging my flats up the front path. "If I'm not going on this hunt right away, I wouldn't mind hanging out for a while."
    I'd meant hanging out alone , but Bronwyn took no notice. "Don't be silly," she said. "I've ordered you a bath, Lexie and I are going to brush up that dress you're wearing, and then we'll all have some nice sandwiches."
    "Sandwiches?" I groaned. "I just said I'm not hungry!"
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    "You're not setting off on a pisky hunt with, an empty stomach," Bronwyn told me.
    I let them into the cottage, too depressed to argue. The bathtub was already full of clove-scented water. I moved toward it, then stopped. "What happens if I fail?" I blurted out. "If I don't make keeper, then what?"
    Bronwyn and Lexie exchanged uneasy looks.
    "You won't fail," Bronwyn said. "Maureen sailed through her trial, and aren't you her granddaughter?"
    "But if I do," I insisted. "You said yourself that piskies are dangerous."
    Lexie stared at the floor, avoiding my gaze.
    Bronwyn clucked and shook her head. "That they are. Nasty creatures. Trapping them has been off-limits since the changeling tragedy. I'll admit it makes me wonder what the council is about. But Sosanna is wiser than all three o' us--wouldn't be chief if she weren't. Keep your wits together and you'll be fine."
    "But what if I can't catch one? Or it tricks me like it did those leprechauns at the dance?"
    Bronwyn hesitated, then sighed. "If you fail, the clan will be forced to take back its key and choose a new candidate. Your memory will be wiped o' all things pertaining to the folk. And we will have to send you away. But it would break our hearts to do it, Lil, and there's no good reason it should come to that."
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    "Wait, you'll send me away? Where?" Because if they were going to send me home, failing to catch a pisky wasn't just a possibility. It was my new game plan.
    Bronwyn shook her head. "No Green has failed her trial in three hundred years, and you mustn't think o' it either. The very shame! Our poor Maureen would never rest in peace again. Not that you'd know how you'd let her down."
    "But if ... wait. Why wouldn't I know that?"
    "The memory wipe, o' course! Can't send you back knowing Maureen was our keeper or that you have leprechaun blood, or anything else to do with the folk. You might figure out how to come back and steal our gold."
    I rubbed my aching temples. "Let me get this straight. You're saying if I fail, you'll send me home, but I won't remember anything about you guys or that Gigi was your keeper?"
    "No," Bronwyn corrected. "You won't remember Gigi. Part o' the folk, wasn't she?"
    "You can't do that!"
    "It doesn't hurt, Lil. You just drink a little clover tea brewed with enchanted gold dust. The gold absorbs the right memories and passes straight out o' your body."
    "I don't care if it hurts --Gigi was my grandmother! I have to remember her!"
    "And you will, because you'll succeed. It's bad luck thinking anything else, and you'll be wanting your luck about you
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    tonight when you venture out after that pisky. Now, take off those shoes and let Lexie give them a polish."
    Stepping sullenly out of the silver flats, I kicked them in Lexie's direction. They didn't even look dirty, which was kind of odd, considering all the dirt, grass, and clover they'd stomped through. Taking a seat at the table, I slouched down till my chin touched wood.
    Bronwyn climbed up a stool to join me. "Lexie, dear, go fetch the sandwiches," she ordered. "I'm not sure how much longer our Lil will be awake."
    Lexie put down the shoe she was