Any Way the Wind Blows

by Rainbow Rowell

  Shepard leans closer to me and whispers, “Is that Def Leppard?”

  “What’s deaf leopard?” I whisper back.

  “Listen.”

  There’s music playing. Somewhere close.

  “Ungh.” Baz is struggling with the duffel now, scrabbling to get the strap off from around his neck. The bag looks like it’s trying to pin him to the floor.

  “Nicks and Slick!” I say, holding out my fist.

  “I’ve got it,” Simon says, grabbing the strap from behind.

  “It’s trying to get—” Baz drops to his knees. Simon is standing over him, pulling the strap with both hands away from the back of Baz’s neck. The bag thumps to the floor, and the strap sags enough for Baz to slip free.

  We all stare at it.

  “The basement!” Shepard says. “There must be a—”

  Right, of course.

  It takes both Baz and Simon to lift the duffel bag off the floor. Baz wraps both arms around it and rushes back through the swinging door. “Come on!”

  We run out of the kitchen, trying every door in the hallway. Some of them are locked. “Any of these could lead to stairs,” I say.

  “Here!” Simon’s already at the end of the hall, shaking a door by its knob. “Listen. It’s that music—”

  “‘Pour Some Sugar on Me,’” Shepard says.

  I frown at him. “What?”

  “Come on, Penny,” Simon says, rattling the door. “‘Open Sesame!’”

  I catch up with him and hold out my fist. “Open Sesame!” The door swings open in Simon’s hand. The music gets louder. It is a stairwell.

  “Me first,” I say. “I have magic.”

  “So?” Simon says, running ahead of me down the stairs.

  “Simon!”

  The music is thundering down here—and terrible, some old hard rock music from when my parents were kids. I glance over my shoulder to make sure Baz is still with us. He’s coming down the stairs behind me, leaning way back so that the bag won’t pull him into a dive.

  “Is this where it wants to go?” I ask.

  “I think so. It mostly just wants to get away from me. Keep up with Snow.”

  I nod and hurry down the stairs, pulling Shepard along with me. We end up in another hallway. Dark. Old. Walls of crumbling brick. We follow the music and find Simon standing outside another locked door, trying to muscle it open. “Penelope!”

  Morgana below, has anyone ever cast so many “Open Sesame”s? I hold my gem over the lock, and do it again. Simon wrenches the door open, and the music is suddenly unbearably loud.

  There’s a middle-aged white man inside the room, drinking tea and watching television. He’s got stringy blond hair and a patchy beard. He fumbles for the remote. “Sorry! I thought everyone was—” He stops fumbling and stares at Simon. “Is that—Are you—Simon Snow!?”

  Simon is staring back. “Jamie?!”

  67

  BAZ

  Jamie Salisbury has been locked in a basement, listening to hair metal. He looks hale enough. He was sitting in an armchair, drinking tea when we barged in. Now he’s standing and staring at Simon.

  “How do you know who I am?!” Salisbury shouts over the music.

  “We were looking for you!” Simon shouts back.

  Shepard walks past them and picks the TV remote up off the floor. He turns the music down.

  Salisbury looks at the TV, then back at Simon. “Why is Simon Snow looking for me?”

  “Because your mum is worried about you,” Simon says.

  “My mum knows Simon Snow?”

  “You can just call me Simon.”

  “Really?”

  “Jamie”—Simon touches the man’s shoulder—“who locked you in the basement?”

  Salisbury pulls his head back, surprised. “They didn’t. I mean, I’m not locked down here. I mean, well, I am—but not like that. Smith is letting me stay here. He’s letting me lie low.”

  “Why do you need to lie low?”

  Salisbury looks down at his feet and scratches the back of his head. “If I could talk about that, I wouldn’t need to lie low.”

  Simon looks around the little room. There’s a bed and the easy chair and a bare lightbulb hanging over our heads. The walls are brick and held together by spiderwebs. “If you want to be in here … why was the door locked from the outside?”

  Salisbury shrugs. “Well, there is no lock on the inside, so Smith had to—Wait, how did you open it?” His eyes get big. “Did Smith fix your magic?”

  “No,” Simon says. “I—”

  “Smith said he was going to fix your magic.”

  This is ridiculous. Jamie Salisbury hasn’t been kidnapped. He’s just hiding from his mother. I need to find Philippa. She’s here somewhere—the bag is pulling towards the far wall of Salisbury’s cell.

  I step in front of Simon before he tells Salisbury the whole story. “Where’s Pippa?” I demand. “Pippa Stainton?”

  “Pippa?” Salisbury says. “She’ll be at Watford by now, with Smith.” He looks at Simon. “You’re supposed to be there, too.”

  He’s useless. I head for the door.

  Once I’m in the hallway, I try to let the bag lead, but it wants to move as the crow flies, not down hallways and through doors.

  “Baz, wait!” It’s Penelope. I ignore her. Philippa is close. She must be—the bag is getting harder to hold on to. If I let go of it, it will smash into one of these brick walls and destroy the tape recorder. Fucking Bunce and her spells.

  Most of the doors down here aren’t locked. Most of the rooms are empty. When I get to the end of the hall, the bag pulls me flat against a door. I have to arch my neck up to breathe. I pry my arm free and try the door. It’s locked. My wand is already in my hand. “Open Sesame!”

  I try the knob again, and the bag pushes the door open, hauling me in.

  It’s a dark room. Philippa is here. Her hands are tied. And a man is holding a wand to her head.

  “Drop your wand,” he says. “Now.”

  68

  SIMON

  “Honestly,” Jamie Salisbury says. “I’m fine.”

  I suppose he looks fine. He’s watching music videos. He’s got a pot of tea and a stack of dirty dishes. There’s a bed down here. “Maybe you could call your mum,” I say, “and tell her that.”

  “I will,” Jamie says, “as soon as Smith—”

  “Smith won’t let you call your mum?”

  “It’s not that simple—”

  “Simon”—Penelope is pulling on my arm—“we can’t let Baz run off.”

  I turn to her. “Where’d he go?”

  Shepard is standing in the doorway. “Down the hall and out of sight.”

  “Fuck.” I run after Penny—out the door, into the passageway. It’s a properly creepy basement. One step up from the Catacombs. We run past a bunch of empty rooms and round the corner. Penny gets to the last doorway and stops—I run into her back.

  There’s an old man standing inside the room with a wand to Baz’s head.

  “Drop your wands.”

  69

  BAZ

  “Drop your wands,” the man says.

  And instead Penelope Bunce raises her fist. “K.O.!”

  The man slumps to the ground.

  “Evander!” Salisbury shouts.

  “For fuck’s sake, Bunce, you could have killed me.” I pick up my wand and rub my temple. I wonder if I have enough blood in me to bruise.

  “But I didn’t,” she says. “Who’s Evander?”

  Salisbury’s kneeling over the fallen man—who I’m fairly certain is the same person who runs the door at Smith-Richards’s meetings. “It’s Smith’s godfather,” he says, distressed. “Did you kill him?”

  “No.” Penny puts her hands on her hips. “Not intentionally.”

  Evander Feverfew is an older white guy, around 60 maybe, with longish grey hair, a diamond earring, and an elaborately tooled leather wand holster on his belt. Shepard stoops t
o pick Feverfew’s wand up from the floor and hands it to Penelope. She tucks it in her waistband.

  I let them fuss over him—I need to get to Philippa. The duffel bag is hauling me deeper into the room, where Smith’s godfather shoved her. She’s lying on her side on the floor, arms and legs tied. She’s still so small. She still reminds me of a mouse …

  When she sees me, she tries to squirm away.

  “Pippa…” I say. Should I untie her first, or—No. I just need to—

  I fall on my knees before her and unzip my bag. The tape recorder tries to sail out; I catch it. It pulls my arms straight and my body forward.

  Philippa sees the tape recorder, and her eyes get wider. She’s crying now. Kicking the floor to get away from me.

  “I’m not going to hurt you,” I say. “I promise!”

  She twists her face away from me.

  “I have your voice, Pippa. I—” Circe, what am I waiting for? There’s nothing I can say or explain. I hold the tape recorder out and press play.

  There’s a staticky sound, and then Philippa’s squeaky little voice rings out from the speaker. “Hiya, Simoooooooooooon!”

  The last syllable disintegrates into a long squeak. Then there’s a sound like a record being played backwards. Like a little girl talking very quickly, in reverse.

  Lying on the floor, Philippa gasps—and swallows and swallows. The noise gets higher and more chaotic, like a high-pitched waterfall.

  Then the tape snaps to a stop. The squealing ends, and Philippa’s head falls to the floor. The tug has gone out of the tape recorder. I drop it. “Pippa…” I say, scooting forward to free her hands. Simon is already working on her ankles.

  As soon as she can, she sits up—and scuttles away from us. She’s rubbing her throat.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  She doesn’t answer. Her shoulders are shaking.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I didn’t know, back at Watford. I thought it was temporary. I’m so sorry.”

  “Here,” Shepard says. He’s getting a bottle out of his backpack. “Have some water.”

  Philippa takes the water and swallows some.

  “Philippa,” Simon says, crouching next to me, “are you okay?”

  She looks up at him, her eyes still wide, but no longer fearful. “S-Simon,” she rasps. “We have to stop—stop Smith. His spell … is a curse.”

  70

  SIMON

  “Pippa, that’s not true!”

  “It—it is, Jamie! Smith lied to—to you.”

  We’re in the kitchen again. I made them all come upstairs to sort things out. (I hate basements.) Penelope “Light as a feather”-ed the old guy to get him up here, and now she’s tying him to the radiator.

  “You can’t do that,” Jamie says, genuinely distraught. “That’s Smith’s godfather…”

  “We don’t have time—time for this,” Philippa says. Her voice is still scratchy, like her throat isn’t used to managing it, and she trips over every word. She hasn’t calmed down at all since we untied her. She keeps pulling on my sleeve. “We have—We have to st-stop Smith!”

  “We will,” Baz says, standing on her other side. I think he’d give her anything she asked for right now. “Won’t we, Snow?”

  I’m not sure.

  I’d like to believe Philippa …

  No, that’s not true. What I’d like is to know what’s really happening here. Philippa would have us believe that Smith is a villain who tied her up and locked her in a basement. But I’ve tied things up and locked them away before, and I’ve always had a good reason …

  I mean, we’re tying up Smith’s godfather right now. Is he a villain? Rather seems that way—he did have a wand to Baz’s head. But Jamie Salisbury doesn’t think so. He’s been arguing with Philippa since she opened her mouth. (I think Baz is going to smite him if he doesn’t stop.)

  Who’s good, who’s bad—it’s all about which side of the wand you’re standing on. And who you’re trying to protect.

  I push Philippa’s hand off my arm as gently as I can. “The thing is, Philippa—”

  “She goes by Pippa,” Baz interrupts.

  “Right, sorry. The thing is, Pippa, we’ve seen Smith cast the spell. We’ve seen it work.”

  “It worked on me,” Jamie agrees.

  Pippa tries to argue, but nothing comes out for a few seconds. Then her voice kicks in, and she yelps, “—not true, J-Jamie!”

  Penelope is looking between them, her hands on her hips. “Pippa, maybe you could explain what happened, from your point of view.”

  “There isn’t … t-time.”

  “Well, we’re just wasting time, arguing.”

  Baz looks like he might smite Penny, as well. “Lay off, Bunce. She was tied up in a basement.”

  “That’s a good place to start,” Penelope says. “How did you end up in the basement?”

  Pippa holds her throat and swallows. “I—” She swallows again. “I—”

  Shepard reaches out to her. He’s holding a piece of yellow chalk. “Want to try writing it?”

  She looks at his hand for a moment, then grabs the chalk, nodding. She turns to the wall and starts scribbling frantically on the wallpaper, as high up as she can reach.

  I’ve been with Smith from the beginning, she writes.

  We’re all crowded around her, trying to read along. Baz pushes us back—“Give her space”—and starts to read aloud:

  “He said he could bring back my magic … and I believed him … I worked for him … and for Evander … They trusted me.”

  Pippa glances back at us, like she’s making sure that we’re listening. We are. She goes back to writing.

  “But today,” Baz reads out, “Beth … came to see Smith … She was afar—no, afraid … She told him all her spells … have stopped working.”

  “Not Beth,” Jamie cuts in. “She was so happy.”

  Philippa looks at him and nods. “Beth,” she says. “Her magic—” She turns back to the wall, finding more space.

  Baz leans over her shoulder. “Smith told Beth that … she was just tired … That it was temporary … But … when she turned to leave … he cast a spell on her.” Baz shoots a glare at me, like this is my fault somehow.

  “What spell?” I ask.

  Baz looks back at the wall. “‘Put it out of your head.’”

  “No!” Jamie is adamant. “Smith would never!”

  “Yikes,” Penny says. “That’s like shaking up an Etch A Sketch inside someone’s brain.”

  Philippa is still writing.

  “Smith didn’t know … that I was watching … but he’d asked me to bring tea … I was standing…”

  She’s running out of space. She gets on her knees.

  “In the doorway,” Baz reads. “With a tray … I dropped it … Then he cast a spell on me, too … ‘Freeze’ … and called for Evander … to take me away … I couldn’t cry for help.” Baz’s voice cracks. He looks wretched. “Smith told me he couldn’t … have helped me anyway…”

  Philippa is kneeling on the floor, bent over. She’s written herself into the corner.

  “That my voice was gone…” Baz reads. “Forever.”

  “She’s lying,” someone says.

  We all whip around. Smith’s godfather has come to. He’s trying to sit up, but his hands are tied to the bottom of the radiator. Baz points his wand at him.

  “She attacked Smith,” Evander Feverfew says, furious. (He’s an odd-looking duck for an old guy: shoulder-length grey hair, long sideburns, a pierced ear. I’ve seen him helping Smith at meetings. I thought he was a roadie.)

  Pippa’s eyes are wild, and her voice sounds bloody: “Why—Why would I do that?”

  “Because he couldn’t help you, Pippa. You didn’t want anyone to have magic if you couldn’t.”

  “Th-that isn’t—isn’t t-true!”

  Evander looks at me. “She attacked him, and then she threatened to stop today’s meeting! We couldn’t let that happe
n. Smith is going to cure six people today. Six magicians.”

  “He’s going to—to—curse them!”

  “Liar!”

  Baz is still pointing his wand at Smith’s godfather; he looks like he’s got a curse of his own at the tip of his tongue. Penelope looks as confused as I feel. Jamie Salisbury has both of his hands fisted in his hair.

  “Jamie,” I say. “Did Smith fix your magic?”

  “Of course he did!” Evander shouts. “Everyone saw it.”

  “I…” Jamie looks ashamed. “I hardly had any magic to fix.”

  “But Smith cured you,” I say.

  “He did,” Jamie says eagerly. “And then…”

  “He cured you!” Evander strains against the radiator. “First among his followers. It was a tremendous honour.”

  “It’s true.” Jamie nods. “I was the first.”

  “And it worked,” I say. “You can do magic now?”

  “Smith was still developing the spell,” Jamie says earnestly. “He’s already improved it since then.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “It m-means,” Pippa scrapes out, “his magic—his magic faded. Just. Like. Beth’s.”

  Jamie looks embarrassed. He runs a hand through the top of his long hair. “Pippa…”

  “Everyone who—who Smith—cured,” she says, “has stopped c-coming to—to meetings.”

  “Did Smith-Richards take your magic?” Baz demands of Jamie.

  “No!” Evander booms. “He made him a mage for the first time in his magic-forsaken life!”

  “And now?” I ask Jamie. “Can you do magic?”

  He’s pulling his own hair. “It’s complicated. Smith says—”

  “Simon”—Baz squeezes my arm—“we have to stop Smith-Richards. He’s going to cast that spell on Daphne.”

  “And Gloria Brooks,” Pippa says, looking at Jamie. “And Eliza—Eliza Murphy. And Martin B-Bunce. And—”

  71

  SMITH

  It’s better than I hoped—every bench is full.

  I’ve never been in the White Chapel before; I’ve only heard about it from Evander. The windows are disappointing, but the architecture is excellent. I can imagine how I look standing by the altar. I’m wearing white. My followers are fanned out behind me. I’m going to do Daphne first—she’ll cry, but she won’t wreck her face. Daphne has excellent presentation.