Chapter 3
Overgrown grasses brushed my skirts as we approached the door. I put a hand to my hat as a strong wind, scented of the ocean, swept over us, almost roaring as it stirred a million leaves. Erris stopped for a moment and looked around, a strange expression on his face-half wonder and half sadness.
He knocked on the door.
We waited long enough that I took a turn knocking. Someone was home, but would they ever answer the door?
“Maybe we should try walking around the back,” I was saying, just as the ancient hinges creaked and the great slab of carved wood swung open with a groan.
A girl looked out at us. I couldn’t help but notice her scar before anything else-it spread across her cheek, leaving the skin red and mottled, suggesting an accident with a lantern or candle, perhaps. Without it, she might have been lovely. She was almost as dark as me, with glossy hair the deep brown of pine bark and bold, round eyes. She was tall and slightly plump, in a simple blue dress and apron, no corset.
“Who are you?” she said. She was holding a broom, and I had a feeling she wouldn’t hesitate to strike us with it if she felt the need.
“Erris Tanharrow. My sister was Melia Tanharrow.” Erris cupped his hands in a fairy gesture I’d seen him make before. It seemed to indicate a plea.
Now the bold fire in the girl’s eyes was replaced with something welcoming. The change was startling. She held the door open for us. “Oh, yes. Of course. We had hoped you’d come!”
There was a chill in the dusty room, which had a museum quality to it-the tapestries on the walls were faded; the chairs were ornate and obviously fine, but the fabric seats were frayed. A few newer needlepoint pillows were strewn about and looked quite out of place. There was a sheepskin rug in front of the fireplace and, above it, a painting of a lovely woman carrying a beacon in one hand and a sword in the other. Candles lined the mantel, unlit but dripping with wax.
“The Queen of the Longest Night,” I said softly, gazing at the painting. She had been the one to grant Erris life. Necromancers sometimes worshipped her, for she led spirits into the next world.
“Er… yes,” the girl said. “I’m sorry it’s so dusty. I try and keep up with it during the summer while Mr. Valdana is here, but…” She shrugged.
I assumed she must be the housekeeper, then, and she appeared to have no help keeping up the house. She looked about my own age.
“Mr. Valdana told me you might come,” she continued. “Maybe… maybe you can be of some help. I’m Celestina.”
“What is it you need help with, Celestina?” Erris asked. “We are actually here to ask for Mr. Valdana’s help ourselves.”
“Oh, he won’t come back until spring, I’m afraid,” Celestina said.
“Is there any chance he might?” Erris persisted.
“Or maybe we could go to him,” I suggested. “We can’t wait until spring.”
“I don’t know where he’s gone,” Celestina said. “He travels the world. He might be overseas, he might have crossed the gate into fairy. The northern gate isn’t far at all.”
Erris frowned. We didn’t dare go to the fairy lands just now. Although Erris was the direct heir to the throne, his cousin had ruled for the last thirty years and would not be happy to see Erris.
“You could wait for him to return,” Celestina offered.
“All winter?” I already missed Karstor’s apartment full of art and books, with fresh baked goods every day.
Celestina paused, wrestling a difficult question, before she said, “I’m taking care of Mr. Valdana’s daughter, Violet. She’s fifteen, but it’s a wonder she’s lived this long. She’s very ill. Maybe… you could help. You’re her uncle.”
“Erris has a niece? But back in New Sweeling, the sorcerers said all the fairy royals died in the war except for Erris,” I said. “If Violet is really his niece, why don’t the sorcerers know about her?”
“Violet is protected by an enchantment,” Celestina said. “If the two of you were to leave this house, you would forget she existed within hours. If I left, I’d forget her too, although it might take a few days since I spend so much time around her.”
“Did Ordorio make that enchantment?” I asked.
“It was the Lady. The Queen of the Longest Night.” Celestina shook her head. “I’ll explain later, if you decide to stay. And if you don’t, you mustn’t speak of this anywhere, even if you do remember bits and pieces of it. I’m putting my trust in you because I’m rather at the end of my wits. Please, won’t you look at her?”
“Of course,” Erris said. “Of course I want to see her anyway. My sister’s child…”
Celestina led us up a steep and narrow staircase and stopped just before an open door. Her voice dropped. “She’s in here.”
We followed her into the room. Here was the origin of the white curtains I had seen fluttering out of the open windows, matching the white curtains on the canopy bed. They were tied back, and within the airy cocoon, a girl lay sleeping on the pillows. The moment Erris laid eyes on her, his footsteps quickened to her side.
“Mel…,” he said breathlessly. “She’s the very picture…”
She was like the ailing young women in romantic fiction, with just a thread tethering her to the mortal plane. Her cheeks were flushed, the rest of her pale as could be, long brown hair rippling across her pillows and nightgown. She barely looked fifteen.
Erris put a hand to her forehead. He looked so tender. My heart ached for him to see this girl who apparently looked like his sister and know his sister was gone. But I couldn’t help my own heart’s aching, thinking how lovely Erris was and how I had saved him, yet he remained elusive. I didn’t want to need him. I didn’t want to feel selfish and wish I were the one to capture all his attention.
“What is making her sick?” he asked.
“The doctors aren’t sure.” She looked weary. “She’s as bad as I’ve ever seen her. I’ve hardly been sleeping for making poultices and giving her medicine and urging her to eat her bread and milk, but if something happened to her, I’d die myself. Mr. Valdana lives to bring her presents and tell her stories.” The girl who had been so fierce at the door now slumped against the bedframe, as if she had been strong for a long time and our appearance had finally given her another shoulder to lean on.
I knew how that felt.
“I’m no healer,” Erris said. “Even what little magic I had is gone.”
Celestina looked at him a moment and then nodded. “Yes, I understand… I just don’t know what else to do.”
As she spoke, the girl stirred. Her eyes blinked open to Erris standing over her. Suddenly she gasped, sitting bolt upright and coughing. “You-” she started.
Celestina rushed to her side. “Don’t overexert yourself.”
“Your face, I know it!” Violet said, regaining control. Her voice, though weak, sounded terribly excited. “You look like Mother!”
“I’m her brother,” he said.
Violet, moving with unexpected speed, reached out to hug Erris. I could see his reaction before he even thought it through, shoving her down with a strength he still wasn’t accustomed to. She fell back on the pillow, looking stunned.
“I’m-I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to-I just don’t want to be touched.” He was looking at the floor. “I’m not… a fairy anymore.”
“Don’t be sorry!” The girl paused to cough, and then pushed back the covers, reaching for Erris again. He went rigid as she made a second attempt to embrace him. “I’ve been waiting for you,” she said. “Father gets the papers from the city in the summer, so I know all about it, and I hoped you would come.”
Just as Erris gingerly reached out to return her embrace, she jerked away, her whole body wracked with coughs. Her face flushed with exertion.
