He stared, amazed, until the last formation fractured and broke.
And then they were gone, in long streamers of darkness over the sleeping Wood.
Summer watched, ankle deep in snow.
Behind her, Wharton saw Venn.
“I could have dealt with the Replicant. Sarah had no right to come to you.”
“But she did. And here is my reward.”
She turned and held something up and it caught the moonlight as it hung on the gold chain. For a moment Wharton didn’t recognize it. Then he saw it was the half coin that Sarah had always worn.
“What use is that?” Venn asked, suspicious.
“No use.” Summer hung it carefully around her own neck. “So. What will you do now, Venn? Go back to your useless experiments?”
He seemed to reach out for her. Wharton saw a sliver of moonlight; it lit Summer’s cool smile as she stepped away.
“Let me use the Summerland,” he begged. “Let me go through…”
“To save my rival? Never.”
He heard Venn say, “You always hated Leah.”
“Did I? I don’t need to. She means nothing. You belong to me. And one day, when you realize that, you’ll come into the Wood and never leave it again.”
She raised her small lips to his, and Wharton felt a cold shiver travel up his spine as Venn stood still as a ghost and was kissed by her.
Far off and deep and sonorous he heard the bells of Wintercombe church, chiming for Midnight.
The effect on Summer was instant. She drew back, like a snake. “What is that?”
“You know,” Venn said quietly. “It’s Christmas Day.”
She shivered, and turned lightly in the snow. “So it is. I’ll be back, Venn. Now that I can get in, you’ll never know what I might do.”
She took a step, and seemed to become in an instant nothing but an edge of the moonlight that fell across the blue-shadowed banks of snow.
Wharton swallowed his gasp and kept still.
So did Venn, for at least a minute, a tall, remote figure on the snowy steps, as he gazed out at the night. And then he said, so quietly Wharton barely heard the whisper, “I love her more than you, my lady.”
Gideon looked up, eyes sharp. “Hear that?”
“What?”
“Bells. The church bells. I can’t stay.”
“Of course you can.” Jake came and grabbed his sleeve. “Don’t go back to them! Stay here. They can’t get at you.”
“Can’t they?” Gideon laughed his practiced bitter laugh. “You have no idea.” He watched Piers come in, carrying a tray of hot spicy drinks. “Enjoy it, Jake. Enjoy it while you can. The food, the warmth, the people. Do everything, taste everything. Enjoy your life because outside is only the cold and the dark.”
“We’ll release you. I swear.”
“To be just dust and ashes?” Gideon shrugged. “Maybe that would be better. Better than this.”
“I won’t let you go,” Jake said, angry.
But even as he said it, Gideon wasn’t there; the frail green velvet faded from between his fingers, and he held only air.
He looked up to find Venn standing by the fire, watching. “You can’t hold them, Jake. It’s like trying to hold the wind. She’ll never let him go.”
Wharton came in. The teacher seemed a bigger man, somehow, than he had in the school, and his glance at Venn was oddly measuring. He said, “The house is sealed now. The mirror is safe. Maskelyne and Rebecca are in the drawing room, but we can’t keep them here. Tomorrow, when it’s light, you’ll have to let her…them…go.”
Venn said to Piers, “Get them.”
In the silence the fire crackled, smelling richly of applewood. The room had grown warmer; Sarah went and stood by the flames. She felt as if the water of the lake had chilled her forever, as if a splinter of cold had reached her heart and lodged there, like failure.
Wharton piled a plate with the sandwiches Piers had made. His hunger was suddenly an unbearable pain.
Maskelyne came in and stood by the table, Rebecca behind him. She looked at Sarah.
“Are you…okay?”
“Fine.”
“You and your secret friend are free to go,” Venn snapped. “Don’t let us keep you.”
“Surely,” Wharton muttered. “Not in this weather.”
Rebecca looked at Maskelyne. “Don’t worry about us. The car is by the gates and if the snow is thick, we’ll walk. It’s only a few miles.”
The scarred man stood dark and brooding in the red flame-light. He turned and looked at Venn and Jake. “First, I have something to say to both of you. In private. Please.”
He seemed agitated; he went out into the passageway and walked down it, waiting for them like a shadow under the coiled bells.
After a moment, Venn followed. Jake glanced at Wharton, and went after them.
Maskelyne waited until they were both close to him, then gazed back at the lighted kitchen, where he could see both the girls and Piers, pouring out tea.
“What?” Venn said.
“Listen to me. Sarah wears a token around her neck. The right half of a coin.”
Jake, alarmed said, “But she gave it—”
“Shut up, Jake,” Venn said quickly. “What about it? Was it the token Symmes had?”
“The one I gave him long ago.” Maskelyne leaned against the wall, his head back. He looked very tired. “But you don’t know its significance. I have no choice but to tell you, because you need the mirror safe now as much as I do. I have to trust you.”
It was as if he was arguing himself into it.
Venn said, “The coin is a danger?”
“The mirror cannot be broken. Not by force or fire, by wind or water. There is only one way to destroy the mirror.” Maskelyne’s haunted eyes flickered to Jake. “The Zeus coin was forged in ancient times as a safeguard by the original creator, in case the power of the mirror should ever threaten the world. It contains enough energy to obliterate the Chronoptika, to destroy it utterly.”
Venn said, “How do you know this?” but Maskelyne ignored him, talking in a low, rapid voice. “It was cut in two, and the halves separated widely in time and space, so that they would never be brought together by accident. The left half is lost. It has been lost for centuries. But if it should be found—if they should ever join, and the crack be sealed…” His voice was a whisper now, his lips barely moving. “A wave of terrible intensity would be generated. The coin holds the only power in the universe that could do this. Or so I believe.”
Jake stared, appalled. “If Sarah knew…”
“She doesn’t. She never must.” Maskelyne looked at them, his eyes dark. “And you must somehow get that coin from her.”
He stopped, as if he was too weary to go on, as if everything he could say had been said.
Jake looked at Venn. There was nothing to say. Silent, the three of them watched Sarah talking to Rebecca, stirring sugar into her tea.
After Rebecca and Maskelyne had trudged away in the deep snow, warm in borrowed coats and boots, Wharton gave a great yawn and said, “Sorry. I really need my bed.” He smiled at Jake. “Maybe I might even get a few days at home after all.”
“Before you go back,” Jake said.
Wharton’s face fell. “Great. The play’s the thing. That bloody school.”
“Perhaps,” Piers said softly, “Mr. Venn’s godson might need a personal tutor.”
Everyone looked at Venn. He shrugged. “What do I care? Do what you want.” He stood up, then turned on the small man abruptly. “And you! Where were you when all this was going on? You’re supposed to be guarding the place and you just vanish.”
Piers shrugged. “Busy busy. Janus scuppered every power source we have. Cue heroic efforts by yours truly.”
One of the black cats, washing its face on a chair by the fire, stopped and stared at him. He glared back at it, hard.
Venn said, “Stay if you want,” and went out, toward the study.
“Let me think about it.” Wharton turned. “Merry Christmas to you all.”
To his surprise Sarah came and kissed him on the cheek. “Merry Christmas, George,” she said.
Jake ran upstairs to check on the monkey. He found Horatio curled in tight sleep on the pillow of his bed, and just for a moment lay next to him and rubbed the smooth dark fur.
The marmoset snuggled under his arm.
They had failed. But they could try again. Dad was out there somewhere, and they had time, all the time in the universe, to find him again. And Moll. Maybe even Moll…
He woke with a start.
The room was dark. Someone had put the lights off and pulled the quilt over him; he shrugged it away and sat up, then slid off the side of the bed and hurried to the door, opening it and listening.
Something was wrong.
Wintercombe Abbey was utterly silent in its deep frost. But there was one sound, very faint, and it was coming from below. He raced down, filled with an unreasoning dread, fleet and fast below the moon-striped faces of the portraits, hurtling along the corridor to the kitchen, but it was empty, the teapot cold, the fire almost out.
Cursing himself, he ran back. Outside Venn’s study he stopped, hearing her voice, and then Venn’s, low and ominous.
He went in.
Venn was lounging in his armchair, one arm hanging over the side, a whisky glass in his hand. The bottle, half empty, stood on the littered desk.
Sarah, by the window, turned.
They both looked at Jake.
“What’s going on?”
She shrugged. “It’s time for me to go.”
“No.” He stepped forward, barring the door. “No way!”
“Why stay? I can’t do what I came for, and you see me as a danger, rightly. I have a duty to ZEUS. I have to find my own way, sort out my ideas, do research, work out what to do next.”
Venn laughed, slurred and bitter. “And if you find out how to save the future, you’ll come back and tell us how?”
“Yes,” she said.
Jake took a step forward. “Sarah.”
“Good-bye, Jake.” She was at the window.
He said, “You know this house in the future.”
She was still. “I know its ruins,” she whispered. Then, abruptly she turned to Venn. “Don’t give up on the mirror. You will succeed.”
He shrugged. “Words. Meaningless.”
His moroseness annoyed her. “I know. In my past Leah does come back.”
He sat up, slowly. His ice-blue eyes caught the moonlight. Shadows of branches moved down walls and ceiling.
“Prove it.”
She came over and pushed something into his hands.
It was a small diamond brooch in the shape of a starburst. He stared at it with open, vivid astonishment. “Sarah!”
She smiled. “Till next time.” She turned away.
And wasn’t there.
Jake gasped, dived after her.
The window latch was lifting, the casement swinging wide. He heard a scrape, a breath of effort, but Venn had leaped up, shoved him away, was grabbing at the swinging casement, hauling himself onto the windowsill, yelling at the empty snowfield. “Sarah!”
Her whisper came so close, it tickled his skin. “You and Leah had no children.”
Her breath warmed his cheek. Close behind, Jake barely heard his answer. “No.”
“But you will have,” she said.
A crunched landing in the snow outside. Her voice, calm and clear in the frost.
“I’m your great-granddaughter, Venn. Yours and Leah’s. That’s how I know.”
Then there was nothing but the creak of the window against the frame, and a soft shower of dislodged frost.
Jake said, “She might be lying.” His voice was quiet.
Venn spun, slid down with his back against the bars. He stared at the brooch in astonishment. “This was Leah’s, Jake. I buried it with her. In her coffin.” He looked up, and out at the snow, then flung the window wide and yelled, “Sarah!”
No one answered.
A single set of footprints led away, through the snow, into the dark.
End of Book 1
About the Author
CATHERINE FISHER is a critically acclaimed author and poet and was named the first Young People’s Laureate for Wales. She graduated from the University of Wales with a degree in English and a fascination for myth and history, and has worked in education and archaeology and as a lecturer in creative writing. Her genre-busting novels, like the New York Times bestselling Incarceron and Sapphique, have given her the reputation of being “one of today’s best fantasy writers,” as noted by the London Independent. Ms. Fisher lives in Wales in the United Kingdom.
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