Edward loved the estate best of all, but I could not destroy that. My place depended on it.
I trailed after the others to the Music Room, stretching my lips agreeably as they laughed at the hounds, at fierce Liquorice, so terrified of the Storms he tried to squeeze beneath a sofa. He fit only up to his red ears, and there he lay, sides heaving, pretending all of him was hidden.
Taffy was undisturbed by the thunder. I felt rather smug (he belongs to me more than anyone, following me everywhere as he does) until I realized he is so deaf he doesn’t hear it much.
The Storms brought out the worst in everyone, and a good thing too, for it was Finian, gibing slyly at Sir Edward, who found my revenge for me.
“Just the right night for a moonlight sail, eh, Corin?” he said, leaning over the dessert tray and arranging twenty or thirty cakes on his hand.
“Won’t you ever stop this useless playing around with boats!” said Sir Edward.
“That’s all it is,” said Finian gently, but he was watching Sir Edward closely. “Just playing.”
“Why couldn’t you play about with something more fitting?” Lightning struck, illuminating the world fiercely and briefly, catching every leaf and blade of grass in its white eye. “Your stepfather would have been proud to see you add a trophy to our collection. Both he and I have our prizes. Mine, that great pelt from the black jungle beast. Hartley, that silvery one.”
Sir Edward was speaking almost calmly now, his irritation draining away into small talk. “Hartley took a number of silvery ones over the years, mostly smaller, as I recall. I wonder what became of them?”
Finian threw a coal on the fire. “How thoughtless of His Lordship to marry my mother.”
He spoke lightly, but a thread of malice ran beneath his voice, puckering it slightly in hidden places. “Neither she nor I knows how to run the estate, which it seems you must do by tacking dead things to the walls. A pity we ousted you from your inheritance, Edward. I know you were counting on it.”
Sir Edward sprang to his feet, lithe and muscular as a cat — finicky as one, too, in his black and white satin. Finian shook the cakes from his hand and very calmly took off his spectacles.
The bear against the cat. I knew which of them would win.
“For shame, gentlemen!” cried Lady Alicia, spoiling all the fun. Finian bowed coldly to Sir Edward, and I left without a word. I had waited too long to tend the Folk. My revenge would have to wait.
I slipped past Cook in the Kitchens, who was fighting a lump of dough and raging at the wind. “Will it never be still!”
I threaded myself through the vegetable gardens and the tangle of out-buildings, hiding from the weather behind the stables, the brewery, the dairy. But on the exposed seaward side, the wind was a fierce thing, almost alive. It flattened me against the wall with an invisible thumb, but I beat at it with my head and shoulders until it gave way. Nothing was going to keep me from the churchyard, and the wind at last understood.
The latch on the churchyard gate stuck fast. My hands do not grow stiff with cold, but they are clumsy. I finally gave up and scaled the fence, ripping my jacket on a picket. The fingers of the storm scribbled a vast wild portrait on the sky, while through a window, a single candle burned. It was Finian, his hair very red in the glow.
I scooped a handful of wet earth from His Lordship’s grave. “To ward off the Folk.” The Lady Rona’s grave was not so easy, as the grasses and lichens wove the mold fast into itself. But if the wind couldn’t turn me aside, neither could mere grass. I scrabbled about and gathered another handful of earth, much of it under my fingernails.
Last, to the tiny headstone. I felt briefly sorry for the baby, set apart to receive the drippings of water from the chapel eaves. But maybe she’s like me: I don’t mind a little wet.
Before I left, I stood by the stone wall that surrounds the shaft opening into the Caverns. Eight feet around perhaps, and tall as I am. I tried to toss my words inside, where they might fall into the ears of the Folk — if they have ears.
“I’m ready for you!”
But I wasn’t sure.
I was less sure still when I sat in the Cellar, concentric rings of salt, bread, and churchyard mold rippling out around me. I felt the hum of energy behind the Door, closed my eyes, and snuffed the candle.
The Folk first crackled over the roasted lambs — seven of them! — silently picking them clean, then absorbed the butter and the sardines. Only then did they turn their hollow energy my way.
When was it they paused? At the ring of churchyard mold? At the crosswise scissors? I only know that bare seconds before they would have touched me, the energy sank back into itself and retreated.
Sir Edward was wrong: The Folk are mild as lambs during the Storms.
I was full of a strange energy when I left the Cellar, even growing two shadows as I passed between the double rows of candles that lined the corridors. All the sconces were lit on this stormy night. The shadows shrank again into my heels when I stepped into the Trophy Room. There was just enough light to see a dozen wet noses and twice as many glistening eyes turned my way.
The hounds yawned and stretched to show their contempt. Liquorice and Honeycomb paced beside me as I fetched a step stool. “Puppies!” I said scornfully, just to remind them of how they’d hidden so shamefully from the thunder.
The jungle beast’s skin was heavier than I’d expected. It toppled me off the stool and onto the bony part of my hip. “At it, lads!” I heaved it as best I could.
Taffy did not stir, but the others leapt upon the skin. I’d been afraid they might begin that inhuman baying of theirs, but they were silent. Terribly silent. I waited until the skin was savaged beyond recognition.
Will you be proud, Sir Edward, proud of your prize trophy now? It is a measure of your power, just as my position of Folk Keeper is a measure of mine. Never threaten my power, for then I will threaten yours.
By twenty-six minutes past three in the morning, my vengeance was complete.
By ten minutes to seven, all the dogs were in disgrace. They slunk about, red ears pinned to their heads, yellow eyes downcast. Sir Edward spoke of it calmly enough at breakfast. Who could understand it? he asked. He seemed calm, I say, but there was a little scar I’d not noticed before, almost hidden by his eyebrow, which turned livid when he spoke.
“If anything,” said Sir Edward, “I wish they’d destroyed the silvery skin instead. It looks to be ruined in any event, as it is somehow stretching.”
Then again and again, “Why did the hounds do it? Why?”
Lady Alicia said that the Storms must have driven them wild, and so did Mrs. Bains and even the Valet. But Finian did not speak. He removed his spectacles and pinched the bridge of his nose as he does when he’s tired, then looked so purposefully away from me that my heart jumped. He knew!
I’m back in the Cellar now, inside my triple-layered protection, but not protected from a nasty certainty. He knows. Finian knows.
And what if he does? He hasn’t given me away; he won’t do so, I think. What more do I care about? I think only of Cook’s promise to save me a platter of sardines, dried and salted. They are so fragile even I can eat them, bones and all. Why have I grown ravenous at Marblehaugh Park? I cannot wait to feel the crunch of bones between my teeth.
Mrs. Bains says the Folk are very well, and quiet. They have consumed:
Six brace of quail
A shoulder of pork
Five chickens.
The Storms are over, but the memory of them remains. The wind’s voice is rough, tired from screaming.
I never screamed. What a pity that my writing hand is free from hurt, so I must record what happened the second night of the Storms.
The Folk didn’t touch me with a touch that is physical, but I have the bruises still. They sank beneath my skin, ripping through tissue and fiber into the heart of my bones. It hurt red-hot for what seemed a long time, then faded into a slow numbness, which faded into a merciful feeling of no feeling at all.
