The Hummingbird Heart

by A. G. Howard

  She could no longer hear the silence below. For the higher she climbed, the louder the wind howled in her ears and whipped at the ties on the basque covering her chest. The cloth smelled of Julian, and it grounded her … gave her courage to continue. He was waiting at the bottom. Were she to fall, he would never forgive himself for letting her go.

  Another gust of wind shook the spokes, this time hard enough that Willow had to grip with the entire length of her bared arms, the cord eating into the tender skin underneath them. Upon her first opportunity, she resumed. Once she came within reach of Sala, she tapped his ankle. Though she couldn’t see his face with clarity, she could sense the terror radiating off of him.

  “I knew … you would … rescue him …”

  She barely heard his raspy Italian over the gusts. Clasping tight to the steel cords, she forced herself up several more spokes, pausing to balance beside him against the wind’s resistance.

  “I never dreamed you would have the courage to try,” came her answer.

  A roll of thunder and a snap of blinding light sent a buzzing hum through the Ferris wheel’s frame. Sala’s profile intensified, and only now, on the same level as him, could Willow see the whiteness of his knuckles.

  “I … I was all right, until the lights.”

  “Just hold on,” she said.

  Another flash shattered the sky, and she noticed his gaze had locked on the menacing depths below them.

  “Dare not look down,” she said. “That’s a mistake. Do you hear me?”

  He tensed his muscles—she felt the reverberations in the spoke they shared. She slid her hand along the length of the steel so the edge of her palm touched his. “Just hold on and look up. I’ll see to Newton. Do not move, whatever happens. Once he’s safe, I’ll return for you.”

  Sala still looked down, rigid and un-answering.

  “Father. Look at me.” The sky blinked again as he met her gaze. “I will come back for you.”

  “Thank you—” A sob choked his words.

  “Just focus on the Fontianna costume above. Look only at it.”

  He lifted his pinky enough to curl it around hers on their spoke. Her mother’s hummingbird ring pressed into her skin. “I knew you were like her. I knew you were forgiving and wise … just like Mariette.”

  Willow saw his hand, marred by the blood oozing from gashes where the spokes had sliced into them. Feeling warmth seep from her own mutilated palms, she mused that they would have matching scars one day. Then her attention caught on the ring again, and she realized they already did.

  A garbled whimper came from overhead, nailing all of her focus on Newton’s silhouette. Willow pulled her hand from Sala’s to recommence her climb, but paused two spokes up as she noticed the outline of Newton’s movements—black against a flashing sky. He had one arm looped around a cross-spoke to hold on; with his free hand, he yanked one of Vadette’s shoes loose from the rope cinched through the latchet. He proceeded to lift it, then slid it in place in midair. Willow sucked in a sharp breath of rain and wind.

  He was putting the shoe on Nadia’s ghostly foot. It levitated there, as if hanging by invisible threads. Newton did the same with the second shoe. Willow gasped and Sala sobbed as Vadette’s glowing, ghostly form materialized—visible and hovering in place inches away from the spokes, at last wearing her full Fontianna costume. All but the brooch.

  “My God, Vadette!” Sala shouted—his voice teetering between disbelief and the razor’s edge of pain.

  The startled screams of their audience rose above the wind and thunder. Willow knew they couldn’t make out a clear image in the darkness from such a distance, but no doubt they saw the glow. Still … her mind raced on an epiphany that overplayed any other concerns. Nadia had told Willow that only Newton could free her from her earthly binds. It must be because only he could touch her to return the shoes to her feet and the brooch to the dress, when he deemed the time appropriate. Perhaps, once in full costume again, her spirit could be released. In which case, Willow had the final key to unlock her childhood friend’s prison.

  Touching the brooch to assure it still hung in place, Willow climbed the rest of the way until she shared Newton’s spoke. She lifted an arm around him. After securing her hold, she followed with her leg, anchoring him between the steel cords and her. Taking a deep breath, she buried her nose in his damp, dust-scented hair, cherishing the feel of his warmth snuggled against her. “Little widget. Do not ever scare me like that again. Never.”

  He tilted his head back and pressed his cheek against her sternum so their gazes could meet. Utilizing Vadette’s otherworldly glow, Willow could see recognition in his eyes. A bone deep recognition. He knew.

  “Nadia told you.” Through the wetness of her lashes, coated in rain and tears, Willow watched her brother’s heart-shaped mouth tremble. A lump fisted in her throat and she resituated her grip on the slippery upper spoke and tightened the bend of her legs around the lower, holding him secure. “Then you know that we’re family and I love you. You will never be alone again. So it’s time to let Nadia rest. She’s tired.”

  Vadette looked down from them to Sala, her expression shifting between anger and anticipation. The wind whipped her ghostly hair in knots beneath the hat tied to the spokes above her head. Newton sniffled and nodded against Willow, the movement causing the brooch on her basque to pendulate. The trinket caught his attention and he wiggled, trying to reach for it. Willow’s heart ached at his valiant effort, knowing how hard this goodbye was going to be. “Wait, let me get it for you; I understand what you need to do.”

  She borrowed Newton’s earlier tactic, looping her elbow around a cross-spoke so she could unfasten the brooch without compromising her hold on her brother. She handed off the watch to Newton and together, her body acting as a cradle to his, they inched closer to Vadette’s hovering form so he could pin it in place. The ghost made no move toward them. Instead, she drifted further out of reach, shoes and clothes no longer touching the spokes. She wasn’t yet ready to leave. Her ethereal gaze met Willow’s for an instant before she turned it downward, again meeting Sala’s. He was weeping so hard his body shuddered with the strain of his sobs.

  “Sweet Vadette,” he wailed. “Forgive me! I never knew … how could I have? My precious, precious child. I never meant to break your heart.”

  It seemed to happen in slow motion: Sala lifting his hand to move up to the next spoke in an effort to get closer; his rain-slicked fingers failing to grasp the steel just as a gale of wind ripped through the wheel’s framework.

  “Father!” Willow screeched.

  It was too late. Sala lost balance and fell backward, his face frozen in a silent scream of horror as he dropped to the depths below.

  Twenty-Five

  Willow’s cries burst in her chest as she held Newton close to shield him from witnessing the tragedy.

  In a blur of soft light, Vadette skimmed from the heights, swooping in beneath Sala to act as a cushion moments before he hit the ground hundreds of feet below.

  Shaking and numb, Willow descended the Ferris wheel with Newton holding tight to her. She barely felt the rain pelting them. Barely noticed that the lightning and thunder grew further apart and farther away. She was a dreamer trapped within a nightmare, only able to focus on the faint ghostly glimmer that moved around her fallen father and lit up Julian’s form where he knelt beside Sala, trying to rouse him.

  Finally, Willow’s feet touched the car where she’d first started her ascent. Julian hurried over to help her down. She let Newton slip safely to the ground beside her. Her brother still clasped the brooch in his plump little hand. He took one look at Sala—lying in a lifeless heap—and his arms wrapped around Willow’s waist, his face buried in her abdomen to muffle his sobs.

  She bit her tongue to hold back her own shuddering sobs.

  Julian embraced both of them. He kissed Willow’s forehead. “I’m so sorry.”

  Willow leaned into his warmth, but only for a momen
t. She drew back to find their entire audience gone, short of Josephine, Katherine, and Gwenaviere—who knelt at Sala’s side, staring up at Vadette with mouths agape. Willow looked questioningly at Julian.

  “The girls came seeking Sala when he didn’t show up at the Japanese exhibit,” he explained, stroking Newton’s hair. “When I told them the situation, they cleared the audience, claimed no one was truly in danger, it was all part of their rehearsal. That the Ferris wheel incident had been their elaborate plan to win the contest the next day with the most shocking debut. But now that they had damaged the fair’s equipment, they were being forced to forfeit the contest. The other troupes—realizing they’d lost almost an entire night’s worth of practice on the farce—grumbled and left before Sala fell.”

  “The theft?” Willow asked.

  “Never took place.”

  Willow had a passing thought of Louisa’s part in the plan. She was the one holding the rowboat docked at their rendezvous point in the water tunnel. Now she would have a long wait ahead of her.

  Willow met Vadette’s gaze. The ghost hovered over Sala’s awkwardly posed body, tears streaking her phantom cheeks. “Newton wanted those he loved to find peace.” Willow watched everyone’s reaction to the ghost’s voice. Just as she could now be seen by all, she could also be heard. “‘Tis why Newton kept me here. He refused to let me leave until I had forgiven his father. So he revealed me tonight with us both trapped in place, unable to avoid one another.”

  Katherine, Gwenaviere, and Josephine moved aside to stand, silent and wary as Vadette knelt down beside Sala. Her shimmering hand caressed his cheek, leaving behind a residue of glittering water droplets that Willow suspected would vanish before she could blink.

  “I understand,” Vadette whispered to Sala. “I only hope you can. All is forgiven. You were a wonderful father to me. Never doubt that. No more regrets, for either of us.”

  Sala’s lashes fluttered as though trying to open.

  Seeing the movement, Willow gasped. She came forward with Newton still leeched to her side. Julian picked up her brother so she could take her place next to Sala. On her knees, she clasped his cold, bloody hand and found a pulse, though very weak. She leaned in, stroking his dark hair off his forehead, unable to find any wounds. There was no blood on the back of his head or on the ground, only puddles of water and mud. By the position he’d landed in, it was obvious he had broken his back.

  If not for Vadette’s intervention, he’d most surely have cracked his skull open. He would be dead instead of clinging to life.

  Willow cast a grateful glance to Vadette and the ghost tilted her head in acknowledgement. Then her attention shifted to Sala’s mumbling troupe. Her translucent image shuddered. “See that he retires from the profession forever, like he tried to when Newton was born. Make Louisa understand.”

  The three girls nodded, their bewildered faces a pale green in Vadette’s preternatural glow. The ghost turned to Newton. “I am ready now, Newt. Please.”

  Julian stepped up, still cradling Newton. Vadette caught the sniffling child’s hand and kissed the back of it. “I will always be a part of you. We share blood like any brother and sister. But you have a new sister now. You’ve a family and a lifetime to love them.”

  Julian settled Newton on the ground and stepped back. Newton reached up to pin the brooch in place on Vadette’s gown. Her arms enfolded him, hugging him as he cried. A thick fog clotted the air—slithering into place as suddenly as the storm had lifted. Through the clouded veil, Willow saw Vadette release Newton and drift toward a soft light—a rift in the firmament where a man beckoned her to join him. Still holding Sala’s hand, Willow waved her free palm, trying to clear the fog to see the face of Nadia’s ethereal companion. But what she saw made no sense. It couldn’t have been him…

  Before she could make sense of it, the fog lifted and the rift had closed. It was as if Vadette and the man had never been there at all. Hearing swift footfalls splash through puddles, Willow jerked a glance toward the entrance to the Japanese gardens. Several actresses bustled down the path in their direction.

  “They’ve found one of your troupe,” a woman with a neck like an ostrich spouted to Josephine. “Found her drowned inside the water channel. The currents…” She caught a breath. “The flooding was too strong. It filled the channel. She was floating face down in the River Des Peres.”

  “Louisa!” Josephine screeched.

  Looking back only once, Katherine jumped to action, following her troupe as they faded into the darkness. The ostrich-necked actress left to get help for Sala.

  Silence again wreathed Willow and her small crew, all but the patter of mist falling around them.

  Julian had picked up Newton to ease the boy’s whimpering.

  Willow studied them, the lantern glazing their disheveled appearances. Her friend, her lover … the man she’d always dreamed would one day be her husband. And her tiny brother. So young. So damaged.

  Then she turned to her father. An inanimate, shattered hull. His eyes were still shut, no longer even trying to open. Willow could see so much of herself in him now … so much she hadn’t allowed herself to see before. She traced the cleft in his chin, squeezing his hand in hers. His rings cut into her fingers. An impulse led her to slide off the hummingbird ring from his pinky and place it upon her finger, as he’d tried to on the train. All the years she’d envisioned the man responsible for her parents’ deaths dying in the same excruciating way her mama had, but now here it was laid out before her, and all she wanted was to get back all the time lost with him. Did that make her a traitor to Mama’s and Papa’s memories?

  “If he survives, he will need a personal physician,” Julian finally spoke, interrupting the unsettling battle between her mind and emotions. “And many months—possibly years—of care. He might never be the same. Dependent upon others for even the smallest things. There are institutions in Italy …. they will be able to relate to him better there. Speak his language. You can visit him…”

  Hot tears edged Willow’s lashes, blending with the cool mist to a lukewarm stream of grief. She’d heard Sala’s choppy attempts at English. She agreed, he would be more comfortable in such surroundings, especially during the grueling months of recuperation. But he would need hope to heal, and his children were the only things he loved enough to give him that will to fight.

  She could not leave him there alone.

  “Families belong together, Julian.” She looked over her shoulder, humbled by Julian’s beautiful compassion as he nuzzled her brother’s hair with tears in his eyes. She swallowed back a sob. “My family will stay together. From this day forward…” She paused, for the bitter irony didn’t escape her. Those were the very words she had once rehearsed as a young girl and saved in her heart for Julian. She nudged the ring on her finger. “From this day forward, we will never be parted.”

  “Then I go with you.” Julian’s voice was strong and resolved where hers trembled. He held Newton closer to him. “You and Newton are my family now.”

  Willow’s heart felt as if it were ripping in half. She clutched at the place over her sternum where she earlier wore the Fontianna brooch … the place where Uncle Owen’s pin-watch belonged. She’d lost that heirloom forever. Lost the one remaining piece of her past with her parents. She couldn’t take that away from Julian. He’d never planned to live anywhere but The Manor of Diversions. For his entire life he’d wanted nothing more than to tend the grounds and the amusement park, to be there with his parents always and see it thrive.

  “Your family and mine,” Willow said, eyes burning. “Uncle Owen, Aunt Enya, Leander … they need at least one of us there. You must go back to London. Emilia and your parents, they’re struggling already with Nick gone. You’ve the park to maintain and build. The summer session starts soon. Your father is unable to run such things alone. Only you and I understand the mechanics behind it all. We can’t both be gone for that long. Everything will fall apart.”

  Juli
an groaned in acknowledgement, a guttural sound that came from so deep within his chest it hurt Willow just to hear it. “But, Willomena … without you I’ll fall apart.”

  Diurnal assignments for Thursday, June 6, 1905:

  1. Test the Looking Glass ride one last time before its premier; 2. Assure the decorations are in place; 3. Breathe…

  Julian laid his pen upon the journal opened in his lap, leaning his nape against the oak’s rough bark. He positioned himself so the sun dappling through the canopy overhead could warm his face. His eyes closed and he smelled the spice of magnolias on the morning breeze, letting it carry him back to a year ago, when things had been so different.

  He grinned, a smile turned inward, remembering how Willow used to follow him here to this very spot. How much simpler things were then. His father once told him that simpler wasn’t always sweeter.

  Julian pondered that now, wrestling an uncomfortable jitter in his gut. He’d never told his father of the man he and Willow saw escorting Newton’s phantom sister into heaven. He wondered how Father would feel about complexity, were he to know it had been his twin brother’s ghost—Julian’s dead Uncle Nicolas—helping the woman’s spirit cross over.

  Hearing a rustle in the shrubbery wall surrounding the tree, Julian glanced up and squinted, letting his lashes filter the bright sunlight. A lady’s figure appeared in the opening … a silhouette of grace and loveliness against the blue sky. Julian set aside his journal and stood, wiping grass from his linen trousers.

  He held out his palm. “Miss Katherine. I had hoped you would come.”

  She allowed him to kiss the back of her gloved hand then laced her fingers over her gown, a lavishly tiered ensemble of alternating lace and hand-beaded embroidery. Her upswept hair sported fresh flowers the apricot hue of sunrise.