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The wurse sleeps in the storage unit in the cellar. In the midst of all this it's good to know that the wurse is close at hand. It makes Elsa feel a little bit less lonely.

Elsa stands alone on the balcony of Granny's flat. They used to stand here often. It was here that Granny first pointed at the cloud animals and talked about the Land-of-Almost-Awake, just after Mum and Dad had got divorced. That night Elsa got to see Miamas for the first time. She stares out blindly into the darkness and misses her more than ever. She has been lying on Granny's bed, looking up at the photos on the ceiling and trying to figure out what Granny was talking about at the hospital when she said Elsa mustn't hate her. And also, "it's a grandmother's privilege never to have to show her grandchild who she was before she became a grandmother." Elsa has spent hours trying to work out what this treasure hunt is for, or where the next clue can be found. If there even is one.

She peers over the balcony railing. Has a sense of something moving down there on the ground, in the darkness. She can't see anything, obviously, but she knows The Monster is there. Granny has planned the fairy tale in this way. The Monster is guarding the castle. Guarding Elsa.

It's the woman in the black skirt, talking into the white cord. She's heaving four heavy plastic bags along, and they knock into each other and then against her shins at every step. The woman swears and fumbles with her keys by the door.

She's just angry with Granny for never explaining what he's guarding it from.

"Oh there'll be at least twenty of us -- and you know how well the guys in the office hold their drink. Not that they had any time to help, mind… Yeah, isn't it? I know! As if I didn't have a full-time job as well?" is the last thing Elsa hears before the woman marches into the house.

Elsa doesn't know much at all about the woman in the black skirt, except that everything smells of mint and she always has very well-ironed clothes and always seems to be stressed out. Granny used to say it was "because of her boys." Elsa doesn't know what that's supposed to mean.

"… Yeah, yeah, I've got all the booze for the party, I'm only just getting back home now!" the voice declares irritably as it draws closer.

A voice farther off saws through the silence.

Of course, Granny thought efficiency was rubbish, and she couldn't give a crap about the negative effect of conflict. Elsa heard one of the doctors at Mum's hospital saying that Granny "could start a fight in an empty room," but when Elsa told Granny she just looked miffed and said, "What if it was the room that started it?" And then she told the fairy tale about the girl who said no. Even though Elsa had already heard it at least an eternity of times.

Inside, Mum is sitting on a high stool in the kitchen, talking on the telephone and fiddling restlessly with one of Granny's tea towels. She never seems to have to listen very much to what the person at the other end of the line is saying. No one ever disagrees with Mum. Not that she raises her voice or interrupts; she's just not the sort of person anyone wants to get on the wrong side of. Mum likes to keep it like this, because conflict is bad for efficiency and efficiency is very important to her. George sometimes jokes that Mum will give birth to Halfie during her lunch break, to avoid any negative effect on the hospital's general efficiency. Elsa hates George for making all those stupid jokes. Hates him because he thinks he knows Mum well enough to make jokes about her.

And then the queen simply forbade all conflict in Miaudacas. Everyone had to get along all the time. And because nearly all conflicts start with someone saying "no," the queen also made this word illegal. Anyone breaking this law was immediately cast into a huge Naysayers' Prison, and hundreds of soldiers in black armor who were known as Yea-Sayers patrolled the streets to make sure there were no disagreements anywhere. Dissatisfied with this, the queen had soon outlawed not only the word "no' but also other words including "not" and "maybe" and "well." Any of these were enough to get you sent straight to prison, where you'd never again see the light of day.

"The Girl Who Said No' was one of the first stories Elsa ever heard from the Land-of-Almost-Awake. It was about the Queen of Miaudacas, one of the six kingdoms. In the beginning the queen had been a courageous and fair-minded princess very much liked by all, but unfortunately she grew up and became a frightened adult, as adults tend to be. She started loving efficiency and avoiding conflict. As adults do.

After a couple of years, words like "possibly" and "if" and "wait and see" had also been made illegal. In the end no one dared say anything at all. And then the queen felt that she might as well make all talking illegal, because almost every conflict tended to start with someone saying something. And after that there was silence in the kingdom for several years.

Until one day a little girl came riding in, singing as she went. And everyone stared at her, because singing was an extremely serious crime in Miaudacas, because there was a risk of one person liking the song and another disliking it. The Yea-Sayers sprang into action to stop the girl, but they couldn't catch her because she was very good at running. So the Yea-Sayers rang all the bells and called for reinforcements. Upon which the queen's very own elite force, known as the Paragraph Riders -- because they rode a very special kind of animal that was a cross between a giraffe and a rule book -- came out to stop the girl. But not even the Paragraph Riders could lay their hands on her, and in the end the queen in person came rushing out of her castle and roared at the girl to stop singing.

But then the girl turned to the queen, stared her right in the eye, and said "No." And as soon as she had said it, a piece of masonry fell off the wall around the prison. And when the girl said "No' one more time, another piece of masonry fell. And before long, not only the girl but all the other people in the kingdom, even the Yea-Sayers and the Paragraph Riders, were shouting "No! No! No!" and then the prison crumbled. And that was how the people of Miaudacas learned that a queen only stays in power for as long as her subjects are afraid of conflict.

Or at least Elsa thinks that was the moral of the story. She knows this partly because she checked out "moral" on Wikipedia and partly because the very first word Elsa learned to say was "no." Which led to a lot of arguing between Mum and Granny.

They fought about a lot of other things as well, of course. Once Granny said to Elsa's mum that she only became a manager as a way of expressing teenage rebellion -- because the very worst rebellion Elsa's mum could dream up was to "become an economist."

Mum finishes her call and stands in the middle of the kitchen floor with the tea towel in her hand, looking as if she's forgotten something. She looks at Elsa. Elsa looks back dubiously. Mum smiles sadly.

Elsa nods. Even though she doesn't want to. Mum insists on packing boxes every night despite being told by both the doctor and George that she should be taking it easy. Mum isn't very good at either -- taking it easy or being told.

Elsa never really understood what was meant by that. But later that night, when they thought Elsa was sleeping, Elsa heard Mum rebuff Granny by saying, "What do you know about my teenage years? You were never here!" That was the only time Elsa ever heard Mum saying anything to Granny while holding back tears. And then Granny went very quiet and never repeated the comment about teenage rebellion to Elsa.

"Do you want to help me pack some of your granny's things into boxes?"

"Your dad is coming to pick you up from school tomorrow afternoon," says Mum in passing as she ticks things off on her Excel packing spreadsheet.

"That's the quickest way for me to know that I should be mega-worrying," answers Elsa.

Mum massages her temples and looks away.

"No it isn't, no one has so many routine checkups in a pregnancy. I'm not that stupid."

Elsa packs things haphazardly into the box, deliberately ignoring the spreadsheet.

"Is Halfie sick?"

"I'll be… staying on for a while at the hospital," says Mum, because she doesn't like lying to Elsa.

"It's just a routine checkup.

Mum tries to smile again. It doesn't go so very well. "Don't worry, darling."

"Everything is complicated if no one explains it to you."

"Because you're working late?" asks Elsa, as if she means nothing in particular by the question.

"What do you mean, 'as well?' What ELSE have I been making trouble with you about?" Elsa hisses, as one does when one is almost eight and feels slightly put upon.

"George is coming with me to the hospital."

"Can't George pick me up, then?"

"It's complicated," Mum sighs.

"Please, Elsa, don't you start making trouble about this as well."

"I'M NOT SHOUTING!" shouts Elsa.

"Don't shout," says Mum in a composed voice.

And then they both look down at the floor for a long time. Looking for their own ways of saying sorry. Neither of them knows where to begin. Elsa thumps down the lid of the packing crate, stomps off into Granny's bedroom, and slams the door.

You could hear a pin drop in the flat for about thirty minutes after that. Because that is how angry Elsa is, so angry that she has to start measuring time in minutes rather than eternities. She lies on Granny's bed and stares at the black-and-white photos on the ceiling. The Werewolf Boy seems to be waving at her and laughing. Deep inside, she wonders how anyone who laughs like that can grow up into something as incredibly doleful as The Monster.

She hears the doorbell go and then a second ring following incredibly fast, much faster than would be feasible for a normal person when ringing a doorbell. So it can only be Britt-Marie.

"I'm coming," Mum answers politely. Elsa can tell by her voice that she's been crying.

"Your mother's car is parked in the garage! And that hound is still loose on the property!" She's talking so quickly it's clear she can't prioritize her various upsets.

"No. We're not home. We're here."

"The dog is probably far away by now, Britt-Marie. I wouldn't worry about it --"

Mum sighs.

Elsa sits up in Granny's bed, but it takes almost a minute before she manages to take in what Britt-Marie just said. Then she bounces out of bed and opens the door, and has to muster all her self-control to stop herself dashing off down the hall, because she doesn't want to make the old busybody suspicious.

Britt-Marie stands on the landing with one hand very firmly inserted into the other, smiling at Mum in a well-meaning way, nattering on about how in this leaseholders' association they can't have rabid dogs running around.

The words come flowing out of Britt-Marie, as if she's fitted with a windup mechanism and someone has cranked it up using a key on her back. "I rang your bell! No one opened!"

"A sanitary nuisance, a sanitary nuisance is what it is!"

"No, no, of course you wouldn't, Ulrika. Of course you wouldn't. You're not the type to worry yourself about other people's safety, even your own child's, are you? It's something you've inherited, I see. Putting the career before the children. That is how it's always been in your family."

Elsa sticks out her head before Britt-Marie has time to turn around and leave.

Britt-Marie turns to Mum and smiles well-meaningly.

Mum's face is utterly relaxed. Her arms hang down, apparently relaxed. The only thing that gives her away is that she's slowly, slowly clenching her fists. Elsa has never seen her do that before.

"Was there anything else on your mind?" says Mum slowly, but something in her eyes has changed hue, which makes Britt-Marie take a small, small step back.

Britt-Marie also notices. Again she switches the position of her hands on her stomach. Looks as if she's sweating. Her smile stiffens. "Not that there's anything wrong with that, Ulrika, obviously. Obviously not. You make your own choices and prioritizations, obviously!"

"No, no, nothing else. Nothing else at all!"

"She doesn't think I should drink coffee when I'm pregnant," Mum replies. Her phone starts ringing.

Mum closes the door in a slightly less self-controlled and composed way than usual, and heads into the kitchen.

"Maybe if you didn't drink so much coffee you wouldn't get headaches so often, Ulrika!" She turns and stomps down the stairs so quickly no one has time to answer her.

"I don't know where the car keys are, Britt-Marie. And if you don't mind, I need to sit down -- I seem to be getting a headache."

"It's in the garage," she says curtly, avoiding Mum's eye. "It's parked in my space. And if it isn't moved at once, I'll call the police!"

"What was that you said about Granny's car?"

"What did she mean by that?" asks Elsa.

"How did it get there?"

"That's not what I meant," says Elsa. She hates it when Mum pretends to be stupid.

Mum picks up her telephone from the kitchen counter. "I have to answer this, sweetheart."

"How am I supposed to know?!" Then she turns to Elsa's mum again, with renewed courage. "The car has to be moved at once, otherwise I'm calling the police, Ulrika!"

"It's from the hospital, I have to answer."

"What did Britt-Marie mean when she said in our family we 'put the career before the children?' She meant Granny, didn't she?"

They stand in silence looking at each other while the telephone rings two more times. Now it's Elsa's turn to clench her fists.

Mum's fingers steal across the display. "I have to take this, Elsa."

The telephone continues ringing.

By the time Elsa gets up an hour after that, Mum is sleeping on the sofa in the living room. Elsa sneaks up and tucks her and Halfie in. Kisses Mum on the cheek. Turns out the lamp. Mum is still holding Granny's tea towel in her hand.

Mum closes her eyes and answers the telephone. By the time she starts talking into it, Elsa has already slammed the door to Granny's bedroom behind her.

"No you don't!"

Elsa fetches a flashlight from one of the boxes in the hall and puts on her shoes.

When Mum gently opens the door half an hour later, Elsa pretends to be asleep. Mum sneaks up and tucks her in. Kisses her cheek. Turns off the lamp.

"No you don't!"

Because now she knows where to find the next clue in Granny's treasure hunt.