Foxlowe. Eleanor Wasserberg
id="u8621e041-b06f-562d-aa56-56c9ba29f64d">
4th Estate
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by 4th Estate 2016
Copyright © Eleanor Wasserberg 2016
Eleanor Wasserberg asserts the moral right to
be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record for this book is
available from the British Library
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780008164089
Ebook Edition © June 2016 ISBN: 9780008164119
Version: 2017-01-04
For my parents
Contents
At Foxlowe everyone has two names. One is a secret, meant to be lost. For most, it worked like this: first they had the one they came to Foxlowe with peeled away like sunburnt skin. Then a new name, for a new life.
I used to get jealous of the Family with their secret outside names, while I only had the one, like half a person. Sometimes an old name would slip, strangled at a syllable with a blush. This was a sign to watch for, in case someone might wish to become a Leaver.
Now I am doubled that way, named twice, but for me, it’s worked in reverse: my new name came later, on the outside, like putting on that crusty old skin that should be lying on the floor.
My one name was Green, but no one calls me that any more. I had no old name to peel away, because I was born at Foxlowe. Freya named me first, of course. She named all of us, except for one. There’s a power in naming. Green was strange even for home — most of the women had flowers, or pretty ideas, like Liberty.
If I could speak to Freya, I’d tell her not to worry, because I hold my new name ever so lightly, ready to shrug it off, if ever Foxlowe could start up again.
Of course I wasn’t Green all the time. With Toby, it was the ungrown; once Blue came, it was the girls, too.
Since this is a story for Blue, first here is