Blythewood

by kindle@abovethetreeline. com

  The only way I could think of to get into the Special Collections was to volunteer to help Miss Corey carry books up. Now that Nathan was so distracted with his own reading, Miss Corey always carried the lantern downstairs and held it up while pointing to the books she wanted brought up, making it difficult to search for A Darkness of Angels on the shelves. A layer of dust covered the spines and many of the shelves were double stacked. The day I left Sarah dusting specimen cases, I had the idea of volunteering to dust the books so Miss Corey wouldn’t get her clothes so dirty.

  “Perhaps that’s not a bad idea,” she replied. “Vi is always saying I look like a chimney sweep. But won’t you mind being down here all alone?”

  “Not at all,” I lied. “Why should I?”

  “It’s just that it’s so close to the candelabellum.” She looked nervously toward the door at the end of the corridor. Now that I looked toward the door it did give me a strange feeling to think of those bells hanging in the dark, the pictures lurking in them like sleeping dragons. As I stared at the door I thought I even heard a faint tinkling.

  “It is peculiar,” I said, “to think of the founding families bringing over the original dungeons with the castle.”

  “These rich people,” Miss Corey said irritably, “who can ever understand why they do the things they do? Why does Rupert Bellows buy violets every day for Vionetta when she could get them for free from her own aunts’ greenhouse? Go ahead and dust, if you like. I’m sure Vionetta and Rupert will prefer that we don’t look like grimy paupers.”

  It had never occurred to me that Miss Corey might not be as well off as Miss Sharp or Mr. Bellows. Truthfully, I hardly thought about my teachers’ lives beyond Blythewood. Someday, though, I would have to make my own way in the world beyond these walls. I didn’t know whether my grandmother intended to help me financially, or what strings might be attached to any help she offered. And as for marriage . . . what if Charlotte Falconrath was right and no one would marry me because I was a freak? Better to remain unmarried, though, than to be matched up like a prize cow or to trade a dowry for a house in town, summers in Newport, and a handsome dress allowance.

  I’d wager the Darklings didn’t talk about dowries and bloodlines when they married. If they married.

  “My mother always said it was better to be a pauper than a slave to money,” I told Miss Corey.

  Miss Corey gave me a startled look from under her veil. “Evangeline was very wise,” she said, squeezing my hand. “Thank you for offering to dust the books, Ava. I’ll bring down an extra lantern and some dust cloths.”

  I spent the rest of the afternoon down in the Special Collections Room carefully dusting and inspecting each book, but I didn’t find A Darkness of Angels. I did find, though, a catalogue of special collections in other libraries run by the Order. I discovered it just as Miss Corey called me to come up for tea. I slid the catalogue behind one of the shelves and hurried up the spiral stairs, promising myself that I’d look through it later. At tea I casually asked Miss Corey if she’d ever worked at any other libraries.

  “I worked at the Order’s library in Edinburgh,” she replied, “until the head librarian absconded with all the funds and several priceless books.”

  “Oh, I remember that!” Miss Sharp exclaimed, sipping her tea. “What a scandal! Did they ever apprehend him?”

  “No, but they recovered the books when he tried to sell them in Scotland. They’re in the special collections in the Hawthorn School in Scotland. I worked there, too, for a year before coming back to the States.”

  “Can’t imagine why you’d leave Scotland for this backwater,” Mr. Bellows remarked.

  “If you don’t like it here,” Miss Corey replied, “I hear there’s an opening at Hawthorn.”

  I didn’t follow the rest of their conversation. I bided my time through tea and then waited for everybody to leave. Nathan took forever, rearranging the books in this window seat and making Miss Corey promise not to disturb the order of his stacks.

  “I have a system,” he said. “I think I’m on to something.”

  “That’s fine, Nathan, but they’ll all have to go back in the Special Collections by spring break.”

  “I’ll be done with them by then,” Nathan assured her. “Or else it will be too late.”

  He left without explaining what he meant. I offered to help Miss Corey straighten and lock up. She seemed touched by my offer. “Perhaps you might want to be a librarian, Ava. You’d make a fine one.”

  “I would like that very much,” I said, feeling guilty as I slipped the library key from its ring before handing her keys back to her. “I do love libraries.”

  “I’ll talk to Dame Beckwith about having you assist me. Perhaps she could even pay you a small salary. Then you’d feel a bit more . . . independent.”

  I was so touched I almost confessed and gave her back the key, but I couldn’t bear to ruin her good opinion of me. And I wanted to get another look at that catalogue. After dinner Daisy disappeared, stuffing a roll and apple in her pocket and making a vague excuse that she’d forgotten something somewhere. Helen, rereading a letter from home, didn’t even look up when I said that I’d forgotten my Latin textbook in the classroom in the North Wing. Charlotte Falconrath tried to stop me as I passed through the Great Hall, but I distracted her by telling her that Cook had put out fresh-baked cookies in the Commons Room.

  I hurried past the empty classrooms, which looked eerie in the moonlight. Someone had left a window open, letting in an icy breeze that ruffled the large maps that hung in the history room. I thought I heard footsteps behind me and turned to see the shadow of wings on the corridor wall. I ran to the window, hoping that it would be Raven, but it was only Blodeuwedd flying past a window with a long mournful hoot. I rushed on to the library, my hands shaking as I fitted the key in the lock.

  “If you want to become a librarian, you’ll have to learn to be quieter.”

  I nearly shrieked at the voice inches from my ear. I whirled around. For a second I thought one of the ice giants had found a way in from the forest. A figure pale and still as a frozen statue stood in the moonlit corridor, its eyes cold as ice chips. Then the figure moved and I recognized Nathan.

  “You were spying on me!” I accused him.

  “I wanted to know where your sudden interest in library economy came from. Now I see that you’re really interested in a career in book thievery.”

  “I am not,” I hissed. “I just wanted to have a look at something.”

  “Something you couldn’t look at with everyone else here?”

  “As if you don’t hoard your books to yourself, too, Nathan. I’ve seen you hunched over them like a hawk mantling its prey.”

  Nathan laughed at the image. For a moment he looked like the old Nathan, but then his eyes turned chilly again. “I suppose you know all about birds of prey now,” he said.

  “So you did see me with the Darkling that night,” I said, glad it was too dark where I stood in the hall for him to see me blush. “Why didn’t you tell the others?”

  “Because I saw other things in the woods that night that I’m not ready to tell anyone about. I’m willing to hide your secret if you’re willing to hide mine.”

  I knew it was a deal I shouldn’t make, but my fingers were itching to get a look at that catalogue. Once I’d found A Darkness of Angels I could prove the Darklings weren’t evil and find a way to rescue Louisa from Faerie. Then I could tell Nathan everything and find out what he was hiding. “Fine,” I said. “I suppose you ambushed me here so I could let you into the library, too.”

  “Actually, I don’t need you for that,” he said, taking a ring of keys out of his pocket. “I stole these from my mother months ago. I just thought it would be fun to give you a scare.”

  If Nathan had looked like he was having fun I would have been angrier, but it was clear he was in the throes of winter fever, pursuing his mysterious obsession. “Then let’s go in, shall we? I won’t bother you if yo
u don’t bother me.”

  He unlocked the door and waved me in. “Ladies first,” he said with mock courtesy.

  The moonlight was bright enough to light the library, but I would need a lantern to go down to the Special Collections. Descending those spiral stairs with the moonlight pouring down them felt like climbing into the well I’d envisioned when the crows had attacked me. I was relieved when Nathan offered to go down with me.

  “So what was worth fooling Miss Corey for?” he asked when we reached the bottom.

  “It’s a catalogue,” I said, taking the book out of its hiding place, “of other libraries belonging to the Order. I thought I might find a book I’m looking for.” I flipped through the pages, searching the alphabetical list . . . and found it. A Darkness of Angels by Dame Alcyone. Alcyone. That was the name of one of Merope’s sisters. There was a copy in the Hawthorn School library in Scotland.

  “Hm,” he said, looking over my shoulder. “Are you going to Scotland to find it?”

  “Hardly,” I said, “but I can write to the librarian at Hawthorn. The address is on the first page.” I flipped to the beginning of the catalogue and copied down the address. I was closing the book when I heard a noise from the candelabellum.

  I turned to Nathan to see if he had heard it, too. I wasn’t sure what would be worse—if I was imagining noises in the candelabellum chamber or if something was making the bells move on their own. The minute I saw Nathan’s frightened face, I knew which was worse. I thought of the figures we’d seen in there—shadow crows and shadow wolves, but worst of all, the prince who’d succumbed to the shadows and become a shadow master. What if he were in the candelabellum chamber?

  The door knob turned.

  Nathan extinguished the lantern, plunging the archive into darkness save for the circle of moonlight coming down from the stairwell. He pushed me behind a filing cabinet and squeezed in beside me while the door creaked open, making so much noise it covered the sound of our breathing and my heart beating—out of fear, I told myself, not from the warmth of Nathan’s body pressed against mine.

  A lumpen figure loomed in the doorway, cast in shadow by a ruddy wedge of light that angled toward us. I thought of the red eyes that had fixed onto mine in the teacup vision and imagined the light came from them. The figure lumbered into the corridor and paused, holding a lantern up to one of the shelves. I was afraid he would find us when the light reached us, but evidently the intruder found what he was looking for. He took something off the shelf and turned to go, pausing in the circle of moonlight. He looked up . . . only it wasn’t a he. Shining greasily in the moonlight was the face of Euphorbia Frost.

  She stared at the open doorway to the stairwell for several long seconds. Then she looked around the corridor, peering into the shadows. She was staring straight at us, her eyes shimmering red in the light from her lantern, which, I saw now, was shaded by a red silk scarf. I was sure that she’d seen us, but then I remembered that she was nearsighted. She groped for her lorgnette, but she was holding too many things in her hand to raise it to her eyes.

  “Careless!” she muttered, clucking her tongue. Then she lifted the thing she’d taken from the shelf. Something glimmered glassily in the moonlight and the room was suddenly full of the smell of spirits. Miss Frost lifted the bottle to her mouth and took a long swallow of the clear liquid. Then she smacked her lips, belched, and went back into the candelabellum chamber.

  When the door had closed behind her, and the sound of her retreating footsteps had faded, Nathan exploded in a paroxysm of giggles. I elbowed him in the ribs to hush him, but laughter was bubbling up in my own mouth.

  “She hides . . . her liquor . . . in the dungeons!” Nathan managed through bursts of hilarity. “All the most valuable secrets in the world—the location of the fountain of youth for all we know!—and she uses it for her liquor stash.”

  “Well,” I said, “I suppose for her it is the fountain of youth. She’s certainly well . . . pickled.”

  Nathan collapsed against me giggling. It was so good to hear him laugh like his old self that I added, “Perhaps she stores the stuff here to age it like fine wine.”

  “I sincerely doubt she leaves it long enough to age it,” Nathan replied, wiping his eyes. “Imagine what we could do with this knowledge. We could switch her liquor for one of Jager’s potions. Turn her hair lavender . . .”

  “Or give her a shape-shifting potion that makes her grow horns,” I spluttered.

  But Nathan had stopped listening. He had spotted a book on a shelf that interested him. As soon as he plucked it off the shelf the hunch came back to his shoulders and all the merriment drained out of his face.

  “Yes, that would be droll,” he replied absently. “Well, if you’ve got what you want, then, I’m going upstairs to do some reading. You can let yourself out.” He drifted up the stairs, leaving me alone in the dark.

  I went to the shelf from which Miss Frost had removed her bottle and saw that there was an empty space between the books. I’d just dusted this shelf so I knew that it held forbidden books on contacting evil spirits. What would Miss Frost want with those?

  Unless she was the spy Raven had warned me about.

  28

  I WROTE A letter to the head librarian of the Hawthorn School in Scotland, whose name, I learned from Miss Corey’s files, was Herbert Farnsworth. I considered pretending to be one of my teachers, but in the end I told him that my mother had been looking for the book A Darkness of Angels before she died. Generally all the girls posted their letters by leaving them in a basket in the front hall, where they were collected by Gillie and then taken to the town post office. I’d seen Miss Frost idly rifling through these letters, though, tsking over bad penmanship and improper modes of address. If she were the spy, I couldn’t take the chance of her seeing that I was writing to the librarian at Hawthorn, so I decided to walk into town and post it myself, even though it was against the rules to leave the grounds without permission. I waited for a morning when Daisy had vanished again (to wherever it was she went) and Helen was busy writing a letter to her mother, and then snuck out and walked the mile into town myself.

  It felt good to get out of the castle and into the crisp, clean air away from all the whispers and secrets lurking around the halls of Blythewood. It was cold, but I was wearing my Christmas present from my grandmother, an oxblood-red wool coat

  348 Blythewood with black passementerie embroidery on the sleeves and hem and plush black fur at the collar and the cuffs. It had come with a matching fur hat and muff that Agnes had said in a separate note were just like the ones the youngest tsarina wore. I did feel like a Russian princess in the ensemble.

  But I still didn’t feel like I fit in at Blythewood. If the girls at school knew what I was really like they would turn away in horror—even Sarah, who’d been so kind to me these last few months, would never understand my feelings about one of the creatures she blamed for abducting her best friend. I would be expelled, as my mother had been. And then where would I go? My grandmother wouldn’t take me in after a second humiliation to the family name. Even Caroline Janeway might not be able to employ me if I’d embarrassed myself at Blythewood when she depended so much on the school for her trade.

  No wonder my mother had drifted from place to place. When you didn’t fit in anywhere, you had to keep moving.

  By the time I reached the post office I’d worked myself into a tizzy. The salutary effects of the fresh air wore off as I stood on line in the snug, low-ceilinged building. I was sweating under my Russian princess coat, my shoulders and back itching against the wool. When the postal clerk looked up from my letter and said, “All the way to Scotland, eh? Have you family there?” I almost burst into tears.

  “No,” I managed hoarsely, “no family.”

  Outside on the street the cold air snaked under my loosened collar and spread its icy touch down my damp shoulder blades. It felt as if someone had laid his hands on my back. And then I heard a bell tolling inside
my head. I whirled around. A shadow moved on the front porch of the inn next door to the post office. I squinted at it, the bright winter sun glancing off the glass windows of the inn momentarily blinding me. I shaded my eyes and saw him—the man in the Inverness cape. He was standing beside a column, facing me, his face shadowed by his Homburg hat.

  Then he tipped his hat and smiled at me. A wisp of smoke curled out of his mouth.

  I wanted to scream. I wanted to run. But suddenly I was tired of running. My mother had spent her whole life running, and look where it had gotten her.

  I straightened my back and felt the ice along my shoulder blades turn to steel. I strode up the flagstone path, straight toward the man in the Inverness cape. Two women whisked their skirts out of my way and whispered behind their fur muffs. Let the great Shadow Master take me on here in front of the good people of Rhinebeck. Let him loose his crows at me and turn into a writhing smoke monster. Let him . . .

  He bowed low in front of me, sweeping his hat out in an arc. I stopped abruptly, my boot heels screeching on the bluestone flags. I held my breath as he lifted his head, steeling myself for a monster.

  Instead, a handsome gentleman of perhaps forty-odd years with refined features smiled at me. He had a long narrow face, an aquiline nose, and dark hair brushed back from a high forehead with two silver streaks at his temples that looked like wings. His eyes were dark—almost as black as Raven’s, but flatter and colder. One eyebrow was raised archly in query.

  “I do not believe I’ve had the pleasure of your acquaintance, Miss. Was there some way I could be of assistance to you?”

  Did I have the wrong man? Had I imagined that wisp of smoke? “I . . . er . . . I thought you were someone else,” I stammered. “Ah, I am relieved. You approached me as if you had a vendetta against me. I would not like to be the man who crossed you so. Allow me to introduce myself.”