The Wishbreaker

by Tyler Whitesides

  Mr. Wong ran his fingertips along the outward-facing spines of the books. “This is the special collection,” he said. “My trinket lamp replaces all the common novels with these books. As the Genieologist, it’s my duty to write down everything I can about each young Wishmaker.”

  “What’s the purpose of keeping a record?” Ridge asked.

  “What’s the purpose of history?” he shouted. “The Universe likes things organized. If there is ever a question about wishes made, or consequences accepted, the Universe can send a young Wishmaker to me for answers.” He moved to another bookshelf, squinting through his thick glasses. “Much like what you’re doing here today.”

  “So, the Universe tells you about every Wishmaker?” I asked.

  “The knowledge comes into my mind as each quest unfolds,” he answered. “I then have three days to write it down before it is lost from my memory.”

  “So, you know that Ace just took a consequence that makes smoke come out his ears?” Ridge asked.

  Mr. Wong nodded. “Yes. He accepted that consequence in order to have the trinket dagger wash up on the beach.”

  “Oh, he’s good,” Ridge said to me.

  “Does that mean you know what Chasm is up to?” I asked. Maybe Mr. Wong could give us a glimpse into what our enemy was planning. Maybe he could tell me how Tina was faring.

  “I’m sorry,” said Mr. Wong, “but I cannot sense the actions of the Wishbreaker.”

  “Wishbreaker?” I’d never heard that term before.

  “The one you call Chasm,” said Mr. Wong. “The Universe named him the Wishbreaker because he can take control of the human he is tethered to. I know that he has stolen Tina’s voice, and with it, her ability to make her own wishes. But that information was only made known to me because it was part of your last quest.”

  “We’re going to save Tina,” I said.

  “I believe that is Jathon Anderthon’s quest,” said Mr. Wong. “The Universe has trusted him to save the world again. It is very unusual to see a Double Wishmaker.”

  “I’m a Double Wishmaker, too.” This was another new term, but I had a good idea of what it meant.

  “Are you really, though?” asked Mr. Wong. “With Tina’s trinket, you found a way to forcefully get your genie back. At great personal sacrifice for the girl.”

  “What was her consequence?” I had wondered before, with no way to find out.

  “Tina wished for that trinket necklace when she was with the genie named Vale,” answered Mr. Wong, still perusing the books. “When the jewelry snapped, a great chain of iron would suddenly tighten around her neck.”

  “Yikes!” Ridge cried. “That could kill her.”

  Mr. Wong shook his head. “If she had died, the Wishbreaker would have returned to his jar. I sense his presence in the world, so Tina must have survived the consequence.”

  I took a deep breath, suddenly feeling really guilty for breaking the necklace and bringing that kind of pain to Tina.

  “Likely, the Wishbreaker saved her life,” continued Mr. Wong. “He is said to be very strong. He probably stopped the chain from strangling her. The Wishbreaker needs the girl alive in order to stay free.”

  Mr. Wong finally pulled a book from the shelf. “Oops. Wrong one.” He put it back and kept scanning.

  “It’s a hard book to find?” I guessed.

  “Well, the trinket desk lamp has a way of shelving the books in a random order every time I access the special collections,” answered Mr. Wong. “I expect it’ll take me several hours to find what I’m looking for.”

  “Several hours?” I cried, a bit of smoke venting out my ears. “I can’t wait that long.”

  Ridge looked at me. “Yesterday you didn’t even want to think about your quest.”

  “Something changed,” I said.

  “Like what?”

  Should I tell him? Ridge knew how badly I wanted answers about my past. As Mr. Wong pulled out another book, I leaned closer to Ridge and lowered my voice to a whisper. “I think I might be Samuel Sylvester Stansworth.”

  “What?”

  “It’s just a theory,” I said. But I was growing more sure of it with every minute. “That’s why we’re here.” I glanced at Mr. Wong. “But the old guy’s taking forever. We’ve got to speed up this process.” I took a deep breath. “I wish Mr. Wong would find the book he’s looking for in the next minute.”

  “If you want him to find the book,” Ridge said, “then every time you reach into your pocket, a rat will crawl out of it.”

  I shuddered. I knew people that kept rats as pets, but they always creeped me out. Now I’d have to deal with furry rodents crawling out of my clothes. . . .

  “Seems kind of steep, just to have Mr. Wong find a book,” I tried.

  “A book about Samuel Sylvester Stansworth,” replied Ridge.

  “How long will I have rats in my pants?”

  “Only for a month.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I guess I just won’t reach into my pocket.” It was that or wait painstaking hours while Mr. Wong searched for the book. “Bazang.”

  “Ah.” Finally, Mr. Wong pulled a book from the shelf. “Here we are, at last.”

  The old man opened the front cover and scanned over the volume as he turned pages. I tried to peek over his shoulder, but the handwriting in the book was really squiggly and hard to read.

  “Oh, yes,” Mr. Wong said after a few painful minutes. “I remember this story. . . .”

  My story. I was about to get the answers I’d been craving for years!

  “Three years ago,” Mr. Wong began, “on July fourteenth, a boy named Samuel Sylvester Stansworth opened a jar of salsa.”

  I liked salsa.

  “Was it spicy or mild?” Ridge asked.

  I reached over and whacked him on the arm. “Don’t distract him!”

  “The salsa, as you might have guessed, was a genie jar,” said Mr. Wong. “Upon opening it, Samuel Sylvester Stansworth became a Wishmaker to a genie named Dune.”

  “Because his jar was first opened on a sand dune?” Ridge guessed. That was the usual way for genies to get their names.

  “Yes,” said Mr. Wong. “Dune was an experienced genie and he quickly explained the rules of the Universe. He gave Samuel a quest.”

  “What was it?” I asked. Maybe I was a Triple Wishmaker! Had I really been a Wishmaker before opening Ridge’s jar? I was desperate to know how I’d worked with this Dune genie on my first forgotten quest.

  “Samuel needed to find a specific saltshaker and empty it into the Grand Canyon,” said Mr. Wong.

  “Well, that’s random,” I said.

  “More random than poking a statue of Roosevelt in the eye?” Ridge reminded me.

  “The Universe has a reason for everything,” Mr. Wong explained.

  “What was the reason for emptying the saltshaker?” I asked.

  The old man shrugged. “The shaker was a trinket, but we’ll never truly know what purpose it would have served since Samuel failed his quest.”

  “What?” Maybe I was a better Wishmaker now than I’d been with Dune. “What was the consequence?”

  “When Samuel failed,” said Mr. Wong, “every silver car that was parked on the street at the end of his quest was swallowed up by the asphalt.”

  “Every silver car in the world?” I asked.

  Mr. Wong shook his head. “In the United States.”

  “What if there were people inside?” Ridge asked.

  “The quest only threatened vehicles,” said Mr. Wong. “The Universe spit anyone inside the car onto the sidewalk.”

  “But I don’t remember hearing anything about silver cars getting swallowed up by the streets,” I said. Not that I’d ever spent much time watching the news.

  “It happened,” said Mr. Wong. “On the morning of July twenty-first, three years ago.”

  Well, that would explain why I didn’t remember it. If Mr. Wong had his dates right, then I would have still been asleep in the
hospital. I wasn’t due to wake up for another three days.

  “The media reported a massive string of automobile thefts,” Mr. Wong said. “The Universe’s shield stopped anyone from being too suspicious about the fact that all the cars were silver.”

  “Why did Samuel fail his quest?” I finally asked.

  “Sometimes Wishmakers fail. Let me see. . . .” Mr. Wong turned the page of his book and scanned the text. “Oh, yes. Here we are.”

  I leaned forward, hands feeling suddenly sweaty. “Go on,” I urged.

  “The saltshaker that Samuel was trying to find belonged to a dangerous ex-Wishmaker who kept an unauthorized collection of active trinkets,” Mr. Wong said. “Samuel and Dune discovered the ex-Wishmaker’s hideout—a little diner on the interstate in western Iowa. Time was running out and Samuel felt overwhelmed with consequences.”

  “I know the feeling.” Toward the end of my last quest I had wanted to give up more than once.

  “Samuel and his genie made it into the diner, but the ex-Wishmaker had a number of trinket defenses safeguarding the building,” Mr. Wong continued. “The two boys ended up trapped in the diner restroom, Samuel forced into making several wishes in a very short space of time, piling more consequences onto his already burdened shoulders. The restroom door was blockaded to buy them time, but it was only a matter of minutes before the angry gorilla chefs broke through with their fiery spatulas.”

  “Whoa,” I said. “How did they get there?”

  “Summoned by a trinket,” said Mr. Wong. “To defend the ex-Wishmaker’s hideout.”

  “Sounds like a bad situation,” Ridge said.

  “Indeed,” the Genieologist answered. “And with only minutes left before his genie disappeared, Samuel tried to make a direct wish for his quest to be completed, but he couldn’t bear the consequence. He made a trinket that he thought would help, but it turned out to be useless. So, Samuel Sylvester Stansworth gave up.”

  “Just like that?” I cried. “He let the evil spatula-wielding gorilla chefs get him?”

  “Not quite,” said Mr. Wong. “He made one more wish. A wish for no more wishes. No more choices. No more responsibility. And that was the end of Samuel Sylvester Stansworth.”

  Ridge and I sat in stunned silence, knowing exactly what that meant. I had made that very wish on my last quest with Ridge. I had been overwhelmed with consequences, betrayed by Tina, and I had been so tired of it all. I hadn’t accepted, of course. The consequence was . . . unknown.

  “He accepted the Unknown Consequence,” said Mr. Wong. “And he was never heard from again.”

  “What is that consequence?” I asked. “What does it do?”

  “I do not know,” Mr. Wong said. “For me, Samuel’s story ended when he said bazang. I know nothing more.”

  Ridge shuddered. “I’m glad I don’t have consequences.”

  “You shouldn’t be so happy about it,” the Genieologist said. “Having consequences means having choices. And that is what makes us human.”

  “So, that’s it?” I shouted, smoke shooting out my ears as I felt the disappointment settle in. “That’s all you can tell me?”

  “I think you know enough for your quest,” said Mr. Wong. “I can tell by the look on your face that you believe that you are Samuel Sylvester Stansworth.”

  Well, it made sense! Samuel’s quest fit with the timeline of my memory loss. The Unknown Consequence must have done something to me!

  I stared at Mr. Wong, finally getting the nerve to ask it out loud. “Am I Samuel Sylvester Stansworth?”

  “I do not know,” he answered. “I only know his story. I never actually met the boy. But if you are correct, perhaps now is the time to make yourself a peanut butter sandwich and complete your quest.”

  “If I finish my quest early,” I said to Ridge, “what happens to you?”

  “Nothing,” he stated. “You’re stuck with me until the week ends, no matter what.”

  “So, I could test my theory by eating a sandwich,” I went on. “If it completes my quest, then I’ll know that I really am Samuel Stansworth.”

  Ridge made a glum face. “There’s no way to know for sure until the end of our time together.”

  “That’s cruel,” I said.

  He shrugged. “Just the Universe’s way of keeping you guessing until the end.”

  “I don’t care about my quest,” I said to Mr. Wong. “I came here to find out if I am really Samuel. If you don’t know, then I’ll have to find someone who does. You said you could help me find Samuel’s family?”

  “Yes,” he replied. “Written in these pages will be the names and address of the Stansworth family. Or at least their last known location. This information will be three years old, since I would have written it when Samuel first opened the jar of salsa and released Dune.”

  Mr. Wong flipped a couple of pages and peered down through his thick glasses. His fingers scrolled over the handwritten text at the same speed that a snail moves across the sidewalk.

  Ridge and I looked on with growing impatience as he turned to the next page and began the same slow reading.

  “Maybe I should make another wish to speed him up,” I said to Ridge.

  “Or at least wish for some dinner,” replied the genie. “I mean, while we’re just standing around, we might as well have something to eat.”

  Mr. Wong suddenly turned to stone.

  Seriously, stone! The transformation started at his feet and spread through his entire body in the blink of an eye. His clothes, his hair, even the book in his hand now looked to be chiseled from smooth marble.

  “What the heck?” I jumped back in shock, smoke venting through my ears.

  Ridge stepped forward and knocked on Mr. Wong’s head. “Seems like solid rock!”

  “I don’t get it,” I muttered.

  “Is he, you know . . . dead?”

  “I hope not.” I carefully grabbed the book and tried to pry it away from him. Yeah, right. That thing was fused tightly to his stone hands, as though they had been carved out of the same piece of marble.

  “Did we do something wrong?” Ridge asked. “The only thing Ms. Gomez told us not to do was say . . .” He trailed off. “You remember.”

  “Meanwhile,” I said, the truth of what had happened dawning on me.

  “Shhh!” Ridge covered Mr. Wong’s stone ears.

  “You already said it,” I explained. “You said meanwhile.”

  “No, you did,” said Ridge. “Twice!”

  “Before that,” I answered. “What was the last thing you said before he turned into stone?”

  “I wanted you to wish for something to eat,” said Ridge.

  “‘I mean, while we’re just standing around.’” I quoted him directly.

  “Ohhhhhhhh,” Ridge said sheepishly. “I don’t think that should count.”

  “Well, I’m guessing it did, since Mr. Wong is now a statue.” I tried to turn a stone page, but there was no chance. “Maybe I can make a wish to turn him back.”

  Ridge shook his head. “Not if this is one of his old consequences. You can’t wish to undo a consequence.”

  I knew that. But what else were we supposed to do? And I thought he moved slowly when he wasn’t made of rock! “How long is he going to be like this?”

  “No idea.”

  Behind us, I heard the library’s front door open.

  “Oh, of course,” I said. “Now that Mr. Wong’s a statue, his library finally gets a visitor.”

  I peered around the corner of the bookshelf to see who had arrived. My heart stopped.

  It was Tina.

  And filling the doorway behind her was the hulking form of Chasm.

  Chapter 12

  Tina looked terrible. I know that’s not something you’re supposed to say about your friend, but it was true. In fact, she was so weighed down with consequences that my eyes had a hard time believing it was her.

  Tina’s mouth was agape, and her black hair was soaking wet. One eye
was covered with a green Post-it note, and there was an old banana peel draped over one shoulder. Her left arm was tucked behind her back, and her right hand was covered with a dirty sock.

  She wore a belt that looked to be dripping with sticky honey, and a few bees were buzzing around her. Tina had a small plant tucked in one pocket and Chasm’s crimson jar protruding from the other. Her left foot had been replaced with a roller skate, which caused her to stand a bit lopsided.

  Chasm, too, looked a little different from the last time I’d seen him. Instead of a shirtless chest webbed with tattoos, he wore a classy button-down linen and a gingham bow tie. Suspenders looped over his massive shoulders, fastening to a pair of skinny jeans with rolled ankle cuffs. He reached up and perched a stylish fedora on his bald head.

  I ducked behind the bookshelf, covering Ridge’s mouth as I pulled him into a crouch. At the library entrance, I heard Chasm draw in a long sniff.

  “Oh, don’t you just love the smell of old books? Dusty, woody, with subtle notes of printers’ ink.” He clapped his hands. “Mmmm! Makes my nose hairs stand up and salute the sad little librarian who stocks these shelves.”

  Beside me, I saw Ridge’s expression change as he recognized the frighteningly chipper voice of the evil genie.

  The Wishbreaker.

  “What do you say, Teeny?” said Chasm. “Should we make a few painful wishes until we get what we want? Or should your old pal Ace just step out from behind that bookshelf so we can have a little chat?”

  At the mention of my name, I, too, turned into a statue. At least that’s how I felt. My outsides were as motionless as stone, while it felt like someone was popping popcorn in my stomach.

  “We’re going to die,” Ridge mumbled. “We’re so dead right now.”

  “Alrighty!” said Chasm. “I guess we’ll start wishing! Sorry, Teeny. Friends can really let you down sometimes.”

  I stepped out from behind the bookshelf. It was an impulsive decision, but I wasn’t going to let Chasm start manipulating Tina into careless wishes. She obviously had enough horrible consequences.

  “Acey-poo!” Chasm’s face showed mock surprise. “So good to see you again, bud. For reals.”