“It was such bullshit,” Isabelle said, “but I wanted to believe it. I didn’t want to remember how I was a disappointment to my father from the time I wasn’t born a boy right up until the day he died. I never did one right thing in my life, so far as he was concerned, and he was always ready to tell me about it. And my mother wouldn’t say a thing. She’d just keep on doing her chores, as though it was normal for a parent to batter down their child’s self-esteem the way he did.”
She picked up the utility knife and began to play with it again, rolling it back and forth on her palm.
“I got tired of being the person who came out of that environment,” she said, “so somewhere along the line I reinvented how it happened, and you know, Kathy was right. Once you do it, once you really believe it, the world is different. All of a sudden you have that much less baggage to drag around with you.
“So at Kathy’s funeral—”
“I really believed that she’d died in the hospital of cancer. I I ... I convinced myself that that was the truth because I couldn’t live with what had really happened. Kathy just couldn’t have killed herself. Not the Kathy I knew.”
“It was a shock to everybody,” Alan said.
“Only because we didn’t know her at all. If she’d shared with us what she wrote in her journal, we’d have known.” She gave Alan a sharp look. “Do you know why she killed herself?”
He shook his head. That question was one of the ghosts haunting him. He’d wrestled with it for years and still couldn’t understand.
“She wanted amnesia,” Isabelle said. “She didn’t want to have to carry around the baggage any longer and killing herself was the only way she could see to accomplish that. I remember she told me that the reason she believed we had to reinvent the world for ourselves was that if we didn’t change the world to suit us, then it would change us to suit it, and she couldn’t bear to be who she thought the world would change her into.”
“I don’t understand,” Marisa said. “Even though she came from such a terrible background, she rose above it. She’s helped so many kids through the
Foundation and touched so many others through her writing. If there’s anyone who left the world a better place than it was when she came into it, it was her.”
Isabelle nodded. “But she was never happy. Her writing and the kids at the Foundation were all she had and I guess one day she realized it wasn’t enough. She gave of herself, she gave until there was nothing left for herself. If you stop letting water into the well, but you keep drawing from it, eventually it’s going to run dry.”
“Jesus,” Alan said softly.
“It’s heartbreaking, isn’t it?” Isabelle said. “And there we were, her best friends in all the world, and we didn’t even see it happening.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this before?” Alan asked.
“I only just found out this morning myself “
She told them then about the letter arriving at her house, the locker key, the security guard who’d held on to the locker’s contents for her for all those years, the journal.
“I didn’t know about Paddyjack and John,” she finished. “Kathy rescued Paddyjack’s painting from the fire, but she kept it instead of giving it back to me. The painting was just sitting there waiting for me with Kathy’s journal. I hadn’t known that John’s painting sur-survived ....” Her eyes welled up with tears again, but this time she kept them in check. “Jilly mentioned seeing—” She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “—seeing John when I was asking her about a place to stay in the city, and then he came to see me at my new studio ....”
“Why would Kathy not have told you about Paddyjack’s painting?” Alan wondered aloud.
Isabelle gave him an anguished look. “I think ... I think she thought I might destroy it.”
“What?”
“Don’t you remember the rumors that went around for a while—that I’d set the fire myself? Kathy didn’t believe them, but according to her journal, she wasn’t ready to entrust Paddyjack’s painting to that belief “
“I have to ask,” Alan said. “Did you set the fire?”
“I ... I don’t know.”
Her reply surprised Alan. He’d been expecting a quick denial. He’d heard the rumors that had circulated back then, but he’d dismissed them immediately. With what he knew now about Isabelle’s art, about the numena, when he could see how dedicated she was to their safety and survival, he couldn’t imagine her having played any part in the destruction of so many.
“Rushkin spiked the punch that night,” Isabelle said. “With acid—remember?”
Alan nodded. “Yes, but—”
“I had a couple of glasses of it,” Isabelle said. “I started tripping very seriously and then everything went black. I remember passing out in the farmyard—out by one of the old barns. When I came to in the morning, I was on the far side of the island, my clothes and hands and arms and face all covered in soot.”
Cosette was staring at Isabelle in horror.
“So what are you saying?” Alan asked. “That you did set the fire?”
Isabelle shook her head. “I’m saying I really don’t know. Rushkin told me, just before the acid kicked in, that he could make me destroy all the paintings. He put a box of matches in my hand. Then I was gone. I remember having what
I thought was a dream. I remember seeing them burn, all those lovely, innocent creatures. I remember holding them in my arms as they died. But when I woke, I was a long way from the farmyard.”
She paused for a moment, then added, “Rushkin said I did it.”
“From all I’ve heard about him,” Marisa said, “I don’t think you should be taking his word as gospel.”
“He doesn’t lie about everything. He didn’t lie about the numena and how I could bring them across.”
“No, he only lies when it suits him. I know too many people like that.” Alan nodded in agreement.
“But if she did do it .....Cosette said in a soft, strained voice.
Isabelle gave the wild girl an unhappy look. “It makes me as much of a monster as him. John was right. He told me from the first. I should never have brought anyone across. All I’ve done is cause them terrible pain.”
“My god,” Marisa said suddenly. “Those two creatures of Rushkin’s. They’re going back to the Foundation for the paintings.”
“And to hurt Rolanda,” Alan added. He looked at Cosette. “You’ve got to go back. You have to warn her and hide the paintings of you and your friend.” But Cosette shook her head. “I won’t go.”
“What?”
Cosette stood up and folded her arms, looking down at the three of them. “You can’t make me do it.”
“But why won’t you go?” Marisa asked.
Cosette pointed a finger at Isabelle. “Because she’s going to free her red crow and I have to see it fly. I have to see, I have to know what she has that I don’t. Why she can dream and bring us across, but I can’t.”
Marisa and Alan looked at Isabelle in confusion.
“Do you know what she’s talking about?” Alan asked.
Isabelle nodded slowly. “I’ve thought and I’ve thought about it,” she said in that same strained flat voice she’d been using all along. “I can’t kill Rushkin in cold blood, and I don’t know if I have the strength to stand up to him anymore. He wants me to paint more numena for him to feed on.”
“Christ, if you’re worrying about Kathy’s collection,” Alan said, “don’t even think about it.”
“It’s not that. Rushkin said he’ll have his numena kill my friends if I don’t paint for him.”
“So we’ll have to figure out a way to—”
Isabelle cut him off. “No, there’s no more thinking to do. There’s only one way I can make sure that he can’t use me anymore.” She picked up the utility knife again, this time sliding the blade out. “I have to follow Kathy’s lead one last time.”
“Now, hold on there,” Alan said.
&n
bsp; He started to reach for the knife to take it from her, but she swept it back and forth in front of her, making him back away.
“This is totally stupid,” he argued with her.
“No, this is the only option I’ve got left. I can’t kill another person in cold blood—not even a monster like Rushkin—but I can’t let this go on anymore.”
“You see?” Cosette said. “She has to do it and I have to watch.”
Marisa just looked at her. “How can you be so cold-blooded?”
“I don’t have any blood at all,” Cosette replied. “I don’t have a red crow beating its wings in my chest. When we die, we become nothing. We’re not the same as you. When you die, the red crow flies away and you’re supposed to live somewhere else. I want to follow it. I want it to show me how we can be real, too.”
“I told you before,” Isabelle said, “a long time ago. You are real.”
Cosette shook her head. “I’ve no dreams and no blood and because of that I can’t be like you. I can’t reach into the before and bring more of us across. So how can you say I’m real?”
“Because all it takes for you to be real is for me to give you a piece of myself,” Isabelle said. “John explained it to me.”
At the mention of John, Cosette seemed more willing to listen. “So when will you give me something?” she asked.
“I already have.”
“No,” Cosette said. “I don’t have anything of yours. I’d know if I did.”
“You have my love—that’s what I gave you when I brought you across.”
“But the dreams ... and the red crow ...”
Isabelle sighed. “I said you were real. That doesn’t make you the same as me.” She shook her head.
“Why would you even want to be like me?”
“Because of your magic. Because of the way you can make something out of nothing and then bring us across.” Cosette pointed to the unfinished canvas that stood on the easel. “I can feel her stirring already, you know. Somewhere in the before she’s leaving the stories and getting ready to come here.”
“You’ll have to learn your own magic,” Isabelle said. “And if you don’t go rescue your painting, you won’t survive long enough to do so.”
“But—”
“If you don’t care about yourself or your friend in the other painting,” Alan said, “then at least think of Rolanda.”
“She is nice,” Cosette said, wavering.
“Do you want her to be hurt, when you could have saved her?”
Cosette looked from Alan to Isabelle. Her gaze focused on the utility knife in Isabelle’s hand, the shining length of razor-sharp blade that protruded from one end. Cosette put a hand to her chest, palm flat between her small breasts, and a look of sadness came over her. Alan couldn’t tell if it was for Isabelle, or for herself; for the red crow that Isabelle would be loosing, or for the one she herself didn’t have. Then she blinked out of existence, leaving behind her only the sound of displaced air that rushed to fil the spot where she’d been standing.
Beside him, Marisa shivered and took his hand. Alan knew just how she was feeling. It was one thing to talk about magic being real, but something entirely unsettling about experiencing it firsthand.
“I’m sorry you have to be here to see this,” Isabelle said.
Alan watched her stand up and back away from them.
“We won’t let you die,” he said. “If you cut yourself, I’ll stanch the wound.” He stood up himself:
“Hell, I’ll make you cut me first.”
“Don’t make this harder than it is. It’s already taking all the courage I’ve got.”
“What would Kathy think?” Alan tried.
“I don’t care!” Isabelle cried. The flatness left her voice and Alan could hear the utter despair that was driving her. “We always thought she was so brave and true, that she was so strong. Well, we were wrong, weren’t we? Maybe we could have saved her, if we’d known, but it doesn’t matter anymore. I’m not doing this for Kathy. I’m not doing this because I want to. I’m doing this because it’s the only way I can stop Rushkin from hurting my friends. I won’t make more numena for him, but I won’t let him take away anything else I love.”
“And when he finds someone else to make numena for him?” Alan asked. “What changes?”
Isabelle shook her head. “Do you think he’d be risking what he is, if he could find someone else? His last student killed herself because she realized the truth: that’s the only way to get out of his clutches. I don’t think there is anybody else. And even if there is, I doubt he’s strong enough to live through the time it’d take to train them.”
“Unless he feeds on whatever numena of yours that are still around. Paddyjack and Cosette. The painting of Annie Nin that I’ve got. The reading woman at the Foundation.”
Isabelle nodded. “I guess it’ll have to be up to you to protect them,” she said, lifting the blade of the utility knife to her throat.
Marisa turned her face away, unable to look. At her side, Alan made an inarticulate sound and lunged forward. He knew he couldn’t possibly reach her in time, but he had to try.
IX
A few rooms away, Rushkin sat on his pallet, back against the wall, oblivious of the drama taking place in the makeshift studio down the hall. He still held the knife he’d used to destroy The Spirit Is Strong, gently thumbing its edge as he looked across the room. Finally consuming the obstinate John Sweetgrass had been far less satisfying than he’d imagined it would be. He was stronger now, much stronger than he’d been for weeks, but the gnawing hunger continued to eat away inside him, unappeasable.
He remembered when Bitterweed had first brought the painting to him, how angry he’d been at the numena’s stupidity until he’d felt the unmistakable aura of the otherworld rising up from under the paint Barbara Nichols had used to cover Isabelle’s original painting. He’d picked away at a corner of the canvas, working at the dried oil paint with his thumbnail. The garish top layer had come off in small flakes under his effort, revealing the richer tones of Isabelle’s oils hidden under it.
That had been clever of Sweetgrass, but not clever enough. Did Sweetgrass think that he hadn’t kept tabs on him, that he hadn’t been aware of the friendship that had developed between Isabelle’s first fully-realized numena and his own erstwhile student? Who better to guard the painting for Sweetgrass than lovely Barbara with her quick tongue and a temper to match Rushkin’s own? Rushkin hadn’t expected The Spirit Is Strong to be hidden under another painting, but that had been the only surprise.
That, he amended, and the singular lack of substance he’d acquired upon consuming the numena.
Perhaps it had something to do with Barbara’s having covered Isabelle’s original under her own work.
The additional layer of paint could well have worked subtle changes in the properties of the original.
Although Barbara hadn’t stayed with him long enough to fully learn the craft of bringing numena across, there were still traces of enchantment in her work—enough to create some slight imbalance.
A pity about Barbara, he thought. She’d been so promising. Much more talented than poor Giselle.
Perhaps more talented than Isabelle as well, though it was hard to tell. She hadn’t been with him long enough. She’d certainly been more volatile. Not at all like poor innocent and trusting Isabelle. He smiled, thinking of Isabelle. Even now, even after all that he’d done to her, she couldn’t sift fact from fiction. As though she would ever have set the fire that consumed her farmhouse and all her numena. As if it could have been any other hand but his own that had struck the match, just as he’d had to do a few years later in Paris with Giselle’s studio.
Rushkin held up his hand and studied the way light played along the edge of the knife he held. He regarded it for a long moment, then leaned over the side of the pallet and tossed the knife on the floor where it landed beside Bitterweed and Scara’s gateway paintings.
A shame y
ou couldn’t feed on your own, he thought. It would make life so much simpler.
He stretched out on the pallet and put his hands behind his head. Staring up at the cracked and water-stained ceiling, he tried to ignore the hungry gnawing in his belly by imagining how Isabelle would finish the painting he’d glimpsed on her easel. It was such an interesting choice of a palette. He could almost taste the sweet angel it would bring across from the Garden of the Muses.
Poor Isabelle. She imagined her subject as an angel of vengeance, a stern-faced, winged Amazon who would leap the bridge between the worlds, redressing wrongs with the edge of her bright sword.
But numena were really only sustenance, nothing more. In this he hadn’t lied: it took a piece of the soul of their maker to make numena equal to humans and who would be fool enough to do such a thing? Let the creatures run one’s errands. Let them remain food. Anything else led only to needless complications.
That was something that Isabelle hadn’t stayed with him long enough to learn. Undoubtedly it had been for the best. Had she stayed, she would have continued to grow stronger and one day she might have tried to wrest control from him—as he had wrested control in his time.
His smile deepened and a dreamy look came over his features. Now, that had been a bloody night.
He had bathed in the hot crimson gushing from the man’s throat, astonished at how much blood one human body held. He’d been so strong in those days—even without the sustenance stolen from another’s numena.
He would be that strong again.
X
A sudden relief flooded Rolanda when she realized that the rapping she heard was coming from inside the storeroom where she’d locked away the paintings for safekeeping. Not bothering to put the baseball bat down, she hurried to the door, disengaged the lock with the key from her pocket and flung the door open.
“Cosette,” she cried. “God, am I happy to ...”
Her voice trailed off and she backed away as a tall, red-haired woman walked out of the storeroom.
The stranger was oddly familiar, but Rolanda couldn’t immediately place where she knew her from. She seemed to be in her early thirties and stood a few inches taller than Rolanda. She had a striking figure and carried herself with a stately grace. Her solemn grey eyes were the same color of the calf-length gown she wore over a rust underskirt.
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