Mrs. Grenville wrote as if the paper had personally offended her. Every stroke of the pen was a slash, every dot a thrust. Olivia, sitting across from her in the drawing room, kept her eyes on her own research for as long as she could, but eventually couldn’t concentrate anymore.
Not that concentration had been easy to begin with. Olivia’s night had been restless, full of dreams about scurrying, shadowy things like cockroaches, and she’d woken just as tired and out of sorts as she’d been the day before. More so, because now she had Gareth’s predictable idiocy to remember. Intellectually, she hadn’t been surprised. She’d known what to expect.
She still wanted to slap him.
The situation with the demon was affecting her, she knew, just as it was affecting the whole household. Mr. Grenville had been curt and weary, the servants had gone about in poker-faced silence, and her lesson that day had absolutely lacked energy.
And Joan was clearly taking something out on the paper.
“Upsetting information, I take it?” Olivia asked, keeping all but a slight edge out of her voice with a significant exercise of will.
Joan looked up, eyes narrow. “Stories I’d heard in London. Names. Places. That kind of thing.” She didn’t go back to writing. “Figured I might as well do something with myself.”
“It could be useful,” said Olivia.
“Could be. Right now, it’s just cataloguing how inventive people can be.” Joan nearly spat the word. “You never know what they’ll come up with next.”
Olivia lifted her eyebrows. “Like teaching magic to children?”
“Someone’s going to teach them. Some of them don’t need teaching to be dangerous. At least we’re—” Joan bit off the stream of heated words and took a long breath. “Yeah.”
“You shouldn’t draw too many conclusions from what you’re reading,” Olivia said. “You’re seeing only one side of people there, remember.”
Joan sighed. “Yeah. It’s just…I don’t get it—what they do.”
“Meaning no offense,” Olivia said, “but you never seemed very sheltered.”
“No,” Joan said. “It’s not what they do. It’s that they do it here. And they don’t need to. Desperation, sure. Even fun I can sort of see. Some people are sick bastards. I understand that. But the people I heard about, just about all of them can keep themselves comfortable in other ways. They’ve got plenty of food, nobody’s attacking them, and they’re willing to shed blood for the Outsiders, for demons, in your terms, so they can make a few more pounds. Be a little better looking than the next man. Be in charge, as if that was ever anyone’s sane idea of a good time. It’s goddamn stupid, is what it is.”
Rain crawled down the window by Olivia. She watched it for a moment, seeing the misty green expanse of Englefield’s lawns stretching away, gray-green under gray skies. Her irritation faded away, but only weariness replaced it.
“I don’t know,” she said finally. “I think it’s easy to be desperate for something you don’t need, if everyone around you has it, or if they convince you you need it. Not that it’s an excuse. But if you ask ten men what the necessities of life are, you’ll probably get eight different answers.”
Joan nodded. “We adjust. For good or bad. That makes sense. But”—another gesture to the notebook—“going this far—”
“I don’t think it happens all at once.” Olivia didn’t realize she was interrupting until she’d spoken, and then she froze for a second, prepared for sharp words. They didn’t come. Joan simply sat and listened. Olivia went on. “I don’t…I’ve never encountered these people. I can’t speak with any sort of certainty. But I would imagine it starts with small compromises. Nothing that requires blood sacrifices or binding promises. Nothing that kills or enslaves, just a spell to make young women find you more attractive, perhaps, or a mild jinx on your enemy.”
“You wouldn’t see anything wrong with it,” Joan agreed, but her upper lip curled in revulsion, as if she was looking at a slug. “Not here.”
“Not most places, I’d think,” Olivia said. “Even most of our stories don’t say there’s anything wrong with love potions or with a bit of mischief. And maybe there isn’t, always, except…except it’s easy to think you should have what you can get. It’s easy to start thinking you’re better than normal people, that normal rules don’t apply to you. Especially when you’re young. Look at Michael. Before he came here, he didn’t see any reason why he shouldn’t call down rainstorms to suit his convenience. Or, rather, he didn’t see any reason why he should think about other people’s convenience before doing so.”
Joan sighed and leaned back in her chair. “And there’s not much difference between thirteen and thirty sometimes. Especially not—” She paused and shook her head. “Not for people who’re used to getting their own way.”
“Or who aren’t and are angry about it. Or who are…tricked. I can’t explain the masters entirely, any more than you can, not what makes one man turn to evil and not another. But the men who follow them, some of them…I have to wonder whether some of them started out seeking something greater and realized their mistake only when they thought it was too late to turn back.”
Olivia felt the urge to apologize, though she didn’t know to whom. She tried to dismiss it. After all, she had never even dabbled in the darker magics or tried to seduce anyone else into doing so. But Gareth had said the men and women who believed her would be more open to other charlatans, less scrupulous ones, and she couldn’t discount that possibility. Now she considered, for the first time, the chance that she might have led a few in her audience into something real and quite sinister.
“There’s great good in seeking a…deeper meaning in life,” she said aloud. “Most people take no harm from it, and it puts many of them on a better path than they might have found otherwise. Maybe a truer one too.”
“Sometimes,” Joan said. “Sure.” Then she went back to her notes, philosophy abandoned now that she’d had her chance to wax wrathful. Olivia doubted if, an hour later, she’d remember much about the conversation.
Olivia’s mind, however, remained unsettled, if she ever had been able to call it truly settled over the last week or so. She still couldn’t say with certainty that she regretted her choice after Tommy’s death. She was certain she could have chosen worse occupations. But she found herself thinking about the faces she’d seen in her audiences. Had any of the curious young men and women who’d come to see her turned to bloody bargains to get their way in later life? Had any of the grief stricken, the elderly, the desperate gone from her to another “medium,” one who had drained them of any means of support? And if so, how much of that had been her fault?
Surely she was not completely to blame. The people for whom she’d performed had still possessed their will, and the people who might have lured them into one trap or another were certainly the most accountable. Olivia was too old for extravagant self-reproach, and she couldn’t believe her hands were as bloody as all that.
Neither were they so mildly tainted as she had always thought.
And what did Olivia do about that? Lyddie was dead, she had no idea where Hawkins and his show had gone…and neither of them had made her join up. She’d come of her own free will. There was nothing to be found there. Of her clients, she’d known few names and remembered still fewer, and she didn’t know what reparations she could make.
Then…
Elizabeth’s scream shattered her thoughts.
***
Elizabeth was close at hand, and Olivia and Joan were quick. Before the scream had completely died away, Joan was across the hall and opening the door to the room from which it had come. Olivia, though she couldn’t claim such speed, was close at her heels.
As she might have expected, Elizabeth was hovering near the ceiling again. Below her, Charlotte was facing what looked, for a second, like a human figure with a dreadful face. It was grayish and hung in loose flaps of flesh. Jagged teeth surrounded a gaping maw. Olivia caught her breath.
“You vile little pig,” Charlotte said and boxed the figure’s ears with quite a bit of strength.
Olivia stepped forward, ready to defend her student even as she realized the scene wasn’t quite what it appeared to be, and the monster reached for its face.
“Ow,” it said in a muffled boy’s voice. “I had that coming, didn’t I? Sorry, Lizzie.”
“Arthur?” Olivia asked as he drew off the mask. On closer inspection, it appeared to consist of a pillowcase, some broken bits of glass, and a substantial amount of both paint and glue. It was rather well done, in all honesty. That didn’t do much for her temper. “What in the name of God is going on here?”
All three students started talking at once.
“Donnell.” Joan’s voice cut through the clamor. Her glare silenced it. “Get down from there. I know you can.”
Elizabeth sniffled and wiped her eyes, but nodded. She looked over briefly to Olivia, who gave her a reassuring smile, and then closed her eyes and started breathing deeply.
Joan turned her attention on the next easiest student to deal with. “Woodwell, don’t hit when you’re angry. If you ever stood a chance of talking things out with the guy, it’s a lot harder if you hit him. And if you didn’t, now he knows how you fight, and you probably need to kill him.” She paused, seemed to realize they were staring, and added, “That doesn’t apply here. Don’t kill Waite.”
“I’ll try to restrain myself, ma’am,” said Charlotte, sounding like it would be a challenge.
“Waite, really, what the hell?”
“Um,” said Arthur. He didn’t seem shocked. Olivia had overheard Joan teaching the students to fight, and thought all of them were used to worse language by now, but he looked down at his shoes for a moment before meeting Joan’s eyes again. “Wanted to find something out, ma’am, so I was hiding in the closet. I didn’t think Lizzie’d be coming in.” He added, looking upward, “And I am awfully sorry about that.”
“Oh,” said Elizabeth, opening one eye to look at him. “If you didn’t mean to be horrid, I accept your apology. But still, it was a nasty thing to do.”
“It was an idiotic stunt,” Mrs. Grenville corrected her, “and this is one of the better ways it could’ve ended. Trust me on this, Waite. You do not want to give me a scare. Or Simon. And we’re not made of sheets, by the way.”
“Yes, ma’am. Sorry.”
Joan looked over at Olivia. “You have this under control? I should make sure Simon’s not trying to rush in and save us all.”
“Yes, I’ll be fine,” Olivia said. When Joan had left and Elizabeth was on the ground, she sent them off to get some tea, and turned to Arthur. “Now,” she said. “What did you have to find out that was so important it merited childish pranks in a house where someone’s trying to recover?”
“It’s just that…” Arthur looked toward the door and shrugged. “I wanted to see what one of us would do when something jumped out.”
Olivia lifted her eyebrows. “So you were trying to get yourself killed?”
“No, ma’am. I’d put up a shield of power, the way you taught us. I thought I’d find out. It probably wouldn’t be anything, but we’d know. Given the way things are.”
“Arthur,” Olivia said with what felt like the last remaining store of her patience. “If I had three wishes, I think I’d spend all of them on making you, for once in your life, think before you acted. I realize it’s not something you’ve had to do often, but I strongly suggest you develop the habit.”
She knew her voice was harsh. Arthur faced her with tight lips and flaming cheeks, and simply nodded. He looked miserable. Most of the time, that would have moved her. Now she just wondered if it was an act. Surely he’d had worse scoldings.
“Go help in the kitchen,” she said. “I’m sure they need something peeled or chopped or sliced. And I’m sure that’s a far easier punishment than you deserve. If you have an idle moment for the next three days, it won’t be for lack of trying on my part.”
She watched Arthur leave, stiff-backed and quick. Then she sank into a chair, wondering why she felt so drained when she hadn’t done anything.