The Gazels

Chapter 77

Ann turns the letter over in her hands. “Guess I’d best get it over with.”

I present my arm like a courtier. “It isn’t every day I’m privileged to escort a star of the stage.”

“Thank you, Lady Carmen,” she says as if entering stage right for her bow. She walks straight up to Brigid and offers the letter with a hasty “Brigid, will you post this for me tomorrow?”

“Course I will,” Brigid says, tucking it into her apron pocket.

“There, now that’s done,” I say.

“Yes. Done.”

“Come on, then. Fee wants to play cards, and I’m determined she’ll not whip us at it as she always does.”

Buoyed by Ann’s success, the three of us sit up playing hand after hand, wagering wishes like shillings—“I’ll see your dream of becoming princess of the Ottoman Empire and I’ll raise you one journey into Bombay riding on an elephant’s back!” Ann wins most rounds, and not even Fee minds. She swears it’s further proof that Ann has changed her luck at last, and that nothing is beyond us now.

* * *

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

* * *

SEVERAL DAYS PASS, AND STILL THERE IS NO SIGN OF Kartik’s red scarf. I worry that he’s met with misadventure. I worry that when he returns, I will not be able to help him with Amar. I worry that he will not return at all but will travel on to Bristol and the Orlando.

Such worry has put me in an ill humor. Already we have suffered the ignominy of walking backward as we shall do when presented to Her Majesty at Saint James’s Palace. I stumbled twice, and I cannot imagine how I shall manage with the long train of my gown thrown over my left arm, my head bowed toward my sovereign. It makes my stomach hurt to think of it.

Mrs. Nightwing has settled us at the dining room table. At each of our places is a daunting array of silver. Soupspoons. Oyster forks. Fish knives. Fish forks. Butter knives. Dessert spoons. I half expect to see a whaling harpoon and perhaps, in case we find it all too overwhelming and wish to die with honor, the seppuku sword of Japanese legend.

Mrs. Nightwing drones on. I find it difficult to pay attention, and only catch every few sentences. “The fish course…the bones, pushed to the side of the plate…buttermilk, by the by, preserves the softness of a lady’s hands…”

The vision steals over me quickly. One moment, I am listening to Mrs. Nightwing’s voice, and the next, time stands still. Mrs. Nightwing is frozen at Elizabeth’s side. Felicity’s eyes are trained on the ceiling in an expression of utter boredom. Cecily and Martha, too, are suspended in time.

Wilhelmina Wyatt stands in the open doorway wearing a grim expression.

“Miss Wyatt?” I call. Leaving my frozen companions, I chase after her.

She stands at the top of the first flight of stairs, but when I reach the landing, she steps through the portrait of Eugenia Raftel and vanishes like a ghost.

“Miss Wyatt?” I whisper. I am suddenly alone. The very bones of the school seem to murmur to me. I cover my ears but it does not stop the ghastly whispers, the muffled cackles, the hissing. The peacock paper on the walls comes alive, the eyes blinking.

Wilhelmina’s spidery handwriting emerges on the portrait of Eugenia Raftel: The Tree of All Souls. The Tree of All Souls. The Tree of All Souls. It fills the whole of the painting. The whispers grow louder. I put my hand to the painting, and it’s as if I fall straight through it and into another time and place.

I’m in the great hall, but it’s changed. I see what must surely be Miss Moore as a girl, the brooding concentration in her face. A girl with startling green eyes smiles at her, and I gasp as I recognize my own mother.

“Mama?” I call, but she does not hear me. It is as if I’m not really here.

An older woman with white hair and blue eyes sits with them, and I know her, too. Eugenia Raftel. The face that seems so intimidating in her portrait is kind here. Bright and ruddy with life.

A girl brings her an apple, and Mrs. Raftel smiles. “Why, thank you, Hazel. I shall relish it, I’m sure. Or should I cut it up with a share for all?”

“No, no,” the girls protest. “It is for you. For your birthday!”

“Very well, then. Thank you. I do so love apples.”

A small girl in the back raises her hand shyly.

“Yes, Mina?” Mrs. Raftel calls.

Now I see traces of the woman in the girl’s face. Little Wilhelmina Wyatt trudges toward her teacher and presents her with a gift of her own, a drawing.

“What is this?” Mrs. Raftel’s smile fades as she examines the drawing. It is a perfect representation of the enormous tree I’ve seen in my dreams. “How did you come to draw this, Mina?”

Wilhelmina hangs her head in shame and misery.

“Come now. You must tell me. Lying is a sin and speaks badly to a girl’s character.”

I hear the scrape of the chalk as Wilhelmina writes upon the

slate, the words taking shape slowly: The Tree of All Souls.

Hurriedly, Mrs. Raftel takes the chalk from the girl’s fingers. “That’s quite enough, Mina.”

“What is the Tree of All Souls?” a girl asks.

“A myth,” Eugenia Raftel answers, cleaning the slate with a rag.

“It’s in the Winterlands, isn’t it?” Sarah asks. Her eyes glimmer with mischief. “Is it very powerful? Won’t you tell us, please?”

“All you need to know at present lies within the pages of your Latin book, Sarah Rees-Toome,” Mrs. Raftel scolds in a teasing way.

She throws the drawing into the fire, and tears fall from little Mina’s eyes. The other girls snicker at her crying. Mrs. Raftel lifts the girl’s chin with her finger. “You may draw me another picture, hmmm? Perhaps a nice meadow or a drawing of Raftel. Now, dry your tears. And you must promise to be a good girl and not listen to voices you shouldn’t, for anyone can be corrupted, Mina.”

The scene shifts, and I see Wilhelmina slipping a jeweled dagger from a drawer into her pocket. Her body changes with the years until the womanly Wilhelmina stands before me again, the dagger in hand. Her face is twisted in fury. She raises the dagger.

“No!” I scream. I put up my hand to block the blow.

I’m still shouting when I come back to myself in the dining room. Everyone’s gawking at me, horrified. Pain. In my hand. Rivulets of blood trickle down my palm and onto the damask tablecloth. The knife at my plate. I’ve gripped it so tightly I’ve cut my hand.

“Miss Carmen!” Mrs. Nightwing gasps. She rushes me to the kitchen, where Brigid keeps the gauze and salve.

“Let’s ’ave a look,” Brigid says. She rinses my hand, and it stings. “Not too deep, thank goodness. More a scratch ’n’ a scare than anythin’ else. I’ll fix it right up.”

“How did it happen, Miss Carmen?” Mrs. Nightwing asks.

“I—I don’t know,” I answer truthfully.

She holds my gaze a moment past what is comfortable. “Well, I trust you’ll pay closer attention in the future.”

Felicity and Ann are waiting for me in my room. Felicity has taken over my bed and helped herself to Pride and Prejudice. Seeing me, she tosses the book aside like one of her suitors.

“Have a care with that, if you please.” I rescue the poor book, soothing its ruffled pages, and put it back to bed on the shelf.

“What the devil happened?” Felicity asks.

“I had a very strong vision,” I say. I tell them what Wilhelmina Wyatt showed me, the scene in the schoolroom. “I believe she’s trying to tell me that the Tree of All Souls does exist. I think she needs us to find it. The time has come for us to go into the Winterlands.”

Felicity sits forward. Some fire has been lit within her. “When?”

“As soon as possible,” I answer. “Tonight.”

The woods are patrolled by one of Mr. Homk’s men. We see him with his pistol, walking back and forth. He’s as jumpy as a cat.

“How will we get to the door without being seen?” Ann asks.

I concentrate, and suddenly, there’s a haunt of a woman in the woods. The man quakes at the ghostly sight of her. “Wh-who’s there?” Shaking, he directs the pistol at her. She ducks behind a tree and comes out farther on.

“Y-you’ll answer to m-my foreman,” the man says. He follows at a careful distance as she leads him toward the graveyard, where she will disappear, leaving him scratching his head at the mystery of it all. But we’ll be inside the realms by then.

“Come on,” I say, dashing for the secret door.

Felicity lifts her skirts, grinning. “Oh, I do like this.”

The tall stone slabs with their watchful women greet us on the other side. But they can’t give me the answer I seek. Only one person can, much as I’m loath to admit it.

“You go on to the castle. I’ll join you shortly,” I say.

“What do you mean? Where are you going?” Ann asks.

“I shall ask Asha if she has protections to offer us,” I explain, feeling awful for the lie.

“We’ll accompany you,” Felicity says.

“No! That is, you should prepare Laverne and the other girls. Gather everyone.”

Felicity nods. “Right. Hurry back.”

“I shall,” I say, and that, at least, is true.

I run through the dusty corridors of the Temple and head straight for the well of eternity. Circe is waiting, floating below the surface, a pale thing raised from the deep and forced into the light.

“Has the time of my demise come so soon?” she asks in a voice stronger than before.

I can barely control my anger. “Why didn’t you tell me that you knew Wilhelmina Wyatt?”

“You didn’t ask.”

“You could have told me!”

“As I said, everything has its price.” She lets her breath out in a sigh.

“For all I know, you were the one who killed her,” I say, inching closer to the well.

“Is that why you’ve come back? To question me about an old school chum?”

“No,” I say. I hate myself for coming, but she’s been to the Winterlands before. My mother’s diary chronicles it. She’s the only one I can ask. “I need for you to tell me about the Winterlands.”

A note of wariness creeps into her voice. “Why?”

“We’re going in,” I say. “I want to see it for myself.”

She’s quiet for a long time. “You’re not ready for the Winterlands.”

“I am,” I declare.

“Have you searched your dark corners yet?”

I run my fingers along the polished stones of the well. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“That is how you can be snared.”

“I’m tired of your riddles,” I snap. “Either you will tell me about the Winterlands or you won’t.”

“Very well,” she says after a moment. “Approach.”

Once again, I put my hand to the well, where I can feel the power still lingering in the stones, and then I place it on her heart. Somehow it’s easier to do this time; my need to know about the Winterlands and my desire to find out about the Tree of All Souls are stronger than my apprehension. For a few seconds, she glows with the power. A hint of a smile touches her pinkening lips. With this second gift, she’s become even lovelier and more vibrant—more like the teacher I loved, Miss Moore. Seeing that face startles me. I wipe my wet hand on my nightgown as if I could rid it of all traces of he