Page 215 of The Seven Rings
She turned toward the house, and inside, gave Yoda a treat before grabbing Cokes.
When she walked by the music room, she paused.
“Where are you, Astrid? Where’s your portrait? You’re the next step. I know it.”
As she walked upstairs, the servants’ door slapped open. She closed it on the sound of the ringing bell.
Except for Cleo’s music, something with a lot of harps and strings, the third floor held quiet.
She found her friend at her desk, the cat perched on the top of her cat tree. But the painting drew her forward.
“You finished the tree!”
“This morning, before I started work. It was all but done.”
“The colors, Cleo. Not really gold, not really orange, but a beautiful mix of both. And I love it just bursts against a broody sky.”
“Three seasons down, one to go. It’s the actual work that has me on edge. You read the book. It’s so out of my comfort zone. I know it’s important. Major author. I thought, once I committed to it, I was confident. I’m not.”
“I’m happy to help there. You’ve run these by the author, the publisher.”
“Yeah, the drafts, of course. But…”
Sonya picked up the stack of drawings. “I’m taking these over to the sofa.”
“I’m going to pace. Oh, shut the hell up,” she snapped when Dobbs banged against the wall. “You’re nothing against possibly screwing up a major job.”
“There’s no screwing it up, because if these don’t hit the mark, you’ll fix them.”
“That’s the thing. I’m out of ideas on how to fix them. Monsters, terrified teens, evil teens, teens battling monsters or each other?
“Not my comfort zone.”
Sonya sat, sipped her Coke. Then set it aside and began.
She’d read the book—enjoyed the hell out of it. Then had read it a second time knowing Cleo would ask just this.
She studied each sketch, nodding at its position in the story as she ran through that story in her head. From the quiet town on the title page straight through to the final illustration of a single, bloody shoe beside an abandoned shack, she noted the details, the tone, the mood.
Then, though Cleo made a frustrated argh sound, went back to the start and went through them again.
She set them down, drank more Coke. She made a gun with her finger.
“Bang. And that’s a bull’s-eye, Cleopatra.”
“Are you sure? One-hundred-percent-positively sure? I mean, the one for chapter twelve with the boy—he’s still shy of eighteen—holding up the severed head?”
“Is genius.” Sonya paged through, pulled it out. “You made Will look triumphant and appalled. Yeah, he knew the now-headless guy, who was another teenager. But Chuck had been infected. It was kill or be killed. That’s what shows. That’s what needs to show.
“And this?”
She went back to the stack. “Chapter two. The classroom scene. Oh, doesn’t the teacher look nice? Doesn’t he look like a good guy, all casually dressed, hands open, palms up as he teaches the class of teenagers. But you’ve got this faint shadow, an aura going, very subtle, and when you look, you get the feeling something’s just not right.
“And it wasn’t. Face it, Cleo. You’ve just illustrated a bestselling YA horror novel. And you’ll be doing the next two in this trilogy.”
“I can’t decide if that’s good news or bad news. But okay. Okay.” Lifting her hands, Cleo pushed them out as if pushing something away. “You wouldn’t tell me they’re right if they’re wrong.”
“They’re not right. They’re fabulous. Now send them, and take a walk out in this beautiful fall day. It won’t last much longer. In fact, we need to decorate for Halloween.”
