Eternal

by Gillian Shields

  “So what went on last night that was so terrible?” I asked.

  Sophie groaned and blew her nose. “It was so awful. Velvet was going on and on yesterday about some weird idea about greeting the May, you know, because it was going to be the first day of May today. She wanted us all to meet her in the ruins at midnight to have some kind of dumb ritual for Bel—Bel something.”

  “Beltane. It’s an ancient celebration,” said Evie.

  “Yeah, that was it. But I was fed up with getting out of bed in the middle of the night—she’s dragged us out three times now, and it just makes me so worried about being caught. So I told her that May Day is about getting up early and washing your face in the dew and skipping about with flowers in your hair, not creeping around in the middle of the night, but she didn’t listen. She laughed at me for being scared, and the others laughed too, so I had to go along with it. But I wish I hadn’t.”

  “So what actually happened?” I asked, beginning to feel impatient with Sophie’s rambling story. It seemed to be nothing more than Velvet showing off and fooling about.

  “Promise not to tell anyone else?” she asked.

  “Okay, I promise,” I said. “Just tell us.”

  Sophie shuddered. “We all crept down to the ruins just before midnight, like Velvet had told us—me and Annabelle and Julia and the others. Velvet had got all these candles and stuff that she had taken from the cupboard in the dining hall. We all had to hold a candle and act in her horrible ceremony. I was cold, and I just wanted to get it over with, but Velvet was really into it. She had got dressed up in these black clothes and weird makeup, and she made us parade around the altar chanting, ‘We call the spirits of the dead, we call the spirits of the dead. . . .’ Over and over again like that. Annabelle was giggling like anything, but it made me feel scared. I couldn’t help thinking about Laura and how she’d been found dead in the lake, just a few yards from the ruins, and how the place had once been a church. It seemed wrong, you know, sacrilegious. But Velvet wouldn’t stop. She kept going on, calling out for the spirits of the dead.”

  Sophie looked nervously across to the girls in the corner, leaned closer to us, and whispered, “Then it got worse. Velvet seemed to get serious, sort of desperate. She said we had to perform a ‘Rite of Freedom,’ to get her out of Wyldcliffe. She made a circle in the ground with a knife, slashing at the earth, and said we had to stand in the circle and make vows of freedom. I didn’t want to, but she made us.”

  “Why didn’t you just leave?” asked Evie.

  “I don’t know, I don’t know. I was frightened to stay and frightened to go. And then Velvet brought out a bottle of wine she had stolen from the kitchens and we had to drink it in turns and say, ‘This is the blood of my enemies—the blood of my mother. I renounce her. I am now the daughter of the night.’ I know it was stupid, really, but you can’t imagine how freaky Velvet looked, saying all that stuff. And then she poured some wine on the ground and said it was an offering to the spirits of the dead.

  “Velvet started to dance and writhe about, pretending to be, I don’t know, possessed or something, and she said, ‘With this blade and this wine I release every prisoner, every trapped animal, and every fettered spirit. I claim freedom for myself and everything around me.’ And the others were holding hands in a circle and chanting, ‘Freedom, freedom,’ and laughing like it was just a big joke.

  “But after that—I don’t know whether it was the wine we had drunk, but something happened.” Sophie paused and seemed to sink into herself, remembering. “Velvet went all—all weird, but perhaps she was just playacting. I don’t know, but anyway she terrified me. She stood as stiff as a scarecrow and said, ‘We take our freedom. We are the spirits of the dead. We are the Priestess.’”

  “We are the Priestess?” Evie and I looked at each other in alarm.

  “Yes, and Annabelle said, ‘That’s very funny, Velvet, you can stop now.’ But Velvet just stared at us with these huge demented eyes and said it again and again: ‘We are the Priestess, we are the Priestess, prepare for the end. . . .’ And it was so real, like she really believed it. The next moment there was this great crash, and I nearly screamed. A massive stone had fallen from the ruins onto the grass. If it had hit any of the girls, they would have been dead.

  “I’d really had enough, and besides I was sure we would have woken the whole school by now. So I pulled away from the circle, and then Velvet snapped out of it and was herself again, just laughing and showing off and drinking more wine. I didn’t want to stay a minute longer, though, so I ran back to the school and flew up the stairs to the dorm. Thank goodness I didn’t see any of the mistresses, but I had this awful feeling I was being watched the whole way. I was sure I was going to be caught. I felt terrible when I woke up.” She sniffed. “Then all this horrible business about Helen. And I thought the summer term was going to be so nice.”

  We sat in silence for a moment, then Sophie asked timidly, “Do you think we’ll get into trouble about that chunk that broke off the ruins? Aren’t they worth millions?”

  “I don’t see how anyone will trace the damage back to you, Sophie,” I reassured her. “It was probably just ready to fall after all those years, nothing to do with Velvet.”

  “I don’t know,” said Sophie uneasily. “She says she can make things happen, and maybe it’s true.”

  “What kind of things?”

  “She told us this morning that she had made that stone fall on purpose. And—and that she could make me throw myself in the lake if she wanted me to.”

  “Of course she can’t.”

  “But she was there when Helen fell! I didn’t tell Miss Hetherington, because I was scared to say anything. But I swear Velvet was there, looking out of the window, when I found Helen. She stared down at me and put her finger on her lips as if she was warning me . . . oh God, I wish she would get expelled and go away!” Sophie sniffed again and wiped her eyes, then looked at her watch. “I’m so tired. I’m going to bed early. The nurse said I need to rest and was excused evening prayers. You promise not to tell anyone what I told you?”

  “Of course,” we both said, and watched her leave. My heart felt as cold as a stone. “The Priestess—that’s what Helen talked about too,” I whispered. “It must be Mrs. Hartle’s spirit manifesting itself.”

  “So it was Velvet who broke our protective seal and awakened her!” Evie groaned. “And then Mrs. Hartle was free to attack Helen. How could Velvet have been so reckless and stupid?”

  “I don’t suppose Velvet really knew what she was doing. She probably thought it was a laugh, a silly game.”

  “Some game,” said Evie grimly. “If Velvet wants to dabble in the unknown realms, she might cause all sorts of damage.”

  “But do you really think she has any actual power? Isn’t it just talk to make herself important and scare people like Sophie?”

  Evie threw herself back in her chair and closed her eyes for a moment, trying to think. Then she sat up. “I remember Helen saying something once, Sarah, right at the beginning of all this. Something about everyone having a voice inside them, telling them the story of their own power, and that you can reach that power if you bother to find out how. Why would we be the only ones to unlock that part of ourselves? Why shouldn’t Velvet be alive to her own potential, even if she doesn’t exactly know what she’s doing?”

  “And those stories of what happened at her last school . . . that girl being caught in the fire . . .”

  “Should we go and talk to her?” Evie asked. “Confront her?”

  I shook my head slowly. “No . . . no, I don’t think so. If it was only a fluke, there’s no point, and if she is onto something—if she is stirring something up, it might be best to keep out of her way. She’s done enough already. Let’s pray that it was just Sophie getting scared.” But somehow, I didn’t really believe that. I looked at Evie and saw my own fear reflected in her face. “Oh, Evie, how are we going to get through all this?”

&nbs
p; She laid her hand on mine. “We’ll get through, if you guide us. S for Sarah, remember? Tell me what to do.”

  I took a deep breath. “The first thing is to find Miss Scratton. We need our Guardian now. We can’t wait any longer.”

  Leaving the crimson common room and its murmur of voices and music, we walked down the silent corridor as quickly as we could. Soon we reached the High Mistress’s study. As I raised my hand to knock on the door, I heard the sound of furniture being dragged around. I glanced at Evie in alarm, then tapped loudly on the door. It was flung open by Miss Dalrymple. For once she wasn’t smiling.

  “What do you want?” she said abruptly. “It’s late. You should be getting ready for prayers.”

  “Um . . .” I took a risk. “Miss Hetherington asked us to . . . to give the High Mistress a message.”

  “The High Mistress cannot be contacted with any messages tonight.” A cold smile spread across Miss Dalrymple’s flushed, plump face. “Or for many nights to come.”

  “Why not?” Evie demanded.

  “A little accident has occurred on the way back from St. Martin’s. But I wouldn’t worry about it if I were you. You’re in safe hands.” Her blank, toadlike eyes held a threat as she stepped nearer to us. I could smell the sickly perfume she used and see the powder on her mottled cheeks. Over her shoulder I saw that she had been ransacking the study. Books and papers were strewn all over the floor. What had she been searching for? “And I hear that poor Helen has had a mishap too,” Miss Dalrymple went on. “You must be so concerned for her. After all, you’re so close, aren’t you? Almost—” Her voice quivered. “Almost like sisters.”

  Without warning Miss Dalrymple gripped my arm so tightly that I gasped in pain. “We’re watching you,” she whispered. “You need to be very, very careful if you don’t want to get into more trouble than you can handle.”

  “Don’t touch her,” said Evie, flaming up in anger. “We know who you are and your disgusting friends. We’re not frightened of you or your precious Priestess or whatever she calls herself now.”

  Miss Dalrymple’s face registered a flicker of surprise; then she pulled herself together. She let go of me and assumed her usual, sickly sweet expression. “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

  “But what about Miss Scratton? What have you done to her?”

  “What have I done? Sarah dear, I think you must be feverish. You need to calm down. If you carry on with your wild accusations, you might end up in trouble. And if you must know,” she added with a bright smile, “our dear High Mistress is in the hospital at Wyldford Cross. Such a dreadful accident. Such a shame.”

  She shut the door in our faces and left us standing there, completely stunned. A single night and a stupid prank had changed everything. First Helen, then Miss Scratton had been struck down. Which of us would Mrs. Hartle and her minions attack next?

  Chapter Twenty-one

  So it looks as though the coven has worked out that Miss Scratton is not one of them,” Evie said.

  “And Mrs. Hartle must be behind all this, acting as the Priestess or whatever she wants to call herself now,” I added.

  We were sitting at the door of the shepherd’s hut the next day, talking to Josh and Cal in the early morning sunshine. Evie and I had gone there before breakfast on our ponies, accompanied by Josh. We had told the boys everything that had happened.

  “So you think this road accident was part of a plan?” asked Cal.

  The news had been announced at evening prayers the night before. Apparently the minibus in which Miss Scratton and the students had been traveling on the way back from St. Martin’s Academy had skidded across the road when a deer had leaped out in front of the vehicle. The girls had been taken to the Wyldford Cross hospital with minor cuts and bruises, but Miss Scratton had been admitted with serious head injuries. It was sickening even to think about it.

  “I’m sure it must have been set up deliberately,” I said. “Helen and Miss Scratton both have ‘accidents’ the day after Velvet stumbles into working a spell to release the spirits of the dead? It has to be Mrs. Hartle attacking them.”

  Cal frowned and looked puzzled. “But I thought that Miss Scratton had some kind of power. How could she be ambushed by Mrs. Hartle?”

  “Miss Scratton is a Guardian,” I explained. “She has lived at different times in Wyldcliffe’s history, using different names, playing different roles. She’s been a teacher, a healer, and a sister in the old convent. That’s all we know, and she wasn’t supposed to tell us that much. But I don’t think she can just step in and put everything right. We have to do it for ourselves. She can guide us, that’s all.”

  “But wouldn’t she be able to protect herself from attack by Mrs. Hartle?” added Josh.

  “I don’t know—not if she was taken by surprise, maybe. Anyway, she’s not invincible, is she? Her spirit might be from the mystic realm, but she lives in the human world. Her bones can be broken in a car crash like anyone else’s. It sounds as though she’s really hurt. I just hope she’ll be all right.”

  “Didn’t she say something about not being allowed to stay in Wyldcliffe?” Evie asked. “Because she had told us her secret—do you think this is how she is being taken away from us?”

  We had so many questions, and there was no one to answer them for us. My head was throbbing from anxiety and lack of sleep. I tried to grasp hold of something positive.

  “Even if we assume that both Helen and Miss Scratton have been attacked by the Priestess,” I said, “the fact is that she didn’t actually kill them. So that must be good news for us. Either the Priestess wasn’t strong enough, and they managed to resist her, or . . .”

  “Or perhaps she doesn’t want them dead yet,” said Cal. I shuddered, and he put his arm around my shoulders with awkward pride, conscious of the others watching us together. Evie looked across at us and smiled encouragingly, but Josh suppressed a sigh. He was being so patient with Evie—just good friends—but I could sense how much he longed to have the right to embrace her.

  He got to his feet and looked out over the valley. “So Mrs. Hartle is back and Miss Scratton is out of the way, Helen’s had a mysterious accident and Velvet might be involved as some kind of rogue element. It’s not looking good, is it? You and Sarah are vulnerable to attack, Evie. You need to work together to be safe. You need Helen back with you.”

  “I agree with Josh,” Cal said. “We have to do something to help Helen, not just for her own sake but for all of you.”

  I remembered what Miss Scratton had said the previous term: If you stay true to each other, you will be strong enough for anything. . . . And her more recent words now seemed to hold another message: Do not break the Circle.

  She was right. We were linked together, and we needed one another. If one of us was hurt, we were all hurt. Our sisterhood was our bond and our strength.

  “I brought this,” I said, taking the Book out of my bag. It looked faded and insignificant in the sunlight, but I felt a vibration in my fingertips when I touched it. “I’ve found something that might help Helen get better quickly.” A thought struck me. “You don’t mind, Evie? I mean, it’s okay to show the Book to Josh and Cal?”

  “Of course. They’re part of this now.” She glanced up at the boys. “If that’s what you want. Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” said Cal. “I’m sure.”

  “I’d walk through fire for you, Evie, you know that,” said Josh, with sudden intensity. “And what I told you about Martha and Agnes might help. I belong in Wyldcliffe. Whatever I can do, whatever is inside me—it’s all for you.”

  Evie blushed and said faintly, “Thank you, Josh—thank you so much.”

  He stepped back and tried to shrug the moment off, forcing his emotions under control. “Hey, I’m just glad to be here, if it helps. And I’m glad Cal has come back too.” Josh looked at me and smiled with understanding in his warm brown eyes. “So, Sarah, what do you want us to do?”

  I had already found
the page I wanted. “A Charme to Cure a Friend.” It wasn’t a complicated ritual or spell, just a recipe for a simple cordial of the kind Martha might have made, and her mother and grandmothers before her. In my bag were the necessary ingredients and equipment—a bowl, some sealed jars, and a tiny green glass phial—which I had taken earlier from Agnes’s little treasure store. Her secret study was still open in the attic, and I had got up at dawn to raid it in preparation.

  “‘Distille the essence of Lavender for Cleansing, and Hawthorne blossom for the Heart, and add to a Mixture of Rosewater and Honey. All the time saying the Incantation of Friendship, and burning aromatic Woods. The Flame of Friendship must heat the Mixture, and all due Ceremonie must be kept. Add the Secret Spices and offer all with Prayers and Supplications. . . .’”

  Cal quickly made us a small fire in a ring of stones in front of the hut, and Josh watched in fascination as Evie and I prepared everything. We asked the boys to keep a lookout for other riders from the school, or anyone else who might be out early—farmworkers or enthusiastic hill walkers. They took up their positions, and then Evie and I reached into ourselves for faith and hope. We chanted the incantations under our breath as softly as the wind sighing over the bright hills. “Let Helen be as free as the air,” I begged. “Let her be liberated from sickness.” Step by step we followed the instructions to make the healing potion, and a little while later the glass phial was full of pale liquid. We put out the fire and cleansed the area, so that no one would suspect what we had done there.

  “Bless this healing remedy,” I said, and gave the phial to Evie for her blessing. She took the little bottle in her hands and prayed fervently, “Let it make Helen well again.” Then she glanced over at Cal, who was still scanning the land for any unwanted intruders. “Your blessing, please, Cal.”