The chandelier in the main entrance hall captured Awen’s attention, as it always had. She paused on the third-to-last step, looking up at it—watching, as if it might do something more than just glow. Awen did not know what it was about those hanging circles of light: the chandelier was grand and opulent and foreboding and sorrowful, all at once. She wondered, too, if it really was not any of those things at all, but rather it was whatever one wanted it to be. Or if…
“Awen.”
She peered over the railing. For a moment, she had forgotten why she was even there on the stairwell.
Miss Nina was standing outside the library door, looking up at her. “Come on, I haven’t got all day.”
Awen took a deep breath, trying to calm herself—then gave up and stepped into the hall, her heart jumping in her chest. She entered the library behind Miss Nina, who had left the door halfway open. Awen made a motion to shut it.
“Leave it open,” Miss Nina told her. “We shan’t be in here for long.”
Awen glanced over her shoulder into the hall, not sure if she hoped someone was listening, or not.
“So. Burned your patron’s artwork to bits. And a good portion of his studio, too.”
Awen picked at her nails and tried to wriggle her toes on the stone floor.
“In all my time here, I must say I’ve never met a girl as stupid as you. Any girl in her right mind would take that household over this school, any day!” She leaned across the desk so that her face was right above Awen’s. “But now…Sir Robert won’t take another one of my students! I offered to send him another girl, straightaway, but he said he wouldn’t have anything to do with us again!” She looked away—then back at Awen. “Can you even imagine what you’ve done to the image of this school? Much less the financial damage! The money I’ve had to pay him for repairs! I’ll be sending even more to keep him from spreading the news!”
Awen grimaced. She hardly cared about what Miss Nina said, but the woman’s voice vibrated through her whole body. She wanted to take a step backward.…
Miss Nina dropped her voice to a whisper, the intensity of her words increasing tenfold. “So now, I’ve made my decision.” She aimed her words between Awen’s eyes. “I am expelling you from Crickhowell. You are no longer welcome here, as of…” She glanced down at her shiny gold pocket watch. “Right. Now.”
Awen’s jaw dropped.
“Yes, that’s what I thought. They all hate it here—until they’re kicked out! Kicked out, with nowhere to go!” Her eyes glinted with a fury Awen had never seen. “I’ll have someone retrieve your trunk from upstairs, and then you’re out the door. You may have some extra food if there is any in the kitchens, but that’s it.” She shook her head. “I knew from the moment my men brought you in that you’d be a mistake.”
Miss Nina stepped back around the desk. “Wait right here,” she said over her shoulder, turning into the hallway. Awen listened to the sound of her heeled shoes on the staircase.
She leaned against the door frame, staring at her hands in disbelief. She tried to come up with a plan, a direction in which to go…but she could not think up any more questions, much less the answers. She pressed her hands together, looking desperately around the bookshelves for some idea of what to do. Then, an idea hit her—just in a name:
Gwen.
There were walls and walls of books, with thousands of pages worth of records; Gwen’s had to be in there somewhere. But finding one girl’s name within that mess of paper sounded beyond impossible.
Awen hesitated. Then, clenching her teeth against the pain in her bruised feet, she sprinted to the back wall of shelves. She perused the volumes, nearly running as she read the titles. She glanced over the entire wall of books, then moved to the shelving on the left, her eyes beginning to water as her muscles protested. These books were all for matching up students with patrons—just like her own book, SINGERS, S-Z, which merely contained artist biographies.
Awen sneaked past the open library door, glancing once for Miss Nina, and continued to the books on the right. These were different: two entire columns of books were engraved with the word EXPENSES down the spine, each with a year printed under it. They were filed chronologically. Awen’s heart raced as she moved down the shelves, her hope increasing but her time running out: Miss Nina had to be back soon. She reached the end of the right-side shelving. The books had been nothing but financial records.
The sound of two voices in the hall threw Awen back into a frenzy. She did not know whether or not one of the voices belonged to Miss Nina, but the sound propelled her forward, toward the unexamined shelves in the center of the room. The books she saw first were unlabeled, except for one letter on each spine. Q, one volume read. And then R—there were five of these. Then S. She did not know precisely what information they contained; she could only hope she would find a record of Gwen if she chose the right one.
“Thank you, William.” It was Miss Nina’s voice, echoing in the stairwell.
Awen knew she had to run, and she had to trust her gut. She spun around the corner of the bookshelf, toward what she hoped would be the beginning of the alphabet. A…B…C…her heart raced as she sprinted down the row, finally reaching the books labeled with G. There were five of them.
“No, that’s all I need.” The voice was closer.
Awen snapped up the last, thinnest G in the stack, her sore arm almost giving out under its light weight, and ran so hard she nearly slid into the doorframe. She leaned back against the wall, wedging the book between it and her spine, and forced her breathing to steady.
Miss Nina appeared; she remained in the hall just outside the library. “William put your trunk by the door. There was a bit of extra food, so he’s packed that, too.”
Awen nodded solemnly, but already she felt lighter, less terrified of walking out that door with nowhere to go.
“Well, come on, then.” Miss Nina turned away.
Awen slid the book up the back of her dress; she could hold it up with just one hand held near the back of her hip. She followed Miss Nina to the main entrance door.
Miss Nina opened the door and stood back.
Awen spun around to face her, then walked partially backward and partially sideways to the threshold, the pain in her feet and muscles returning. She bent her knees and leaned forward just enough to reach the handle of her trunk, and struggled to straighten her back while lifting.
The book was still in place under her dress.
Awen stepped backward out of the castle, wheeling her trunk after her.
Miss Nina still regarded her, silently, from within.
Just as Awen began to wonder how far she would have to continue walking backward to hide the book, the front door began to creak shut. Awen stopped, watching it close—then let the book slip stealthily down the back of her dress, to the path below.
Grimacing, she turned and squatted in front of her trunk. The lock was gone; she sighed in relief, for she no longer had a clue where she had placed the key. Awen opened the lid and slid the book inside to rest on top of the packed food. She hauled herself up with the help of the trunk and reached for the handle.…
“Awen!”
She snapped around.
Miss Nina’s head was sticking out the open entry door.
Had she seen?
Miss Nina lowered her voice. “Good luck.” She regarded Awen for a moment, then disappeared back inside the castle.
* * *
Awen sang softly to herself a song she had heard many years ago and since forgotten. The words were from a poem, and the music moved like whispered wind blowing through long blades of grass. She was hardly aware of her moving lips. The sound was just there, a part of her.
She approached a large grey boulder and sat on it, unpacking a strawberry muffin from her trunk. She had been traveling all day—the sun was just beginning to set—but she had been moving so slowly, she could still just see the silhouette of Crickhowell at the top of the hill in the distance. She had y
et to come across a single house or building. The question of where she would sleep began to nag at her, until it felt like a hole was burning in her stomach.
Awen had been picturing the book in her trunk the whole way, too nervous to actually take it out and page through. She was afraid the book was not what she thought it was, or that it did contain student records, but that she had grabbed the wrong G. What if it contained the Ga through Ge names, and not the Gw? And what if it did not even matter? The records could be outdated—and even if they were not, what would she do with the information? Would she look for Gwen? She knew she would never see Sir Robert Thomas, or Francis, ever again—not after what she had done.…And yet still, she knew this was important. She had to discover for herself what had happened to Gwen. She had to know it was possible to survive in this kind of life.
Awen took up the book, carefully, in both hands. She crossed her legs slowly and set it in her lap, cracking it open in the middle. She smiled.
Awen furled through the pages, which were labeled at the top like the pages of a dictionary, until almost the very end. She stopped at a page with the name Gunda, then flipped forward, just one page at a time.
Gwen. Awen stopped. She looked at the full name on the page: Gwen Brellwen. “No…” she mumbled. Then there was Gwen Gawel, and Gwen Rose. She turned the page again, and again. There it was:
Gwen Thomas. Daughter of renowned painter Sir Robert Thomas.
Awen shivered. It was strange seeing the life of a girl she hardly knew laid out before her. She ran her fingertips over the text—words Francis had probably longed to know for years. The secrets of his sister’s existence.
As Awen curved her finger around the page, an image flashed into her head like an unbidden daydream. She saw a woman in a gold dress with blonde hair piled high on her head like a rope. Gemstones sparkled in the dim light in her hair and around her neck. She stood tall next to a cascade of red silk curtains, but her mouth was pulled into a distraught line, and her brown eyes glittered with obvious fear. The contrast between her expression and her extravagant surroundings was peculiar.
Awen snapped her head back as if she had been shocked, and the image fizzled away. What had just happened? Could it be?
Awen looked down at the open book in her lap and flipped through the pages until she reached the end of Gwen’s section. That was all that really mattered, anyway.
Gwen Thomas was delivered to Philip T. Stratton after one year and three months of training at Crickhowell in the usual subjects. Not possessing any notable talents except for her attractiveness, she inspires through her beauty and charm. Gwen was, however, a difficult, stubborn student who caused much trouble. She has hardly been missed, but we were well compensated for her.
A sour taste formed in Awen’s mouth, and she was glad Francis would never have to read those words. But another feeling was growing along with the bitterness—a feeling that caused her heart to beat faster and her muscles to tense, as if she were preparing for a physical challenge.
She knew what to do: she had to find Gwen.
Maybe Francis’s sister had been stubborn at one time, but if the image that had come into Awen’s mind had any truth—and she knew, she knew it did—then Gwen had lost her willfulness. Something was wrong. She had been broken down, made into little more than a slave. She had lost the spark that Awen herself had been able to hold on to, the deviousness that had gotten her out.
Gwen had to be helped, and Awen even dared to believe that if she could save one muse, perhaps one day she could end the entire trade.
Awen stared at the page for a moment longer, until the long day caught up with her and her eyelids began to droop. She folded back the corner of the paper and closed the book, bending over to rest her head on it. She closed her eyes. The road ahead would not be easy and the clues leading to Gwen were few. But she had something to believe in, and that was all that mattered.
Awen’s eyelids fluttered open: there had been a noise. It was soft and muffled, a ways off in the distance—yet she knew her ears were not deceiving her. Awen rose from the boulder and peered into the distance, but the sinking sun produced too much glare for her to see. She turned around, quickly gathering her things into the trunk, and trudged through the grass toward the sound; it was steady, and growing louder. Awen pushed forward, now running, forgetting the pain and fatigue.
As she ran, the sound appeared in full color: a streak of chestnut, a rider with golden hair galloping toward her. The horse was slowing, now to a canter, to a trot, a walk…and finally, it stopped. Its rider dismounted and walked toward her.
Awen dropped her trunk and continued to run. “Francis!” she called out—but the word stuck in her throat. And then, she began to giggle. She leaned over to catch her breath, but she was laughing so hard, she could not breathe; she sank to her knees and rolled to her back on the ground, still laughing, though she did not know why.
Awen looked up at the darkening sky. “Isn’t it beautiful?” She smiled.
“Yes. Yes, I suppose you’re right.” Francis’s face appeared above her—he looked serious.
“I have many things to tell you. I hope you’re ready for an adventure.” Awen sensed that in this moment they had switched roles, for now she wore the jesting smile, and he the cloud of grey.
“I…came to rescue you.…” He paused, then knelt down beside her.
Before Awen could sit up, she felt shoes being slid onto her feet—first the right, and then the left—the jeweled shoes she had left behind. She said nothing at first—then saw that her smile was spreading to Francis’s face as well.
He put a hand to her cheek, and slowly curved it around to touch her lips. He looked at her, hardly blinking, and kissed her.
When Francis finally pulled away, Awen giggled. “My dear sir, somebody else needs our help even more. And you’re far too late—for I’ve already rescued myself.”
About the Author
Rachel Waxman is a writer, oboist, and entrepreneur who makes and sells handmade chocolate truffles. While at Northwestern University she studied music and spent her Sundays writing. She has a contradictory affinity for old books, castles, and new technology and is nostalgic for the eighteenth century. She now lives and writes in New York City.
The Crickhowell School for the Muses Page 20
