Greenwild

“The Prof” explains that the Five O’Clock Club has been investigating the disappearances of the Botanists ever since her grandfather vanished one year ago. The Prof laments the fact that if she doesn’t find her grandfather, she will be “stuck with” her snobbish Aunt Elspeth as her caretaker. However, she considers the new information about Craven/Cardew to be promising, as this is the first clue that the group has had in a year. The group shows Daisy a list of disappearances, all of which happened in South America. They plan to research Cardew in the library.

Though the children find nothing in the library, Daisy reflects that Greenwild feels “different” in a way that has nothing to do with magic. She recalls one of her trips with Leila, during which she made a friend named Anna. At that time, Daisy was sad when she was forced to leave Anna behind. Now, she worries about becoming close to the Greenwild children, because she knows that she will be forced to return to her nomadic life after she finds her mother. She recalls the seed that her mother gave her to use in an emergency and slips outside to secretly plant it. Before she can do so, however, she hears someone crying. She follows the sound through a door that is hidden in a nearby wall.

Through the door, Daisy finds a glowing apple tree that she recognizes from a dream she had while she was at Wykhurst. She finds a boy named Hal crying over his father’s cruel comments deriding his intellect and his ambition to become an explorer. Daisy befriends Hal and teaches him about celestial navigation, but he explains that constellations are different in the Greenwild. Daisy shares stories about her mother, missing Leila all the more. She finds Hal familiar but cannot place him. (She later learns that Hal is her father when he was a child; this version of him has been magically summoned by the dandelight, the so-called “paperweight” that Leila gave to her.) Before Daisy leaves, Hal urges her not to tell anyone about this hidden place, where he goes to be alone. Later, in the wee hours of the morning, Daisy spots Sheldrake moving furtively through the garden.

The next morning, Daisy is dismayed to find that the seed from Leila is missing, although she still has the red envelope that once held it. She asks Indigo and the Prof about Hal but does not reveal where she saw him. However, neither of the other children recognize his name. That night, when she visits Hal again, he denies knowing any of the Mallowmarsh children. She and Hal look for the missing seed but cannot find it.

The next day, Daisy starts school in the Greenwild and struggles to catch up with the students who have already begun learning green magic. She meets several classmates, including Ivy Helix, the snobby girl whom the Professor’s aunt hopes that the Professor will befriend. Throughout the lessons in green magic, Daisy’s plants remain stubbornly unmoved by magic. Brightly Marigold advises Daisy to hold onto hope as a magical force, but Daisy is too worried about Leila to feel hopeful.

Over lunch, Acorn complains about being too young to take green magic classes, and the Prof laments the pressure she feels to be accepted to Bloomquist, a senior green magic academy. Acorn grimly explains the concept of  being “stripped.” This term denotes a recently banned punishment that removes a person’s green magic entirely. The Prof claims that being stripped is “worse than death” (167).

Indigo and Daisy go to “the Great Glasshouse” (169) for their afternoon lessons, and Daisy reflects that every day she spends in the Greenwild makes her feel closer to her mother. Their teacher is Gulliver Wildish, a man who is famous for his years researching the Amazon. He has an artificial arm made from enchanted wood. The children watch, enraptured, as a greenhouse worker uses “minim moss” to make himself temporarily tiny so that he can tend to extremely fragile plants.

Wildish guides Daisy through the process of using her magic to “weave” vines into desired shapes. He advises her to always pay attention to the wonders of nature, both in the Greenwild and in Grayside. Ivy mocks Daisy’s failure to make her vines respond, derisively commenting that Daisy will never be a candidate for Bloomquist. Indigo reassures Daisy that “loads of really good Botanists” (177) don’t attend the school, but he also tells her that if she wants to become an explorer or healer, she must gain entry to Bloomquist. Indigo frets that he is not talented enough to get into the prestigious academy, unlike his older sister. Daisy reassures him that his talent with animals is just as important as the plant magic that is so highly valued in the Greenwild. Daisy worries that she doesn’t have any magic at all.

That evening, the Five O’Clock Club regrets their collective failure to learn more about Cardew; the adults whom they asked all insisted that the children had no need to know about this person. The only adult that they didn’t dare ask was Sheldrake. The Prof explains that Sheldrake anticipated being commander and is now jealous of the fact that Artemis got the role instead. The commander’s magic is bound to the Heart Oak (181), the anchor of Mallowmarsh’s magic. The children visit the oak and wish for luck for Acorn’s father, who has recently departed for the Amazon.

As Daisy heads back to the commander’s treehouse, she wonders whether her father had ever been a Botanist, given that the dandelion paperweight was once his. She is distracted by these thoughts and doesn’t notice Ivy approaching until after Ivy catches a glimpse of her paperweight.

That night, Daisy continues to tend the secret garden with Hal, who claims that they both “have a responsibility” to “bring [the abandoned garden] back to life” (184). He intends to repair the garden in order to prove his father’s doubts about his abilities incorrect. Daisy helps him through the night. When she returns home near dawn, she again sees Sheldrake and resolves to follow him.

Daisy follows Sheldrake into the Sighing Forest, where she hears him speaking to someone about his plans to betray someone else to the Grim Reapers. He plans to enact his plan in a month. Daisy begins to succumb to the power of the sighing forest, dwelling on her failure to stop her mother from going to the Amazon. However, before she can become so regretful that she transforms into a sighing tree, the dandelion paperweight blazes brightly, waking her from the magical trance. Sheldrake finds her and carries her to safety.

Sheldrake reprimands Daisy for breaking the rules and confiscates her paperweight, much to Daisy’s dismay. When she explains the incident to her friends, they are irritated that Daisy didn’t trust them with the truth about the paperweight. Indigo reassures her that the Prof’s anger will wane, but Daisy still frets over her mistake, worrying about her friendships and about what she overheard Sheldrake say.

Daisy struggles in class the next day, as her magic has not improved and the Prof remains angry with her. In her room, Daisy finds an old notebook with a date from 30 years ago. It is titled “The Logbook of Hal White, age twelve and a half” (192). She dismisses this as coincidence, but when she asks Miss Tufton, the elderly woman explains that Hal White was Artemis’s son and “one of the most famous Botanical explorers in history” (193). He was killed by his best friend many years ago.

Daisy hurries to the secret door, but it won’t open. In Hal White’s notebook, she sees a sketch of a hand featuring Cardew’s telltale constellation of moles. She waits for night to fall so that she can return to the garden and ask Hal what he knows, certain that this plan will help her to find her mother.

A storm rages that night, and the residents of Mallowmarsh gather for a “lightning-seed harvest,” which delays Daisy’s trip to Hal’s garden. Ivy intentionally knocks Daisy’s seed bucket to the ground, causing the lightning-seed to fizz out. While everyone is distracted, Daisy decides to seek the “Perilous Glasshouse” where dangerous plants are kept, hoping to find her paperweight there. The Prof follows her and warns her about the many dangers inside. She, Indigo, and Acorn insist on going into the dangerous greenhouse along with Daisy. Together, the friends bolt through a thicket of dangerous, hostile plants, then enter through a door that opens only when it is provided with blood.

Daisy nearly succumbs to a dangerous, disorienting scent emitted from the flower, but the Prof gives her putty to block her nose. The children sneak past a dozing guard and search for the paperweight, which they finally find amongst the Venus flytraps. The Prof recognizes the paperweight as a “dandelight,” a rare, centuries-old artifact that has the power to lead people to the nearest door that connects the Greenwild with the Grayside. The dandelight permits someone to cross into the Greenwild even if they do not have magic of their own. Suddenly, the children hear a sound; the guard has been knocked unconscious, and the precious flower that he was guarding is now gone. Sheldrake enters and sees the children, and he immediately assumes that Daisy has stolen the flower.

Sheldrake takes the children to Artemis, who has recently returned from the Bureau. Daisy explains that Sheldrake stole the dandelight from her, but he denies this. Artemis decides to protect the dandelight herself. Daisy considers telling Artemis about overhearing Sheldrake in the forest but decides to wait.

Artemis tells Daisy that the Bureau has denied her request to send a rescue mission to the Amazon in search of the missing Botanists. Instead, they plan an unofficial rescue mission. Artemis has learned that Leila grew up in a Grayside orphanage but found her way to the Greenwild as a child. When Leila was 19, corrupt Botanists killed her adoptive family; Leila escaped with the aid of Daisy’s father. Artemis postulates that Leila kept the Greenwild a secret from Daisy in order to protect her from its dangers. However, Leila still desired to help the Greenwild, and this ambition explains her trip to the Amazon. Later that night, Daisy discovers that Artemis has hidden the dandelight behind an ivy-covered brick.

The next day, the children shovel griffin manure as punishment for entering the forbidden greenhouse. The Prof complains that the true punishment for their transgression is a demerit, which lessens their chances of gaining admission to Bloomquist. The Prof vows to follow the school rules to the letter from now on.

Daisy reports Artemis’s plans for an unofficial investigation into the Botanists’ disappearances. She also relates what she overheard Sheldrake say in the Sighing Forest. She believes that Sheldrake himself stole the orchid; however, the guard has no memory of his attacker.

That night, Daisy visits Hal and learns that there is a discrepancy in their timelines; although from her perspective, she was absent for only two nights, he perceived this absence as lasting two full weeks. When she asks Hal about Cardew, he claims that Cardew is his best friend. Daisy discovers that she physically cannot warn Hal about the “future” attempt that Cardew will make against Hal’s life. Similarly, when Daisy tries to explain to the Five O’Clock Club that she knows Hal, she finds herself physically unable to speak.

The Prof reports that the stolen flower is a ghost orchid and has very specific magical powers; for each flower eaten, a person gains a year of life, but this year is taken from the life of the person they love the most. Hal White first discovered the plant but was killed before he could bring it home. The children assume that Cardew is Hal’s murderer, although none of the adults will speak of it. The children conclude that Cardew, who was convicted of his crimes before the punishment of “stripping” was outlawed, must have survived in the absence of his green magic and renamed himself Craven. Now, Craven/Cardew seeks entrance into the Greenwild using the dandelight, since he no longer has his magic and therefore cannot enter on his own. They realize that if he manages to enter the Greenwild, he can attack it all at once instead of waiting for Botanists to come to the Grayside one by one.