A Great And Terrible Beauty (27 page)

When we step through that door of light again, the garden realm is there to welcome us with its sweet smells and a bright sky. I’m apprehensive. I don’t know how much time I shall have with my mother, and a small part of me doesn’t want to share that time with my friends. But they are my friends, and perhaps it will comfort my mother to meet them.

“Follow me,” I say, taking them into the grotto. She’s nowhere to be seen. There are only the trees and, farther on, the circle of strange crystals.

“Where is she?” Ann asks.

“Mother?” I call out. No answer. Nothing but the chirping of birds. What if she’s not really here? What if I did imagine it?

My friends avoid my eyes. Pippa whispers something low in Felicity’s ear.

“Maybe you dreamed it?” Felicity suggests softly.

“She was here! I spoke with her!”

“Well, she isn’t here now,” Ann comments.

“Come with us,” Pippa says, treating me like a child. “We’ll have a jolly time. I promise.”

“No!”

“Looking for me?” Mother strides into view in her blue silk dress. She’s as lovely as ever. My friends are struck dumb by her presence.

“Felicity, Pippa, Ann . . . may I present Virginia Doyle, my mother.”

The girls mumble their polite how-do-you-do’s.

“I am so very pleased to meet you,” Mother says. “What beautiful girls you all are.” This has the desired effect. They blush, completely charmed. “Will you take a stroll with me?” Soon she has them regaling her with stories of Spence and themselves, the three of them competing for her attention, and I’m a bit grumpy, wanting to have my mother only to myself. But then Mother gives me a wink and takes my hand, and I’m happy again.

“Shall we sit?” Mother gestures to a blanket woven of fine silver thread, stretched out on the grass. For something so light, it is surprisingly strong and comfortable. Felicity runs her hand over the delicate threads. They give off the most striking tones.

“Dear me,” she says, delighted. “Can you hear that? Pippa, you try.”

We all do. It’s as if we’re conducting a symphony of harps through our fingers, and it sets us to laughing.

“Isn’t it marvelous? I wonder what else we can do?” Felicity muses.

Mother smiles. “Anything.”

“Anything?” Ann repeats.

“In this realm, what you wish can be yours. You have only to know what you want.”

We take this in, not quite comprehending it. Finally, Ann stands up. “I’ll give it a try.” She stops. “What should I do?”

“What do you most want? No—don’t tell us. Fix it in your mind. Like a wish.”

Ann nods, closes her eyes. A minute passes.

“Nothing’s happened,” Felicity whispers. “Has it?”

“I don’t know,” Pippa says. “Ann? Ann, are you all right?”

Ann rocks back and forth on her heels. Her lips part. I’m afraid she’s gone into some kind of trance. I look to my mother, who brings a finger to her mouth. Ann’s lips open wide. What comes out is like no music I’ve ever heard, clear and soaring, sweet as an angel’s voice. Her singing raises gooseflesh on my arms. Every note seems to change her. She’s still Ann, but somehow the music makes her achingly lovely. Her hair shines. Her cheeks become smooth and bright. She’s like some watery creature from the deep—a mermaid come to live on the glossy surface of the river.

“Ann, you’re beautiful,” Pippa gasps.

“Am I?” She runs to the river, catches sight of her reflection. “I am!” She laughs, delighted. It’s startling, hearing a real laugh come from Ann. She closes her eyes and lets the music soar out of her.

“Incroyable!”
Felicity says, showing off her French. “I want to try!”

“Me too!” Pippa cries.

They close their eyes, meditate for a moment, and open them again.

“I don’t see him,” Pippa says, looking around.

“Were you waiting for me, m’lady?” A beautiful young knight appears from behind a large golden oak. He sinks to one knee before Pippa. She gasps. “I have frightened you. Forgive me.”

“I might have known,” Felicity whispers dryly in my ear.

Pippa looks as if she’s just won every prize at the carnival. Giddily she says, “You are forgiven.”

He rises. He’s no more than eighteen, but tall, with hair the color of just-ripe corn and broad shoulders draped in a chain mail so light it is nearly liquid. The effect is of a lion. Powerful. Graceful. Noble.

“Where is your champion, m’lady?”

Pippa trips over her tongue, trying to be ladylike and controlled. “I have no champion.”

“Then I shall ask to have that honor. If the lady would grant me her favor.”

Pippa turns to us, her whisper verging on an excited squeal. “Please tell me that I’m not dreaming this.”

“You are not dreaming,” Felicity whispers back. “Or else we all are.”

It’s all Pippa can do not to shriek with happiness and jump up and down like a child. “Noble knight, I shall grant you my favor.” She means to be imperious but can barely keep from giggling.

“My life for yours.” He bows. Waits.

“I believe you’re supposed to give him something of yours, a token of affection,” I prompt.

“Oh.” Pippa blushes. She removes her glove and offers it.

“M’lady,” the knight says demurely. “I am yours.” He extends his arm and with a glance back at us, she takes it and lets him lead her down into the meadow.

“Any knights for you?” I ask Felicity. She shakes her head. “What did you ask for, then?”

Her smile is enigmatic. “Sheer might.”

Mother regards her coolly. “Careful what you wish for.”

An arrow whistles past our heads. It sticks fast in a tree just behind us. A huntress creeps into the open. Her hair is piled loosely upon her head like a goddess’s. There’s a full quiver of arrows strapped to her back, a bow at the ready in her hands. The quiver is all she’s wearing. She’s as naked as a newborn babe.

“You might have killed us,” I say, catching my breath, trying not to stare at her nakedness.

She retrieves the arrow. “But I didn’t.” She regards Felicity, who is studying her, intrigued and undaunted. “You’re not afraid, I see.”

“No,” Felicity says, retrieving the arrow. She runs her fingers over the sharp point. “Merely curious.”

“Are you a huntress?”

Felicity hands the arrow back. “No. My father used to hunt. He said it was the sport he admired most.”

“But you did not accompany him?”

Felicity’s smile is bitter. “Only sons are allowed to hunt. Not daughters.”

The huntress clasps a hand around Felicity’s upper arm. “There is great strength in this arm. You might prove to be a very skilled huntress. Very powerful.” The word
powerful
brings a smile to Felicity’s face, and I know she’s going to get what she’s after. “Would you like to learn?”

In answer, Felicity takes the bow and arrow.

“There’s a snake coiled about the limb of that tree,” the huntress says.

Felicity closes one eye and pulls back on the bow with all her might. The arrow soars straight up, then bounces along the ground. Felicity’s cheeks flush with disappointment.

The huntress applauds. “A solid effort. You might be a huntress yet. But first, you must observe.”

Felicity, observe? Perish the thought. Huntress or not, she’s got a tough road ahead of her, teaching Felicity patience. But to my surprise, Felicity doesn’t scoff or argue. She follows the huntress and patiently allows her to demonstrate the proper technique over and over again.

“What did you wish for?” Mother asks me when it’s just the two of us.

“I have what I want. You’re here.”

She strokes my cheek. “Yes. For a little while longer.”

My good mood evaporates. “What do you mean?”

“Gemma, I cannot stay forever, else I could be trapped like one of those wretched lost spirits who never complete their soul’s task.”

“And what is yours?”

“I must set right what Mary and Sarah did so many years ago.”

“What did they do?”

Before Mother can answer, Pippa runs to me, nearly knocking me over in her gushing enthusiasm. She hugs me tightly. “Did you see him? Wasn’t he the most perfect gentleman? He pledged to be my champion! He actually pledged his life for mine! Have you ever heard of anything half so romantic? Can you bear it?”

“Barely,” Felicity says wryly. She’s just returned from her hunt, exhausted but happy. “That’s not as easy as it looks, I can tell you. My arm will ache for a week.”

She moves her shoulder in small circles, wincing a bit. But I know she’s grateful for that aching arm, grateful to have proof of her own hidden strengths.

Ann wanders over, her fine, lank hair curling about her shoulders in new ringlets. Even her perpetual runny nose seems to have cleared. She points to the tall, thin crystals arranged in a circle behind Mother. “What are those?”

“Those are the Runes of the Oracle, the heart of this realm,” Mother says. I stand beside one. “Don’t touch them,” Mother warns.

“Why not?” Felicity asks.

“You must understand how the magic of the realms works first, how to control it, before you can let it live in you and use it on the other side.”

“We can take this sort of power with us to our world?” Ann says.

“Yes, but not yet. Once the Order is reestablished they can teach you. It’s not safe until then.”

“Why not?” I ask.

“It’s been such a long time since the magic here has been used. There’s no telling what could happen. Something could get out. Or come in.”

“They’re humming,” Felicity says.

“Their energy is very powerful,” Mother says, making a cat’s cradle from a skein of golden yarn.

When I tilt my head one way, they seem almost to disappear. But when I turn my head another, I can see them rising up from the ground, more dazzling than diamonds. “How exactly does it work?” I ask.

She snakes her fingers in and out of the yarn. “When you touch the runes, it’s as if you become the magic itself. It flows through your veins. And then you are able to do in the other world what you can do here in the realms.”

Felicity brings her hand ever closer to a rune. “Strange. It stopped humming as I got near.”

I can’t resist. I hold out my hand, not touching it, but near it. I’m seized by a rush of energy. My eyes flutter. The urge to touch the rune is overwhelming.

“Gemma!” Mother barks.

I pull my hand back quickly. My amulet glows. “Wh-what was that?”

“You are the conduit,” Mother explains. “The magic flows through you.”

Felicity’s face clouds over. But an instant later, she’s wearing a ripe smile, thinking some naughty thought. She leans back on her elbows in the grass. “Can you imagine it? If we had this power at Spence?”

“We could do as we wish,” Ann adds.

“I’d have a closet filled with the latest fashions. And bushels of money.” Pippa giggles.

“I’d be invisible for a day,” Felicity adds.

“I wouldn’t be,” Ann says bitterly.

“I could ease Father’s pain.” I glance at Mother. Her eyes narrow.

“No,” she says, unraveling a Jacob’s ladder.

“Why not?” My cheeks are hot.

“We’d be careful,” Pippa adds.

“Yes, terribly careful,” Felicity chimes in, trying to charm Mother as if she were one of our impressionable teachers.

Mother crushes the yarn in her fist. Her eyes flash. “Tapping into this power is not a game. It is hard work. It takes preparation, not the wild curiosity of overeager schoolgirls.”

Felicity is taken aback. I bristle at this comment, at being chided in front of my friends. “We are not overeager.”

Mother places a palm on my arm, gives me a faint smile, and I feel churlish for having acted like such a child. “When it is time.”

Pippa peers carefully at the base of a rune. “What are these markings?”

“It’s an ancient language, older than Greek and Latin.”

“But what does it say?” Ann wants to know.

“‘I change the world; the world changes me.’”

Pippa shakes her head. “What does that mean?”

“Everything you do comes back to you. When you affect a situation, you are also affected.”

“M’lady!” The knight has returned. He’s brought out a lute. Soon, he’s serenading Pippa with a song about her beauty and virtue.

“Isn’t he perfection? I think I shall die from happiness. I want to dance—come with me!” Pippa pulls Ann after her toward the dashing knight, forgetting all about the runes.

Felicity brushes herself off and trails behind them. “Are you coming?”

“I’ll be there in a moment,” I call after her.

Mother resumes her meticulous yarn architecture. Her fingers fly, then stop. She closes her eyes and gasps, as if she’s been wounded.

“Mother, what’s the matter? Are you all right? Mother!”

When she opens her eyes, she’s breathing hard. “It takes so much to keep it away.”

“Keep what away?”

“The creature. It’s still looking for us.”

The dirty-faced girl peers out from behind a tree. She looks at my mother with wide eyes. Mother’s face softens. Her breathing returns to normal. She’s the commanding presence I remember bustling about our house, giving orders and changing place settings at the very last moment. “There is nothing to worry about. I can fool the beast for a while.”

Felicity calls to me. “Gemma, you’re missing out on all the sport.” She and the others are twirling each other about, dancing to the lute and the song.

Mother starts to build a cup and saucer from her yarn. Her hands tremble. “Why don’t you join them? I should like to see you dance. Go on, then, darling.”

Reluctantly, I amble toward my friends. Along the way, I spy the girl, still looking at my mother with her frightened eyes. There’s something compelling about the child. Something I feel I should know, though I can’t say what.

“It’s time to dance!” Felicity takes both my hands in hers, twirling me around. Mother applauds us in our jig. The knight strums the lute faster and faster, egging us on. We’re picking up speed, our hair flying, hands tight on each other’s wrists.

“Whatever you do, don’t let go!” Felicity shrieks, as our bodies lean back in defiance of gravity till we’re nothing more than a great blur of color on the landscape.

The sky is a softer shade of night by the time we return to our rooms. Dawn is mere hours away. Tomorrow we’ll have the devil to pay.