SOLVED. Fantasy. Boy gets head dunked in water, wakes up in another world. Spoilers ahead. [s]

[Emily]

From around 2006-2011. Read to me in 2nd-4th grade. Fantasy, I believe set in the middle ages. A young teen (at least 12?) boy's head gets dunked in a water barrel as a magic trick and/or joke and he wakes up somewhere else, a magical place. At the end of the book the boy suddenly is back in the water barrel- he asks how the guy who pushed his head did it, but the guy is either clueless or doesn't reveal anything.

[Rainbowheart]

How old is the boy?

Is this book for kids, teens, or adults?

[Emily]

Thanks for the advice, I made the edits!

[Orsolya Könyvtáros (formerly Memp)]

I've read this one! It's The First Two Lives of Lukas-Kasha by Lloyd Alexander.

[Orsolya Könyvtáros (formerly Memp)]

The First Two Lives of Lukas-Kasha

pg. 7:
Facing the mountebank, Lukas found him taller than he seemed. The little man's eyes glittered as he cocked his head to one side. Instead of a sparrow, he resembled a hawk. Lukas shifted uneasily. But, with half the town looking on, there was no way to back out.
He nodded. "What's your game, then? You'll saw me in half? Send me up in a puff of smoke?"
"Look into the water," Battisto said. "Closer," he urged, as Lukas crouched and peered in. "Closer yet."
Lukas felt the conjurer's bony hand on the nape of his neck. Before he could brace himself or turn away, his head was plunged into the vessel.
Brine filled his nose and mouth. He struggled to clear his bursting lungs, and jumped to his feet only to feel his legs give way beneath him. He blinked open eyes that smarted with salt water.
Battisto had vanished. All the town had vanished.
Lukas, alone under a blinding sun, was drowning in the sea.

pg. 208:
Lukas gasped and stared wildly. He was standing on the cart, in the middle of the market square of Zara-Petra.
Everything was as it had been. The hands of the town clock had scarcely moved. The baker's boy had swallowed the last morsel of pie crust and was wiping the crumbs from his chin.
"Battisto! What have you done to me!"
The little man gave him a curious glance. "My dear lad, all I did was touch your face for a moment into a kettle of water."
"No! There was Abadan-- the sea, the cliffs, Kayim. Nur-Jehan."
The mountebank shook his head. "I have no idea what you are talking about."
"Send me back! You must!"
Lukas tried to seize the iron vessel, but Battisto overturned it and spilled its contents onto the cobbles. "You see? Water from your own horse trough, nothing more."

[Emily]

That’s it!! I remembered that scene but not the details. Thanks so much :)