The Sisters Grimm

by Menna Van Praag

“Yeah? Me too, on Halloween.”

  Now I’m surprised. “That’s my birthday too.”

  “Oh,” Liyana says. “How weird.”

  “This whole thing is pretty fucking weird,” I say. “Don’t you think?”

  “Yeah.” She grins. “But it’s pretty fucking amazing too.”

  10:39 p.m.—Goldie

  It’s madness. Absolute madness. And yet, I’m doing it. Liyana has fallen asleep on the sofa and I am sitting on the carpet, cross-legged, with a rose at my feet. A rose I impulsively stole from a stall in the market square yesterday afternoon.

  I stare at the rose, trying to summon something—I have no idea what—within me. Okay, so I’m trying to move the damn thing.

  After ten minutes of intense focus, of trying to summon up some sort of magical force, of trying to re-create my recurring dreams, I’ve achieved absolutely nothing. The rose remains a rose and hasn’t shifted even a fraction.

  Shit, shit, shit.

  I throw up my hands, like Teddy does when he’s frustrated with an illustration that isn’t working. Which is fitting, since only a kid would think she could make her dreams manifest. What’ll I try next—leaping from the top of our block of flats to see if I can fly?

  Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  I glare at the rose then snatch it up. I pluck at each petal one by one, cursing with each velvet rip. Then I stand, walk over to the kitchen, and drop the whole mess into the bin.

  Something else I won’t be telling Liyana when she wakes up.

  11:11 p.m.—Goldie

  I lean back against the sofa, tucking a blanket around my legs, planning to sleep, when Liyana wakes. She stirs and yawns.

  I turn to face her. “Sorry I woke you.”

  Liyana looks at me, slightly startled. “I—I was dreaming about you.”

  I smile. “You were? What was I doing?”

  Liyana frowns. “We were together in a forest, except it was different, I can’t explain . . . enchanted, perhaps. You were standing in front of a tree and making vines of ivy uncurl from the trunk and reach towards the branches—”

  “I was? Really?”

  Liyana nods. “And I was suspending drops of rain in midair, making them float back up towards the clouds.”

  “That’s a great dream. I wish I had d—”

  “Yeah,” Liyana interrupts. “But the thing is, I don’t think . . .”

  “What?”

  She shrugs. “I don’t think it was just a dream. I think it happened. I think it’s a memory.”

  “Really?” Now I frown. “But how—if it was, then I’d remember it too, don’t you think?”

  But Liyana is already shaking her head. “No. Well, not necessarily, I mean. It wasn’t recent. We were young, only kids, so—I can hardly remember anything from when I was a child, can you?”

  Nothing I’ll be telling you about, I think. “No. Not much.”

  “Me neither,” Liyana says. “But it was so real, I—I . . .”

  I’m about to tell her about my own dreams, about the flower. I hesitate. She reaches for my hand and, as our fingers touch, I meet Liyana’s gaze and I believe, suddenly and inexplicably, that she’s right. It’s the reason I recognized her when she knocked on my door. And I know then, though I can’t explain how, that we’ve met not only once but many times before.

  11:28 p.m.—Leo

  Alone in his room at Saint John’s, Leo tries to focus on something, anything other than thoughts of Goldie. Unsurprisingly, his law books aren’t compelling enough to perform the trick. More frustratingly, even the desire to train has left him tonight. And, given how his feelings for her are weakening his heart, he’ll have to strengthen himself to compensate—so that, when the time comes, even if he doesn’t have the will to kill her, muscle memory will take over and do it for him.

  Leo paces. He should go out for a run. Lift weights. Sneak down to the gym. But no matter how heavy his methods of persuasion, how inventive his personal insults, or how elaborate his curses, still Leo can’t propel himself out of his room. The truth is, though he’s too stubbornly furious to admit it, the only place he wants to be right now is in bed with Goldie, and the only thing he wants to be doing is whatever she wants to do.

  But the reality, the tragedy, is that if he won’t fight Goldie, another soldier will. So she needs to know. She needs to go to Everwhere before the moon next reaches its first quarter. She needs to train, practise, hone her skills until she’s strong, as strong as the best soldier. After that, he can only hope that Goldie chooses to go dark. Because she can’t beat her father, no matter how powerful she is. She’ll never kill him. It’s impossible. Sisters before have tried and all have failed.

  Leo glances at his phone, on the desk atop his law books. He could call her. He could ask what she’s up to, invite himself over. He stops pacing, steps over, and picks up his phone. He finds her number, contemplates it.

  “Fuck.”

  He puts the phone down again. Then stacks the books on top of it. And resumes pacing.

  11:59 p.m.—Scarlet

  When she steps into the kitchen, Scarlet is met with a sight that—after a single moment of immovable shock—tips her instantly into tears. The ceiling. The world has turned too fast, tilting everything on its axis, capsizing the little café and bringing the ceiling crashing down to the floor.

  Wet-cheeked, Scarlet stares up at the space where, only two days ago, a crack was snaking across the ceiling.

  Now it has split open, leaving a great gaping hole in its wake.

  A little less than a decade ago

  Everwhere

  You think of Everwhere. You wonder if you’ll ever go back. You want to but, for now at least, longing is trumped by fear.

  You try to forget, but every time you wander past a particularly ornate gate, you wonder if—so long as you arrived on the correct night, at the correct time—it might just take you back to Everwhere. You carry on past these gates, knowing you won’t return on that particular night, at that precise time. You’re too scared of what happened last time and if it might happen again. Still, the question of what might happen if you did lingers long after the gate has gone.

  Goldie

  For nearly a week I didn’t go to Everwhere. Instead, I stayed up late watching Teddy—I’d named him after my lost bear—sleep. He was fun to watch. He made silly scrunched-up faces as if he was having strange dreams. He kicked his legs and flailed his arms, as if trying to escape his cot. Sometimes he opened his eyes, darker blue in colour, but in shape mirrors to my own, and I was reminded again that he was mine. Brother, mine. It was only a shame that his tiny hands were always tight shut, since I wanted to hold them. I wanted all his fingers to wrap around one of mine. Sometimes I wriggled my littlest finger between the commas of his clenched fingers until he grasped hold as if he’d never let me go. I hoped, one day, he would do the same on purpose.

  It shocked me, every day, how deeply I felt for Teddy. More than I’d ever felt for anyone, even Ma. I loved my sisters, even Bea, but it wasn’t the same. Perhaps because he was a baby. I wanted to protect him. Sometimes, when Ma and my bastard stepfather were shouting, firing words at each other over the top of Teddy’s bed, I wanted to scoop him up in my arms and run. I wondered if I could take him to Everwhere. I didn’t think so. It seemed to be a place only for girls, given what I’d seen. But perhaps. Bea would know, naturally, though I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of asking. She loved to tease us, her ignorant sisters. She drew great delight from dropping buttered breadcrumbs into conversations and waiting for us to bite. The others always fell for her bait, but I’d learned better. She still hadn’t told us who “he” was.

  So, since I probably couldn’t take Teddy with me, I whispered stories to him instead, telling him all the secrets I knew about my special place. I didn’t know if he heard me or not. Still, I thought the words soothed him, wrapped around his little body like the swaddling Ma sometimes used to still his flailing limbs and help him sleep
. I even braved my stepfather during these nights, feeling his gaze on my back while I crouched over the cot. I didn’t care. He could do what he liked. He could leave his mark on me, the stench of his sweat, the sourness of his breath, the slick wet of his tongue . . . But I wasn’t there anymore to feel it.

  I wondered: If I couldn’t take Teddy to Everwhere, could I bring my sisters to Cambridge? I hadn’t yet asked where they lived; it might be anywhere in the world. So perhaps it was impossible, but perhaps not. I’d like to know them better in this world, though Bea annoyed me and Scarlet slightly scared me, but Liyana seemed sweet. It’d be good to have real sisters, real friends. Ma might feel too ashamed to let me bring them to the flat for tea, but I could sneak Teddy out for a walk in the pram while he napped and meet them in the park. I made a mental note to mention this idea the next time I returned. Though I was still in no rush to go.

  Scarlet

  “Let’s do something fun,” Scarlet said.

  Liyana looked up. “What?”

  “Let’s play a trick on Bea.”

  “Why?”

  Scarlet shrugged. “It’ll be funny.”

  “All right,” Liyana said. “As long as it doesn’t make her upset. I don’t like it when she’s upset.”

  “Don’t worry,” Scarlet said. “It’ll make her laugh.”

  If it took Scarlet a while to convince Liyana of this, it took longer to convince her of the necessity of climbing a tree to execute the trick. Scarlet went first.

  “You have to be high up if you want to call the rain.” Scarlet coaxed her sister up to the second branch. “Hurry.”

  Liyana refused to climb any higher. “I think this branch is about to snap.”

  “All right, all right.” Scarlet rolled her eyes. “So close your eyes and bring the rain to the glade, but a downpour, not a drizzle.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “I haven’t a clue. How did you make that massive wave in the river last week?”

  “I don’t know.” Liyana gripped the branch. “It just happened.”

  “Well, once you work it out, let me know.” Scarlet started to scramble down from the tree. “Then we can have some fun.”

  “Why?” Liyana said, wishing she could follow. “What are you going to do?”

  Scarlet jumped onto the mossy ground. “Hot rain,” she said with a grin. “That’s what we’re going to do.”

  Liyana

  Liyana adored Everwhere, for the possibilities, the companionship, the grandeur, but what she adored most of all was the weather. The damp mists, the cold fog, the leaves falling like rain. London was a fitting place for a pluviophile, but it couldn’t compare with Everwhere. In London one must at least expect the odd ray of sunshine, however rare, but here the weather was always predictable, a constant unchanging drizzle.

  As well as the climate, Liyana appreciated the time of night. She’d always slept straight through the night even as a baby, a fact deeply appreciated by her mother. So Liyana had never known the true magic of the moon in her element, during the early morning hours between three and four o’clock. Now Liyana could spend an entire night watching the moon, soaking up her strength, until she imagined that she too could shine brighter than the stars, could pull the seas from the shores, could control the shape and substance of people’s dreams.

  After her failure last night to drench Bea with hot rain—a failure that had brought great relief—Liyana decided to test herself, to see if the wave had been an anomaly or if she really could control water. Now she stood on a riverbank watching the water flowing beneath her feet, her own shifting silver shadow cast across the stream, her silhouette broken only by the current and the falling leaves.

  As Liyana watched the eddies and swirls, she imagined that the brook was being stirred by an invisible spoon, by some great water god enjoying his particular cup of tea. And as she watched, all at once she knew. She was like the moon: she could sway and shape the water as easily as if she were stirring her own cup of tea.

  Liyana smiled and her glowing silhouette stilled, the stream now calm and clear enough to hold not only her shadow but her reflection, as sharp as if she were looking into a mirror. She studied the water for a while, keeping herself straight and unmoving. Then she frowned, simply to see the effect. As soon as the lines drew across her forehead, the stream started to stir. Liyana deepened her frown and the currents began to churn, tiny waves crashing onto the banks, as if a river-storm were coming.

  Liyana dropped her frown and grinned. The water stilled and the storm ebbed. She wasn’t the one sister without skills after all. And if she could control water, then what else could she do?

  Bea

  The first time her mamá was committed, Bea was eight years old. At first, she hadn’t minded and had enjoyed staying with her abuela, who took pride in indulging her only granddaughter’s every whim. And after their first visit to Saint Dymphna’s, Bea had secretly prayed (when she knelt with her abuela at their bedside) that Cleo would extend her stay by a few extra years.

  They’d caught the number 6 bus, disembarking at the church and walking awhile until they reached the gates of the “hotel” where her mamá was resting. Then Bea sat on the pavement and refused to budge.

  “Vamos, niña,” her abuela insisted, tugging Bea forward. “Tenemos que irnos, tu mamá está esperando.”

  But Bea planted her feet and shook her head. She didn’t care if her mamá was waiting. Even outside she could already feel the melancholy heavy in the air, thick as the Everwhere fog. She wasn’t going in.

  “Por favor, mi niña. Tu mamá te extraña.”

  But Bea stood firm, shaking her head. “No, Abuela. No voy a ir nunca.”

  No amount of cajoling, begging, or bribery would compel Bea over the threshold. So, finally, her abuela picked Bea up and carried her, rigid and spitting, all the way to Cleo’s room. When Bea met her mamá’s eye, the fog had closed in. She’d been scared of her mamá many times before but never scared for her. Bea had a slight sense of déjà vu then, recalling the time she’d been devastated by the sight of a silverback gorilla at the London Zoo, whose big wet eyes were filled with the same defeated sadness as her mamá’s now.

  “¿Mamá?” Bea stepped forward, lifting her little hand to Cleo’s pale cheek. “¿Que pasa?”

  Her mamá didn’t reply, didn’t say anything for the duration of the visit. When Bea and her abuela left, Cleo didn’t say goodbye. This didn’t matter to Bea, nor the scrutiny of the nurses, the glassy-eyed watch of the other patients, or the screams echoing along the corridors. But the look in her mamá’s eyes lingered long after everything else had gone.

  Leo

  “Are you scared to be a soldier?” Christopher asked.

  “No,” Leo said. “Are you?”

  “Sometimes,” Christopher said. “I think you’ll be better at it than me.”

  Leo, since he didn’t disagree, said nothing. He didn’t want to say that not only was he not scared, he was looking forward to it. He liked the idea of hunting, of fighting. A place he could vent his anger without getting punished. The thought of the killing disturbed him, so he didn’t think too much about that. But it was thrilling, this existence of another world. Other boys might talk excitedly into the night about Middle Earth, but that was make-believe. This was real. This was a great and glorious secret that only he and Christopher knew.

  21st October

  Eleven days . . .

  3:33 a.m.—Leo

  Leo stands on the cobbled pavement in front of King’s College and contemplates the chapel, its ancient stonework bleached by a waning moon that seems to lie cradled between the filigree turrets, as if being rocked to sleep. How Leo wishes he could sleep, if only to shut out this world for a little while.

  He steps over to the low, cold stone wall and sits. He thinks of Goldie, then finds himself thinking of his first love, his brother, his best friend. Leo had been right. The night he’d finally killed the Grimm girl who’d murdered Christ
opher, he’d known it.

  That night Leo had crept out of the flat, his parents sleeping in their respective rooms, to seek out the closest gate. Actually, not quite the closest: when he was home from school Leo didn’t use the nearest entrance to Everwhere but the most illustrious. He hurried past the plain gates of the Royal Hospital Chelsea, walking an extra fifteen minutes to the infinitely more remarkable gates of Cremorne Gardens. Leo had loved these gates—featuring four golden lion heads and flanked by three-dimensional pillars inlaid with sculpted roses and topped with ornate lamps—ever since he’d first found them while wandering the streets one night.

  The gates were always locked, but the heavy chain padlock gave way when Leo pushed at precisely the right moment. That night she was the first Grimm girl he saw when he stepped through. She fought a good fight, singeing his eyebrows with a well-aimed fiery breath and fracturing his ankle, and would certainly have won against any other soldier. She was exceptional—she’d survived the Choosing, after all—and far older than him. But Leo had a singular advantage: he was fearless. He didn’t care if he lived or died. He wanted only vengeance.

  It wasn’t until her final breath etched the tiny crescent moon on his arm that Leo realized who she’d been. For her breath carried the scent of his friend, as if she’d swallowed his sweat and blood, instead of extinguishing his spirit, and done so only an hour before, instead of two years ago. Leo had cried out as the mists engulfed the Grimm girl’s spirit and the ground soaked up her soul. He screamed to stop it, to seize hold of them both a moment longer. But the scent of Christopher had evaporated with her and with it any satisfaction of vengeance fulfilled. And Leo was left once more bereft, longing for his beloved brother as acutely as he had the night he’d died.