What I Wore to Save the World (27 page)

I'd forgotten all about the poor enchanted architect. The ice had melted and now he was standing in a puddle, shivering and sneezing. I handed him a crumpled but mostly clean tissue from the pocket of my jeans. “Bless you, Mr. McAlister. Maybe we should get you a blanket or something.”

“As you wish, Your Majesty!” Before I could say another word, a team of elves dressed like medics had wrapped Mr. McAlister in foil blankets, like he'd just finished running a marathon. A winged pixie, looking like Tinker Bell in a nurse's uniform, fluttered around his head and spooned hot cocoa into his mouth. He gave me a thumbs-up and talked between spoonfuls.

“Congratulations, Morgan dear—
yum
! Not enchanted”—
mmmm
—“anymore! Sorry for my”—
slurp
—“embarrassing remarks earlier, I don't know what got into me. More marshmallows, please!”

I'm gonna have to be careful giving orders from now on,
I thought.

Phinnbar now held a clipboard and was busy ticking items off a list. “Throwing a coronation on such short notice,
tsk tsk
! But I'll do my best. Your Majesty?”

It took me a minute to realize he meant me. “Uh, what?”

“Will you be bringing a royal consort to the coronation? I'm trying to do a seating chart.” He tapped his pencil on the clipboard. “For dinner we have beef, chicken and vegetarian options.”

“I'll be her date. If she'll have me, that is.” Colin put his arm around my waist. “And chicken suits me fine.”

I turned and slid my arms around his neck. “One chicken, one vegetarian,” I said, as romantically as I could.

Phinnbar clucked his tongue and made marks on the clipboard. Colin held me tightly. “My girlfriend, the half-goddess,” he murmured. “And now ye're Queen of the Faeries! Ye must have had some wild adventures. I want to hear all about 'em. If ye choose to tell me, o' course.”

“No more secrets,” I whispered in his ear. “Hey, would you like to know why you were so sleepy when you came to Connecticut? There was this enchantment, see, and—”

“At the moment I'm just curious about what it'd be like to kiss royalty,” he said, cutting me off. “But if that's classified information I'll completely understand.”

“Classified . . . ?” I was going to make some kind of wisecrack but somehow we were already too busy locking lips for that.

“Ahem! Your Majesty? Royal Consort? Enough with the tonsil hockey.” Phinnbar clicked his heels together offi ciously. “It's time for your coronation!”

Colin and I slowly floated back to earth. I looked down at my grubby jeans and T-shirt. Colin's outfit wasn't much better, plus his pants were covered with unicorn hair.

“I feel like a slob,” I confessed to Phinnbar. “My first coronation, and I'm a total fashion disaster.”

“No worries, Your Eminence! We have people to take care of this kind of thing. Bring on the royal stylists!” No sooner did he say it than luxurious scarlet robes were draped around our shoulders. Somebody did something fancy with my hair, and a golden crown was placed on my head. And a handsome medal reading “Royally Excellent Boyfriend” was pinned to Colin's robe.

“I feel like the bloody prom king now,” Colin cracked. I made sure to hang my locket on the outside of the robe, where everyone could see it. Grandpap looked ready to burst with pride.

“Spectacular!” Phinnbar declared. “Now, it's been so long since the last coronation, nobody really remembers what the ceremony is supposed to include. Even the
Book of Horns
is vague on the subject; it merely says that ‘appropri ate revels should ensue.' But the unicorns have offered to do a little something, and in the absence of any other entertainment I say let's go with it.” He pointed. “Cue unicorns!”

The unicorns proceeded to perform the halftime coronation show to end all halftime coronation shows. Formation gallops, synchronized leaping, gymnastic tricks and elaborate unicorn pyramids. They ended by spelling out LONG LIVE QUEEN MORGAN(NE) with their twinkling horns, as the fireflies provided a laser light-style display overhead and the sea of onlookers cheered.

“They're bloody fantastic,” Colin whispered to me. “Beijing Olympics pales in comparison. So much better to see these large-scale spectacles in person too, the television cameras can never really do 'em justice.”

Which made me start to hyperventilate, as I suddenly realized—
television cameras?

I looked around the piazza. The cameras were still rolling, filming the festivities. Reporters wandered everywhere, gathering on-the-spot reaction from spectators and blathering all the usual self-evident commentary into their microphones.

“Phinnbar?” I tugged on his sleeve. “Where exactly is all this being broadcast?”

He looked at me like I was dense. “Everywhere, of course! It's the biggest news story ever, practically. According to the latest Nielsen data, ratings are through the roof.”

“Everywhere?” I gulped. “Meaning, in the human realm too? Even in Connecticut?”

“
Especially
Connecticut!” he crowed. “I mean, how often does their very own hometown girl get elected queen?”

twenty-three

oh, phek.

How could I be so stupid? Of course all of this was being broadcast. My campaign speech was probably a YouTube sensation by now.

I thought of Tammy, glued to the TV. Except instead of
SpongeBob
, she'd be watching
My Sister, the Faery Queen
. On every channel.

Imagine the princess outfits she's picking out right about now,
I thought.
She'll be mighty pissed off to have missed the coronation.

And what about Sarah, and her boyfriend, Dylan, and all my other friends from school? Would being Queen of the Faeries boost my chances at winning senior prom queen next year?

And—oh yeah—my parents. I could just picture Mom, white-knuckled, clutching the coffee table and fanning herself with a Princeton brochure, while the voice mail picked up call after hysterical call from her astonished friends. At least I'd given a major shout-out about how declutter ing was vital to human happiness. That had to score a few points.

And, nearby: my dad, taking up smoking again twenty years after he quit.

I even thought of Raph. I had to admit, it would be pretty satisfying to see his smug face seething with envy. Ruler of a realm totally pwned valedictorian.

But really—this was an
epic
fail! After all my obsessing about keeping goddess-me secret, now every single person within remote-control reach of a TV set was in on it. My fantasy of freelancing on the down-low as part-time Queen of the Faeries while faking my way through another year as Morgan Whatshername, third Senior from the left, had just popped like a Mr. Bubble bubble that floated too close to a ceiling fan.

But it isn't about you anymore,
my inner get-your-act-together voice reminded me.
It's time to save the world, remember?
Messing with the heads of the mortals was exactly what I'd been supposed to prevent, and in fifteen minutes as queen I'd wreaked more havoc in that department than Titania ever had. Was there any way to undo the damage? It was time for Queen Me to find out.

“That was so cool, everybody, thanks!” I yelled, waving to the crowd. Then I turned to Phinnbar and Epona. “The ‘appropriate revels' were awesome, and I really appreciate all the fuss. But I want to get to work fixing stuff, like I promised during the campaign.”

“Now?” Phinnbar looked hurt. “What about your dinner? I thought we might have a little dancing after.”

“That would be fun.” I was pretty hungry, to be honest. “But think about those poor mortals. They must be getting more freaked out by the minute. I want to put the veil back right away. So, stupid question: What do I do?”

“It's very simple,” Epona explained. “As Queen of the Faeries, you have unimaginable powers. If you decree that the veil between the realms is restored, it shall be restored.”

I glanced at Titania, who was sprawled on a nearby bench having a weepy fit while Mr. McAlister patiently handed her tissue after tissue. “And what about the magic stuff that's already gotten loose?” I asked. “All those gargoyles and the dragon—and these television broadcasts!” I thought of my family and cringed. “Can I decree that everybody in the world forgets what happened?”

“Your powers are vast, Your Majesty, but not
that
vast,” Epona said thoughtfully. “Erasing the memory of the whole human race is a big job. But you can certainly make the mortals a bit foggy about what's happened. Rest assured, they'll come up with some perfectly rational explanation for whatever memories remain.”

“Sounds like it's up to you, love.” Colin gave me a supportive wink. “Just say the word.”

“Okay.” I took a deep breath. “I want the veil between the realms restored. I want everything put back the way it was before Titania started to mess it up. And I want the human realm to forget all the magic stuff that's happened, or at least not be freaked out by whatever it was they think they saw. Let no evidence remain.”

I did a z-snap in the air, just to give my first act of queenly authority some oomph.

An icy wind blasted across the piazza. My robe and Colin's billowed outward like red velvet sails. A strange buzz traveled up my spine until my scalp tingled. It was like the static shock you sometimes get from touching a balloon, only much, much weirder.

Whoosh.
The topiary bunnies were shrubs once more.

Whoosh.
The gargoyles resumed their rightful positions along the balustrade.

Whoosh. Whoosh. Whoosh
. One by one, the magical beings on the piazza marched calmly to the reflecting pool. Some waited on line to board the pirate ship. Others just dove in. All of them seemed ready, willing and able to go back to where they belonged.

Almost all of them, that is.

Titania stood reluctantly at the edge of the pool, whining, “But how can I
possibly
show my face in the faery realm again? All I know how to do is be queen! Without my career, who am I?”

Phinnbar hobbled over to her with his crooked old-man gait and threw his spindly arms around her waist. “You're still my mum! Perhaps we'll get to spend more time together now that you won't be so busy.”

Titania unwrapped his arms with distaste. “Phinnbar, darling. You are terribly sweet, but sooner or later a woman wants more in life than packing lunch boxes and wiping noses. Especially when the nose is so old and wrinkly.”

Embarrassed, Phinnbar quickly morphed back into the cute teen boy I knew as Finnbar. He held out his arms for another hug, but Titania ignored him. “Oh, it's awful,” she moaned. “How can I ever be happy as just another ordinary, gorgeous, brilliant, scintillating faery woman, when I'm used to being ‘all that and a sparkly crown.' I wish I could forget I'd ever been queen!”

“Do you really mean that?” Epona asked, nostrils flaring.

“Maybe.” Titania was petulant. “Why? What are you driving at, shiny pony person?”

“I think she's sayin' ye could have the veil of forgetfulness too,” Colin suggested gently. “If Queen Morgan here so decrees.”

“You mean,
really
forget I was queen?” She considered it for a second, then made a face. “But all of
you
would remember! You'd make fun of me behind my back. How perfectly humiliating that would be! Sorry, no can do.”

“What if you defected and lived among the mortals?” I offered. “Like Glinda the Good Witch did when she wanted to be in
The Wizard of Oz.
”

“Me? Mortal? That is
beyond
ridiculous!” She laughed wildly at the suggestion. “It's ludicrous! Absurd!” Then she stopped. “Tell me more.”

“It's the perfect solution.” I glanced at Epona to make sure this would work. The unicorn nodded, and I turned back to Titania. “I mean, isn't that why you lifted the veil to begin with? So you could share in all the really, really fun things mortals do?”

Titania took a fresh tissue and dabbed at her eyes. “You mean, I could take budget cruise vacations on the off-season and pay for them with my AmEx points? Use my cell phone to help choose a winner on
American Idol
? Shop at big-box stores and come home with a year's worth of toilet paper for only ten bucks?”

“And more.” I didn't dare catch Colin's eye for fear I'd bust a gut laughing. “Being mortal's fun. You'll love it.”

Now Titania was getting excited. “I must admit, it sounds relaxing. Especially after all these gazillions of years of being the gal in charge. ‘Uneasy lies the updo that wears the crown,' as I once quipped to my old pal Bill Shakespeare. If anyone deserves a break, it's me.”

She turned away from the reflecting pool and extended a hand in my direction, pirate-red press-on nails and all. “All right, Miss Queeny. It's a deal. I'm willing to be mortal—as long as I'm special.”

“You will be, believe me.” I shook her hand, still trying not to crack up.

“And what about you, Colin?” Epona asked gently. “Have you made up your mind yet?”

He looked at me, confused. I was confused too. “About what?” I asked.

Epona flicked her tail in concern. “The veil of forgetfulness is blanketing the human realm even as we speak. Colin will need to choose—is he one of them? Or one of us?”

The way Epona referred to Colin as “one of them” and me as “one of us” made my stomach lurch. Colin seemed to miss the significance. He shrugged at Epona. “I'm a simple bloke. I can't imagine bein' anything or anyone other than who I've always been.”