“That’s nonsense,” Tati said. “We all know how good you are at these things, Jena. About the missing money —there were folk at the door a day or two ago, and I did give them some coins.”
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“How many?” I asked her with a sinking heart.
The brush stilled. “I didn’t count, Jena. They looked so pale and tired, and there were little children. Father did teach us to be compassionate. But there was plenty left in the box. I think Iulia had to deal with travelers yesterday—she may have given more. Anyway, can’t you just top up the domestic funds from the business coffer?”
I could think of nothing to say. It was possible to see how it might have happened: the drained faces at the door, the small acts of generosity that added up to far more than a wise dispensing of charity. I could see how my sisters might all have believed that the answer was as simple as Tati’s suggestion. I had not shared Father’s financial system with any of them except Paula. They’d never been interested. Mixing the funds was something we never did—if we had planned correctly, it should never be necessary. Anyway, it was too late now. And it looked as if, in a way, what had happened was my fault.
“Jena?” My sister’s voice was soft in the shadows of the candlelit chamber. “Are you cross with me?”
Gogu jumped into his bowl. There was a miniature tidal wave, then he settled, neck-deep.
“I was,” I said. “With Father gone, I need to be able to rely on you. I didn’t think Cezar would try to take over. He shocked me today. It’s not just the money. You’ve heard the kind of thing he says about felling the forest and destroying the folk of the Other Kingdom. I’m beginning to wonder if he might actually go through with that.”
Tati stared at me, horrified. “But it’s just talk, isn’t it? How could he do it? He doesn’t know about the portal, so he couldn’t 103
reach them even if he wanted to. It’s just . . . bluster. Nobody’s as powerful as that.”
“I don’t know. I think if he cut down the forest in our world, it would be destroyed in the Other Kingdom as well.
The way I understand it, from what folk say, the two realms exist side by side. They have the same pathways, the same ponds and streams, the same trees. If you do harm or good in one, it has an effect in the other. I think our world and the Other Kingdom are linked—balanced, somehow—and they depend on each other. That means Cezar could wreak havoc there without even needing a portal. I always thought he’d grow out of his anger over Costi.”
“He probably will, Jena, especially now he’s master of his own estate and has so much more to occupy him. Anyway, couldn’t Ileana stop him?”
I slipped my gown off over my head and reached for my night robe. “I don’t know. When Cezar talks about it, his eyes fill up with hate. He seemed different today, so sure of himself that he didn’t really listen to me. He scared me.”
Tati did not reply.
“Tati,” I said, “there’s something else we have to talk about.”
“What, Jena?” Her voice was suddenly cool. It was as if she had taken a deliberate step away.
“Sorrow. The Night People. I saw the two of you dancing; I saw the way you were looking at each other. You need to be careful—careful you don’t forget the rules.” I pulled the covers up to my chin; the chamber was freezing.
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“I haven’t forgotten them, Jena. I just . . .” Tati’s voice faded away as she lay down beside me.
I struggled for a way to say what I had to without hurting her. “I know that Ileana said you could join the grown-up dancing. That worries me, too. You may not have seen the way some of your partners were looking at you. I started to think that maybe we shouldn’t be going there anymore. It began to feel different. As if danger was coming closer and closer. You and Sorrow . . . That’s something that can’t be, Tati. Even if he wasn’t with the Night People, it would still be impossible.
I can’t believe I’m having to tell you that. It’s in this world that we must find husbands, bear children, make our own households—the world of Aunt Bogdana’s parties and polite conversation over the coffee cups. The world of feeding the pigs and needing to be careful with money. Not the world of Dancing Glade.”
There was a silence; then came Tati’s voice, not much more than a whisper: “Sometimes you’re so sensible, you make me angry.”
“Someone has to be,” I said, swallowing my annoyance. “I’m just trying to keep you safe. To look after things while Father’s away.”
“I don’t really want to talk about this.”
“We have to, Tati. Things are hard enough already without you drifting off into your own world and losing touch with common sense.”
“If we decided everything on common sense,” Tati said, “we wouldn’t go to the Other Kingdom at all. We wouldn’t take 105
such pains to keep the secret month after month and year after year. We’d just lead the kind of lives Aunt Bogdana thinks are appropriate for young ladies. I can’t believe that’s what you’d want, Jena. You’re the most independent of all of us.”
She was right, of course. That didn’t make me feel much better.
“We won’t be able to keep visiting the Other Kingdom forever,” I said. “The portal only opens if all of us make a shadow with our hands. It’s possible that as soon as one of us marries and goes away, the magic won’t work anymore. Perhaps it was never intended to last after we grew up.”
“It worked with only four of us before Stela was born,” Tati pointed out.
“All the same,” I said, “it didn’t work those times one of us was ill or off on a trip with Father. We do need to start getting used to the idea that this may not be forever. We need to make sure we don’t form serious attachments, because not going will be hard enough even without that.”
Tati said nothing.
“Promise me you won’t spend the whole night with Sorrow next time,” I said. “Promise me you won’t get . . .
