Nieve had been warned about the spherals, but followed a trio of them down the stairs regardless. Seeing as Elixibyss had been the one to issue the warning, she didn’t know how seriously to take it. They seemed harmless enough and helped to light the way, three softly glowing beacons that floated above and before and around her. So far so good anyway.
Once on the main floor again, she made her way back to the dining room and stood with an ear pressed against one of the doors. It was utterly silent within. Slowly, she tried the handle. The room was locked. She bit her lip, wondering what to do. If only she could whisper some words of encouragement to Lias through the door, let him know that she hadn’t forgotten him. But that would be stupid. A guard might be stationed in the dining room. She’d passed by one earlier roving the hall – his seven eyes roving, too – before following Weazen up the stairs. Elixibyss herself could still be in there, having nodded off at the table. If so, she might wake up at any moment, check the spy ring and find herself staring at the bottom of a jar of salve.
The spherals were hovering in an archway nearby, waiting for her. Waiting to lead her astray? Could she be more astray than she already was? She pictured herself stepping through an open trap door and plummeting down a shaft into a pitch black, rat-infested dungeon. Then she pictured Malcolm being clobbered by that huge mud-faced septaclops. She decided to follow the spherals, trust her instincts.
As soon as she moved toward them, they wafted away, leading her down yet another hall. Trailing after them, she reflected how this whole long night was like an extended, frustrating dream of hurrying down hallways, never reaching the end.
This one, however, came to an end shortly.
The spherals arrived at another set of double doors and briefly wavered in front of it, illuminating patches of ornate gold embossing on the panels. A special room, then. One after the other, they then poured through the crack between the doors, leaving her behind in the dark hallway.
Nieve hesitated, queasy with nerves. She sensed that they were taking her exactly where she wanted to go, but wasn’t at all sure she was prepared for what she might see.
Prepared or not, she pushed ahead through the darkness, arms stretched out before her like a sleepwalker in a cartoon. When she reached for the doors, she ran her hands along the panels’ fancywork in search of the knob. Fat as an orange, she found it easily, and it turned just as easily in her hand.
Stepping inside, Nieve found herself in a shadowy ballroom, vast as a gymnasium. The massive crystal chandelier that hung from the ceiling in the centre of the room was unlit, but, as in the dining room, there were lit candles in sconces on the walls. Visibility wasn’t great, but she immediately saw enough to make her want to turn around and run.
The spherals were gliding around the room, moving along the rows of chairs that lined the walls. The chairs were normal enough, if fussy – spindly legs and gilded woodwork – but what filled them wasn’t. Every single chair was occupied by a person who sat unmoving and staring straight ahead, like wallflowers at a dance. No one spoke or made a sound of any kind. Everyone sat in exactly the same position, very straight, with hands in their laps and feet flat on the floor – no crossed legs or waggling feet, no slumping or restless twitching. They very strongly and eerily resembled wax figures, but of course they weren’t that.
Steeling herself, Nieve moved closer to examine them, and began walking along the nearest row, following one of the spherals. It was drifting and circling slowly, casting a bluish glow on each face as it passed. She recognized the man who had escaped from the orderlies at the hospital, and felt her heart sink, sorry that he hadn’t made it after all.
And then she stopped moving. Stopped and stared. The next person in line was her teacher, Mrs. Crawford. She was seated beside an older boy Nieve also recognized from school. Most of the faces she’d seen so far had been drained of emotion – the boy’s was, but Mrs. Crawford’s certainly wasn’t. Her frowning expression had been caught and frozen while she’d been speaking, and speaking her mind by the looks of it.
A troublemaker.
As was Mayor Mary. Nieve knew she’d find her here, and she did, not much farther along. The spiders’ silk still clung to her in thick strands, although her head was mostly uncovered. She looked furious. Her face was locked in an angry snarl that was startling it was so unlike her.
“Now, see? See what happens when you make faces, dear? Your face gets stuck. She looks ridiculous, doesn’t she?”
The Impress. She had risen, unnoticed, from the last chair in the row. As she approached Nieve, she mused, “An experiment, the cobwebs. Interesting results, but not particularly useful.”
Nieve glared at her, this creature with the borrowed face, her mother’s face. Was that an experiment, too? She was glad to see that Elixibyss’ right eye was smeared-looking and watery.
“Go ahead, glare all you want, dear. Your fierce-eye isn’t going to work on me. You have been naughty, haven’t you? A very bad girl!” Elixibyss squinched her one bleary eye. “Not only throwing away my beautiful gift and sneaking out of bed, but take a look at this.” She raised a sleeve, exposing her mossy arm and a tiny black patch of skin. “A disfiguring bruise! I wasn’t going to mention it, but someone forced my car off the road earlier this evening and we had a little accident.”
Nieve looked at the arm, then looked again, trying to take in what she was seeing. She was sure it hadn’t been there before.
“That’s not a bruise,” she said slowly. “It’s a . . . puncture.” A puncture beneath which there was nothing. No layers of skin, no muscle, sinew, or bone, only emptiness. “You have a hole in your arm.”
Elixibyss dropped her sleeve instantly. “Don’t be absurd! It’s a bruise. Your eyes haven’t adjusted to the light here yet.”
Nieve knew what she’d seen.
Elixibyss flinched, pain evidently streaking across her brow. She flicked a hand and a teeming pile of headache pills appeared on her palm. These she crammed into her mouth, crunching and grinding them, while saying, “Yes, you’ve been a most disagreeable daughter. Punishments are called for, spoil the rod, etcetera, I do want to be a good parent.” She swallowed the pills down in one acrid lump. “However, I am willing to overlook your insolence and disobedience and bad attitude this one time. If you cooperate.” She sniffed loudly. “I have a little chore for you to perform.”
“What kind of chore?”
“You’ll see.”
“What I want to see is Malcolm.”
“A what not a who, eh? Now you’ve got the right idea, darling. Your tutor will be able to skip the grammar and get down to the real lessons. Genevieve Crawley, didn’t I tell you? I believe you’ve met. I must say she’s done some fabulous work at your old school. Absolutely everyone has graduated and become most . . . useful. But come, this way.”
As Elixibyss marched toward another line of chairs, Nieve, following behind, caught a flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye. She stopped and surveyed the other side of the room, unable to see anything, only more seated, comatose bodies lining the wall. But she had the distinct impression that someone had waved at her.
“Dawdle, dawdle, dawdle!” Elixibyss called back. “Come, before I lose my patience.”
Nieve hurried toward the spot where the Impress was waiting, tapping her foot noisily, as if cracking beetles with the toe of her shoe. In the chair before her sat Malcolm.
Nieve crouched down in front of him and placed a hand on his ice-cold one.
He looked terrible, gaunt and worn, his forehead marked with a ugly bruise (a real bruise). He stared straight ahead, but not with resignation, Neive thought. She knew Malcolm could be a scrapper if it came to that. Another troublemaker. But how much trouble can you make with only an ounce of life left in you?
Elixibyss smiled down at him.
“Why are you doing this?” Nieve clenched her jaw.
“That’s obvious, isn’t it, dear? I’m doing it for you.”
“Me? ”
“Really now, there’s no need to play the ignoramus, is there? Mothers make sacrifices, that’s simply what we do. Your dreary old granny has told you, surely, that you have a few minor abilities, nothing to boast about. But they haven’t anything to do with healing. That’s sentimental nonsense. Quite the opposite, in fact. Why, you could quench this boy’s light with a snap of your fingers.” Elixibyss raised her hand, as though she were about to do exactly that, but paused and dropped it again. “It’s fantastic luck to touch the dead, you must know that. Everyone’s lined up here, ready and waiting. Think, a whole roomful of luck to harvest! Yes, you’re going to be a busy girl indeed once the wedding is over.”
Nieve was so astonished by this, all she could think to say was, “What wedding?”
“Twisden’s, of course. To that Sarah person, hand-picked for the job. Finalizes a few matters for me, but honestly, wedding, divorce, funeral . . . humans have the most pointless rituals. Which reminds me, I have preparations to make, and you, my dear girl, have a job to do. Remember, no more naughty behaviour. We wouldn’t want your little friend here to perish before his time, would we?”
With that, Elixibyss gathered up the hem of her gown and walked briskly toward the double doors. “Get a move on!” she ordered, without once glancing back.
Nieve herself rose, heartsick, giving her friend’s hand a squeeze, passing along some warmth, some hope, even though there seemed precious little of that to go around. On rising, however, she saw that flicker of movement again. Then, from across the room, someone – a short familiar someone – jumped up from one of the chairs, dashed over to Elixibyss, and began making faces behind her back.
Lirk!
He hopped around and cavorted behind the unwitting Impress, imitating her regal walk, jeering and thumbing his nose at her. After which he simply . . . vanished. He mostly vanished, that is, for the stubby fingers that waggled on the tip of his snub nose were visible for a few seconds longer before they too winked out.