Page 25 of Blackwicket
“I’ll be there. If you change your mind…”
I brought the receiver away from my ear and rested it in its cradle, cutting him off. My breath shuddered once through me before I picked it up again, bashing it on the corner of the wood desk, blow after blow, gritting my teeth against the jarring impact that sent tremors of pain through my shoulder, peppering the ground with splinters. With the phone smashed into unrecognizable bits of machine, I threw what remained at the wall, where it bounced on its curled cord like a hanged man, destroyed. Breath coming ragged in my lungs, I stared at the gouges I’d created in the antique desk, permanent trenches made by my lack of self-control, the same flaw that had triggered all these terrible events. There were no words too brutal to describe who I was for accusing Darren of crimes I was guilty of. I muttered a curse to the house, and it rumbled in return, drinking in my wrath. The lights flickered, corners darkening, and I was sure every Drudge would rise to feast on my inconsolable hatred for those responsible for murdering my sister with their greed, their contempt, or their neglect. Including and especially me.
Tears were needles at the backs of my eyes, and I chose to flee.
I was wearing my coat, but I wanted the cold to numb me, so I rid myself of it, left it on the floor as I dashed into the blue winter evening. Increasing my pace, I sprinted across frozen land, defying the wind that mounted the cliffs, my hair whipping free from its pins, lashing my cheeks. I wasn’t going to stop at the edge and prepared to let the air carry me over the water and into silence. But my feet slipped on the icy grass, and I collapsed a breath from the drop, rocks biting my knees and palms.
Looking over the expanse of dull gray water, I remembered the ships that sailed on the horizon before our borders closed. Fiona and I would name them, crafting tales of their destinations and the secret things they carried. Before our mother chose DarkHall, we’d dreamed of someday being passengers, carried away to lives we imagined were kinder than our own. Now, in this horrible future, my sister had left, but she’d gone alone.
The cry that had built in my chest since Devin spilled from my lips, first as a throaty whimper, followed by a wail.
I screamed until my throat turned raw, letting the sea swallow my grief.
Chapter Ten
I stayed on the cliff side as long as I dared until my teeth rattled together so forcefully I thought they might break. Emptied, I made my way back to Blackwicket House, the skin on my knees tight, feet aching, and the awful light of those lamps glowing weakly from the front windows. This place should have been beautiful, and maybe it had been when I looked at the world the way a child does, noticing the blossoms but never the thorns.
Everything was hushed when I entered, but not still, and this was all the comfort I could ask for. To whatever extent it would help, I locked the bolt. It gave me some satisfaction to imagine the Inspector forced to stand outside in the cold, filled with impotent rage and driven by the snow to search for a proper hotel in town.
Muscle memory guided me up two flights of stairs to the third floor, glass sparkling on the runners. I didn’t bother to avoid the debris, crushing it underfoot as I approached the small suite that had been my family’s haven, positioned across the hall from the room Inspector Harrow had chosen. I wondered if he’d somehow known when he picked the keys. The key. I’d forgotten again, too strange a thing to try and remember after years of never needing one. With fatigued desperation, I took the handle and begged mercy. The magic had barely gathered in my fingerswhen the lock turned, and I was granted access without dramatic consequence. I murmured my gratitude.
The anteroom was unchanged, a modest semicircle of three doors. The rightmost lead to our mother’s room, the left, Fiona’s and mine. The center door opened to a washroom shared by the three of us, the smallest but most private. The other four bathrooms, once intended for guests, had fallen into disrepair, their pipes frozen and rusted, with nobody willing to come and replace them. Blackwickets have never lacked money, yet generations of amassed wealth delivered a hollow promise of comfort. Money meant little if there was no one to help, no workers to hire, no local shop willing to sell their stock to the house on the hill where children went to die at the hands of Curse Eaters hungry for the innocent.
That was one rumor, anyway. The favorite of the town.
Exhausted, I entered the bathroom, its black and white tiles resembling a chessboard. Not content with just the floor, the tiling climbed the wall, reaching halfway to the ceiling before giving way to cream plaster. I’d expected stains, perhaps cracks in the tile, the porcelain worn to the iron in the tub. But here seemed untouched by the ravages of neglect, and I was grateful. I stripped out of my skirt, heavy from the slush and dirt of the cliff, the cuffs of my shirt blackened with the same. My underthings were the nicest I’d ever owned, a cream silk set purchased at employee discount at Galton’s. I’d planned to wear them for Ben, but never had the opportunity.
I prodded at this wound of losing a companionship I’d begun to feel secure in. It didn’t hurt as much as I thought it would. Ben hadn’t been a great love of mine, merely a comfortable one, but for Curse Eaters in hiding, pickings were slim.
I prayed for hot water and received the answering knock of the pipes, with blessed steam rising from the basin in mere minutes. Sinking in up to my ears, I savored the soothing,muffled silence, my hair drifting around me like summer seaweed.
The rhythm of my heart and welcome warmth began to lull me to sleep, until a metallic clang reverberated, throbbing through my skull, as if the side of the tub had been struck with a mallet. I emerged, sending water sloshing, soaking my skirt, which lay in a jumble.
I scanned the ceiling, peering into the dim corners high overhead, but saw no movement. I was too tired, too broken, for whatever games the house was playing tonight. Still, I placed my hands on the rim and looked over, expecting to find a shape or shadow staring up at me from beneath the basin, but there was nothing.
Knowing there’d be no solace here after all, I submerged myself again and used the soaps and shampoos belonging to Fiona, all infused with the soft scent of honeysuckle, to wash away the horrors of the last few days. Despite my scrubbing, the memories clung to me, oily and uncomfortable, but at least feeling had returned to my limbs. My heart remained numb, but that was a blessing, and I hoped I’d feel no more in it for the rest of my life.
I refused to don my soiled clothes, but my bags were downstairs. I rejected the idea of that journey and removed a satin robe from its hook. Putting it on was like slipping into my sister’s life, filling the void her absence created. I considered staying in my mother’s old room, but Fiona had likely claimed it in the years since, and I couldn’t bring myself to intrude.
I chose the leftmost instead, leaving the light switch untouched. The gloom was thick, the wood shutters closed tight to block the glow of the moon off the sea, but I could discern the shape of two beds—Fiona’s near the high, far wall, and mine tucked neatly under the slanted dormer.
Bypassing my corner, I stumbled to Fiona’s, collapsing ontoher coverlet, which rustled as I wrapped myself in it. I anticipated crying a bit more, but as I prepared myself for the deluge of emotion, I was waking, startled from the sleep that had borne me under without preamble. I’d dreamed of chasing Fiona through the halls, missing her with every turn.
Scuffling drew my attention, a deliberate movement along the floor as though something were crawling near. I strained to see, but the dark was absolute. I sat up.
The air pulsed with a vague energy, a confounding, befouled power humming with an undercurrent of organic magic. My sudden action resulted in an almost profane vibration that settled low in my body.
“Who is it?” I was wide awake now, the unusual sensation encouraging curiosity over fear.
Whatever lurked retreated at the sound of my voice, its sudden exit creating a vacuum, stealing my breath. I surged from bed, eager to discover the thing responsible for such strangeness. The door to the anteroom creaked, and I pursued the anomaly into the dim hallway, remembering the glass too late. I braced for the sting of slivers in the soft soles of my feet, but the carpet was clear of debris, every shard absent.
I stared down the long stretch of corridor, with nowhere for a person to hide unless they were the size of a child, and listened to the unsteady breathing of the foundation.
Making a tedious procession, I began testing doors. They were all locked. In my weariness, I’d let Blackwicket House get the best of me. When I reached the window at the end of the hall, I wilted against it, taking a moment to glance out at an expanse of bare branches, the blanket of hills rolling to the valley where Nightglass sparkled, even at this hour. It was both a foreboding and enchanting sight, a realm of fairies—beautiful, treacherous, and full of secrets. This strange tenderness urged me to lean my head against the windowpane, my inhibitionslessened by fatigue. I opened my magic, offering peace, but when I brushed the cool curve of darkness, it convulsed. Its convergence was swift as an unexpected wave, filling your nose and mouth with brine. I snapped my defenses shut, and the house moaned.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
Forceful thuds reverberated within the wall like the desperate fists of prisoners, growing louder.
