IN MY DREAMS I hear Benny. I know it was you, you thief. Marjorie comes and goes. She always wears her yellow raincoat. And then, suddenly, she is a black ghost with a white face, only it isn’t her at all anymore, but Sister Mary Grace in her nun’s habit.

She strokes my head.

“Shh,” Sister Mary Grace says. “Try to rest, child.”

There is someone else in the doorway. Muddy red hair and a muddy red sweater.

“It’s all right, Benedict,” Sister Mary Grace says. “You can go. She’s waking up now.”

He looks at me—wide eyes, no hint of his usual sneer—and then quickly looks down and leaves through the open door.

“He came and got me right away, and wouldn’t leave until you woke. Now, try to drink some tea.” Sister Mary Grace tips the edge of the steaming cup toward my lips.

I shake my head, trying to sit up. “I need to go outside. I need to visit the garden.”

Her kindly look fades into consternation. “Not today, Emmaline.”

How long have I been asleep and dreaming? Hours? A whole day? I throw a desperate look at the dark sky outside. I can just make out the garden wall in the moonlight. The moon, so bright it’s blinding. Perfectly round. Full. Full! Panic starts to gnaw at the edges of my fingers, making them itch to pull on my boots and race downstairs.

“No,” she says.

“Just for twenty minutes.”

“No.”

“Ten.”

She gives me a look.

“Five!”

Sister Mary Grace sets down the cup with a sigh. “Dr. Turner examined you. Your body is very weak right now. You can’t…” She looks down at the quilt. “You can’t go outside. Not for a long time. I’m so sorry, my child.” She looks over her shoulder at my door.

There is a new ticket there. A red one.

My blood thumps in my ears.

Not go outside?

Not go to the garden?

“You don’t understand! Foxfire needs me. It’s the full moon and the spectral shield isn’t finished yet and the Black Horse might have already gotten to her!” I tear at the quilt, trying to get out of bed, but Sister Mary Grace holds me down. She’s stronger than I remember, or else I am weaker.

“I’m so sorry. You must get some rest.”

“I have to save her!”

“Em—”

“It’s true! Everything Benny said is true! I did steal his comic book and I did steal the altar cloth and I’m sorry for all of it, but Foxfire needed it more than we did!” I swallow, try to speak more calmly. “If I don’t go to her the Black Horse is going to kill her. Tonight.”

Sister Mary Grace looks like she is almost in tears. She stands, brushing at her eyes, and takes a deep, bolstering breath. “You’ve been talking nonsense in your sleep, and trying to get out.” Her hand falls on a gleam of brass right above the knob. “Sister Constance had Thomas put a bolt on the door, for your own safety. We’ll move you to Anna’s room tomorrow. You’ll be warmer there, and there’s that pretty painted ceiling, won’t you like that?”

I stare at the lock.

A bit of brass that wasn’t there before holds me in now. Thomas must have come up with hammer and nails and turned my room into a prison cell. He knows about Foxfire. How could he do this to me?

I ball my fists in the quilt.

“Tell Thomas to come. Tell him I need to speak to him urgently. Alone.”

Sister Mary Grace hesitates. Other than to bring up firewood, Thomas rarely enters the upper levels in a house of nuns and young children. He almost never is alone with one of us, except for Anna, who was bedridden and needed extra help. Thomas is a young man, and even now, even in war, there are rules that must be followed.

Sister Mary Grace runs her finger over the lock, and then nods. “I’ll tell him.”