The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray
“Gemma!” Ann says, and I realize I’m holding fast to her.
“S-sorry,” I say, wiping the sweat from my brow.
“Ugh. Here.” Felicity hands me a handkerchief.
The pump organ’s blast of missed notes calls us to sing, and I hope its garish tones can mask the frantic beating of my heart. Hymnals are lifted and girlish voices rise without question of a bulwark ever failing. My lips move but I cannot sing. I’m trembling and drenched in a cold sweat.
Don’t look. But I must, I must….
I slide my eyes ever so carefully to the right, where moments ago an angel’s bloody trophy hissed a warning I don’t understand. But now the angel’s face is peaceful. The gorgon’s head sleeps. It’s only a picture in a window, nothing more than colored glass.
My blood will not settle, so I sit, alone, and read the letter from home I put away earlier. It is the usual twaddle from Grandmama, with mention of this party and that social call and all the latest gossip, but I’ve no head for it at present. I am surprised to read that Simon Middleton asked after me, and for a moment, my gloom is dispelled, and then I hate myself for allowing my thoughts to be turned so easily by a man; and just as quickly, I forget to hate myself and read the sentence three times over.
Just behind Grandmama’s letter is a note from Tom.
Dear Gemma, Lady of Pointed Tongue, he writes. I am writing this under duress, as Grandmama will not grant me peace until I do. Very well, I shall meet my obligation as a brother. I trust you are well. I, myself, am simply superb, never better. My gentlemen’s club has expressed a very keen interest in me, and I’ve been told I shall face a rigorous initiation into their sacred rites before the season commences. They’ve even been so kind as to ask after you with all manner of questions, though I can’t imagine why. I’ve told them exactly how disagreeable you can be. So you see that you and Father are wrong about me after all, and I shall try to be kind and acknowledge you on the street with a nod and a smile when I am a peer. And now, my duty finished, I leave you. Fondly as is possible given your unsuitable temperament, Thomas.
I crumple the note and throw it into the fire. I desperately need advice—about my brother, the Order, Wilhelmina Wyatt, the realms, and this magic inside me that both astounds and frightens. There is only one person I can turn to who might hold the answers to all my questions. And I shall go to her.
* * *
CHAPTER THIRTY
* * *
AT THE BRAMBLE WALL, I LEAVE MY FRIENDS. ANN PUTS her face close to the barbs that separate us. “Aren’t you coming?”
“Yes, later. There is a matter I must attend to.”
Felicity is suspicious. “What is it?”
I sigh dramatically. “I must speak to Asha about a matter between the Untouchables and the forest folk. A dispute.”
“Sounds terribly dull,” Felicity says. “Best of luck.”
Arm in arm, they hurry toward the castle, which juts up from its nest of vines like a bony mirage.
The smudge pots that line the dusty road to the Temple belch their colorful smoke. Usually, the scent is of the sweetest incense, but today, there’s a different smell, something sharp and unpleasant. The Hajin seem agitated. It is as if they await a promised storm.
“Lady Hope,” Asha says with a bow.
“I must approach the well of eternity,” I say, heading for it without stopping.
Asha keeps pace with me through the maze of corridors. “Lady Hope, my people are afraid. The forest folk accuse us of collaborating secretly with the Order—”
“And have you?” I query.
“Surely you do not believe it also?”
I don’t know what I believe anymore. The Order has some plan, and I intend to have answers about that when I leave. We’ve reached the Caves of Sighs. “Asha, I need to be alone.”
She bows again, shielding her eyes. “As you wish, Lady Hope.”
Circe’s body floats beneath the glasslike surface of the well. She seems weightless, yet I feel her presence so heavily I can scarcely breathe.
“So you’ve come back after all.”
I need your help. Try as I might, I cannot choke out those words.
“Something is at hand, and I want to know what it is!”
Her voice is like a dying woman’s. “You understand…the price…for my counsel?”
I swallow hard. Once this has begun, there is no turning back. And if I give her magic as she wants, who is to say that she can’t cause me harm? “Yes. I understand.”
“And you would give it…of your own free will?”
“What choice do I have?” I retort, and then I laugh bitterly, knowing full well what her response shall be. “Yes, I know, there is always a choice. Very well. I choose to give you what you want in exchange for what I need.”
“Of your own free will…”
“Yes, I give it of my own free will!” I snap.
“Then come to me,” she whispers, no more loudly than the rustling of silk.
I approach the well, where her body presses against the seal of water like a phantom. It takes every bit of strength I have to look into those staring eyes.
“Listen closely, Gemma,” she says in her slow, hoarse whisper. “Do exactly as I say, else you will kill me and know nothing.”
“I’m listening,” I say.
“Put your hand on the surface of the well and bestow it with life—”
“But I thought it would kill—”
“Just until the seal breaks and the water clears.”
My fingers linger on the edge of the well. Go on, then, Gemma. Get it over with. Slowly, I lower my trembling hands to the surface and rest them there. It is like a sheet of ice that melts at my touch. The water clears and Circe rises till her face is nearly breaking the surface.
“Good, good,” she whispers. “Now, place your palm over my heart and give me a small bit of magic—but only a small token. I am weak and cannot take more.”
My hand sinks into those waters until it is flush against the soggy fabric of Circe’s bodice, and I stifle a scream.
“Now,” she sighs.
Soon, the magic travels between us, an invisible thread. I feel nothing of her thoughts, only my own reflected to me.
“There,” I say, pulling quickly away.
Miss Moore rises until she’s floating peacefully on the surface. Her cheeks and lips show the palest hint of pink. Those unseeing eyes blink for the first time. Her voice gains strength.
“Thank you, Gemma,” she murmurs.
“I’ve done what you asked. Now I’ll have my answers.”
“Of course.”
I circle the well as I talk, not wanting to look at her. “What did you mean when you said the Order was plotting against me? How can I stop the Rakshana? What should I know about the realms, about the Winterlands creatures, and this magic? And Pippa. What do you know of—”
“So many questions,” she murmurs. “And yet, the answer is very straightforward. If you want to defend yourself against the Order and the Rakshana, you’d be best served to look inside yourself first, Gemma.”
“What do you mean?” I approach the well with caution.
“Learn to master yourself—to understand both your fears and your desires. That’s the key to the magic. Then, no one shall have any hold over you. Remember”—she takes a deep, wheezing breath—“the magic…is a living thing, joined to whomever it touches and changed by them as well.”
I pace the room, careful to avoid looking at her. “I am nearly seventeen. I should think I know myself.”
“You must come to know everything—even your darkest corners. Especially those.”
“Perhaps I have no dark corners.”
A thin rasp of a laugh comes from the well. “If that were true, I should be out there and you would be in here.”
I start to answer but no words come.
“You must know what the magic will cost you.”
“Cost me?” I repeat.
I hurry to the well, where she floats, her eyes closing. “Wait! But what about Tom and the Rakshana and Pippa and the Winterlands? I have more questions! You said you would help me!”
“And so I did,” she answers, drifting into the well’s depths. “Search those dark corners, Gemma. Before you find yourself caught there.”
I can’t believe I’ve given so much and gotten so little in return. I should never have thought to trust Circe in the first place.
“I won’t be back until the day I return the magic to the Temple—the day you die,” I say, storming from the room.
When I emerge from behind the curtain, Asha is there. She sits upon a small mat with her legs crossed, shelling bright orange peas into a bowl. Behind her, several Hajin sort through bushels of poppies, selecting only the brightest blooms, discarding the rest.
Asha gestures to me. “Might I have a word, Lady Hope?”
I sit beside her on the mat, but I can scarcely keep still. I’m far too agitated by my conversation with Circe, and angrier with myself for having trusted her.
“I have considered your offer,” Asha says. “I believe it best the Hajin not join your alliance.”
“Not join? But why?”
Asha’s fingers work diligently at separating the pea from its useless husk. “We do not wish to become involved in such a struggle. It is not our way.”
“But, Asha, with a share of the magic, your people could become a power in the realms. You could change your lot. You could cure—”
I bite the words off, afraid I will offend her. The Hajin cast a curious glance at me. Asha nods to them, and bowing, they take their leave.
“Back in the dark time, we were persecuted. Treated as slaves. Murdered for sport,” Asha explains. “And then the Order came and made us safe. Since the talk of an alliance, that safety has been in question. Our people have been taunted in the fields and beyond. A Hajin was whipped at the river by centaurs. And just last night, a crop of poppies was stolen—only a small basket, but it is enough.”
I ball my hands into fists. “That will not stand! I shall speak to Philon at once!”
Asha shakes her head. “No. We shall withdraw. Here, away from all, we are safe.”
I look about at the rugged caves where they have lived in exile for centuries. “But you are forced to live in these caves. How is that safety?”
Asha smooths her sari over her blistered legs. “It is best not to question.”
“Would you make that decision for the rest of your people?”
She drops the peas into a bowl with a hard clatter. “They should not know everything. It will only bring discontent.”
“For whom?” I ask.
“It is for the best,” she says as if it’s a mantra.
One of the Hajin approaches. Her face is limned with worry. “It is not a good harvest, Asha,” she says in apology. “We have lost many flowers to frost and blight.”
Asha frowns. “Frost?”
The Untouchable opens her blistered hand to reveal a poppy withered and blue with cold. “They do not survive.”
“Here,” I say. I put my hand to it and new poppies spring out, fat and red. “That is what you could do if you wanted.”
The girl looks hopefully to Asha, who shakes her head.
“That way does not last,” Asha answers. She plucks the first blossom from the Hajin girl’s hand and throws it into the rubbish pile.
I take the path through the willows again. The majestic branches fan out over my head, and I walk through the cocoon of them, lost in thought. What plan does the Order have for me? Could they have killed Wilhelmina Wyatt to silence her, and if so, what secret did she hold that was worth murdering for? How can I help govern the realms when the very people who would form my alliance do not trust one another?
Even the promise of seeing Pip and the others in the Borderlands doesn’t soothe me just now. They will not want to hear of my troubles. They’ll want to dance. To play merry games. To make ball gowns from thin air and capes from threadbare tapestries. And when Felicity and Pippa are together, it is as if the rest of us do not exist. Their friendship is exclusive. I am envious of their closeness, and I hate myself for it. I cannot decide which is worse—the envy or the small, petty way it makes me feel inside.
A little dust storm kicks up along the road. It is followed by a galloping sound. My heart quickens. It’s gaining fast and I cannot possibly outrun it this time. I try to squeeze between the willows but there is not enough room. Magic. But what? Cloak myself. What, what, what? Can’t think. Illusion. An illusion. But what? Look about, Gemma. What is here? Road. Sky. Dust. Willow. A willow tree!
He’s getting closer.
Let go of the fear. Let go. Let go. I feel the magic working within me, and I can only hope it has obeyed. When I look at my hands, they appear as branches. I’ve done it. I’ve masked myself.
The rider slows to a trot and then stops altogether. I can scarcely breathe for my fear. It’s Amar. He wears a cape of animal skins—the animals’ eyes still move within it—and a helmet made of human skulls. His eyes are black holes, and I bite back a scream. Don’t lose your purpose, Gemma. Calm, calm…
The horse is an unearthly thing with eyes like Pip’s have been at times. It snorts and bares its teeth while Amar searches the path.
“I know you are here,” he calls. “I smell your power. Your innocence.”
My heart beats faster than I am certain it can bear. A crow flies from tree to tree, and I fear it shall find me out. It flies instead to Amar and settles on his shoulder.
“The time nears. Beware the birth of May.”
He kicks the horse’s flanks and rides off in a cloud of dust.
I stay hidden for a full count of one hundred, and then I run hard and fast for the Borderlands.
I want to tell them about Circe, but I’m afraid. How can I possibly confess that she is still alive? That I’ve gone to her for counsel? That I’ve given her magic? I’m ill when I think of what I’ve done, of the risk I’ve taken. And for what? Rubbish. Admonitions to search my dark corners, as if she weren’t the most evil soul I’ve ever met.
Once I reach the castle and see my friends laughing and playing a game of catch, I’m cheered considerably. It was a mistake seeing Circe, and one I’ll not make again. I won’t go back until it is time to return the magic and make the alliance, the day she’ll be gone from our world forever.
* * *
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
* * *
WE WAKE TO A GLORIOUS SUNDAY MORNING FULL OF color and dappled with a soft light that blurs the landscape into the sort of palette that might please Mr. Monet. After a hideously dull sermon, compliments of the half-dead Reverend Waite, Mrs. Nightwing offers a reward for our saintly endurance by asking our help in preparing for Spence’s masked ball. We are turned out of doors in our artists’ smocks with paintbrushes in the pockets. On the back lawn, long stretches of canvas have been spread out on tables. Pots of paint hold down the corners. Miss McCleethy directs us to paint pastoral scenes befitting a paradise so that we may employ them as scenery for our masked ball performances. The only scene that comes to my mind is the ridiculous frolicking Pan in pantaloons from my grandmother’s home in London. I refuse to copy that monstrosity, though the prospect of outfitting him in a corset is rather tempting.
Felicity is hard at work. Her brush dips from pot to pot, and when I see the castle emerge, I smile and add the craggy mountains of the Winterlands behind it. Miss McCleethy walks between the tables, her hands behind her back. She makes improvements with her paintbrush, correcting a bush here, a flower there. It is quite annoying and I have the thought of painting a mustache on Miss McCleethy.
“What is this?” Miss McCleethy frowns at our picture of the Borderlands in progress.
“A fairy tale,” Felicity answers. She adds to
“Fairy tales are rather treacherous. How does this one end?”
Felicity’s smile is a challenge. “Happily ever after.”
“It’s a bit dreary.” Miss McCleethy grabs a paintbrush and dabs a bright pinkish orange over the churning gray of my distant Winterlands sky. It doesn’t improve it; it only makes it into a muddy mess with a false dash of color.
“That helps,” she says. “Carry on.”
“Monster,” Felicity mutters under her breath. “Promise you won’t give her a drop of magic, Gemma.”
“I shouldn’t share with her if my life depended upon it,” I vow.
In the afternoon, the Gypsy women come bearing baskets of jams and other sweets. We slather jam on bread, not caring about our paint-smeared fingers. Miss McCleethy asks if one of the Gypsies might be hired to chop firewood, and a short while later, Kartik comes, and the heat rises in my face. He removes his coat, rolls his shirtsleeves to his elbows, and takes the ax to a tree.
Miss McCleethy leaves us so that she might inquire after the East Wing’s progress, and I sneak over to where Kartik is working. His shirt is damp and clings to him. I offer him water. He glances toward McCleethy, who pays not a whit of attention to us. Satisfied, he gulps the water and wipes the back of his hand across his forehead.
“Thank you,” he says, smiling in a curious way.
“What is so amusing?” I ask.
“I’m reminded of the oddest dream I had.” He rubs his thumb across his lower lip.
The blush begins at my toenails and whooshes up to my face. “Well,” I say, fumbling with the water bucket. “It was only a dream.”
“If you remember, I believe in dreams,” he says, gazing at me in such a way that I find I must look elsewhere to keep from kissing him again.
“I…I need to speak to you about an urgent matter,” I say. “Mr. Fowlson paid me a visit in London. We’d been invited to dinner at the Hippocrates Society. He was waiting outside.”