The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray
“Asha, have the forest folk come?”
“I have not seen them,” she answers. “Are you well, Lady Hope?”
No. I am not well. I am diseased with hate. “Stand by. I may have need of you.”
“As you wish, Lady Hope.”
Face your fears. That’s what the well is for. I’m ready. And after tonight, I’ll have nothing more to fear.
The room is warm. Close. And the floor is wet. Water trickles from tiny cracks in the well.
“Circe,” I call.
“Hello, Gemma,” she answers, and my name echoes in the cave.
“I know you’ve made a pact with the Winterlands creatures. You were in league with them all along. But now I have the dagger, and I’ll set things right.”
It’s quiet save for the trickling of the water.
“Do you deny you wanted my power?”
“I’ve never denied that,” she says, and there is nothing of the careful whisper to her voice now. “You say you have the dagger?”
“I do, and I’ll return it to Eugenia, and all your plotting will be for nothing,” I say. “Wilhelmina Wyatt tried to warn me. The two of you were close—Brigid told me. And Wilhelmina told Dr. Van Ripple that her sister had betrayed her—‘A monster.’ I can think of no one that description fits more. She trusted you,” I say, fighting the magic inside me. “As my mother did. As I did for a time. But not anymore.”
“And what will you do now?”
“What I should have done already,” I say. “The forest folk are coming to make the alliance along with the Hajin. We will lay hands together at the well. I’ll return the magic and bind it. And you will die.”
A rippling sound, clear and strong, comes from the well. Movement. One of the stones pushes out of the well, and water splashes out in a stream. It is followed by another and another, and then, like some leviathan of the deep, Circe rises from the well, pink and alive.
“How—”
“I am part of this world now, Gemma. Like your friend Pippa.”
“But you were trapped….” I trail off.
“I had you give the magic to the well first, so that I could draw from it. I used it to loosen the stones. But really, the die was cast the first time you gifted me—when you gave it to me of your own will. That was all I required to be free.”
I tuck the dagger into the sheath at my waist, safely out of sight. “Then why didn’t you do this earlier?”
“I needed more magic,” she says, stepping over the broken wall. “And I am patient. It is a reward for having lived through a great deal of disappointment.”
I take a step back.
“I’d had higher hopes for you, Gemma. You’re in over your head. I shall see this Tree of All Souls for myself.”
“I won’t let you,” I say, the magic building inside. “I’ve lost enough tonight.”
With everything I have in me, I call up the magic, and then Circe flies back, landing in a heap on the floor.
She crawls to her feet, panting. “Nicely done.”
I wave my arm over the stones of the well and send them shooting toward her. She stops them inches from her face and they drop to the floor in shards.
“Your power is impressive, Gemma. How much I would have enjoyed a true friendship with you,” she says as we circle one another.
“You’re not capable of true friendship,” I snap. I reach for a shard, and it becomes a snake under Circe’s touch. I drop it fast.
“Don’t just react, Gemma. Think. The Order was right about that, at least.”
“Don’t tell me what to do!” I turn Circe’s snake into a whip that gashes her across the back.
She cries out in pain, and her eyes go steely. “I see you’ve searched those dark corners after all.”
“You should know. You put them there.”
“No, I only helped you to see them,” she says, but then I’m forcing her to her knees under the magic’s heel.
“Gemma.” I hear Kartik’s voice, and when I turn, he’s there on the floor. His face is bloodied.
Abandoning Circe, I run to him. “Did she do this? How did—”
He starts to laugh. “Careful.”
Before my eyes he vanishes, an illusion. I turn and Circe unleashes her power, pinning me to the wall. “I’ve searched your dark corners, too, Gemma.”
I try to fight back, but when the magic comes, it is out of my control. It bends back on me, and I cannot see clearly. My father stands beside Circe, his eyes staring straight ahead, the laudanum bottle clutched in his hand. I see Felicity and Pippa and Ann dancing in a circle without me. Tom under Lord Denby’s sway. I close my eyes to clear the visions, but the night has been too much. My body shakes. I can’t even call out for Asha. I can do nothing but hang in Circe’s grip.
“This is not a battle you can win, Gemma. It belongs to me. I’m going to the Winterlands to finish what I started. But I will remember you to Eugenia Spence.”
“I’ll kill you,” I whisper. Once more I try to call the magic, and once more my head swims with visions. Circe draws the dagger from its sheath, and for a moment, I know she will kill me with it. “Thank you for this,” she whispers.
Circe lets me go and I fall to the floor, shaking. She crouches beside me, and her eyes are warm, her smile sad. “There are times when I wish I could go back and change the course of my life. Make different choices. If I had, perhaps you and I would have met as wholly different people in another life.” She strokes my hair softly and I am unable to shy away from her touch. I cannot say whether it’s the magic or my need at work. “But the past cannot be changed, and we carry our choices with us, forward, into the unknown. We can only move on. Do you remember that I told you that at Spence? It seems forever ago, doesn’t it?”
In the corners of the cave, I still see my father and the others. They look on with disapproval. They break into bits that become a nest of snakes.
“I should be careful with the magic, if I were you, Gemma. For you and I have shared it. It has changed—the realms have changed—and there is no telling what you might conjure now.” Circe kisses me sweetly on the cheek. “Goodbye, dear Gemma. Don’t be foolish and come after me. It won’t end well.”
She waves her hand over me, and I’m plunged into cold darkness. I vaguely feel myself staggering past Asha and into the poppy fields, my body on fire and my mind not my own. Everything I see is like a pantomime shadow made upon a wall. Amar on his white horse, a line of wraiths behind him with their capes of screaming souls. I lurch away from that image only to fall into Simon’s arms. “Dance with me, Gemma,” he insists, and I’m twirled till I’m dizzy and desperate to be let go. I struggle free, and there is Pippa holding the dead rabbit in her hands, blood smeared on her mouth.
At the stones near the secret door, I watch in horror as every last one of those honored women disappears, and the empty monuments are overgrown with weeds. I return to the party, swaying into the masked revelers. I don’t feel right. There’s too much magic.
“I hear your thoughts,” I whisper to the guests, and their masks cannot hide their confusion, their disdain.
A crow flies through the open window, and as quick as a blink, it transforms into the tall mummer who entertained us on the lawn. I blink and see the kohled eyes and the flower-inked flesh of a Poppy Warrior. He grins at me, vanishing into the crowd.
I run desperately after him, spilling one woman’s punch on her dress. “Sorry,” I mumble. I see him. Chain mail. Tunic. A mask of black feathers. He takes the arm of a lady and leads her away from the ballroom and into the great room, where I lose them both. They are not among the fairies, imps, and birds of prey assembled here.
The column pulses with life. One of the beasties trapped there breaks free and lights upon Cecily’s shoulder. I see her eyes flutter as the thing licks her neck.
“Get away!” I shout, charging her.
“You’re the most appalling girl!” Cecily huffs.
Up on the ceiling, the sh
“It’s not real! None of it! She’s done this to me!” I hear my laugh—a great big witch’s cackle—and it terrifies me. I reach for the dagger and remember that it is gone.
“She took it,” I say.
“Shhh,” the fairy says, and warmth floods through me. I feel as though I have drunk honeyed wine. My head is heavy. The guests’ words are long velvet strings of sound too plush to hear. I am attuned only to the scratchy whispers of the tiny creatures. Their voices are as sharp as flint against stone, each word a spark.
“Sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice…”
“Leave me alone!” I shout, and the revelers stare at this girl who has lost her mind.
“’Eard you’re ’avin’ a bit o’ trouble tonight, miss,” Fowlson says. My brother, Lord Denby, Grandmama, McCleethy and Nightwing, Brigid—they are all with him, worry in their faces. Or hatred. It is so hard to tell just now.
“I’m fine,” I protest.
Wasn’t I warned? She is a deceiver. Wilhelmina feared her—and she didn’t fear much. Beware the birth of May.
Brigid puts a hand to my forehead. “Poor dear, burning up.”
“Where’s Father?” I say, wild.
“Not to worry, my dear.” Lord Denby’s mouth moves beneath his fox mask. “My carriage has been brought round. Your brother and I shall see him safely to London, where Dr. Hamilton will see to him at once.”
“Straight to bed.” Mrs. Nightwing tuts. There’s real worry in her eyes, and I wish I could tell her everything.
Fowlson takes hold of one side of me while Brigid takes the other, leading me toward the stairs. Lord Denby puts his arm around my brother like the father Tom has always wanted.
Run, Tom, I think, but the words die inside my head.
I drag my feet, so Fowlson carries me. Down below, I see the Poppy Warrior leading his lady fair out toward the woods. Brigid undresses me, puts me under the covers like a child. I’m given a glass of something that warms my insides and makes me drowsy. I cannot make words.
I stumble to the open window. The air is warm and fragrant with spring, and I breathe it in deeply as if it alone has the power to help me. I see more of those dark birds.
Something white flashes in the trees, and I think I see Pippa on the lawn, moving toward Spence as she did in life. She’s as pale as a sliver of moon, as elusive as truth. No, she’s not there. Please help me, I pray, even though I don’t believe in a white-bearded God who delivers justice to the unrighteous and mercy to the deserving. I have seen the wicked go unpunished, the suffering given more suffering to bear. And if such a God does exist, I do not believe that I shall merit his attention. But for just this one moment, as I see my dead friend floating across Spence’s lawn like a fallen star, I wish I could believe in such comforts, for I am frightened.
My head burns. I burrow into my covers and close my eyes tightly, listening to my heart beating a warning in my blood. I fight back the only way I can. I tell myself it’s not real.
You’re not real, Pippa Cross. I do not see you; therefore, you are not here. Yes. Good. Very good. If that is illusion, it will do for tonight.
Eyes still closed, I singsong, “I don’t see you….” This makes me giggle, and the giggle terrifies me anew. Stop, Gemma, before you go mad.
Or am I already there?
Sleep’s curtain is raised, and a pageant of dreams parades upon the stage. Wilhelmina Wyatt running her hands over the slate. My father laughing and happy and my father on the floor, his eyes accusing me. Philon’s people readying their weapons. The Temple burning. Kartik’s kiss. Pippa’s blue-white eyes. An army thundering over the black sand and bone of the Winterlands. I climb the stairs and stand before the portrait of Eugenia Spence. The vines of the Winterlands circle more tightly around the throats and bodies of those lost souls readied for sacrifice. Their faces are gray. And I see Circe marching through them toward the Tree of All Souls.
I wake to a sound. Something is in the room with me. The nymph glows in the corner. She has caught a mouse, which she gently swings from hand to hand, catching it each time.
“Troubled?” Her laughter is like the splintering of bones. “Everything is set in motion. You cannot stop it. The day of sacrifice comes.”
“Hush!”
Her whisper wraps around me in a spiral. She dangles the mouse by its tail. Its tiny claws splay out in fear. It tries to climb up itself. “So long, we’ve waited so long, so long. Now she will be free, and so will we all. For that was the bargain made long ago. One soul in exchange for the other.”
I cover my ears. “Stop!”
“As you wish,” she says. She opens her mouth and bites down hard on the mouse’s neck.
I wake with a start, my forehead damp. My nightgown clings to me as if I’ve broken a fever. I let my eyes adjust to the deep dark, and when my room takes shape, I know I’m really awake this time. The rain is splattering against my window, and my body aches. I’m as weak as a new kitten. I don’t hear Ann’s snoring.
“Ann?” I call. She’s not in her bed, and I know in my heart that she has gone into the realms with Felicity.
I have to go after them. I stumble down the stairs and into the kitchen, heading for the lawn and the door. A sharp rap at the window makes me jump. It is too dark to see who is there, and in truth, I am afraid to look. The rapping comes again. The window has fogged. I put my hands to the pane and peer into the night. Ithal puts his face to the pane, startling me. Ithal! I run to open the kitchen door. He stands on the threshold in the pouring rain.
“Ithal! Where have you been?” He looks grim. “What is the matter?”
“It is Kartik. They have taken him. You must save him.”
“Who has taken him?”
“There is no time. We must go now.”
I think of Ann and Felicity inside the realms. “I have to—”
He hands me a strip of soggy fabric from Kartik’s cloak. It has been branded with the Rakshana insignia. Fowlson.
“Take me,” I say, for if I can get to Kartik, he can help me with my friends.
I follow Ithal through the rain to where Freya waits. My legs are weak, and I stumble once or twice. Ithal’s eyes are so ringed in shadow they seem hollow.
“Where have you been?” I ask again. “Mother Elena has been terribly worried.”
“The men came for me.”
“Miller’s men? You must tell Inspector Kent! He will not let it stand,” I say, helping myself onto Freya’s back.
“Later. We must go to him now.”
He swings himself onto the horse, behind me, and I feel the coldness of him at my back. With a small kick to the horse’s flanks, we are off. Rain lashes my cheeks and soaks my hair as we gallop into the woods, turning left at the lake. The horse stops suddenly, spooked. She whinnies loudly, pacing before the edge of the water, sensing something.
“Freya, kele!” Ithal commands.
The horse will not go on. Instead, she pats her right hoof on the ground and sniffs at the water’s edge, as if searching for something she has lost.
The Gypsy gives a sharp tug on the reins, and Freya turns away, picking up speed until she is in a full gallop that makes my heart pound in rhythm with the strike of her hooves against the road. I can feel the night’s breath on my neck. Only small flashes of lightning brighten the path ahead of us.
We turn off at the graveyard. The sky’s an angry throb of light and sound. Freya weaves between the headstones. Her hooves catch in the mud, and she pitches me dangerously close to the sharp edge of one. I scream and cling to Ithal’s shirt as he rights her, guiding the horse onto a grassy path, which she takes at a more cautious clip.
“Where are we going?” I shout.
The storm is coming down heavier than before. It blinds me and I have to tuck my head to keep the water from my eyes. Ithal answers, but I can’t hear over the pounding of the rain.
“What
It sounds like humming or praying. No, he’s chanting. Words fly past as fast as rain on wind, filling me with an icy dread.
“A sacrifice, a sacrifice, a sacrifice…”
The piece of cloth turns to snakes in my hand. I scream and the snakes turn to ashes. Just ahead, mounds of earth sit on either side of an open grave. Ithal steers Freya straight for it, gathering speed. I jab him with my elbows, but he doesn’t stop. With all my might, I pitch myself from the horse’s back. I land hard against the wet earth just as Freya screams and tumbles into the open grave. I do not hear her hit bottom.
I struggle to my feet, feeling my muscles pinch as I do. My legs will bear my weight, but they ache, and my shoulder and left arm are in agony. Trembling, I peer around the headstone, and the ground is as solid as can be.
I choke back a sobbing laugh, and will myself to wake again in my bed, but I don’t. “You’ll wake soon, Gemma,” I tell myself as I hobble through the dark graveyard. “Just sing something to help you through. I had a l-lass in Lincoln-sh-shire, sold mussels from a pail…”
I pass a headstone. Beloved Wife. “S-sold m-mussels f-from a-a…”
Thunder breaks. It makes my teeth chatter. “F-from a p-p-pail…”
Something blocks my path. A flash of lightning splits the sky, illuminating Ithal. Where his eyes should be, there are two deep black pits.
“Sacrifice…,” he says.
I cannot move, cannot think. My legs are frozen in fear. I try to summon the magic, but I’m exhausted and afraid, and it will not come. A voice booms inside my head: Run. Run, Gemma.
Fast as I can, I bolt away from him, running through a labyrinth of headstones as the sky explodes in thunder. Out of the corner of my eye, I see Ithal vanish behind a marble angel and reappear on the other side. He is gaining ground. My nightgown is sodden. It slaps against my already weak legs, slowing my gait with its weight. I pull frantically at it, hoisting it to my knees to run faster. Ithal moves steadily behind me. By the time I reach the lake, each breath feels like a razor’s edge slicing through my lungs.