The Cinderella Theorem (25 page)

“Exactly.
Besides, fairy godmothers have three prohibitions about wishes: No wishing for
extra wishes. No wishing for vanished people to return, and no wishing for ice
cream.”

“Ice
cream?”

“It’s
too messy.” He shuddered.

I
sighed loudly. “I really hoped that would work.” I closed my eyes. “.4%, huh?”

“You
don’t have to do this, Princess. I’ll come up with another plan.”

I
looked at the map table. The heat sensitive map was showing. Twelve of the
thirty-two cells had red in them. The red splotches equaled vanished citizens.
If I didn’t rescue them, how many more splotches would there be?

Calo
was a terrific Happiologist; if I could get him almost to the point of
vanishing back, I could use him to help me rescue everyone else. Calo at 75-80%
efficiency was something like four times better than me. I would need a bit
more information before I could work that equation with accuracy, but I felt
confident my estimate was correct. Then when everyone else was safe, I’d get
Calo to vanish back by groveling or flattery.

I
wasn’t confident that I would get to Happily Ever After–especially not after
groveling to Calo, but…. I went over the numbers in my head again. It was the
only way. I looked at the notes littered on Calo’s desk. On his calendar, in
the square for today, he’d written:
Lunch with Linda
.

“Who’s
Linda?” I asked aloud.

Doug
was furiously scribbling alternative plans for rescue. He looked up.
“Uh…Linda’s the Beauty from
Beauty and the Beast
. She called earlier
looking for Calo. I had to make something up.” He went back to his planning and
I tried to figure out why her name was Linda. Why wasn’t it just Beauty?

I
surprised myself by actually remembering her story. She had traded places with
her father, so he could get out of the Beast’s dungeon. She had sacrificed her
life for his. Of course, it turned out rather well in the end, being a fairy
tale and all.

And
just like that, I knew I’d do it. Even if I wound up stuck in a room that was a
geometrical impossibility–like those staircase illusions–I would do my best to
rescue these stories. I would do it because of Beauty (or Linda, if that is her
real name) and her sacrifice, I would do it because Ella offered me her
friendship without expecting anything in return, because Aven took time out of
his busy Atlantis campaign to make a map table for me, and because Calo didn’t
deserve to be vanished in Levi’s attempt to get me.

I
smiled weakly at Doug. “Okay, so how do I find Levi?”

I
stood at the edge of the Wildwood, willing myself to enter. “Darkness is just
the absence of light,” I repeated for the ninth time.

When
I was little and light was just light and not something that traveled at the
speed of 186,000 miles per second, I would run into Mom’s room and cry because
of the dark. She would give me a hug, read me a fairy tale, and put me back into
bed, telling me “Darkness is just the absence of light.” Then, she’d make some
light: a night light, the hall light, or sometimes she’d leave a flashlight
with me. But when I started school, I grew out of my fear. (Grew out of my fear
= being able to sleep without supplemental light.)

I
wasn’t afraid to enter the Wildwood–well, not exactly. The problem centered
more on the
degree
of darkness. At home, streetlights shined in my
window, and the switch on my computer power strip had a light in it, plus I had
glow-in-the-dark stars on my ceiling. It wasn’t exactly the absolute absence of
light.

The
Wildwood was.

It
was like staring into a black hole. There was nothing giving off light, nothing
in the distance. The sun’s rays didn’t even penetrate the forest.

“It’s
a matter of will power,” Doug had said. “The Wildwood wants to keep you out.
You’ll have to prove you want in that much more.”

I
didn’t understand. “What do you mean? Like the woods are alive?”

Doug
sighed. “Sort of. The darkness is one of the protections they have in place to
keep people out.”

“They
who?”

Doug
raised his eyebrows. “Well, there are lots of really bad things in fairy tales
and legends. You know, like monsters, hags, and wicked dwarves. They need
somewhere to live. Plus, all those questing princes need somewhere to go on
their quests.”

“Huh.”
I wanted to ask clarifying questions, but I was afraid more information might cause
me abandon the quest altogether.

“But
the important thing is the darkness,” Doug went on. “It’s just an illusion.
Once you’ve taken five steps into the Wildwood, you’ll find the lighting to be
just like any other place.”

I
stood at the entrance of the Wildwood preparing to take the five steps,
thinking about how when I asked Doug if he knew about the change in lighting
from personal experience, he’d taken a long time before saying, “No.” He’d only
read reports to that effect.

I mentally
went over the directions from Doug one more time, then took a deep breath and
stepped into the Wildwood.

“Interesting,”
I said, five steps later, blinking in the sunlight. I took a step back into
darkness, then another step forward into light. I felt like I was standing on
the International Date Line or the Prime Meridian, or like I had one foot in Kansas
and one in Oklahoma.

I
experimented a little with how far I could be in the dark and still have a foot
in the light and vice versa. Then, I suddenly remembered why I was in the
Wildwood in the first place. I took off down the path as fast as I could possibly
go without missing the landmarks Doug had mentioned.

At
the twisted oak tree, I turned left, and at the row of stumps, I took the road
to the right. Then, at the abandoned hut, I stopped. This was where I would
find Levi.

I
remembered what Doug told me to say; I just didn’t want to say it. I looked
around the clearing. Maybe Levi would be here anyway. Maybe I wouldn’t have to
say it.

“You
have to do whatever you were told to do.” A low voice spoke.

I jumped
and looked all around. Where was the voice coming from? Disembodied voices are
highly unmathematical.

“The
whole point of the quest is to follow the directions, you know.”

“Where
are you?” I asked, spinning around.

“Down
here.”

I
looked down and saw an old turtle wearing glasses.

“Hello,
Princess.”

“Um...hello.”
I knelt down in the grass next to the turtle. “I’m pleased to meet you.”

“And
I, you.” The turtle nodded. “Now, you should probably get on with your quest.
You young people, always forgetting the important things. Always trying to get
around the quest and do things your own way.”

“Okay,
but, um, if you don’t mind me saying so, you don’t seem very evil.”

“Evil?”
The turtle looked at me.

“I
was told evil hags and monsters live in the Wildwood.”

The
turtle blinked. “They do. But they certainly aren’t the only things that live
here.” He slammed his mouth shut.

I
stood up, and dusted off. “How did you know I didn’t want to follow my
instructions?”

The
turtle rolled his eyes. “Because you had that young headstrong look about you.
I’ve seen it on all those young whippersnappers who turned into slabs of stone
or frogs for not following the directions.” The turtle made an annoyed sound as
he continued ambling away from the clearing. “You just be sure to do what
you’re supposed to!”

After
the turtle had gone, I looked around for anything else that looked like it
might be capable of hearing and speech. I really didn’t want anyone to hear
what I was about to say.

I
got on my knees and bowed my head. Contrition and submission were vital factors
in this equation. Then I said, “I, Lily Elizabeth Sparrow, Princess of E. G.
Smythe’s Salty Fire Land, crave the presence of Levi, Dark Mesa of Uppish
Senna. I have need of his abilities. I need him for what I cannot do.”

A
greasy hand tipped my chin up. “Fair princess,” Levi cooed. “It takes such a
strong person to admit they need help. What can I do for you?”

After
telling me the formula for getting Levi to appear, Doug made sure to tell me
over and over to be servile with Levi. He had to believe he had the upper hand.

“Please,”
I whispered. “I need to see Lord Tallis. It is my only hope.” I looked up at
Levi, suddenly afraid I’d laid it on too thick. Too much groveling might upset
the delicate balance of the equation.

“But,
Lily, my dear, Lord Tallis is not known for his hospitality.”

“It’s
the only way.”

Levi
cocked his head and smiled. “Very well.” He removed a cloth from his pocket. It
was damp with grease. “You’ll have to wear this.”

Levi
tied the blindfold on, and once again, I was mentally repeating, “Darkness is
just the absence of light.” Levi’s greasy hand grabbed mine and he led me
deeper into the forest.

“Lovely
weather we’re having, isn’t it?” Levi remarked.

“Excuse
me?”

“We’re
having nice weather, aren’t we?” Levi went on. “I mean, I vastly prefer this weather
to an ice storm. Don’t you agree?”

“Yes,”
I said, hesitatingly. Weather seemed like an odd conversation topic for a kidnapper
to have with his kidnappee.
[54]

“You
know I knew your grandmother quite well.”

“Oh?
My mom’s mom or my dad’s mom?”

“Your
father’s, of course. It’s not likely I’d know your mom’s mom at all, is it?”
Levi laughed.

I
laughed a little too. Not that I understood what was funny. I was busy not
tripping and making servile conversation. It bothered me, however, that Levi
seemed to know about the mystery of my mom’s parents.

“But,
back in the day, I was almost exclusively assigned to your grandmother. Very cheerful
woman. I thought I’d never get her to vanish.”

I
stopped shuffling along. “You vanished my grandmother?”

“In
a manner of speaking.” He grabbed my hand again and pulled me along.

We
continued in silence for a few moments, then Levi’s greasy hands removed the
blindfold. “Here we are.”

I
blinked, adjusting my eyes to the sunlight. We stood next to a gnarled tree;
its wood was very dark, almost black. But when I looked closer I saw that the
tree was really split at the bottom and growing in six different sections
around the original stump. (Six trees equaling one tree.) The space between the
stumps was sufficient enough for a person to slip in between them and stand in
the middle, which is what Levi directed me to do.

“Now,
dear Princess, we’re going to jump down the hole like in
Alice in Wonderland
.”

“What?”

Levi
rolled his eyes. “Oh, I know, it’s not really a fairy tale, since she’s in a
novel by that Dodgson fellow. You’d like him by the way, he was a mathematician,
but fairy tale or not, though, it’s still a good reference to what we’re about
to do.”

“What?
Do you mean Charles Lutwidge Dodgson?” Him, I knew. He wrote
Symbolic Logic
Parts I
and
II
.

Levi
nodded. “Right. As Lewis Carroll, he wrote
Alice in Wonderland
about his
little neighbor friend, Alice. But since Alice is
his
created character,
she’s not a citizen of Smythe’s SFL. I heard she’s taken up regular residence
in Wonderland, but Baldric is such a gossip, you can’t believe everything he
tells you.”

“I
don’t understand what any of that has to do with the tree.”

“We’re
going to jump in like the White Rabbit and Alice did.” Levi looked at me a
little funny, sort of like Calo whenever I don’t know something about a
citizen’s story. “Oh, you’re surprised I’ve read it. Trust me, Princess, we
have an excellent library in Uppish Senna. (All the pages are laminated, of
course.) And we have a brilliant section devoted to vanished tales. They can literally
only
be found in our library.” He flashed his greasy grin.

I
moved closer to the tree. “I’d be delighted to see it.”

“I’m
sure that can be arranged.” He offered his hand and assisted me in slipping
between the trees.

I
looked down at the cavernous hole, calculating its depth. I stopped myself from
figuring out my rate of speed and velocity. If I jumped down this hole, I’d
have to do it without math. With math, all I had was an equation equaling my
death.

“See
you at the bottom,” I called to Levi as I jumped into the hole.

Surprisingly,
it was not dark in the hole. I tried to determine the light source based on the
refraction and reflection of light in the cavern, but I couldn’t pin it down.
Also, I seemed to be defying the laws of physics. The speed of my descent was
not increasing, nor was it slowing down. It was just the same as it was when I
stepped off the tree.

“Having
a good time?” Levi floated next to me. He was enjoying his fall/float from the
comfort of a reclining arm chair. He laughed at my surprise, and added, “I
didn’t say it was
exactly
like
Alice in Wonderland
.”

I
didn’t answer because I was suddenly aware of a new problem.

We
were coming up on enough furniture to stock a small store.

Beds,
bookshelves, lamps, desks, even a piano, slowly ascended. I wriggled to the
left to avoid a burgundy ottoman. Then, I squirmed to the right to miss a flower-patterned
love seat.

Levi
laughed. “You’d better land in a chair. It will do the piloting for you.” He
pointed. “Look! That leather recliner. Aim for it.”

I
managed to direct my floating so I would be in the path of the chair. “How is
it mathematically possible for the furniture to be rising?”

“Everything
is not about math, Princess.” Levi swiveled his chair so I could see him. “Now,
put your body in a sitting position and—”

WHAM!
I slammed into the leather chair with a grunt.

“Yes,
exactly.” Levi nodded. “It’s Smart Furniture. All you have to do is assume the
proper position above the piece and you’ll find yourself in it. And once we get
to the bottom, the chairs will float up again.”

“Clever.”
 

I
spent the rest of the ride reviewing Doug’s plan in my mind. Levi spent the
free fall examining his finger nails and occasionally muttering things like,
“I’ve got to get a manicure appointment,” or “I must remember to pick up my dry
cleaning.”

I
didn’t really want to have a conversation with him; I needed the time to make
sure the plan was firm in my mind, but still…if he
had
struck up a
conversation with me, I would have asked him some questions about turning
traitor and becoming a Dark Mesa. Had he really been a better Happiologist than
Calo?

Eventually,
after I’d had time to review the plan four and a half times, our chairs landed.
Levi nonchalantly exited his chair and offered his hand. I knocked it aside and
got up of my own volition.

Levi
raised his eyebrows. “Independent, like your father.”

“You
mistake me, Levi.” I smiled at him. “I just don’t want to touch your greasy
hand.”

Our
chairs started slowly rising back up the tree. Levi made a sweeping gesture
with his hand, bowed a little and said, “If you’ll just follow me, Your Highness.”

I
nodded regally and followed him through the rocky passage, noting mentally that
all of a sudden I seemed to be the embodiment of all things regal. My posture
was better, my speech took on a more formal, royal quality, and there was that
random regal nod. I can mathematically prove I am not in the habit of nodding
like a courtier in my normal life. In fact, in my normal life, I am not in the
habit of using the word “courtier” or the phrase “not in the habit.” Was
Smythian magic finally affecting me the way it makes Mom less distracted when
she’s in the kingdom?