by Anya Allyn
He gave a harsh, bitter laugh. Zach leapt on top of the wall, balancing like a crazed person.
He finished the dregs of the bottle and tossed it far toward the full moon. “You, moon, are just a copy. Just a copy. You could explode right now, and there would still be a billion other moons on a billion other earths.”
He doubled over and back again as he lost his balance. Rushing up to him, I reached for his arm and pulled him from the wall. He stood before me, breathing heavily. His arms came around me and he held me in a strong grip.
Touching my face, he shook his head. “If I do one thing that means anything in this life, that thing is going to be to keep you safe. I will never walk away and leave you at their mercy. And I’m never going to stop wanting you, even if you never again want me.”
Everything about the warm, solid boy who had held my hand on the island was gone. That had been a shell. He used to smell of ocean and sun. Tonight he smelled of sour wine and the ancient walls of the castle. He was so different in every way he barely resembled the same person.
“Zach, I am at their mercy. Whether you’re here or not.”
“I’d like to think I can look out for you.” His eyes were serious.
“But you couldn’t even find me tonight in this crazy castle. You said so yourself.”
He moved close to me, so close I could feel his heart beating against my chest. “I won’t let that happen again. I’ll come sleep with you every night.”
“Zach…. you know you can’t, even if I wanted you to.”
For a moment, I felt my mind shifting like sand. I didn’t know whether it was the désorienter or Doctor Verena’s pills. Tonight, it didn’t seem like anything really mattered. Maybe my mind itself was unhinged and I was never going to be okay ever again. Those who see ghosts and otherworldly things surely can’t be sane. Those things were inside me, like a sickness. Maybe I even understood Aisha and Lacey. You could only fight to stay on the surface of this black ocean for so long. Then you just sank below the surface—no longer breathing but somehow existing.
I let my head rest against his shoulder. He bent his head down to mine. Marsh birds called mournfully on the moors, dark wind bringing the briny scent of salt and seaweed up from the ocean. Behind us, the night of the désorienter went on—the terrifying sounds of ancient castle walls and floors rearranging themselves.
18. THE COUPLINGS
I woke shaking in my bed in a cold sweat. I’d been dreaming of Zach standing on the balcony wall. He spoke the words, you and only you, and then let himself drop backwards from the wall—falling through the night to the rocks and ocean below.
Molly chewed her knuckles, her hair falling in layers around her face and body. “You were having a nightmare.”
I gasped in relief seeing her sitting across from me. “Molly! Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I was so scared when I found my way back here last night and you weren’t here. I went looking for you, but the walls stopped me from going far. So I had no choice but to stay here in the room. I fell asleep waiting for you.”
I drew the blanket around me—the morning air had a biting chill. “I got completely lost somewhere down in the dungeons.”
She grimaced. “The dungeons? I hate to think of you alone down there.”
“I wasn’t… alone. There were people.…“
“Did they hurt you?” She studied my face, her eyes shadowed in the dim light.
I shook my head. “No. I wasn’t hurt. Did your half of the room move too?”
“Yeah. I ended up wandering hallway after hallway, trying to find a way back. How did anyone even build a castle like this? It’s like one of those cube puzzles from the dollhouse—only a giant size one.”
I remembered sitting at my desk in the dollhouse, trying to figure out one of those antique wooden cube puzzles. It had been freaky how easily the other girls had solved those puzzles—even little Frances. The girls had had years of practice.
“Some crazy royal had it built back in the fourteenth century.” I wound my hair up into a loose knot. ”When the walls shift, it’s meant to be a time when anything can happen, like there are no boundaries.”
“How did you find that out?”
I felt uncomfortable. “Zach told me.”
“You saw Zach last night?” Molly hugged her knees, resting her chin on them. “Do you still have feelings for him, after all?”
My gaze fell to the floor. “No... we just… talked.” And he held me. But it wasn’t romantic or beautiful or sweet. It was dark and full of pain.
She exhaled a low breath. “I’m scared you’ll end up, you know, with him—on their side. And I wouldn’t blame you. The Batistes have your parents, and that must be—“
“No....” I caught her gaze as I looked up. “I will never be one of them.”
“I’m sorry.” Her voice was small. “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s just… as you said, last night was a time of change. I felt it… I could sense the change everywhere.” She bent her head. “Last night I found my way to Henry’s study. He was there looking over a map—I think it was a map of the other world. Your world. He had scribbles and markings all over it. I guess he’s trying to find out where the book could be.”
“What did he do when he saw you there?”
“He pulled me onto his lap and spoke about all the things we could do if he had the second book. He told me I was his favorite from the dollhouse and that Audette was a stupid sheep—he said he preferred a woman with fire in her belly.” She gave a derisive laugh. “I told him that I agreed Audette was stupid, but that he should have preferred a woman with actual food in her belly than fire.”
I shook my head. “He doesn’t even care that he starved you.”
“He said he left all that to the other Henry and that he wasn’t responsible—the other Henry blew his allowance on drugs, booze and expensive trips away—instead of providing us with all the things he should have. But don’t worry—I didn’t fall for it. I knew exactly what he’s trying to do. He’s trying to worm his way in, absolve himself of responsibility. He needs us now, and wants us on side.” Her eyelashes dropped and she sighed. ”He kissed me before he let me leave. My first ever kiss—was with him. A ghost at that”
“No—he kissed you, and that’s not the same thing as a kiss. A kiss is between two people.”
“That’s never going to happen for me. I’ve always been on the other side of things, on the outside.” Her voice grew wistful. “But last night, it was weird. For the first time, I felt like a woman. I mean, I know I’m eighteen, and in my head I know that’s an adult. But I’d been thinking of myself as some kind of overgrown kid. Now I know differently.”
I smiled at her. “You’re so not an overgrown kid. You don’t even realize how pretty you are. On some other earth, Molly Parkes must have a swag of boyfriends. You’d be tossing them aside and breaking hearts every day.”
She stilled, closing her eyes. “On some other earth, everything might be different for me. My mother might still be there.”
With a start I realized that in all the universes—all the specks of possibilities—that what Molly wished for must be real. There must be at least one world in which her mother didn’t kill herself. In which she and Molly were happy. My vision blurred—my eyelashes dampening. I hadn’t cried since leaving the dollhouse. I’d buried it all since my encounter with Dr. Verena.
She wrung her hands together, her gaze drawing inward, and I knew she was thinking the same as I was. “If… if all the Mollys in those worlds are part of me, if they are me” she said, “then in some way, I still have my mother. She’s still with me….”
I nodded softly.
A tear wound its way down her face. “Then, in some worlds, I never went to live with Uncle Devlin. In some worlds, the dollhouse never happened. And you and me, we didn’t have to know about ghosts and serpents and other worlds.”
I stared at her. “I want to go and live in a world like that.”
<
br /> She nodded. “Imagine that. Both of us could start again.”
It was difficult to imagine a life where the worst of things had never happened. Mom and Dad divorcing, the death of their baby, the dollhouse and all the people of the castle. It seemed like a life I could only look at from the other side of a mirror, a life I could never have.
Standing, Molly gestured towards the door. “Let’s go downstairs to breakfast and then get out of here.” She hated being cooped up inside. After her years in the dollhouse, she craved outdoor spaces.
Downstairs, the dining room was empty. Molly and I breakfasted alone, on the stewed fruit and croissants brought to us by the kitchen maids.
Loud noise and music met our ears as we left the table to walk the corridors toward the entry.
Sienna brushed past me, her green eyes cold as jade. Her blonde hair was caught up in a perfect bun, curled tendrils of hair framing either side of her face. She glanced over her shoulder at Molly and me. “You two should make yourselves scarce today. No need for you to be around during our traditional ceremonies.”
Mrs. Batiste stepped up beside her. “Sienna, you look lovely, dear.” Her eyes fell on us. “And she’s right. The couplings have nothing to do with you. Go do some reading, or something to fill in the time.” She squeezed Sienna’s hand. “Oh, I am excited.”
“Fine with us,” I told them flatly. “We want nothing to do with you and your ceremonies.”
Sienna scowled. “There’s no need to use that tone with my future mother-in-law. You two have everything you could want here. It’s not as though you’re back in that dingy dollhouse. Do try to be appreciative.”
They stepped away together.
Molly and I made our way over to an arched window and sat on the window seat. The air outside the window was crisp—the sky a delicate shade of eggshell blue. Without the usual morning fog, I could see the gardens clearly.
The castle families milled about with anticipation in their eyes. And there were strangers—new people at the castle. Maids and servants streamed out of the castle. They bustled about setting up tables with white tablecloths—complete with centerpieces of fruit and flowers. Musicians brought out fiddles, flutes and all kinds of medieval-looking instruments. Others rolled out barrels of wine.
The men of the castle had mock sword fights and the women fussed over each other’s hair and outfits. They were all dressed in medieval gear.
Viola strolled past in a long blue dress and her hair in tight curls. Maypole jumped from Viola’s shoulder to Lucy’s back—people laughing as the dog tumbled and ran around in circles as it tried to dislodge the monkey.
My breath caught in my chest as Zach and Parker walked past together. Both wore loose white shirts and brown vests and pants. Today, with the sun behind glinting off his hair and temples, Zach was beautiful. He didn’t resemble the drunk, desperate boy in the moonlight last night. Parker had fine stubble around his chin—he’d lost the clean-cut look—but even I had to admit he looked even more attractive.
I startled as I sensed someone behind me. Turning, I saw Lacey’s eyes staring out at the festivities beyond the window.
“We’re not wanted out there today,” she told us.
“No argument from me,” said Molly. “Looks like a good thing to keep away from. Who wants to go to their stupid coupling ceremony?”
Lacey’s face saddened. “At least when you’re with someone—when you get married—it means that you mean something. It’s proof that you exist.”
Frowning, I wound my hair into a messy knot. “You don’t need a certificate to prove you exist.”
Her blonde eyelashes closed over distant blue eyes. “I’ll live the rest of my life at this castle and just fade into the walls when I die. There’ll be no record of me—no painting, no photographs, no children... no one to hold any memories. I’ve been forgotten about my whole life. My father never paid me any attention and my mother spent all her time at social events—the only time she noticed me was when I began playing piano, because that gave her bragging rights with her friends.”
“There’s a better life for you out there” said Molly. “So why not help us? Maybe together we can work out a way to get away from the castle.”
“What would be better for me out there?” Lacey asked. “No one gets what they want in this life... because we always want something we can’t have.”
“Maybe that’s true,” said Molly thoughtfully. “But when you’re being held somewhere against your will, you never get the chance to live.”
Lacey pursed her mouth. “Your only interest in me is how I can help you.”
“Molly was just saying we could help each other," I told her. "You probably know lots of things about the castle and the people here.”
She shrugged her thin shoulders. “What would Lacey know? No one tells Lacey their secrets. She has to listen for them. She listens through walls and ceilings and she hears everything.”
I held my breath. “Lacey, it wasn’t you listening to Molly and me in our room, was it? Someone was looking down at us through the holes in the ceiling the other day.”
She nodded slyly. “Yes, that was Lacey. She heard you trying to plan your way out of here. But there’s no way out. None at all.”
Molly gasped.
“Was it you stopping me from going into the visions?” I demanded.
Lacey frowned. “Lacey can’t do that. It’s the castle. The castle stops everything. It can make the whole world stop.”
I exchanged glances with Molly. It was weird the way Lacey had swapped to talking about herself in the third person.
“Why don’t you tell us all you know?” Molly pleaded. “At least tell us why we can’t get out of here.”
“Lacey can’t do that. Secrets are bad and she can’t tell them to you. They’ll only hurt you. From the time Lacey was nine, she knew the worst secret of all.” She toyed with her braids, eyeing me. “None of you probably even looked for Lacey after you thought she disappeared in the dollhouse. Drippy loopy looney Lacey has gone away. Oh well....”
“That’s not true,” I cried.
“And then when you got out of the dollhouse,” she continued, “when you found out that Lacey was not just loopy—she was bad—then you all paid me attention. A lot of attention. Didn’t you?”
My mouth dropped open. “You liked the attention? Is that what you’re saying? God, Lacey. So you had your big moment, and then you tried to bury us all so we wouldn’t tell—you tried to send us all into a great big hole?” I stood there breathing hard. I hadn’t meant to say all that. It had been boiling away inside for a long time.
Lacey took a step backward. “Is that what you think?”
“What else is there to think?” I told her. “I saw you. You were communicating with that... thing. The serpent. Then the earth opened up and swallowed everything. After the helicopter took off, I saw the shadow rising from the hole in the ground.”
Her small face hardened. “What else do you expect from a servant of the serpent?” Turning on her heel, she skipped away humming.
“She’s so strange,” whispered Molly. “I never know what to make of her.”
“Me either. I don’t know whether she’s dangerous to us, or just so caught up in her own little dark world that she can’t see daylight.”
Blowing up my cheeks, I slowly expelled a stream of air. I turned back to the window.
With a start I noticed the gatehouse that led to the moors had been left open—damp-looking, featureless moors stretching into distant woods.
Molly placed her hands on my shoulders, gazing wistfully from the window. “What if we just walked out of here? I mean, everyone’s distracted by the ceremony today—no one will be watching us.”
I stole a glance at the moors. It was true that we could just walk out. We could pretend to be walking toward the garden, and simply crawl through the hedgerow without being seen. “It couldn’t be that easy...”
“They probably think we
wouldn’t dare. They lied to us that there’s nothing beyond here—that can’t be possible. They probably see us as the poor, terminally terrified little girls we were in the dollhouse. They have Aisha and Lacey in their grip—maybe they think they almost have us too.”
I could taste freedom as I stared at the open gates. “Let’s do it.”
We dressed quickly, slipping on the plain dresses Audette had left here for us when we’d first come to the castle.
Out in the grounds, we pretended to wander about, looking at the floral arrangements and strange musical instruments. Sienna spotted us and scowled in our direction.
The sound of Aeolian harps carried on the wind.
Despite myself, I turned and looked at the gatehouse. We were less than a hundred feet away from it.
“Beautiful, aren’t they?” Henry stepped up behind us, nodding toward the moors.
I took a quick, calming breath. You couldn’t hear ghosts until they were next to you. In the morning light, Henry’s skin had an unnatural tint—his eyes opaque.
“Looks like a swamp to me,” Molly’s words were sharp.
A smirk dimpled his chin. “My girl, you always have that look in your eye—like a tiger about to pounce. Your eyes are so blue in the light of this part of the world. An artist should paint you.” He glanced over at Audette, who had a canvas set up on an easel and was making limp-wristed brush strokes. “Unfortunately that can’t be Audette. I doubt that she’d create a particularly flattering portrait of you.”
“I’ve done nothing to her.”
“That’s true. But she can see that I’m fond of you, and that’s enough to cause her upset. She’s a jealous little thing. And of course, you possess that thing that is denied to her. A body of flesh and blood.”
Molly’s face grew hard. “Perhaps people shouldn’t outstay their welcome in this world.”
