The Tragical Tale of Birdie Bloom

by Temre Beltz

  7. When most people tear something into itty-bitty pieces, they intend to toss it into the garbage can. Agnes, however, wasn’t about to submit anything of hers via the Wanderly Post. Not when she had a far superior form of transmission in her own magic. Unbeknownst to Agnes, this was quite fortunate because the post people were notoriously nosy, and the contents of letters were often riffled through two, three, and maybe even four times before making it to their final destinations.

  8. Gah! Do not be drawn in by this falsity. Though smiles are typically a sign of affection and cheer, one simply cannot deliver what one does not have.

  9. The table was not impressively long in the luxurious sense. It was, instead, impressively long in the lonely sense, because it was roomy enough to seat fifty-four children. There were, of course, only eighteen children at the manor, but they were required to leave at least two empty seats between them at mealtimes.

  10. The blueberry mush was nothing short of an oddity. Nowhere in all of Wanderly did blueberry bushes grow in greater abundance than on Tragic Mountain. Unbeknownst to Mistress Octavia, the Tragicals found the mush to be utterly delicious—whether served hot, cold, or lukewarm. Mistress Octavia, on the other hand, found it to be disgusting, which was likely the reason she demanded it to be served to the Tragicals at every single meal.

  11. Despite Birdie’s fears, magic never once spun off Mistress Octavia. In the kingdom of Wanderly, magic was restricted to certain sorts, such as fairy godmothers, wizards, witches, and magicians. Not to mention, magic was strictly forbidden at the manor. It was the one rule the Tragicals were glad about, for they were certain if magic did happen upon them, considering they were doomed, it would only bring about more terrible things.

  12. The dragons in Wanderly occupied a nearby chain of islands known as Snaggletooth Isles. Though most dragons were uniformly large, magical, ferocious, and in possession of a very sensitive sense of smell (they found humans most odorous of all), it cannot be stressed enough that the stories the Chancellor refused to acknowledge were just as important, if not more than, the ones he did. In short: not every dragon in Wanderly was the same.

  13. Given your keen intelligence, I know you have drawn to an abrupt stop here and wondered why a Tragical should be required to carry a pencil when they were denied even a single sheet of paper. Sadly, it was nothing more than Mistress Octavia’s cruel attempt at humor.

  14. Take heed: in the presence of Mistress Octavia, there are some words she deemed so revolting, it is best not to say them out loud.

  15. Did you expect to see Agnes? Surely she would never believe anyone would ask after a witch, but that is the special magic of a book. For the time being, we shall visit Agnes after two chapters spent with Birdie. But if you must know, Agnes was doing nothing other than spitting at the soupy clouds hanging over her haunted cabin and trying to act as if she hadn’t thought even once about the mysterious disappearance of her letter.

  16. The Drowning Bucket was one of Mistress Octavia’s favorite contraptions. It hung from the tippy-top of the manor and was suspended from a skinny wooden plank by a metal chain. It was sized perfectly for children and remained ever ready to plunge into the Black Sea, churning hungrily three hundred feet below.

  17. No, the walls between the dungeon cells were not riddled with holes like Swiss cheese. They were quite solid. But Birdie had been sentenced to the dungeon twice before and had discovered the loose brick while trying to find a way out. At the time, it had seemed almost cruel (what child can slip through a brick-size hole?), but right then, it was just what she needed.

  18. Beastly Valley was the narrow bottleneck by which Tragic Mountain remained connected to Wanderly. Full of mud pits, winding tunnels, and mischievous vines, it was anything but an escape route. Not to mention it was the relocation zone for Wanderly’s entire werewolf population. Containing werewolves might seem an arduous task, but not when the Chancellor enchanted them to remain in their beastly form so that they lacked any benefits of human problem-solving.

  19. If this seems bewildering to you, let me assure you it was. Dungeons are not, even for the occasional moment, supposed to be full of wonder. Dungeons in a home for Tragicals are quadruply not supposed to be full of wonder. But you can’t fix what you don’t know about, and despite the grave seriousness with which Mistress Octavia viewed her job, she firmly drew the line at traipsing into dungeons.

  20. Why, yes; yes it had. The Chancellor ensured there were oodles of books where this exact sentiment had been written down. And that was perhaps the Chancellor’s greatest problem: as the leader of a storybook kingdom, he did not really understand books. He did not read books to find truth; he instead read them in an attempt to create it.

  21. Agnes found Fatimah’s Flight Academy (No Witches Allowed) especially annoying. Everyone in Wanderly knew the hands-down best way to zip about Wanderly was by broomstick. It was simple; it was effective; for crying out loud, it was comfortable! But apparently, the broomstick had become so closely associated with witches that no one else wanted to touch one with a ten-foot pole.

  22. It is quite possible that, living where you live, you haven’t heard of “You Know Where.” Typically, when people title things in such a manner, it is because they are too awful to even speak of. But what else would one expect from a witchy hangout? Especially when that hangout is Wanderly’s gloomiest, moodiest, shiver-inducingest castle? If you are still curious, however, I shall whisper the name very, very quietly: Castle Matilda.

  23. Gah, this gets me every time! I simply can’t bear to look! Sometimes it is a very dangerous thing to be a book. Please let me know when the scary part is over.

  24. Mistress Octavia did indeed keep an entire wolf pack at her disposal. They prowled off-leash on the patchy grass surrounding the manor. They didn’t know a single command, but they snarled and howled loud enough to properly terrify the children, and that was enough for her.

  25. If temper tantrums were measured not by degrees but by age, a Stage 3 (the sort that explodes from a three-year-old) would likely be the worst.

  26. The Beyond was precisely as vast as it sounded. The Tragicals used the term to refer to anything outside the locked doors of Foulweather’s Home for the Tragical. Though they had a full panoply of books, with quite extensive descriptions of Wanderly, at their disposal, I admit there are some things even a book cannot give full justice to; some things that simply must be experienced firsthand.

  27. Despite her daily striving to make the manor as awful as possible, Mistress Octavia could take no credit for the chilling size of the manor’s rats. Indeed, their round bellies could be attributed to one source and one source alone; the very same source which Mistress Octavia found grotesque, and the very same source that arguably kept the Tragicals alive: Tragic Mountain’s abundant blueberries.

  28. Birdie was not at all off in her evaluation. Even a book knows there are times when losing a bit of oneself results in a gain that is of far greater value. But I would be highly remiss (and highly unpopular among my fellow comrades) if I failed to mention the tearing out of a book’s pages should be carefully reviewed on a case-by-case basis.

  29. As I mentioned earlier, witches default to either slinking or lunging. A strut does not fall into either one of these categories, but neither was the witch at hand a typical witch. The witch at hand sported a badge. The witch at hand thought this was meaningful.

  30. When it comes to witchy insults, this may be the very, very worst. Witches never floss their teeth. Some of them even think dental floss was spun by fairy godmothers as a cruel and unusual punishment for all witchkind.

  31. This was hardly the same sort of dramatic arts class you may be used to; the sort where, on any given day, you may find yourself wearing a royal crown or an ogre mask, or zapping a wand through the air. Namely, the purpose of dramatic arts at the manor was: accept the role you are given. As such, the children had never once switched parts, never once switched props, and never once switched costumes.
They played the same roles every single time. You can imagine precisely how lively such performances turned out to be.

  32. Just as the Tragicals were not sent to Foulweather’s Home for the Tragical on the basis of bad behavior, the Triumphants were not sent to Peabody’s Academy for the Triumphant on the basis of good behavior (indeed, several of the children were dreadfully rotten). Instead, every year a pool of highly select nominees, ages one to fifteen years, was chosen to undergo an exhaustive battery of top secret tests designed exclusively by the Chancellor. An average of merely 1 percent ever passed—the results were never once discussed—but the Chancellor claimed the test’s ability to identify Wanderly’s best and brightest was (in his words) “foolproof.”.

  33. Or rather she flapped the fabric of the cloak up and down a bit, as if she expected it might take flight like the wings of a bird. It was a bit embarrassing, but that was hardly her fault. As I mentioned before, Griselda Peabody was not magical. Still, every Council member was allowed the use of a magical cloak, because with an entire kingdom to boss around—er, manage—instantaneous travel was of utmost importance.

  34. Or even just a hair above tragical would do.

  35. Quite curiously, the dormitory door was never locked. This was not a testament to Mistress Octavia’s negligence, but rather a reflection of the Tragicals’ keen logic. It makes little sense to traipse about a place in the dark when all one can expect to find is: (1) more creepy-crawlies, (2) even darker hallways, and (3) highly secured (i.e. Tragical-proof) kitchen pantries.

  36. Despite the gravity of Sir Ichabod’s confession, it should be noted this statement wasn’t entirely true. He liked the taste of blueberries just fine. But eating them and being cursed to fulfill a quota of picking ten thousand a day are two very different things. Not to mention the endless washing, boiling, and mashing. It should come as no surprise that if Sir Ichabod didn’t see another blueberry for the rest of his life, he wouldn’t raise a single complaint.

  37. Despite their namesake, the commoners in Wanderly likely lived the most interesting lives of all. Whereas everyone knew precisely what lay ahead for a Triumphant or a Tragical, for commoners, a happy ending was just as likely as a bad ending. Consequently, they were always on the hunt for fairy godmothers, magical beans, wishing wells, and anything else that might tip the balance in their favor. Unfortunately for them, witches were more than happy to provide counterfeit substitutes that tended to range from the hilarious to the devious, but never failed to be 100 percent disappointing.

  38. Or rather, together minus Francesca Prickleboo. The children had not excluded Francesca in any sort of malicious way, but as a matter of necessity. Over the years, Francesca Prickleboo had proven time and time again she simply could not be trusted. Her allegiance was to Mistress Octavia and any decree—no matter what it entailed—of the Council.

  39. The ratty booby traps were perhaps better described as butlerish booby traps. In the span of three days, Sir Ichabod Grim had snapped three fingers, two toes, and even got his nose caught in a trap Mistress Octavia hung from the ceiling. Of course, despite Sprinkles’s impressive opinion of himself, he could not (as was typically the case with rats) fly.

  40. The infirmary was not a warm fuzzy sort of place with snuggly teddy bears, extra blankets, and a bright window to cheer the spirits. No. Indeed, the infirmary was created solely for the purpose of keeping the children’s germs contained to one place, because Mistress Octavia couldn’t bear the thought of sharing a single thing with a Tragical. As such, the miniature room was filled with one lumpy bed, one dimly lit sconce, one painting of a three-headed snake with venom dripping from its fangs, three pencils, and of course, no paper.

  41. If anyone should be able to recognize such an opportunity, it was Ralph. Since his arrival at the manor, he had tried to escape on nine different occasions at least (including a death-defying shimmy up Sir Ichabod’s chimney that very nearly worked!). For the fact remained that, however awful life at the manor was, it was infinitely worse for a child who had grown up in the Beyond and knew precisely what he was missing out on.

  42. As a book reader, this should give you pause. For you and I both know that readers, wherever they hail from, tend to be fiercely protective of books they have grown to love. As such, if imagining a few brave souls tenderly stowing their books away like buried treasure, or even conducting an entire underground secret library, should strike your fancy, who am I to stop you?

  43. Worst of all, those busybodies from the Wanderly Whistle would be out in full force sniffing for clues. Of course, Agnes could always conjure up a disguise, but the moment she heard one spout off about “Maggie Pruneface Punch,” there’s no telling what she’d do. Self-control wasn’t exactly Agnes’s strong suit, and she’d likely blow her cover in an instant.

  44. You and I both know this name is as cute as cute can be regardless of its spelling. You also know enough about Agnes never to mistake her for an effervescent Goody Two-Shoes. So, for Agnes’s sake, let’s all pretend that Pooky is a perfectly wicked name and not a bunch of hooey.

  45. The question had become so bothersome Agnes found herself lying awake at night contemplating what precisely the girl could have liked. Her cunning plans? Her blunt words? Her chilling penmanship? What? Because no one had ever bothered to explain to Agnes it was possible to simply like someone just because they were them. Which was certainly a great travesty because of all the very many reasons to like someone, that was, without a doubt, the most grand of all.

  46. For as much as Birdie loved hearing the Winds swirl outside the manor, it was absolutely nothing compared to having them live within the manor. Since their arrival, they had already accomplished a mighty work in redecorating. Namely, the Council portraits hanging in the Dark Hallway were in a ridiculously crooked state of disarray, and Mistress Octavia’s thick black-out curtains simply could not keep from whipping about and letting in oodles of light.

  47. Not only had Ralph already endured such a traumatic event, but Mistress Octavia wasn’t likely to repeat it any time soon. Indeed, she was so disappointed in her entire wolf pack for not making mincemeat out of Ralph when they had the chance that she punished them with a diet consisting solely of blueberry mush. Curiously, instead of howling up a raging storm, the wolves had never seemed so content.

  48. At the beginning of our journey, I warned you about the scary parts. THIS IS ONE OF THEM. But fear not, because there are still many pages after this one. And that is something to note about endings: sometimes a bad ending is simply the product of ending a story too soon. On the flip side, a reader must be prepared for things to get bad (sometimes really, really bad) before they can become good. Hold on, dear reader.

  49. Considering Sir Ichabod was Wanderly’s oldest Tragical, he may seem an odd choice to be permitted entrance to Mistress Octavia’s secret room. Alas, even secret rooms need to be dusted, mopped, and tidied from time to time, and Mistress Octavia had vowed long ago never to engage in such “dirty” work.

  50. Considering Sir Ichabod’s servitude as a butler, this particular abundance of dust did not render him inept. It merely hinted at the Chancellor’s dastardly nature considering Sir Ichabod refused to even draw near to his likeness.

  51. Of course, the specifics are stowed safely away in my memory. What is a book, really, if it doesn’t pay attention to detail? So, for those interested, Birdie was kicked in the shins twice, elbowed in the side once, knocked down to her knees three times, stepped on (oooh, the pinkie finger!) once, and had at least three separate pairs of curly fingernails caught within her hair (shudder).

  52. You are likely more familiar with this game than you realize. It is much the same as the ever-popular Go Fish, except the whole purpose is to catch your opponent in a lie. As you can imagine, given how adept witches are at lying, this game is almost as never-ending as that other popular and extraordinarily lengthy card game War.

  53. If I am right in assuming there are no dragons where you live, it is a
bit hard to put into words precisely how loud such a large creature can be. But perhaps it will help to imagine the sound of your mother vacuuming next to your head while you are trying to read a book. And then multiply that noise by 2,500. That ought to do just fine.

  54. Regardless of our fancy covers or our elegant script, every book knows it is little more than a vessel. Our real value lies in the bits and pieces of truth buried within. Far less important than how that truth is displayed is that it is simply received (torn-out pages and all). Indeed, this is what it means to read a book.