by Ksenia Anske
Daniel cut her off. “Pup, if you want to sleep in your clothes, it’s okay. We understand. Dogs do it all the time.”
Gabby silently sizzled.
Daniel paid her no mind. “Panther loves sleeping in his fur, don’t you, buddy?”
Panther stared. It was the first time he was addressed directly in the presence of all the Bloom family members.
“Dad, in case you’ve forgotten, I’m almost thirteen, not five?” said Lilith.
“Ah? Yes, sure, pup. Just an allegory, is all.” He scratched his chin.
A painful second passed.
Lilith worked up the courage to tell her parents everything she learned, yet words deserted her. She chewed on a lock of hair. Daniel nudged his wife. They exchanged an unspoken sentiment, clearly the result of a late night talk about proper parenting techniques.
Gabby hastily recomposed her face. “Lilith, would you like us to put you back to bed?” she said in a small voice.
“Yes. I’d like that, actually. Me and Panther, please.” She climbed under her blankets. The whippet wagged his tail at the prospect of spending yet another night away from Bär and burrowed himself in between pillows.
After exchanging a few intense whispers, both parents sat on either side of the bed and properly tucked their daughter in.
Lilith hugged Panther, feeling his warmth and grinning happily. If this was what it took, she thought, she’d be glad to travel to her grandfather’s mansion and go through the pain of solving his garden’s mystery again and again, as many times as it took, to arrive at this moment. To feel normal, to feel loved and cared for. For a few minutes, they were a real family. Nobody mentioned her sickness, nobody scolded her, and nobody gave her pitiful looks or fed her pills or tried to take away her best friend.
By an unspoken signal, both parents kissed her on either cheek and quietly left the room.
Panther’s nose steadily puffed into her hair. Lilith thought this night deserved to be called the best of her family reunion so far. Exhausted by the investigation and their dreadful discovery, she drifted into a dreamless sleep.
Chapter 20
The Desperate Warning
Incessant cawing of the crows woke them with a start the next morning. Lilith sat up, her head reeling. The house readjusted itself for the morning with one final shake that caused her to fall back into her pillows. She hardly paid it any attention. Panther yawned and crawled deeper under the blankets, slinking by Lilith’s knees to hide beneath her feet.
“No, you’re not. Come on, Ed is waiting. We have one day left, and that’s today,” Lilith said, unceremoniously pulling out her pet by the tail, to his disgruntled protests and an attempted bite.
“Owww!” She blew on her fingers. “You didn’t just do that.”
“Oh, yes, I did. I’m sleeping. I need my thinking sleep for future thinking; otherwise, my thinking will not be thinking but merely ruminating last night’s thoughts that, by this morning, will surely prove to be obsolete. Now, if you don’t mind...” He inched under the covers.
“Panther Bloom Junior. You know I can’t do this alone. You promised.”
“All right. Then I demand steak. You still owe me steak, remember?” he grunted. “And your father has been behaving strangely lately. I’m terribly distressed because of that. Makes me itchy.” He scratched himself.
For a moment, Panther reminded Lilith of her mother before she had her morning coffee. “You’re excruciatingly impossible sometimes. Maybe dad is starting to believe you can talk, did you think about that?” She stroked his ears, irresistibly warm and velvety.
Panther stretched out his neck. “Oh, that’s more like it.”
“My beret! Where did I put it?” Lilith cried suddenly, looking around. An empty blanket and stack of pillows stared at her with the vacant expression of, well, an empty blanket and stack of pillows. “First the red, then the rosy, now the blue. My head has holes in it, I swear.” She jumped out of bed, skidded on the polished floor, and looked underneath. Nothing there, except dust. With shaky hands, she took her bag from the bedpost and emptied its contents. Not there either.
“You and your berets,” Panther yapped. “I thought I suggested you stop wearing them?”
Lilith waved him off and ran to the window, squinting at the flying crows. The weather seemed to be coming from the other side of the garden. Tongues of noxious vapor rolled in, together with the stench unusually sharp in its potency, as if Rosehead’s bad breath curdled overnight, overwhelming the atmosphere with its poisonous reek. Lilith clamped her nose shut and stared at Panther, who licked himself, sneezing occasionally.
“One might think she’s giving birth to moldy cheese,” he snarled.
“Look!” Lilith pointed.
One of the crows broke off from the flock and zoomed to the other side of the garden. An enormous leafy arm snatched it right out of the air, cutting off the squawking.
“Wonder why she wouldn’t eat Bär. What is he, not juicy enough?” Panther grunted. As if the mastiff heard him, he appeared from a garden alley, a taut leash extending from his neck to Gustav’s bony hand. Alfred, however, was absent.
“Where could grandfather be? What do you think he’s doing right now? I’d give anything to know,” Lilith mumbled.
The door opened. Lilith and Panther wheeled around.
Hair pulled back in a bun, Agatha walked in with a tray of breakfast. It filled the room with the delicious smell of freshly made waffles.
Lilith wanted to say good morning, but her tongue got stuck.
“Good morning,” said Agatha tonelessly, her eyes glinting. “Little miss better get ready, before her grandfazer wakes up. She better eat. She haz a long day ahead of her. Ze doctor iz arriving soon.” The housekeeper pressed her lips into a line, indicating that she will say no more. She placed the tray on the bedside table and marched out.
Lilith stared. She was in a stupor that follows particularly vivid dreams, when you see someone you know performing something unimaginable and then see the same person in real life. Agatha’s head floating in mid-air contrasted sharply with Agatha walking on two legs.
Lilith squinted. “You saw her yesterday, right? Her head?”
Panther appeared deaf, devouring finely diced steak that, no doubt, was prepared for him by Monika. Within seconds it was gone, and he licked the bowl, looking up. “Did you say something?”
“I said, did you see Agatha’s head attached to a rose stem yesterday? And Monika’s, and mine, and Daphne’s, and others? I want to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.”
“Of course I did.” Panther eyed the waffles.
“Don’t even think about it.” Lilith seized her breakfast and gave a little cry of triumph. Her blue beret peeked out from under the plate.
“She found it. She brought it back.” Lilith smiled. “The mansion must be on our side, Panther. You think she knows? Think they’re all connected somehow?”
“First, who do you mean by they? And second, whoever they are, what of it? What if they are connected? That doesn’t mean you will suddenly start calling that hideous walking stick of a housekeeper a friend, does it?”
Lilith chewed, thinking. “I never fathomed that such a little dog could harbor such an incredible amount of jealousy.” She burped and wiped her mouth.
“Don’t mind me, of course, I’m just a little dog. But if my opinion matters here at all, I never fathomed that such a little girl—” Panther broke off.
After a mandatory knock, Daniel squeezed inside. His face looked haggard.
“Pup? Done with breakfast? Doctor Baumgartner is here. He’s ready to see you in your grandfather’s study. Your mother—”
The rest Lilith tuned out. She forgot about Ed waiting for them, about Rosehead due to give birth tomorrow, and about the guests being in mortal danger of her carnivorous baby. Grandfather’s study. Two magical words danced in her head, making her tremble with anticipation, eager to see his thinking place.
“...nee
d more time?” Her father’s voice brought her back.
“Yes. No. I mean, yes. I’m ready. Sorry. Just a moment.” She scooped Ed’s map, her journal, a pen, and The Hound of the Baskervilles back into the bag, slung it over her shoulder, stepped into Mary Janes, and donned her blue beret.
“Dad?”
He opened the door. “Yes?”
“I can’t take Panther with me, can I?”
“No, pup.”
“Can I take him out on a walk after I get back?” She bit her lip, willing herself to look guiltless.
“Sure, sure. I’ll come with you, if you don’t mind?”
“No. I don’t mind at all,” Lilith lied. She whispered urgently into Panther’s ear, “I’ll try to be fast. See if you can gather more vital information while I’m gone. We’re leaving to see Ed as soon as I’m back, okay?”
“How do you propose we get rid of him?” Panther waved his noise at Daniel.
Lilith gave Panther a look that meant, we’ll figure it out later, and was off. She hiked behind her dad at a brisk pace, smoothing her skirt and pulling up her knee socks, hopping on one leg, then on the other. She had no reason to give a false impression to this new doctor. Those games didn’t apply anymore. This time she intended to turn the session around, using many of the tricks she learned from Dr. Corby Crawford and her predecessors, to get a positive reevaluation report and to prove her mother wrong.
They passed the second floor and emerged on the third, its flaming intensity making Lilith cringe.
“Stunning. Such a smooth coat, isn’t it?” Daniel mistook her facial expression for awe, absentmindedly descending into dog speak again. “First time I was here, I couldn’t believe it. Every room is painted a different red, for each breed of rose. Isn’t it something? A kennel the size of a room. Wish I could have one for each of my whippets,” he said dreamily.
Their steps echoed dully. They appeared to be alone.
Lilith took a deep breath. It was now or never. “Dad, I wanted to thank you for not asking me to take the pills.”
“Ah? Yes, yes, no worries,” he said vaguely, deep in thought.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Go ahead.”
“Do you mind finishing that story about grandma’s accident, about how she died?”
Daniel stopped. “No...no, not now. We don’t have the time. You feeling okay?”
“Yes, I’m absolutely fine, Dad.”
“Don’t be puppyish with me. Give me an honest answer, will you? If this is too stressful, we don’t have to wait till Sunday. Let’s go to the airport right now, see if we can buy tickets and race home, huh? What do you say?” He passed a hand through his hair. “I don’t care how much it costs, pup, just say the word.”
“No!” Lilith exploded. “No,” she repeated quieter, seeing a look of alarm on his face. “No, really, I’m fine. I’m very much looking forward to meeting Dr. Baumgartner. He might just have a fresh outlook on my problem; exactly what I need right now, a runt of the litter like me,” she said, biting her lip. Instead of warning her father about Rosehead, she kept talking gibberish.
“You’re not a runt of the litter. Never say that.” Her father straightened.
“Dad, I need to tell you something important. Something...” She sighed. “It’s not a secret, okay? You need to tell mom. I ask you to.”
“All right,” Daniel said cautiously. “What is it?”
“Well, you have to promise you’ll believe everything I say.”
“Promise. Out with it, pup.” Daniel eyed his daughter curiously. The walls appeared to be listening in, sparkling crimson.
“Excuse me for saying this. I don’t mean anything bad by it, and I’m not inventing this to somehow make grandfather look bad, okay? I swear.” She clutched her hands. “I’m simply stating a fact. And the fact is something I’ve seen with my very own eyes. Panther saw it too, ask him. And Ed. Ask them both. Actually, Agatha knows about it, and Gustav and Monika.”
“Seen what?”
Lilith took in a lungful of air. “Dad, grandfather is breeding a monster in the garden, a plant-freak. Well, Panther calls her a plant-freak. Anyway, her name is Rosehead.”
The mansion passed a shiver.
“Rosehead?” Daniel repeated.
“Yes. She lives in the garden, on the other side, closer to the forest. She’s almost thirteen feet tall, Dad, and she’s pregnant.” Lilith’s eyes glistened.
Her father rubbed his eyes, then his temples, then his hands, as there was nothing else to rub. “I’m listening.”
Lilith sighed. “Her baby...we don’t know what it is, but we think—me and Panther—well, it’s me, mostly, because Panther doesn’t quite agree with me. Anyway, I think it’s some sort of a plant mutant like her. We need to warn everyone, to get everybody to leave the mansion. She’s giving birth tomorrow. Ed told me—actually, his dad told him before he died—he said that Rosehead sucks people’s blood. I guess that means her newborn will do the same thing?”
Daniel’s face turned ashen. “That’s possible. Anything else?”
Lilith licked her lips. “Yes.”
“I’m here. Keep going.”
“I think that grandfather fed grandmother to Rosehead. The other Rosehead, ten years ago. Or her newborn. It explains why her casket was sealed and why nobody would talk about her accident.” She waited for a reaction.
“What?” Daniel grabbed his head.
“Sorry to say it like this. I didn’t know how else to tell you. Ed, Panther, and I...we plan on talking to Rosehead, to convince her to stop.” She caught her breath, realizing she said too much.
Daniel stretched out his hand to feel her forehead.
Lilith took a step back. “You don’t believe me, do you? You think I’m sick, you and mom both.”
“No-no-no, it’s not like that, it’s...” He fisted his hair. “It’s a very serious accusation you’re making against your grandfather, do you understand? I’m willing to chalk up your stories to imagination, but this...”
“To chalk them up?” asked Lilith quietly.
“Listen, it’s a little overboard, you understand. Nothing personal, pup. Try putting yourself in my shoes for a second.”
“I see,” whispered Lilith.
Daniel shifted uneasily. “Where did you hear about Rosehead, anyway? I looked up the name in the family archives, out of curiosity. It’s Ludwig’s wife’s nickname. Even I didn’t know about it. Did grandfather tell you?”
“I thought of all people, you’d believe me. I’m sorry. I was gravely mistaken.” Lilith hung her head.
“Oh, Lilith. I didn’t mean—”
Footsteps interrupted them.
A jolly middle-aged fellow trotted up the staircase and swaggered toward them, flocks of copper hair bouncing in rhythm.
“Ask Agatha, the housekeeper. She knows. And Gustav. Ask them, ask them!” Lilith whispered urgently.
Her father appeared torn, mulling over the information, tilting his head to the side like a puzzled dog.
“Dad, I’m very much looking forward to my therapy session,” she added in a loud voice.
“Looking forward, eh? Zat iz ze spirit! I love patients like yourself, Liliz Bloom.” The doctor’s shoes clicked on the marble floor, his arms moved as if directed by an unskilled puppeteer, and his belly jiggled. He held a bulging attaché case and snapped his fingers repeatedly. A strong odor of bad coffee and sardines reached Lilith. She stifled a gag, pretending to have hiccupped.
“Dr. Wilhelmus Baumgartner, Psychologischer Psychotherapeut, Kinder- und Jugendlichenpsychotherapeut, Heilpraktiker für Psychologie, Diplom-Psycholog—” the doctor fired off rapidly, shaking Daniel’s hand.
He mumbled something in German.
The doctor turned to Lilith.
She involuntarily took a step back. She’d seen different therapists, some somber, some inquisitive, some pitiful. But she’d never seen anyone as enthusiastic as Dr. Baumgartner.
“I’m a very, very buzy man. My schedule iz packed, it iz packed. I made very special arrangements to be here today, very special. Alfred Bloom iz an old friend. If you don’t mind, I will take over from here, Mr. Bloom. We have a lot to cover in one hour. How very exciting.”
Daniel glanced at his daughter. “You’ll be all right.”
“I’m sure I will,” said Lilith dully.
“I’ll see about your request,” he added quickly, sticking his hands in his pockets and stalking off.
“Oh.” Unable to believe what she just heard, in a kind of delirious glee of hope, Lilith hastened to follow the doctor and climbed up the staircase after him, without noticing her way, until they stood in front of a heavy black door at the very top.
“After you, Liliz.” The doctor motioned her in.
Lilith realized they were inside the mansion tower, on the fourth floor. She halted, stunned by the sight.
Chapter 21
The Fatal Therapy Session
As transparent as the mansion was on its ground floor, decorated with glass and crystal, as white as it was on the second and red on the third, its fourth floor was completely and utterly black. Polished dark stone encased a circular room, about thirty feet in diameter. Illuminated by individual spotlights, golden frames with awards to Bloom & Co. crowded the wall. In the middle of the floor, on top of a furry rug, three leather chairs surrounded a desk with a gilded lamp and an old rotary phone, which explained the mystery of Alfred’s communication with the world. Black curtains draped the windows shut.
Reminded of her first impression about the mansion being a tomb, Lilith took a nervous step forward.
“Here we are, Liliz. How very, very gracious of your grandfazer to let us uze hiz study. Zis iz ze only room where we can have privacy. It iz soundproof,” said Wilhelmus in the cheery way an executioner might boast about his torture chamber. He shut the door.
Lilith’s throat constricted. She wondered if anyone would hear her yell, on the off chance there was a need to. The room pressed down, sending her a signal that she didn’t belong here with her silly blue beret.
