Magic Under Glass (13 page)

20

I knew those tears must be my last. I wouldn’t have a chance to cry again.

Back in my usual quarters, I tried to pack, in case I was left with no choice but to go. I already had my old valise, of course, with Mother’s clothes and my old books, but someone had brought a second trunk in during the day and folded my new clothes into it.

Space remained for other books, but I didn’t feel like carrying any of Hollin’s books with me. I didn’t want to take a scrap from Vestenveld, unless I could have brought Erris.

I roamed the halls, sick at heart. I might block my tears, but I couldn’t replace them with joy, and hollows filled my soul.

My footsteps brought me to Hollin’s father’s study. I had not entered that room since I’d taken paper from it, and I hardly knew why I entered it now. I wouldn’t be sorry to leave this room behind. The fairies sat waxen on their flowers. I thought of the living ones I had seen, the nocturnal butterflies—how they had glowed and danced over the fields. I wished I could wave my hand and grant them life, and in their dead eyes I saw a reflection of Erris, trapped in clockwork limbs forever.

Hollin’s father was dead. There was no reason to keep the fairies here any longer. Hollin should have thrown these things away, and made Vestenveld his own. This room was proof that he didn’t even try. He told me he wished to be different, but it was all talk. He wouldn’t take action against Smollings even now. He would only run away, where Smollings and Karstor and fairy wars would no longer concern him.

The coward! Had he ever cared?

I shoved the curtains wide. Hollin’s father would have had a striking view of Vestenveld’s image wavering in the reflection pool. I pulled the window latch, but the frame didn’t want to let the window go. With the palm of my hand, I thumped it hard, each time with a great smack. My skin stung. I didn’t care if the servants heard me.

The window flew open, and a flower-scented breeze played with a loose lock of my hair.

I took the fairies under glass into my hands. Only the wooden base had any weight. I imagined they’d crumble like dried flowers if I touched them. Horrible dead things.

With a great heave, I pitched them into the reflection pool. They landed in the shallows with just a small splash, and they were gone. Forever.

I stared at the still waters so long that tears came to my eyes. I didn’t want to go on a ship with Hollin. I wanted to marry someone I loved. I wanted to free Erris. I wanted to be there the moment it happened—whatever happened.

Even if the only fate left to him was to die, he still deserved that much, not this unnatural imprisonment. And he shouldn’t have to die alone. No one should. When Mother died, we had all been there. I had held her hand and felt her grip slacken. I didn’t want to hold my mother’s hand and watch her die, but I would have felt a thousand times worse if she had died without me.

Karstor had implied that only the Lady, the Queen of the Longest Night, could grant Erris life without a body. Or maybe she could find and revive his body somehow. I didn’t know how it would work. Karstor also warned of the danger, but I was growing desperate. I wondered how one summoned her. Did one have to be a necromancer? What would she do if she came?

Karstor said she was not unkind. Back in Tiansher, there was a painting of her in one of the palace halls, where she was smiling and carrying a beacon to lead the dead safely home.

I skimmed Hollin’s father’s shelf, taking out a book I’d seen before:
Mastery of Man: the Perils of Sorcery and the Summoning of
Demons, Illustrated with 32 Color Plates
, by the Reverend Abram Crane.

“The underworld is ruled by a fairy known as the Queen of the Longest Night,” the book declared in chapter two. “All sinners, human and fairy alike, fall under the cruel sway of this treacherous creature.”

An illustration showed a woman whose scowling face reminded me of the
ukuki,
the trickster spirits of Tiansher. She carried a sword aloft and I suddenly recalled the statue of the sword-bearing woman in the square the day I left New Sweeling. I had thought nothing of the statue that day, but now it seemed a sign.

I read on. The Reverend Abram Crane continued page after page about the damnation that fell upon those who summoned the Queen, and how fickle she was about appearing: “She will only appear to those with the most urgent of needs, the darkest of hearts, the most wicked of souls.”

Well, my need was certainly urgent, although I wasn’t sure about the rest. I needed a real book on necromancy, one that told me how to work the spell. But as the sun crawled into the treetops, I had not found one, and Hollin summoned me for dinner.

He was so very happy when he talked of travels or animals or world monuments. “I packed six foreign language books, Nimira. We can practice on the ship; I’m sure we can find other travelers to speak with. That should be fun, I think.”

“If I’m not seasick.”

“You came across in steerage, I imagine?”

I nodded, wishing to purge the memories of the hundreds of beds, the coughing and crying and snoring of my fellow passengers that kept me awake all night, the food I hardly ate and couldn’t keep down, the miserable stink of sweat and fear, some of it my own.

“Bad memories, eh? Steerage isn’t fit for dogs. Well, even if you’re a little seasick this time around, I’m sure you’ll find it more pleasant. In first class we’ll have good food, music, and comfortable cabins. And new friends. Travelers are very cosmopolitan people. I’m sure you’ll charm them all and hear some fascinating stories. And we can sit on the deck and watch the sunset, or sunrise.”

He looked at me hopefully, and when I produced a feeble smile in response, he went on, sounding ever more desperate to cheer me.

“I hope to book us to sail right into Sormesen. They say it’s straight out of a fairy tale. The houses are painted bright colors and the sun shines three hundred days a year. A person can scarcely sleep, with all there is to do. I’m looking forward to the galleries . . . and the food, they say, is the best in the world, to say nothing of the wine.”

Sormesen might have been paradise itself, but I knew I could never be content there.

I still looked for necromancy books after dinner, but I found nothing. It seemed I had no choice but to attempt an even more daring plan. Karstor had said those who speak to the dead would know the Queen.

I had to see Annalie.

21

Linza came to my room that night to dress my hair for bed. She hesitated at my door before she walked over and picked up the brush.

“Are you really going away with Mr. Parry?”

I shifted in my chair to face her, rather than my own wan reflection. “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about that. You trusted me with the secret of Annalie’s fate, and now I need to put my trust in you. You know where her room is, don’t you?”

“You want to see the mistress? Why?”

I decided it was time to tell Linza the whole story. I thought she would have more sympathy than fear for Erris if she knew what he was, and I was right.

“Poor man!” she gasped. “But what could Mistress Annalie do?”

“I need to know how to summon the Queen of the Longest Night. I don’t know if she can tell me, but it’s the only chance I have right now.”

“Well . . .” Linza glanced behind her. “Miss Rashten guards Annalie.”

“But not all the time,” I pointed out. “I see her all over the house.”

Linza nodded. “She likes to know everything that goes on.”

“When does she sleep?”

“It seems like she never does!” Linza said. “But I believe she sleeps from around midnight to four o’ clock, and then takes a rest in the afternoon. Her bedroom is right next to Mistress Annalie’s, though, and she has awfully keen hearing.” Linza rubbed her own ear, as if recalling a time when Miss Rashten had caught her at something.

“Still, I’m willing to try, if you tell me where her room is. I’ll just have to be very quiet.”

“I’ll take you there, miss,” Linza said.

“I don’t want to put you in danger.”

“I don’t want you to get lost up there and stumble into Miss Rashten’s room.” She grinned. “Besides, Mistress Annalie knows me. She might not let you in without a fuss, and that would surely wake Miss Rashten! I’ll come for you at half past midnight.”

At one o’ clock, I crept upstairs in bare feet and my nightgown. The creaks of my soles on the stairs pierced the stillness, but there was nothing to do but go on.

The third floor was lit by only the faintest shreds of moonlight peering between cracks in the curtains. I waited for my eyes to adjust, and listened, but all was utter silence besides my own soft breath and thumping heart.

When Miss Rashten caught me upstairs before, she had been carrying a tray of food, so when I reached the upstairs library where I had tried to hide from her, I thought Annalie’s room must be near. But which door? There were two, both shut. One would be Rashten’s room. I pressed my ear to one and heard nothing, but behind the second door, I heard the clatter of plates or dishes.

Linza said Rashten slept at this time, but Annalie liked the dark hours. Dared I risk it? Or could I knock, and see whose voice called? Could I run fast enough if it was Rashten? I glanced down the hall. Likely not. If I eluded her here, she’d catch me on the stairs.

I cursed myself for not asking Linza for directions, just in case, and then I rapped on the door.

I heard a woman’s voice call, “Yes?” and I knew. The last time I had heard that voice, she’d been begging for help.

“Mistress Annalie?” I didn’t want to spend too much time talking in the hall, lest Miss Rashten hear. I tried the knob, but it was locked.

I heard her footsteps approach. The door swung open, and I stood face-to-face with Hollin’s wife.

“Oh!” she said. “Why, come in.”

The dim room smelled comfortingly of coffee, and there was light, of the most curious sort. Dozens of glowing orbs hovered in the air like fireflies. A few bobbed around Annalie’s head, while others offered gentle illumination to corners. Some flitted by the prisms dangling from the ceiling, scattering soft rainbows across the floor and furniture. Annalie herself was like a shadow, standing in the center of the room, a straight slender line of girl all clad in black with loose sleeves, her dark hair flowing past her waist. Her face was paler even than Linza’s.

“It’s you,” she said. Her ordinary northerner’s accent broke through my shock. “Please, have a seat.” She waved a hand at the slim green sofa, her sleeve fluttering. A few loyal orbs of light followed her every move.

I’d never seen clothes like hers before. She wore no corset, and her dress was simple, without a single touch of lace or beading. Atop that she had a long hooded robe, like something a sorceress might wear in a book. It seemed a lot of clothes to wear in the summer in a shut-up room, but I realized the air wasn’t stuffy as expected. It had the brisk freshness of an autumn day.

Even with the orbs, I could see only the outlines of the exotic clutter filling the room: paper fans on the walls, square vases, and painted screens. The room had more mirrors than I could count in a glance, reflecting the scant lights. Piles of silk pillows in pink and yellow would have been quite vibrant in the sun, but here their colors were whispers and shadows. Annalie reached for a silver pot on a tray in front of us. “Coffee?”

“Oh, no, thank you.”

“I love coffee, likely more than I should.” She poured herself a little silver cupful and sipped. “It’s still hot.” She put it down and regarded me.

“My servants tell me that my husband is about to run off abroad with you.”

This had to be about the most awkward conversation I’d ever lived through. “You know about it? You know who I am?”

“There is little I don’t know, for what good it does me. If my maids don’t tell me, the spirits do.” The orbs bobbed around her head, as if nodding agreement.

“I don’t really want to leave with him.”

“But you agreed. I’m told he’s packing all the trunks.”

“I only agreed so I’d have a chance to save Erris.”

“Erris . . .” An orb drifted past Annalie’s face, and her dark eyes gleamed. “Yes. You need to see Karstor.”

“I already saw him, for all the good it did. You know about Erris?”

“Oh, yes. The spirits tell me their secrets.” She cocked her head as she spoke, as if she were listening not to her own words, but to uncanny voices floating on the air. “Garvin Pelerine has been to see me.”

“Garvin?”

“Yes. He told me about Erris. He says Karstor will know what to do.”

I thumped my fist on the couch in frustration. “Well, he didn’t! Karstor thinks only the Queen of the Longest Night could save Erris. That’s why I came to you. To see if you knew how to summon her.”

“The Queen of the Longest Night!” Annalie settled her robe closer around her shoulders. “Very dangerous, yes . . . but could it work?”

The orbs danced and weaved around her. She watched them thoughtfully.

I was beginning to shiver at the thought of the orbs being actual spirits that she could speak to.

“You talk to Garvin?” I asked.

“I talk to many spirits,” she said. “Good ones, bad ones . . . All the lonely spirits with unfinished business are looking for someone to hear their stories. They can’t move on. Garvin can’t rest as long as Erris is trapped and Smollings is free . . .”

“Is it true, then? Smollings killed Garvin?”

“Yes,” Annalie said. “Smollings killed Garvin. He is also the one who keeps me a prisoner here.”

“You know Smollings is a murderer?” I cried.

“I know,” Annalie said. “But precious little I can do about it when everyone thinks I’m dead or crazy and Hollin doesn’t dare stand up to Smollings to tell the world otherwise. Miss Rashten watches everything I do. Believe me, I’d love to see Smollings imprisoned if I could. He plies me with his concoctions so that I can speak to not just
my
spirits, but darker spirits. Sometimes I even see glimpses of the future. Always terrible things. I feel like I really am losing my mind . . . I was coming out of one such trance when I ran into your room that night. I had broken away from him, but not for long, as you can see.”

We both paused at the sudden sound of approaching footsteps. Annalie sprung to her feet and rushed to a side door, flinging it open. “If that’s Rashten, you must hide! Go under my bed.”

The door shut behind me, and darkness closed in so thick that I felt my way to the bed rather than seeing it. I dropped onto my stomach and squeezed myself beneath the bed frame, stifling a shriek as my hand met fur.

I heard a purr in the darkness. Unfortunately, I also heard Miss Rashten’s voice. “Yes,” she was saying. “I found this one poking around near Nimira’s door. She’s not in her bed.”

“She isn’t here,” Annalie said, quite calmly. “I don’t know why she’d come to me.”

“I heard voices.”

Annalie laughed. “Voices? Here? Fancy
that
.” Then, “Where are you going?”

“I’m checking your bedroom.”

The door flung open. I stayed very still and held my breath, but the traitorous cat had other ideas. It suddenly bit my hand, and when I tried to swat it back, it clamped on and began kicking my arm like it was an unfortunate rodent. I could see Miss Rashten’s feet draw nearer as I grabbed the cat by its scruff and detached it from my injured flesh.

The cat twisted and tore out from under the bed with a low growl. Miss Rashten shrieked and left with it.

Annalie laughed. “Why, you’ve scared the Captain.”

“I despise that beast,” Miss Rashten snapped.

“And it despises you.”

“You hush if you don’t want ‘the Captain’ to meet a bad end with a potato sack and the reflection pool. Linza, come on. We’ll find that girl somewhere.”

“I bet Miss Nimira ran off without even saying good-bye,” Linza said. Her acting was a bit heavy-handed, but I appreciated her attempt to cover me, and no one seemed to notice.

Annalie waited a moment before she told me to come out. She was pouring out some cream into her saucer for the Captain. “Cruel woman,” she said. “That was close.”

“And Hollin was going to leave you to Smollings’s and Rashten’s mercy while he goes abroad?” I asked, appalled.

“Hollin, I’m afraid, is as much at Smollings’s mercy as I am. He didn’t mean for all this to happen. I’m saddened that he meant to go abroad and leave me here, but truth be told, I’ve expected it for a long time. Sometimes I’ve even wished he
would
go. It’s almost easier to bear my fate alone than see it reflected in his eyes—see his guilt.”

I nodded. “I heard he used dark magic to try to save you.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “Not unlike the dark magic you must use now to save Erris.”

Could I end up like Annalie? Shut up in darkness, talking to the dead?

“Tell me what to do,” I said.