The Slippery Map by N. E. Bode Page B

in the nunnery van.”
    â€œ Nunnery. Second time you’ve said that word.” Hopps walked over to a large scroll of a map spread out on the floor near shelves of canned figs. It was hand-drawn—much like the one in his pocket—with different colored inks, but this one was hugely detailed. There were shop names and treetops and ripples drawn into a river. Both ends of the map were rolled up on cane poles. Hopps walked to the silver bucket with the fancy molding; and once he put his hand underneath it to lift it, the bucket shrank and shrank until it was just the size of a small charm on a necklace. Hopps took the rope, which had become string, and tied it around his neck while poised over the map on the floor. “The nunnery,” he said again.
    â€œThat’s where I live,” Oyster said.
    â€œI don’t remember anything like that. Nunnery?”
    â€œWhat do you remember?” Oyster asked, not really sure what his question meant.
    â€œWell, I remember slicing a hole in the Map with the edge of this.” He held up the tiny silver bucket. “And then I enlarged it and climbed in with the baby boy tucked in my jacket.”
    Ringet interrupted. “This was at the height of the Foul Revolution. We had to work quickly. It was dangerous. The baby boy was in danger. Terrible. It was terrible. And it still is!”
    â€œThe Foul Revolution?” Oyster asked.
    â€œDark Mouth,” Ringet whispered. “Dark Mouth took over.”
    Hopps ignored them. He was remembering as best he could. He spoke firmly, trying to nail down the details in his mind. “I went through the Map at night and found myself and the baby in a bed with white sheets and furry floors and an awful painting of a waterfall. When I walked out of the bedroom, I realized I was in a row of bedrooms in a building full of bedrooms.”
    â€œA motel?” Oyster asked. “That’s what that’s called.” It made him think of the Royal Motel, and the towel he’d been found wrapped in as a baby.
    â€œI don’t know what it was,” Hopps said.
    â€œWas it fancy?”
    â€œNo, it smelled of wet dogs and socks and standing water.”
    â€œOh,” Oyster said, disappointed. It couldn’t have been the motel that was part of his birth story. His had been the Royal Motel. It had been fancy, with inscribed towels and all.
    â€œI walked the streets of this Baltimore City, holding the baby. There were automobiles and red dots blipping across the night sky. The river was skunky, and they seemed proud of their sugar in Baltimore because it was lit up in a big red sign. There were paddleboats all locked up for the night, and people walking around,shouting happily. I walked away from the river and finally found what seemed to be a good spot. Across the street, there was a red dragon painted on a window.”
    â€œA red dragon?” Oyster asked. “Are you sure it was a dragon?” He thought of the Dragon Palace.
    â€œYes, it was, and I thought, They know Dragons here—though there’s no such thing as a red Dragon. But this is good. He’ll learn. ”
    â€œAre there dragons here ?” Oyster asked quickly.
    â€œShhh,” Ringet whispered, “let him talk.” It was clear that Ringet had never gotten this detailed a version of the story before.
    â€œAnd there was an open window over the red Dragon,” Hopps went on. “And through it was a woman holding a baby. The baby cried, but then it stopped and I heard her singing. And that seemed good too.”
    Oyster thought of the boy across the street with the leg braces. A boy about his age who’d once been a baby…Oyster’s heart pounded in his chest.
    â€œThere was a trinket shop too, with a little puppy sitting there at the front door, looking out at me, wagging its tail.”
    â€œA puppy?” Could it be the same mean old dog ten years younger?
    â€œAnd,”