Sisters' Fate (22 page)

“Good. Because if you ever do anything to hurt Tess again, you will answer to me, and I will see you and Grace both put on a prison ship for the rest of your miserable lives. Do you understand?” I glare at Lucy until she nods, and then I pull open the door. “Go tell Rilla everything you’ve told me.
Now.
And tell her I’m going after Tess.”

• • •

It’s surprisingly easy to gain access to the council building. There are precious few guards on duty tonight. As I wait for the elevator, I hear the fire bell begin to peal, piercing even from this distance. A man racing down the curving marble staircase gives me an odd look. I press a hand to my face, reassuring myself that my glamour hasn’t given way. But this is an easy illusion. Brother Ishida’s face is one I know well; it’s haunted my nightmares since I was a child. I step onto the newfangled brass elevator, and in a few moments, it cranks and clanks its way to the ninth floor. The heavy door that leads up to the bell tower is locked, but my magic makes short work of it. I open it and climb the spiral staircase beyond.

The tower is open on all four sides to the elements. In the center, high above me, the enormous cast-iron bell hangs from a beam right below the steeply pitched roof. Despite the fierce gusts of wind that send clouds scurrying over the moon, the great bell has gone still. Has Tess already left?

A lantern sits on the brick floor, casting a small circle of light among the shadows. It’s the only clue that she’s been here.

To the west, fire is already blazing on the horizon.

I hurry to the low wrought-iron fence, trying to get a better look, but it’s impossible to tell anything from so far away. It could be one fire; it could be half a dozen.

Damn Inez.

I’ve got to find Tess and get to the river district.

“Tess?” My voice is swallowed up by the night.

“I’m here.” Her voice is so close behind me that I jump.

I whirl around. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting for you,” she says.

There’s something in her voice—something
off.

I take a few steps forward. The hair on the nape of my neck prickles, as if my body can sense danger before I can.

I should not be here.

The wind sends my cloak flapping like the wings of a great black bird. I’ve hardly braced myself against it before I’m pitched backward.

I fling out my arms, grasping, trying to catch hold of something, anything. There’s nothing within reach. My boots slide across the brick floor without gaining purchase. I throw myself forward, but it doesn’t work. An invisible hand is pushing on my chest, shoving me toward the edge and the ten-story drop to the street below.

I scream as my thighs bump into the wrought-iron railing behind me.

“No! Tess, help me!”

But she doesn’t. She can’t.

Tess is the one trying to kill me.

CHAPTER

20

IT ALL HAPPENS SO QUICKLY. I HIT THE RAILING
and begin to fall.

My eyes never leave Tess’s, but her gaze is no longer hers. I have the eerie sense of Inez peering out at me, cold and uncaring and
triumphant.

The prophecy is coming true, and I am going to die.

I want more time.

Another scream claws its way out of my throat.

There are no words this time, just inchoate rage.

Someone grabs my wrist and yanks me forward. I fall to my knees, scraping my palms against the brick. Opening my eyes, I see my sister’s face: bright and beautiful and
furious.

Maura.

Across the tower, Tess lies in a heap of black skirts. As I watch, she pushes herself to her feet, smoothing her cloak calmly, meticulously, as though I haven’t just narrowly avoided death at her hands.

I am shuddering, shaking, sick.

“Tess. Look at me.” Maura strides forward, trying to snag her attention, to distract her from the task Inez has set her.

But Tess has always been extraordinarily focused. I am pushed slowly, inexorably backward. I scramble to my knees and grab the cold iron railing with both hands, curling my fingers around it as tight as I can.

Maura tosses Tess through the air again. Tess’s small body crumples as it hits the door that leads downstairs. “Don’t hurt her!” I cry.

“She’s trying to kill you!” Maura snaps, pulling me to my feet.

Tess struggles up and stalks forward like a small blond wolf hunting her prey. Maura turns to me, her face full of panic, and it’s obvious that her magic isn’t working this time.

I try an immobilizing spell, with no effect.

Our sister is strong. The strongest witch in all of New England.

Maura thrusts her hand into mine. I press my skin against hers, merging our power. Magic crackles through me like lightning as Maura casts and Tess flies through the air a third time.

“Stay down,” Maura commands. “Inez has gotten inside your head. You’ve got to fight. You’re stronger than her, Tess. You’re stronger than anybody.”

It’s a desperate admission, coming from Maura.

Tess sits up, and something overhead cracks. Maura and I look up into the bell tower in time to see two massive bolts pop free and clatter to the ground. Tess is trying to unlatch the beam that holds the bell in place. If it falls, it will crush us.

Maura clutches my hand again. Tess rises to her feet, her lips pursed in concentration.

“Intransito,”
I cast, and she freezes.

Maura sags in relief, looking up at the bell.

I step closer to Tess, careful to keep some distance between us, half afraid she might reach out and snap my neck. Only her gray eyes move, darting here and there. “Tess,” I say, voice gentle.

Then there’s a noise—a huge, terrifying crack—and I whirl around to see the slim white spire of Richmond Cathedral falling right toward us.

All I can think is that Tess, unable to move, will be crushed. I cast silently, freeing her, just as Maura tumbles into me, shoving me toward the door.

Then something smacks into my shoulders, and I trip forward.

Everything goes black.

• • •

I don’t know if it’s been two minutes or two hours.

Something heavy lies across my back, pinning me to the floor. My left cheek is pressed into the brick. The floor is covered with rubble. Nearby, something shifts and dust scatters through the air. I cough.

“Cate?” It’s Maura’s voice, hoarse but alive.

“I’m here.” I try to move my arms, but I can’t. Pain stabs through my left shoulder and splinters down my arm and I bite back a cry. I concentrate on the weight across my back. Try to move it. My magic feels far off, overwhelmed by pain and the nausea spinning my stomach. I cast again, focusing with all my might, and the weight lifts and shifts and I roll to the right, out from beneath it. This time I can’t help the whimper that escapes my lips. My left arm is definitely broken.

“I can’t move.” Maura again.

“I’m coming.” I scramble to my knees, ignoring the wave of dizziness that threatens to drag me under again, and search the rubble for my sister.

My heart sinks when I see her.

Just a glimpse of bright curls beneath a pile of brick and stone and splintered wood. I crawl over the debris to reach her, heedless of the shredded skin on my palms. Warmth trickles over my cheek and I swipe it away and it stains my fingers red. I use a combination of magic and sheer willpower to lift the bit of roof that’s hiding Maura, hoping against hope that beneath it she’ll be uninjured and—

No. I press my fingers to my lips.

Maura lies on her back, her right side still trapped beneath an enormous wooden beam. Her heart-shaped face is dusty, save a clean trail at the corner of each eye. There’s a gruesome cut across her right cheekbone, and her right collarbone—clavicle, I correct myself, from my anatomy lessons—has punctured through her skin and the ivory fabric of her dress.

“I’m here.” I collapse at her good side. “It will be all right. I’ll heal you.” I reach out and touch her chin with my fingertips.

I almost jerk away as I feel her injuries. Her collarbone I could fix, but that’s not the worst of it: shattered humerus and radius, broken right femur. I can’t tell about her spine; her stomach is a haze of red that indicates broken ribs. Has one of them punctured her lung?

I can’t kill again. I cannot kill my sister, not even to ease her suffering.

Please, Lord, don’t ask that of me.

Her hand wiggles out from beneath her cloak and clasps mine. “Does it hurt very much?” I ask.

Her voice is a dreamy wheeze. “It did, but not anymore. Now I can’t feel anything.” Her grip is weak. Her hand slips away. “I think I’ll be all right. Just need a little nap.”

“No! Stay awake, Maura. Where’s Tess?” I glance around wildly. “She’ll—
together,
we can—”

“Gone when I woke up.” Maura’s fingers clutch at my black skirt. “I—was wrong. About Inez.”

I smile through my tears. “You saved my life, silly. Don’t worry about that.”

“You were wrong, too.” She’s as stubborn as ever. “About Elena. She’s
good.
Makes me want to be—better.”

“You’re already the best.” I capture her hand again. “If Merriweather gets his triumvirate government, Elena won’t just lead the Sisterhood. She’ll help govern all of New England.”

Her breath rattles. “She’ll like that.”

Maura’s blue eyes flutter closed, and I grab her hand tighter. Her pain is fading as her body shuts down. “I love you!”

I lean over her. Her voice is threadbare; I feel the words against my cheek more than I hear them. “Love you too, Cate.”

My tears fall onto her chest. “Don’t die. Please don’t die.”

But she can’t hear me.

My little sister—who used to toddle after me, stuffing my toys into her mouth; who used to hide romance novels under her floorboards; who had the most beautiful laugh in the world—is dead, and I won’t ever laugh with her again.

• • •

For a while I just sit there with her. I’m not certain how long. The clouds move over the moon. My arm throbs, and the back of my head aches, but it’s nothing compared to the hurt in my chest. I don’t know why I’m trying to keep the tears back. There’s no one here to see me. Eventually I stop fighting them. Racking sobs trail into quiet tears that wend a stinging path over my raw cheeks.

Eventually, something shifts above me, sending dust and bits of rubble raining down. I look up at the part of the cathedral spire that’s still wedged precariously against the bell tower. I suppose the roof could fall in at any moment, but I cannot bear the idea of leaving Maura alone on this cold rooftop.

I
was supposed to die, not her. That’s what Tess’s vision foretold.

Except—it’s impossible to change the future, isn’t it?

What did Tess really see in her vision?

I’ve spared little thought for her, but now I wonder where she went, and why. Did she think she’d accomplished Inez’s task when she saw me lying amid the rubble? If she’s herself again, free of Inez’s compulsion, she must be racked with guilt. Did she think Maura and I were both dead? How else could she have left us? If Tess hadn’t gone, perhaps—

I stop that thought before it starts. Maura’s injuries were too grave. And if Tess were here, likely she would still be trying to murder me.

Inez.

Inez is the one responsible for this, not Tess.

I let go of Maura’s hand, which has grown cold. Her red curls have fallen out of their perfect pompadour. I tuck one behind her small seashell ear. She’s wearing the pearl earrings she stole from me weeks ago. I like the thought that something of mine will stay with her. When I bring my hand to my mouth, I find a trace of her sweet citrusy scent, from the lemon verbena she always dabs at her throat and wrists.

I struggle to my feet, head spinning, and that’s when I see the red blazing on the horizon. The fire—fires?—are burning higher and hotter than they were before, and I suddenly remember the other people that I care about. Finn is down there. My father. My friends.

I can’t lose anyone else tonight.

I begin to pick my way across the rubble toward the door. My arm hurts with every small movement; it’s hard to keep it from being jostled. I bend down and rip at my petticoat. The thin cotton tears easily enough. I knot it into a sort of makeshift sling around my neck and slide my wounded arm into it, gasping at the pain. This would be easier if I could heal myself, but healing magic doesn’t work that way.

At the door, I pause and look over my shoulder. It’s not really Maura anymore, I remind myself. Her sense of humor, her ferocious temper, her desperate desire to be loved—everything that made her Maura—those things are already gone. I’m not leaving her. It was the other way around. She’s gone ahead of me, into a place I can only wonder about, and she won’t be alone there. She’ll have Brenna and Zara and Mother.

Tears slip over my cheeks again. I want my mother. Want someone to hold me and stroke my hair and whisper that it will be all right.

But I’m not a child anymore, and even if someone told me that, I wouldn’t believe it.

Tonight feels like a crucible.

Before,
with Maura.

And
after,
without.

• • •

The council building seems to have been evacuated. Everything is still and silent as I make my way downstairs. Outside, I glance up at the cathedral’s broken spire, wedged mid-fall against the bell tower. Eventually, I suppose gravity will do its work, and it will all come tumbling down. It’s for the best that there isn’t a crowd here gawking.

The heart of the city has an eerie, abandoned quality. Only a single lanky guard patrols the sidewalk in front of Richmond Square. He hastens over when he sees me.

“Sister, what are you doing? Didn’t you hear the evacuation order?” He takes in my bedraggled state as he draws on his cigarette. “Were you hurt in the accident?”

“I’ll be all right.” I smile through gritted teeth. “I’m looking for Sister Inez.”

His breath fogs the cold air. “She took a carriage down to the river district. Heard her talking about a fire that might disrupt the quarantine. Most of the guard was sent down to barricade the river district this afternoon.” He gives me a patronizing smile, though he can’t be much older than me. “I say, keep the river rats where they belong. Keep ’em from spreading disease to the quality.”

And I suppose he thinks
he’s
an instance of quality. I make a low, noncommittal noise at the back of my throat. “Have you seen a little blonde? Another convent girl? We were separated in all the confusion.”

He nods. “She asked after Sister Inez, too. Seemed awful upset. I offered to fetch her a hack, but she didn’t want help. Can I get one for you?”

So Tess went after Inez on foot. If I go by carriage, perhaps I can overtake her.

“No, thank you. I can manage.” I walk two blocks uptown, where carriages and wagons are rattling past. A hired hack trots past and I flag it down. A lady would never ride in one alone, but I’m well past worrying about being a proper young lady. “Could you take me to the river district, please? To the Golden Hart?”

The mustachioed driver looks askance at me, and I’m not certain whether it’s because I’ve asked him to take me to a house of ill repute or because I’ve got a broken arm, a cloak covered in dust, a scraped-up cheek, and swollen eyes. Possibly both.

“River district’s closed off, miss. Quarantined. And there’s a fire at one of them big warehouses near the Golden Hart. Can I take you somewhere else?” The big bay snorts and paws at the ground restlessly, and I wonder if he can smell smoke on the wind.

“Just take me as far as you can in that direction. I’ll walk the rest of the way.”

“Are—are you sure you don’t want to go to the hospital, miss?” The driver’s brown eyes are worried.

“Quite sure. Just as near as you can get me to the river district.” I half climb, half fall into the carriage.

I will see to it that Father and Finn are all right, and then I will find Inez. It’s well past time for us to have a reckoning.

The carriage pulls up in front of a row of houses on Fifty-Sixth Street. Ahead of us, an army wagon blocks the way to Fifty-Seventh. I climb down and hand the driver coins, but he waves them away.

“Can you tell me how to get to the Golden Hart?” I ask, pulling my tattered hood up over my hair.

His olive skin flushes. “It’s down by the river, miss. River and Seventy-Second. But that’s right where the fire is.”

I thank him and hurry toward the barricade. The air smells of smoke—not the pleasant smell of wood smoke from the chimneys, or the waxy smoke of a candle, but something heavier, more acrid, and more dangerous.

Behind the wagon, the barricades have been knocked down. So much for the supposed quarantine. I spot two guards who’ve been immobilized. They stand at the checkpoint, hands clenched around missing rifles and truncheons. Witches have been here.

As I make my way into the river district, people flood past me in the opposite direction. Mothers carry frightened children; fathers lug suitcases full of valuables. People on foot hurry alongside those on horseback, choking the narrow streets and making it near impossible for wagons to pass. Several carriages sit abandoned in the middle of the street. The sidewalks are littered with dropped toys and clothing and pots and pans. Above it all, smoke clouds the air, and to the west, orange flames leap into the night sky.