The Elementals
Read More from Saundra Mitchell
Copyright © 2013 by Saundra Mitchell
All rights reserved. For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 215 Park Avenue South, New York, New York 10003.
Harcourt is an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the print edition as follows:
Mitchell, Saundra.
The elementals / Saundra Mitchell.
pages cm
Companion book to:
The Vespertine
, and,
The Springsweet
.
Summary: In 1917, Kate Witherspoon, who has lived a bohemian life with her artist parents, goes to Los Angeles where she meets crippled midwestern farm boy Julian Birch, another runaway, and together they realize they have the ability to triumph over death and time.
ISBN 978-0-547-85314-7 (hardback)
[1. Supernatural—Fiction. 2. Runaways—Fiction. 3. People with disabilities—Fiction. 4. Friendship—Fiction. 5. Motion picture industry—Fiction. 6. Death—Fiction. 7. Time—Fiction. 8. Hollywood (Los Angeles, Calif.)—History—20th century—Fiction.] I. Title.
PZ7.M6953Ele 2013
[Fic]—dc23
2013003904
eISBN 978-0-544-03560-7
v1.0613
For my mom. Sorry for all the times I interrupted
Magnum P.I.
1893
Prologue
Ordinary girls are untroubled by destiny.
Unfortunately, neither Amelia van den Broek nor Zora Stewart Birch was entirely ordinary. They leaned against the dining counter, watching the whole of the world grow smaller as they rose into the air on the great Ferris wheel.
Incandescent bulbs twinkled all around them, captured stars that illuminated the car and its sparse elegance. Seats with velvet cushions and wire backs filled the gallery, lazily spinning with no one to sit in them.
Tearing off a bit of fried dough, Amelia pointed toward a white-columned building in the distance and said, “That one right there. You should go look at the murals; I helped paint them.”
“How many talents do you have, Amelia?” Zora asked.
With a snort, Amelia popped the dough into her mouth and said, “Too many. I see the future, I rise from the dead, I’m forever
not
strangling Nathaniel.”
“So your temper’s improved.”
Amelia laughed. “Hardly. I quarrel instead of strangle, and he does the same.”
Her eyes trailed to the corner of the car. Her Nathaniel leaned against the wall, talking to Emerson, entirely ignoring the view outside the window. He could travel on the wind; he had a sick and regular habit of jumping from heights for the thrill of it. Seeing Chicago and its World’s Fair from a locked car didn’t interest him in the least.
After a moment, Zora pressed a finger against Amelia’s nose, then laughed at her dazed expression when she tore her gaze away.
“You’re such a liar,” Zora said, marveling. “You’re still mad for him.”
“I am, I admit.”
“Good,” Zora said. “We needed
one
good thing to come from all that.”
In reply, Amelia kicked Zora’s foot and let that speak for itself.
I have you,
it said.
And you have me as well
.
“Mean,” Zora said, then clutched the counter. She wasn’t sure she liked the view from this distance, and when the car swung ever so slightly, she startled. It turned out that she was a ground-beneath-the-feet sort of girl. Skyscrapers didn’t interest her, and she had learned to dislike the crush of cities. Even though darkness mostly disguised Chicago that night, it made little difference.
Toward the east, thin fingers of lightning stroked the sky. It was a storm so removed, it seemed more decoration than threat.
Amelia frowned at it. Then she asked, “Does it worry you?”
“Not especially.” Smoothing a hand down Amelia’s sleeve, Zora smiled. “I’m not in the middle of it; I didn’t command it. So I think it has better things to strike.”
They’d had days to unburden themselves, to make confessions and share new secrets. They’d spent hours acting like children, spending pennies on Magic Lantern shows and sneaking into the opera, riding the train together, perched on top.
Pretending this visit would last forever, Zora would still sometimes grow sober and exchange a look with Amelia. A room was different when four of them shared it. Not
bad,
but not right, as if everything trembled on the edge of explosion.
Amelia smiled crookedly. She felt the balance shifting and tried to cling to her best friend just a little longer. “I’ve been thinking. We could be the most remarkable wonder of the world if we wanted. A full circus, contained in four bodies.”
“We could call ourselves the Glorious Elements,” Zora agreed. It would never happen, but they could spin fables about it.
“Barnum and Bailey would beg us to travel with them.”
Spreading her hands out, Zora imagined the headlines. “A spectacle for the ages, see the gifts of the ancients performed before your very eyes.”
“We’d be world famous!”
“And rich!”
Throwing her arms around Amelia, Zora pressed their brows together. In a sudden, quiet confession, she said, “It frightens me sometimes, the things we can do.”
“The only reason it doesn’t frighten me,” Amelia confided, “is that I refuse to look anymore.”
Zora loosened her grip a bit. “I’ll look, but I won’t call it.”
“Is Emerson careful?”
“Oh yes.” Zora caught a glimpse of Emerson sprawled in one of the plush seats. He rubbed his own knees idly, his face turned up to listen as Nathaniel held forth. “It would be easy to ruin good land if he weren’t thoughtful. Between us, I’m the reckless one.”
Dark eyes lighting up, Amelia laughed. “Which means you’re both ridiculously steady. Practically dull, even.”
“I resent that,” Zora said. “I stole a horse once!”
“Once!”
Falling quiet, they held tight as the wheel finally crested its greatest height. The fair below was nothing but bright sparks of electric light. Chicago was a silhouette against the distant storm. In that quiet, crystallized moment, trembling in the sky, caged in glass, they both feared this was the end for them.
Zora was married; Amelia planned to never be. One settled, the other wild, there was no reason for them to meet again. They would have to tend their friendship carefully if they wanted to keep it.
Interrupting them, Nathaniel tucked his yellow handkerchief back into his pocket and held out a hand. “We should go before the rain catches us.”
Amelia squeezed Zora once more, then turned to whisper in her ear. “Promise me this won’t be the end.”
Shaking her head, Zora pulled back to meet her gaze. “I swear it.”
Coming to join them, Emerson slipped an arm around Zora’s shoulders. “Good to meet you,” he said, and he meant it in an abstract sort of way.
The car was empty save for their little group, so Nathaniel didn’t bother with discretion. He unlocked the door, opening the car to the night sky. They still dangled above the fair, all its white lights miniature and blinking below them. Pulling Amelia close, Nathaniel nodded his goodbyes. Then he twisted the wind and they jumped. They disappeared, swallowed by the signature of Nathaniel’s magic: the black void and gold stars.
From without, Zora and Emerson stared at a space that was simply, suddenly unoccupied. The explosive edge to their meeting faded, and Emerson relaxed. Brushing a kiss against Zora’s hair, he held her tight when she curled toward him. “Was it a good visit?”
“Yes,” Zora replied. She closed her eyes and pressed her face against his shirt, breathing him in until the ache inside her faded. The hum of gears filled her ears, her skin prickling with the heat she drew from Emerson’s body.
Somewhere in Washington Park, Amelia and Nathaniel stood beneath the glow of a phosphorescent lamp. Trees whispered around them, turning their leaves to stretch for the coming rain. With water in the air, and the rivers that wound through town, they’d have to walk for a while.
Since they didn’t yet know where they were going, a walk before a storm suited Amelia’s mood exactly. She wasn’t an ordinary girl; neither was Zora.
Destiny waited.
1906
One
The first time Julian Birch died, he was six years old.
It was autumn, precisely, just before it was time to mow the harvested cornstalks down. They stood sentinel in the fields, papery and gold. Stretching toward the horizon, they could be endless—and frightening. With each breath of wind, they hissed. They whispered at night. They towered and shook sharp fingers, and quivered. They were terrible.
Sometimes, Julian sat in his eldest brother’s window upstairs. From there, the cornfields didn’t look like a menacing wall. The stalks stood in their rows, trapped in neat lines, separated by gullies. It was only corn, good to eat for boys and pigs alike, nothing dangerous at all.
When Charlie found him at the window late in September, whispering to the fields, he went to carry him back to bed. Julian shivered all the way to his room. The walls bent toward them; dark faces appeared in the flowered wallpaper, baring their awful teeth. Pressing his face to Charlie’s shoulder, Julian didn’t want to let go.
“All right, bedtime,” Charlie said.
Julian clung to him, croaking, “My head is broken.”
With that, Charlie carried him downstairs, interrupting his parents’ reading. Each night, no matter how long the day, they always read together. Mama perched on Papa’s lap; she whispered poetry against his cheek, and he murmured the almanac in reply.
This vaguely embarrassed the older boys, but they suffered in silence. They weren’t invited to this ritual, and if they didn’t want to see it, there was always plenty of work to do around the farm, even at night.
“Sorry,” Charlie said, shifting Julian in his arms. “Found him upstairs talking to the corn. I think he has a fever.”
Mama slipped to her feet, taking the baby and turning back in surprise. “Emerson, he’s burning up.” She still thought of him as the baby; her baby, golden-haired and brown-eyed, her favorite little sunflower.
“I’ll get the aspirin,” Papa replied, then looked to Charlie. “Go make up the sitting room for him.”
Before dawn, Papa rode into town to fetch the doctor. The doctor couldn’t say for certain what the matter was, but with a fever so high and a child so listless, it could only be contagious. No one slept that night; Henry and Sam stuffed a straw-ticking mattress. Mama and Papa took turns bathing Julian with cold water from the well.
By dawn, Julian had a new bed in the pole barn. Mama arranged him on the mattress with the best pillow in the house. The ache in his head felt like a driven spike. It vibrated down his spine and stole all the strength from his legs. Mama came out with meals, but no one else was allowed inside.
Sam and Henry liked to run outside and knock at the walls. Sometimes they’d yell in if they found a toad or a snake or had had a good dessert at dinner. Charlie came, but Julian never knew it. He huddled by the door and peered at him through the crack.