Chapter 35

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At half-past ten, Mrs. Nightwing makes her rounds to ensure that all her tender chickens

are accounted for—lying safely in bed, far away from any wolves. When the downstairs

clock gongs midnight, there's a scratching at our door by Pippa and Felicity, letting us

know that it's safe to come out for one last evening together. "How will we get out?" I

ask. "She's locked the doors." Felicity dangles a key. "It seems that Molly the upstairs

maid owed me a favor after I caught her with the stable boy. Now, get dressed."

The caves welcome us one last time. The nights have grown colder, and we huddle

together for warmth over the last of our candles. When they realize that I won't take them

into the realms, they're furious with me.

"But why won't you take us?" Pippa cries.

"I've told you. I don't feel well."

I have no intention of going back through the shimmering door. Instead, I shall master

French. Perfect my posture. Learn how to curtsy and draw clever pictures. I shall be what

they want me to be—safe. And nothing bad will ever happen again. It's possible to

pretend I'm someone other than who I am, and if I pretend long enough, I can believe it.

My mother did.

Pippa kneels at my feet and puts her head in my lap like a child. "Please, Gemma?

Darling, darling Gemma. I'll let you wear my lace gloves. I'll let you keep them!"

"No!" My shout slaps at the cave's walls.

Pippa plops onto the ground to sulk. "Fee, you talk to her. I'm doing no good."

Felicity is surprisingly cool. "It would seem Gemma won't be moved this evening."

"Now what shall we do?" Pippa whines.

"There's still some whiskey left. Here, have a little. " Felicity pulls the half-empty bottle

from its hiding place inside a rocky crevice. "This will change your mind." After two

quick swallows, she dangles the bottle in front of me. I get up and move to another rock.

"Are you still cross about Miss Moore?"

"Among other things." I'm cross that we let her down so terribly. I'm cross that my

mother is a liar and a murderer. That my father is an addict. That Kartik despises me. That

everything I touch seems to go wrong.

"Fine," Felicity says. "Go off and sulk, then. Who wants a drink?"

How can I tell them what I know? I don't even want to know it. I wish I could make it all

go away, just go back to that first day in the realms when everything seemed possible

again. Felicity keeps passing the bottle, and soon, they're all flushed and glassy-eyed,

noses running a bit from the sudden warmth of the whiskey in their blood. Felicity twirls

around the cave, reciting poetry.

"But in her web she still delights

To weave the mirror's magic sights,

For often thro' the silent nights

A funeral, with plumes and lights

And music, went to Camelot…"

"Oh, not this again," Ann snarls, leaning her head against the boulder.

Felicity is taunting me with the poem. She knows it reminds me of Miss Moore. Like a

whirling dervish, she throws out her arms, spiraling faster into ecstasy.

"Or when the Moon was overhead,

Came two young lovers lately wed.

'I am half sick of shadows,' said

The Lady of Shalott."

Her hands fly out against the cave wall to stop her fall. She rolls her body against the

craggy surface till she's facing us again. Strands of hair, wet with perspiration, stick to her

forehead and cheeks. She's got a strange look on her face.

"Pip, darling, do you really want to see your knight?"

"More than anything!"

Felicity grabs Pip's hand and runs toward the cave's mouth.

"Wait for me," Ann yells, following after.

They spill out into the night like Bedouins, with me trailing in their wake. The cold air is

a shock to our damp skin.

"Felicity, what are you up to?" I ask.

"Something new," she teases.

The sky, indifferent earlier, pulses with the light of a million stars. There's an earlyautumn

moon, buttery golden, riding high over spun-thin wisps of cloud that tell us all it

will soon be the time for harvest, the time when the farmers raise a pint to the legendary

murder of John Barleycorn.

Felicity howls at the globe in the sky.

"Shhh," Pippa says. "You'll wake the entire school."

"No one will hear us. Mrs. Nightwing had two sherries tonight. We couldn't wake her if

we placed her in the center of Trafalgar Square with a pigeon in each hand." She lets

loose with another howl.

"I want to see my knight." Pippa pouts.

"And you will."

"Not if Gemma won't take us."

"We all know there's another way," Felicity says. In the moonlight, her pale skin glows

white as bone. A chill works its way up my spine.

"What do you mean?" Pippa asks.

Something stirs in the trees. There's the sound of twigs breaking and movement, quick

and furtive. We jump. A deer wanders closer to the clearing. It has its nose to the ground,

sniffing for food.

"It's only a deer." Ann exhales in a whoosh.

"No," Felicity says. "It's our sacrifice."

The moon dips behind clouds for an instant and our faces are mottled with light.

"You aren't serious," I say, coming out of my sullen stupor.

"Why not? We know they did it. But we'll be smarter." She's like a carnival barker trying

to entice a crowd into a sideshow tent.

"But they couldn't control it—" I start. Felicity cuts me off.

"We're stronger than they are. We won't make the same mistakes. The huntress told

me…"

The huntress offering me the berries, whispering to Felicity on their hunts. Something's

fighting to take shape in my mind, but it won't come. Only the fear remains, bold and

undeniable.

"What about the huntress?"

"She tells me things. Things you are not privy to. She's the one who told me I could have

the power if I offer her a token."

"No… that's not—"

"She told me you'd react this way. That you couldn't be trusted because you want the

power of the realms all to yourself."

Pippa and Ann look from Felicity to me and back again, waiting.

"You can't do this," I say. "I won't let you."

Felicity creeps forward, knocks me backward into the dirt. "You. Can't. Stop. Us."

"Felicity…"Ann looks as if she doesn't know whether to help me or run away.

"Don't you see? Gemma wants the power all to herself! She wants power over us."

"That's not true!" I struggle to my feet and take a step backward, away from them.

Pippa comes up behind me. I can feel her breath on my neck. "Then why won't you take

us?"

I'm caught. "I can't tell you."

"She doesn't trust us," Felicity says. Suspicion spreads like a disease. She crosses her

arms in triumph, lets the damage sink in.

The deer is just beyond us in the thicket. Pippa watches it. She shifts her weight from one

foot to the other. "I wouldn't have to marry him. Would I?"

Felicity takes her hands. "We could change everything."

"Everything," Ann says, joining them.

I saw a fire start once in India. One second, it was only a spark lost from a beggar's fire,

caught on a high wind. Within minutes, everything in sight was ablaze, thatched roofs

crackling like so much dry kindling, mothers scurrying into the streets, carrying crying

children.

That is how fires start. With a spark. And I see the spark catching the wind.

"All right," I say, desperate to keep them from going it alone. "All right, I'll take you.

Let's go back to the cave and join hands."

"That time has passed," Felicity says, crossing her arms over her chest.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that we are no longer content to ride on your coattails, Gemma. We'll enter the

realms by ourselves, thank you."

"But I'll take—"

Pippa turns her back to me. "How do we catch it?"

"We chase it to the ravine. Trap it there." Felicity unbuttons her sleeves, shimmies out of

her blouse.

"What are you doing?" I ask, alarmed.

Felicity explains to the others, ignoring me. "Take them off. We can't catch a deer in

corsets and petticoats. We'll never stand a chance. We've got to be naked, like the

huntress."

This whole situation is veering wildly out of control. I feel as if I'm watching a building

collapse, with no way to stop it.

Ann folds her arms protectively across her plump middle. "Is it absolutely necessary?

Can't we catch the deer as we are?"

"How exactly will you explain the stains to Mrs. Nightwing?" Felicity is naked now. Pale,

like bark whittled raw. Her voice, hard and aching, cuts through the rustle of dry leaves.

"Stay if you like. But I won't go back to the way it was. I can't."

Pippa sits on the grass and pulls off her boots, starts removing her petticoats. Ann follows

suit.

"Ann, Pippa, listen to me. This isn't right. You can't do this. Please listen to me!" They're

paying me no mind, peel' ing off their garments with frantic fingers. The deer's head darts

up. They crouch low on the forest floor. Felicity holds up a finger for silence. The deer

senses danger, bolts for the • cover of trees.

With a grunt, they're up, naked and shining, running toward the woods till they're nothing

but a flurry of white, a flapping of angel's wings in the moss-covered night.

I chase them as they chase the deer. It slips in and out of trees. Felicity is in the lead, her

skin a beacon. I hear the sharp cracking sound of twigs trampled, hear the heavy panting

of my own breath in my ears. And then something that sounds like a great crash up ahead

where I can't see.

When I reach the ravine, Ann and Pippa are poised on the edge, breathing hard. The deer

is nowhere to be seen. A great chunk of earth wall has been torn away. Carefully, I scoot

to the edge. My boot sends showers of dirt and rocks into the ravine, and I have to grab

hold of a low-lying root to keep from falling in.

The deer lies wounded at the bottom, struggling to lift its head, making the most awful

sounds. Felicity crouches low, creeps closer. She leans over it, stroking the brown fur,

making comforting shushing noises. She's not going to do it. A feeling of relief floods

through me as I wait for her to scramble up the embankment.

The clouds shift, stretch out thin as a scream. The moon is dazzling us with its hard fair

light. It bathes Felicity in a white like plaster, turns her into a statue frozen in time.

She's fumbling with something down there in the dark. In an instant, her hand flies up.

She brings the rock down with a sickening thud. And again. Again till there's nothing

moving in the ravine but her and creatures too small to detect from where we stand above

her. Slowly, Ann and Pippa scuttle down the slope in crablike movements and each take

their turns with the rock. Their bare backs, arched and taut, shine in the night. When they

move away, the thing at the bottom of the ravine no longer resembles a deer above the

neck. The head is pulpy, an overripe melon fallen on the ground and split open in

surprised outrage. I turn and vomit into a sparse bush.

When I stagger over again, they're crawling back up the steep slope on hands and knees.

In the dark, the splattered blood looks black as ink on their alabaster skin. Felicity climbs

up last. She still grips the blood-slick rock in her hand.

"It's done," she says, her voice ripping the still of the night.

This is how the fire starts.

This is how we burn.

Everything is slipping out of my control.

She places the rock in my hand. The weight of it pulls me forward and I stumble. It's

sticky in my hand.

"What happens now?" Ann asks. In the dark, there is no answer, just a slight breeze

rustling through the dry leaves over our heads.

"We hold hands and make the door of light appear," Felicity says.

They join hands and close their eyes but nothing happens.

"Where is it?" Pippa asks, "Why don't I see it?"

For the first time this evening, Felicity seems lost. "She promised me…"

It hasn't worked. They've been tricked. I would feel sorry for them if I weren't both

relieved and appalled.

"She promised…" Felicity whispers.

Kartik steps into the clearing, stops when he takes us in, bloodstained and half wild. He

takes a step back, ready to retreat, but not before Felicity sees him.

"What are you doing here?" she screams.

Kartik doesn't answer. Instead, his eyes flit to the rock in my hand. I drop it fast, and it

hits the earth with a thud.

In that one instant of distraction, Felicity seizes her chance. Grabbing a sharp stick, she

charges Kartik, scraping him across the chest. Blood seeps up through the torn shirt, and

he doubles over from the surprise of the gash. Her new skill as an archer is on display.

She's got the stick poised, ready to run him through.

"I told you we'd carve your eyes out the next time," she growls.

I had thought Felicity dangerous a moment ago, when she felt powerful. I was wrong.

Wounded and powerless, she is more dangerous than I could imagine.

Injured, Kartik is unable to defend himself for the moment.

"Stop!" I shout. "Let him go and I'll take you into the realms."

Felicity is panting, the stick still raised above his eyes.

"Fee," Pippa whines, sounding a bit scared herself. "She's going to take us."

Slowly, Felicity releases him, saunters back to join us.

"She'll give us the power once we're there," she says, trying to save face. "I'm sure of it."

On the ground behind her, Kartik is worried. I give him a small nod to let him know it's

going to be all right, though I don't know that. I have no idea what will greet us on the

other side of that door now. I don't know what they've started, if anything. I only know

that I've got to do it.

Felicity gives me a hard look. Things have changed forever. There's no going back. I

follow them into the woods so that they can dress again. Soon, they are ready.

"Take my hands," I say, hoping for the best, fearing the worst.