Clover's Luck

Text copyright © 2015 by Kallie George
Illustrations copyright © 2015 by Alexandra Boiger
Cover design by Sara Gillingham Studio

Excerpt from The Enchanted Egg copyright © 2015 by Kallie George.

All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Hyperion, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Hyperion, 125 West End Avenue, New York, New York 10023.

ISBN 978-1-4847-0120-1

Visit www.DisneyBooks.com
www.MagicalAnimalAdoptionAgency.com

The illustrations for this book were created using graphite on paper, then spot colored digitally using various textures.

To my Nono, who knew I would be a writer
way before I did

—K.G.

To Vanessa and Andrea,
with love, always

—A.B.

Luck is like magic. It’s mysterious and exciting and impossible to explain. It can’t be described by equations or logic or even by books. You just have to believe.

Clover believed. She believed luck existed—and that all of hers was bad. From the time she was born under a moon as thin as a cat’s whisker—a bad omen, she’d decided—her life had been filled with one misfortune after another, from burst bike tires to burnt toast. Not to mention problems with pets.

She tried everything to change her luck. She painted her room bright green, the color of lucky clover, her namesake, and pasted shooting stars on her ceiling that she could wish on every night. She hung a horseshoe over her bed and collected shiny pennies in a jar that she kept on her windowsill. She even carried a lucky charm with her at all times. This morning she had tucked a wishbone in her pocket. But nothing seemed to work.

The wishbone certainly wasn’t helping her now. It was only the first day of vacation and already her whole summer had been ruined. Her best friend, Emma, had just called to tell her that she was going to Pony Camp after all. Both Emma and Clover had wanted to go, but the camp was full. This morning, though, someone had canceled, and Emma’s name was first on the waiting list.

“Cheer up,” Emma said when she gave Clover the news. “Maybe someone else will cancel, and you can come too.”

But Clover knew that would never happen.

The camp lasted till school started. So much for sleepovers and sharing ice cream. So much for adventures and excitement. So much for spending the summer with her best friend.

“At least I have you,” she said to Penny, her new pet canary. “I can train you to sing and, well, do all sorts of things. It’ll be fun.”

Clover checked to make sure her bedroom window and door were tightly shut before taking Penny out of her cage. She was stroking the bird’s yellow feathers when…Smash! A baseball broke through the window, narrowly missing the jar of pennies and a jade tortoise paperweight, and landed on her bed with a thump.

“Oh no!” Clover cried.

Quick as a wink, with just one tweet, Penny left Clover’s finger and flew out through the hole left by the baseball.

“OH NO!” Clover cried even louder.

She ran out of her room, down the stairs, and out the front door. “Penny!” she shouted, racing after her bird, her shoes pounding the pavement. “Penny, come back!”

The street was empty. Whoever had thrown the ball was gone. Penny soared over the lawn and headed down the street. Clover chased after her.

At the end of the block, Penny perched on a picket fence. Clover tried to sneak up on the bird, but the moment she was within arm’s reach, Penny took off, flying down the next block. Penny landed a few more times, but Clover still couldn’t catch her.

Soon they reached the edge of the village. Penny kept on going. Clover had a stitch in her side, but she didn’t stop either.

She ran through farmers’ fields, over rolling hills, and along a twisty path that grew ever more rough and overgrown. She had never gone so far from the village. The stitch in her side grew into a knot.

The path took a turn, and she lost sight of Penny for a moment. When she rounded the bend, she froze. There before her was a line of trees and bushes, blocking her way like a great green wall. The Woods.

Her canary was perched atop a small, twisted tree, like a tiny star.

“Come to me, Penny! Good little bird,” Clover called, holding out her finger. But as she crept closer, Penny gave a cheeky tweet and flew off, disappearing into the Woods.

Keep away, keep away, the Woods are where wee beasties play. The rhyme sung at school echoed in Clover’s head. People from her village stayed far away from the Woods. They were a strange place, and even stranger lands lay beyond them—or so the rumors rang.

The trees ahead creaked and groaned, and shadows flickered. An eerie breeze whistled through the branches as if in tune to the rhyme.

Clover gulped and reached for the wishbone in her pocket. So far it hadn’t proved lucky, but she would give it one more chance.

She took a deep breath and looked for a path. There was a tiny trail so overgrown it was hard to see, but when she pushed past the first few bushes, it opened up.

The trees cast dark shadows, but were also lush and green. Rotting logs covered the forest floor, yet so did feathery moss, dotted with white flowers. The air smelled clean and fresh.

The Woods were beautiful, and only slightly ominous. They weren’t strange at all. But Penny was nowhere to be seen. She was gone. Really gone.

“Stupid bad luck!” Clover said, blinking back tears. She reached into her pocket again and pulled out the wishbone. “This is the worst charm yet!” She threw it away as hard as she could.

The wishbone glanced off a stump, bounced back, and almost hit her in the face.

But Clover didn’t notice. She was staring at a large sheet of thick yellow paper nailed to the trunk of a nearby tree. The paper was curled and faded, the handwritten message streaked from rain.

Clover stepped closer to read it.

At the bottom were little slips of paper with directions.

Not one had been torn off.

Clover read the notice again. And then a third time. She desperately wanted a pet of her own. But Penny’s escape made it clear—once and for all—that she was just too unlucky.

If I worked at an animal adoption agency, she thought, I could be with animals without actually owning a pet. I could help them. I could set things right.

Carefully, she tore off the first slip and read it.

“The M.A.A.A.—#1 Dragon’s Tail Lane. Down the path. Just around the bend. Follow the signs.”

She hesitated for a moment. Going into the Woods to chase her bird was one thing. Going to apply for a volunteer position was quite another. Who would run an animal adoption agency in the Woods? Weren’t beasties supposed to be the only creatures that lived here?

Clover looked around again. The treetops bobbed in the wind. A squirrel chattered to its friend. Already there were creatures other than beasties.

Just around the bend, thought Clover. That’s not too far to go. I can at least check it out.

Folding the slip in two, she stuck it deep in her pocket and set off down the path, in search of the first sign. Despite her unluckiness, Clover always kept a hopeful heart.

Signs were scarce, and it took Clover much longer than she expected to wind her way through the Woods.

At one point she reached a place where the path branched in many directions. Nailed onto a huge tree in the center were several signs shaped like arrows. SHOPPES made sense. Though she was surprised to find there were shops in the Woods. What kinds of shops would they be? Not ordinary ones that sold shoes or sweets, surely. But if there was an adoption agency, who knew?

MEADOWS and OUT also made sense. The OUT sign pointed to the path that she was standing on, so it must mean out of the Woods and to her village.

But HEART and BEYOND were a little more puzzling. The HEART sign pointed down a dark, twisty path. Maybe it leads into the heart of the Woods, thought Clover. So, did BEYOND mean there were villages and towns on the other side of the Woods? She looked to see what kind of path it pointed to and nearly tripped on an arrow lying flat on the ground.

She picked it up. M.A.A.A. was etched into the wood in black letters.

“Oh no,” Clover moaned. “Now how will I find it?”

She looked again at the other arrows. All the paths except the one to the far left were clearly marked. Was that the path to the Agency? It had to be.

Leaning the arrow against the tree, she started down the path to the left. It wasn’t long before she came to a clearing, and she could see what appeared to be a charming cottage in the distance, with smoke curling out from a chimney. Where the path narrowed, there was a sign that read DRAGON’S TAIL LANE. There wasn’t really a lane to speak of, not like at home, but there were no other buildings in sight, so that had to be it. A sense of well-being filled her. She felt almost…lucky.

But that feeling lasted only a moment. Dark clouds had filled the sky, and it began to rain. Hard. Soon raindrops dripped from her nose.

To top it off, a lady clutching a white kitten bustled by and bumped into her. Clover stepped out of the way and right into a mud puddle.

Dressed in a billowing black raincoat, her face hidden by the floppy brim of her hat, the lady looked like a thundercloud. The kitten, unprotected and dripping, mewed as they passed.

“Mind your way,” snapped the lady, as though it were Clover’s fault.

Mind your kitten, Clover wanted to reply, but the words caught in her throat as the lady hurried away.

Clover thought things couldn’t get worse.

But, of course, they could. And they did.