by Lena Coakley
Maria pushed herself off the bed and into a standing position. “Get my frock and pinny, dear. And a hairbrush, if you please.”
Charlotte wrinkled her nose. Her sister smelled both rotten and sweet, like bad fruit—but it was too much trouble to get her to wash, and by now the water in the basins would have been used by countless other girls. She opened the box at the foot of the bed where Maria kept her few belongings, pulling out a purple stuff frock, a white pinafore, and Maria’s underthings.
She tried to hand them to her sister, but Maria wouldn’t take them and didn’t seem to see. There was something wrong with her balance; she seemed to sway like a sapling in a wind.
“For heaven’s sake,” Charlotte said, practically frantic now. “Will I have to dress you?”
And then Maria coughed.
It was a horrible, painful cough that seemed to rattle up from hell, shaking Maria’s whole body. It didn’t seem to end.
“Oh,” Charlotte said.
Her sister doubled over, holding onto the edge of the bed to keep from falling, coughing and coughing. Charlotte could see the bumps of her bony spine poking through her shift. How thin she had become—a skeleton.
“Maria,” Charlotte whispered. “There’s blood on the sheet. You coughed blood.”
Maria stared at the stain but didn’t seem to see it.
“We must write to Papa.”
“It’s only a cold,” Maria said, straightening slowly. “And this is the only school Papa can afford. We must be educated.”
“If our father knew what it was like here, perhaps he’d say it was better to be stupid.”
“No,” Maria said. “This is the trial that God has given us. Besides”—she lowered her voice—“if we did write, I think they would only confiscate our letters.”
“Brontë!” said a sharp voice from the doorway. “Late again, I see.”
It would be Miss Andrews, Charlotte thought. She was by far the most heartless teacher at Clergy Daughters’.
“Forgive me, Miss,” Maria said. “I’m getting ready now.”
Charlotte quickly pushed the purple frock over Maria’s head, not bothering to remove her night shift, then she fetched the hairbrush. Maria stood docilely, allowing Charlotte to tidy her hair as if she were a little child.
“I see the Duchess has found a servant to dress her,” Miss Andrews said. Charlotte noticed she was carrying the birch rod she often used to discipline her students.
“Please, Miss!” Charlotte said. “My sister couldn’t help being late. She is very ill.”
“We struggle through adversity here,” Miss Andrews said. “We do not cow to it. Please stand in the center of the room, Brontë.”
“No!” Charlotte cried. “Tell her, Maria.” But Maria had pushed herself off the bed and was shuffling to the middle of the room.
“Charlotte! Come away.” Her sister Elizabeth beckoned from the door. “Come! There’s nothing we can do.” Little Emily was beside her, looking blankly at the window, as if there were something far more interesting outside.
Maria bent down into a low crouch, her back to Miss Andrews.
“Oh, Elizabeth! It’s wrong!” Charlotte said. She desperately wanted to throw herself at the teacher, but she was too afraid of being beaten herself.
“Come to breakfast, Charlotte.”
Charlotte backed toward her sisters, turning her face away as the first blow fell across Maria’s back. Emily showed no reaction. Charlotte envied that. She wished she could simply depart, cut whatever fine string held her to reality and get lost in a dream that way.
The sound of another blow made her wince. Elizabeth put a hand on Charlotte’s arm to lead them away, but as they went through the door, Charlotte heard a sound that was even worse than the smack, smack of the rod. Someone was laughing.
She wheeled around, enraged at Miss Andrews, but it wasn’t she.
It was Maria, who held her sides and emitted a low, slow “ha . . . ha . . . ha,” so divorced from any merriment that it could hardly be called laughing at all.
There was something awful in the sound. It was broken and hysterical. There was no hope in it. Charlotte turned away quickly, already telling herself that what she had heard could not have been real. She’d imagined it. Maria hadn’t laughed. Who could laugh at such a moment?
On the stairway, students either smirked or gave them looks of sympathy, but no one spoke to them as they passed. The unfortunate Brontë family was a target of too much attention from Miss Andrews, and no one dared to be their friend. Elizabeth wiped away a tear. She’d been so pretty a few months ago, as pretty as Emily, but now she looked pinched and tired. Her cheeks were very pink, too, Charlotte noticed, but underneath, the skin was papery, stretched too tight over the bones of her face.
Charlotte felt her heart skip a beat. “Lizzy,” she asked softly. “Are you ill, too?”
“Charlotte!” someone said in her ear. “Charlotte, can you hear me?”
And then Charlotte found herself alone. She had reached the bottom of the stairs and should have been at the entrance to the dining hall, but instead of tables, she saw a long, gray room with neatly made beds lining the walls. It was the dormitory, and her sister Maria was sleeping late again.
“Maria,” she cried, running over. “Maria, get up!”
With difficulty, Charlotte’s older sister raised herself to a sitting position. “Hello, dear one. Is it morning?”
“You know it is, Maria. All three bells have gone . . .” Charlotte frowned. Had she said that before? “You . . . you must get dressed.”
Maria lay back down. “Tell Miss Evans that I am ill. She is kind. She will understand.”
“I can’t believe how . . . how selfish . . .” Charlotte couldn’t go on. Her sister wasn’t selfish; she was ill. In a week she would be sent home. Not long after, she would be dead. “Oh, Maria.” She caressed her sister’s cheek, felt how hot it was. If only she had felt it then. But wait. What was then and what was now?
“Charlotte!” someone called. “Listen to my voice!” She turned but could see no one.
Maria raised herself with difficulty. “Hush. I’m getting up. See?” She sat perched on the edge of the bed, breathing heavily. “And you will have my porridge this morning. If you share it with Emily.”
“Don’t,” Charlotte pleaded. “Stay in bed. You must rest—you must!” She cast her gaze around the room, looking for help, and was surprised to find that she wasn’t alone. A dim figure stood watching from the foot of the bed.
“Branwell?” she asked, squinting.
The figure became clearer, resolving itself into a boy. It was him. For a single moment, all Charlotte felt was delight. Her brother had come. He was going to save them all. And then another feeling overtook her gladness like a tidal wave overtaking a tiny ship. Anger.
“You can see me?” Branwell said. He ran to her, his face wet with tears.
“What are you doing here?” she asked coldly. She began to fully realize where she was—in Verdopolis still, beyond the door that Zamorna pushed her into. She had lost herself. “You were never at Clergy Daughters’ School. This isn’t the worst place you can imagine.”
He wiped his eyes. “Isn’t it?” His words were choked with feeling, but Charlotte remained unmoved.
She looked down at her frock and pinafore and tightened her fists, willing her clothes and body to change back to their true form. She stayed the same. If there was any body she hated worse than her own, it was this one. Her younger body. Her hungry body.
“How long have we been here?” she asked. “How many times have I replayed this scene?”
“Five? Six, perhaps? I don’t know.”
“And you were watching all along?”
“I tried to shake you,” he insisted. “I tried to pull the stick out of that woman’s hand, but there was nothing . . . I even tried to shield Maria with my own body, but the stick seemed to go right through me, and she was beaten just the same, every time.”
Maria was standing now and began to cough. They both winced and stepped away. Branwell put his hands over his ears. “I couldn’t do anything. I can’t do anything. It just goes on and on. How can we stop it?”
“We, we, we,” Charlotte said. “There is no we. Must you even steal my nightmares? You never saw any of this. You never saw Maria sicken, get worse every day . . .”
“I saw her when she came home!” Branwell said. “I saw her die. I saw them both die.” He took a deep, gulping breath. “It was awful for both of us. Why are you so angry with me?”
“This is the trial that God has given us,” Maria murmured.
The rage inside Charlotte crested to a peak. “I’m angry because Papa and Aunt Branwell never would have sent you here,” she shouted. “Not to a charity school. Not the precious boy.”
“I know that,” Branwell said, his voice ragged. “I’ve always known that. Don’t you think that might be hard to live with?”
Charlotte pressed her lips together, moved in spite of herself by the pain on her brother’s face.
“This is the place where my sisters went and came back to die. I don’t have to have been here for it to be the worst place I can imagine,” he said.
“Brontë! Late again, I see.”
Charlotte and Branwell both turned to glare at the figure in the doorway.
“Forgive me, Miss,” Maria said. “I’m getting ready now.”
“I can’t bear to see her beaten again,” Branwell said. “I can’t bear to hear that laugh.”
“I know, I know, but how can we stop it? This has already happened.” She went to help Maria, who was struggling with her frock. “Look at her. She’s so young. We had an eleven-year-old for a mother.”
“We struggle through adversity here. We do not cow to it. Please stand in the center of the room, Brontë.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Charlotte cried at Miss Andrews. “We were children! You were meant to protect us!”
“Charlotte! Come away,” said Elizabeth from the door.
Charlotte’s eyes fell on the little girl beside her. “Emily?” Was that her, the real Emily, trapped here just as she and Branwell were? It must be. Charlotte came forward cautiously, as if approaching something wild. “Come back now, Emily,” she whispered. “We need you.”
Emily’s mouth was open slightly, and Charlotte could see she had a tooth out. At six, she’d been among the youngest girls at Clergy Daughters’. Charlotte had always believed that she’d been spoiled at school, that she hadn’t struggled the way Charlotte had, but this was contradicted by the thinness of her arms and the dullness of her eyes.
“Emily, can you hear me?” Charlotte said. Her sister’s gaze was locked on the little square of window. “What are you thinking about, my dear?”
Emily turned away from her daydream, slow as a diver coming up from great depths. She blinked. For a moment Charlotte thought she hadn’t heard, but then she said, “I’m thinking that if we only had a rabid dog for a pet, we could make him come and . . . and tear out Miss Andrews’s eyes!”
“Oh.”
“Charlotte!” Branwell called.
Maria had gone to the middle of the room and was bending down for her beating. Branwell was beside her with his arms around her. Miss Andrews lifted her cane.
“Stop!” Charlotte shouted. “This all happened long ago, and my sisters are dead.”
The scene stopped. The pair were frozen, Miss Andrews’s stick arrested just before it came down. Charlotte circled them—her sister cowering, Miss Andrews with a cruel smile upon her face. Branwell had his eyes squeezed shut, but he opened them when Charlotte put a hand upon his shoulder.
“Help me,” she said. “I’m not tall enough.”
At her direction, Branwell reached up, took the birch rod out of Miss Andrews’s hands, and handed it to Charlotte.
She broke it with a snap across her knee.
ANNE
NO ONE HAD SEEN ANNE YET. SHE WAS SITTING on one of the low beds, hands folded in her lap. She had not attended the Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge—she’d been too young—but she was surprised by how well the scene before her matched the picture in her mind. Bare walls. A dingy sky seen through a tiny window. And so cold. No one seemed to be dressed for the temperature—not her siblings, who were their proper selves again, and not the teacher, who stood like a statue in the center of the room, empty hands lifted above her head, a motionless child hunched before her.
Tentatively, Charlotte held out her hand, palm up. Nothing happened.
“Blast,” said Branwell.
“You might have power over the story again,” Anne said, “but he controls the doors.”
Her siblings turned as one. She wished she couldn’t read their faces so well, because the emotions that flickered across them—anger, sorrow, disbelief—threatened to make her lose her nerve.
I must wear a mask, she thought, a mask of someone who is capable of saying what needs to be said.
“Yes, I am here,” she said curtly. “I had to come.”
Charlotte crossed to her. “You made a bargain? How foolish! Now you are trapped just as we are.”
“But why are you trapped, Charlotte?” Anne asked. She looked from one sibling to another in turn as they drew around her. “Think, all of you. If you are unable to cross back home, then Old Tom doesn’t get his payment, so why hasn’t he made a door for you?”
Charlotte hesitated. Emily and Branwell shared a puzzled glance.
“He wants more,” Charlotte said finally. “He wants a higher price.”
Anne nodded. “I think he’s worried that we’ll never come again, so he’s going to try to get all he can.” She looked calmly into her elder sister’s gray eyes. “Is it your intention to come again?” She didn’t like the answer she saw.
“I must summon him,” Charlotte said, ignoring the question and holding out her hand, “if I’m able. I must offer him something—”
“Don’t!” said Anne. She leapt up and grasped her sister’s hand. “Before we face him, we must be ready. Charlotte, listen to me very carefully. We must never come back here. We must arrange it so we never have to cross again.”
Charlotte shook her head. “It’s impossible now. I failed. I couldn’t kill them.”
“It’s not impossible!” Anne said, her voice raising in pitch. “It can’t be.”
“They’ll haunt us—” Emily began.
“Stop!” Anne shouted. “Listen to me, all of you. There are things you need to hear.” Braver, better Anne, she reminded herself. “And our allies need to hear them, too.”
“Our allies?” Branwell asked.
“We’ll need help if we’re to face Old Tom.” Before they could question her further, she cleared her throat and said:
“Alexander Rogue, Earl of Northangerland, and Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Zamorna, fearing the end of Verdopolis, the Glasstown Confederacy, and the world, began to waver in their decision to dispatch the Genii. They resolved to rescue their makers from whatever terrible fate had befallen them, and so, full of apprehension, entered the mysterious door.”
Anne’s three siblings stared at her, then slowly turned their heads toward the narrow hallway, where two figures were indeed approaching. Zamorna cast his eyes about in wonder as he entered the room.
“It’s uncanny, I’ll give you that,” Rogue said, giving Miss Andrews a poke. “But is this the worst you can imagine? I thought we were sending you to the pits of hell.” He rubbed his hands together. “Too cold for that, though.”
“The pits of hell?” Emily said sharply. “And it took you this long to come for me?” Anne noticed that although she was now wearing her Haworth dress, Emily’s hair was still in braided loops and scarlet bows.
Rogue drew himself up. “I’m not the rescuing sort.”
“I don’t understand,” Zamorna said. “I see Thornton and my two cousins—whom I’ve been led to believe are Genii—but where is my brother, Charle
s?”
“I am the fourth Genius,” Charlotte said, meeting his eye.
Zamorna gave a start of recognition. “But I know you,” he said, taking a step closer. “I’ve imagined you.” For a moment they held each other’s gaze. A blush rose up Charlotte’s neck.
“Take care,” Rogue said, laying a hand on his arm. “Remember who they are.”
“Yes.” Zamorna’s look hardened to a scowl, and Charlotte cast her eyes to the floor. “We may have come to save you, Genii, but you are not forgiven. Look at me still stained with my wife’s blood. I cannot forget . . .” He stopped. His eyes had fallen on the still figure of Maria. “What is this?” He circled the strange tableau. “Is it Mary Henrietta I see? Is she a child?” His voice turned angry. “Who is this woman who threatens her?”
“Calm yourself,” Charlotte said. “She is . . . a villain from another story.”
Zamorna shook his head, still frowning at Miss Andrews. “When I crossed that threshold, I imagined many villains to vanquish, many trials to overcome, but this one poses no threat.”
“No,” said Charlotte. “Not anymore.”
Anne gave a cough. “The two of you might help us in another way.” All eyes turned to her again, and she fought to control her nerves. “That’s why I’ve called you here.” She moved back to one of the beds and sat down. “Rogue, if you will.” She gestured to the bed opposite, inviting him to sit also.
You’re doing well, she told herself. Your mask is holding. Brisk, competent Anne.
Rogue sat, the bed creaking. “You’ve called me, have you?” He didn’t seem to like the suggestion that his presence here wasn’t entirely his own idea.
Emily, Branwell, and Zamorna gathered around, while Charlotte perched next to Anne. The weight of all their attention made her courage flag. She looked up at Rogue, but she realized it was no longer easier to speak to him or to Zamorna than it was to speak to anyone else. They were real people to her now.
