by Marina Cohen
“Now,” he said, “we will demonstrate how heat alters the particles, expanding the metal. Size, my friends, is merely an illusion.”
Mr. Bent prepared the equipment. First, he checked the plastic tubing of the Bunsen burner thoroughly for any leaks. Next, he placed the burner on a heatproof mat, attached the tubing to the gas nozzle, and held a lit match to the top of the cylinder while slowly turning on the gas to light the flame. Finally, he prepared a beaker with cold water.
“Place the metal ball into the flame,” instructed Mr. Bent.
Kallie held the rod over the flame as though she were lighting the Olympic torch.
“Now, try to pass it through the ring,” he said.
Kallie stepped out from behind the counter so the class could get a clear view. She attempted to pass the ball through the same loop, but it wouldn’t fit.
There were oohs and ahhs, and general murmuring, but just as Kallie was about to turn, Anna sprung to her feet.
“The flaming cylinder!” she shouted.
Kallie startled. She dropped the rod. Flustered and embarrassed, she scrambled to retrieve it. Without her glasses, she grabbed the wrong end. A searing pain lit her right hand. The rod clattered to the floor a second time.
19
THE FLAMING CYLINDER
Liah leaped behind a gathering of trees and shrubs, hiding herself among the large foliage. She pressed her back against the trunk of a tree and held her breath, hoping she had not been discovered.
“Great and powerful Empress…”
Liah heard a familiar voice. She peeked out from behind the shrubs. The bone carver was no longer gazing in her direction. He must not have seen her. She breathed a soft sigh of relief. She had been foolish to sneak into the palace. Her toes wriggled in the goatskin shoes, filling her with shame. She would wait until he was well distracted and slip out unnoticed. On their travels home, she would find the right moment to confess.
“Wise beyond years … whose cruelty is justified … whose benevolence and grace know no bounds … feared by many … adored by all…”
It was the Lie-peddler who spoke. Liah had not seen him in the lengthy line. He had appeared as if out of nowhere, striding past the others straight to the front of the line. He stood below the terrace, gazing up at the Empress.
“What is it you come to sell?” she asked in a delicate, yet rigid voice.
The Lie-peddler folded his hands, raised them over his head, and bowed low in customary reverence. Then, Liah watched as he tilted his face upward, one sharp eye meeting the Empress’s. “Lies.”
Liah stifled a giggle. But if the Empress perceived the slight, she gave no indication. Instead, she remained still, reminding Liah of a cat, waiting for the right time to pounce upon its prey.
“I have no use for lies,” she said, each word dripping from her lips like poisonous honey.
The Lie-peddler raised himself to his full height and grinned. “Of course not. How foolish of me. I forget you already have an elaborate selection of your own.”
The Empress sat stiffly, her features frozen in a look of icy amusement. “You are familiar to me. You resemble an arrogant sot I had punished some time ago for displeasing me with his nonsense.” She seemed to be thinking back fondly. “You could not be him, though, for his bones lie rotting unremembered and unattended.”
“An interesting story,” said the Lie-peddler. “Perhaps I might tell you one of my own? It is quite a remarkable tale. It tells of a great and terrible Empress who is vanquished with the bones of an old storyteller … and a little bit of magic.”
Two guards stepped forward, but a slight wave of the Empress’s hand stayed their swords.
“That may be interesting indeed,” she said, calmly, “but I have a better one. Shall I tell you the tale of the storyteller who danced to his death?”
Her thin lips furled into a smile as a group of guards brought forth an enormous bronze cylinder. It was over twenty feet long and eight feet wide with wheels on each end that allowed it to rotate. They placed the cylinder over a bed of coals, lathered it in oil, and forced the Lie-peddler to walk on top. One of the guards lit the coals while others used fans to stoke the flames. As the cylinder grew hotter, the Lie-peddler shifted his feet to avoid burning.
Though the masses of drunken guests laughed and jeered, the Lie-peddler remained staunch and fearless, with a determined, haughty look in his eyes as though he knew something none other did.
When at last the Lie-peddler slipped off the cylinder and into the fiery coals, the bone carver dropped his sack and sprang forth. Before the guards were any wiser, the bone carver had dragged the Lie-peddler out of the flames.
Liah watched in horror as a guard lay hold of the bone carver and thrust him before the Empress. But he rose tall and addressed her in an angered voice such that Liah had never heard.
“Your cruelty and corruption dishonor your ancestors. You neglect your people. You show no mercy. You rule with tyranny and malice. Renounce yourself, for you have lost all moral right to rule. Renounce yourself or your own people shall rise up against you, and your name shall echo with hatred for a thousand years.”
The Empress’s expression contorted into a foxlike grin. “Not only will you dance for me alongside this fool—but for your insolence your bones shall hang on my mountainside for a thousand years, as a warning to all who oppose or offend me.”
The breath caught in Liah’s throat—the boxes she’d seen—they held bones. Without proper bone burial, the spirit could never rest. It would wander the earth for all eternity. She watched as the bone carver was thrown onto the cylinder along with the Lie-peddler. Both did their best to remain upright, but the metal glowed fiery red.
Liah could feel the unbearable heat from where she stood. Her heart fluttered inside her chest as she pressed her mind to think of a way to stop the madness. But what might she do? How could she fight a great army on her own? It would require strength, or magic, or both.
With tears streaming down her cheeks, she peered out from the shadows. The Lie-peddler caught her gaze. A deep sound rumbled inside his belly and burst forth from his mouth as he began to laugh.
“You are a greater fool than I thought,” said the Empress, “for you laugh at your own demise.”
“I laugh not at my demise,” said the man, his face as flush as the fiery coals. “I laugh at yours. For even the strongest guards cannot protect one who has allowed her own doom to pass freely through her gates.”
20
PERSONAL. PRIVATE. SECRET.
Kallie’s pride hurt worse than her hand.
She tried to cover the red spot where a giant blister was forming. She insisted she was perfectly fine, but Mr. Bent sent her to the office for treatment all the same. The head secretary, Mrs. Hewlett, had a quick look at Kallie’s hand.
“It doesn’t appear too bad,” she said, patting Kallie’s head as though she were in preschool. “Have a seat in the health room. We’ll get a cool compress on it. You can rest for a while, and we’ll see if the swelling goes down.”
“But I’m fine. I don’t want to stay,” protested Kallie, adjusting her glasses and smoothing her hair. “I’m missing science class.”
“No buts.”
Mrs. Hewlett ushered her into a small room just off the main office. It had a cot, a small refrigerator, and a shelf full of medical supplies. She wagged a finger sporting a rather long red nail.
“Mr. Bent was very firm when he called down. He wants you thoroughly looked after.” She got a few sheets of paper towels and ran them under cold water, and told Kallie to hold it on the burn. “One minute on, one minute off. I’ll be back in ten to check on you.”
Kallie sat on the edge of the cot. She didn’t want to think about how many students had lain there ill. It was probably full of bacteria. She couldn’t bear the thought of all the microscopic ecosystems thriving there.
She stood and paced, counting the seconds. One minute on. One minute off. One minute on
…
“This is all Anna’s fault,” Kallie muttered between tight teeth. She had put the box completely out of her mind until Anna had brought it back up. And now here it was again, whirling round her head.
The box. The pieces. The Bunsen burner was definitely a sort of flaming cylinder. Was it yet another coincidence? Kallie’s stomach began to churn.
Mrs. Hewlett had left the door to the health room slightly ajar. Kallie could hear her prattling on with her assistant, the short and curly-haired Miss Mallory.
“Such an awful thing,” clucked Mrs. Hewlett.
“No surprise, with what’s happened, they’d want to give her a fresh start in a new town…” said Miss Mallory.
“Good thing no one knows her here. Much easier that way…”
Kallie couldn’t help but listen. She loathed gossip. But curiosity was an unfortunate side effect of a scientific mind. She wondered whom they were talking about. She’d seen several new faces in some of the younger as well as the older grades.
“But that Winslow woman? I mean, honestly…”
Kallie gasped. The Winslow woman? They were talking about Anna. She slunk closer to the door and opened it a smidge farther.
“Such a lovely girl. I’d take her myself if George would let me,” said Mrs. Hewlett. “But you know how he is…”
Kallie stood, listening wide-eyed to the rest of the conversation. She had forgotten all about the one minute on, one minute off. Her heart began to flutter in her chest, threatening to fly away.
When the topic shifted to Miss Mallory’s new puppy, Spartacus, Kallie stepped backward. Her knees wobbled as she sank down onto the cot. The germs no longer seemed important. Neither did her hand. It had begun to throb, but she paid it no mind.
Science class was finished by the time Mrs. Hewlett put a small bandage over Kallie’s blister and dismissed her. She made her way to English class, where everyone had begun working on their dioramas.
As soon as she entered the class, several students, including Anna and Pole, stopped what they were doing. They came rushing toward her.
“Are you okay?” asked Queenie.
“I thought for sure you’d gone to the hospital,” said Grace.
“I’m fine,” said Kallie, awkwardly brushing away the oglers. “Really.”
“Back to work,” said Ms. Beausoleil. “It’s only a blister. She’s not grown a third arm.” She winked at Kallie, who was grateful to slip out of the limelight.
Searching the room, Kallie was pleasantly surprised to see the pillows had been stacked in a giant heap in the back corner and round tables had been brought in. It was still a far cry from the neat rows of desks Kallie preferred, but it was a step in the right direction.
Each table was littered with construction paper, glue, boxes, cotton balls, tissue paper, wood chips, and an inordinate amount of glitter. Anna pulled Kallie to a table with all their purchases plus a shabby shoebox, dented on one side. At least she had remembered to bring everything.
“Come on,” said Anna. “We need to get going.” She was sculpting something out of clay that may or may not have resembled Mr. Tumnus.
Kallie used a sharp pencil to carve triangles from Styrofoam.
“What are you doing?” asked Anna.
“Making stalagmites and stalactites. What does it look like?”
Anna giggled. “There aren’t any of those in Mr. Tumnus’s cave.”
“Says who? And anyway, my cave is going to be realistic—that’s the only reason I agreed to it. And real caves have stalagmites and stalactites.”
“Okay,” sighed Anna, shaking her head. “I’ll make the furniture and the décor.”
They worked for some time before Anna leaned in and whispered, “So what are you going to do about the bewitched story bones?”
Kallie had been trying to glue jagged Styrofoam triangles to the ceiling of their shoebox, but they kept falling off. She frowned. “There’s no such thing.”
“But the Bunsen burner,” said Anna. “You know—the flaming cylinder…”
“It’s the power of suggestion. Just like Pole said. If I hadn’t put that thought in your head, you’d never have made the connection.”
“Maybe,” said Anna. “But aren’t you even a bit worried?”
“No,” snapped Kallie. She was about to say something else, but then she thought about the conversation she’d overheard. She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. Her voice softened, and she tried to sound cheerful. “Let’s just get to work. We have two periods to complete this ridiculous project, and I don’t want to have to spend any more time on it than necessary.”
Kallie worked diligently until she got all the stalagmites and stalactites to stick to the inside of the box. It didn’t look very cavelike being all white. She’d need to paint it. She kicked herself for not having thought to buy paint and a brush when she had been out shopping with Anna.
Anna kept peering up at Kallie and grinning. She had made an acceptable likeness of Mr. Tumnus as well as a lopsided sofa, a lumpy chair, and a crooked lamp. She set the clay aside to dry.
All the while, Kallie thought about what she’d heard in the office. She thought about what the woman in the shop had said about her sweater. And she thought about the box of bones and the next picture—the coffin.
If there was truly power to suggestion, Kallie hadn’t stopped it at all. In fact, like a runaway train, it was gaining momentum.
21
THE REVENANT
Kallie stood on the cracked sidewalk outside the Dollar Basket.
She had convinced Grandpa Jess she needed to return to the shop for paint—which was the truth. Of course, he had offered to go with her, but Kallie claimed it would be much faster, not to mention healthier, if she rode her bike. He seemed genuinely excited she was taking more interest in physical activity as of late.
“I won’t be long. And I’ll come straight home,” she’d reassured him. “It won’t be dark for a while yet, and I’m ready for more responsibility. Just like Dad said.”
Grandpa Jess had reluctantly agreed. He’d even dug into his pocket and handed her a ten-dollar bill. Kallie had refused at first, but he had insisted.
Kallie paced the sidewalk, staring at the basket of woven dollar signs over the store. She should hurry, but she hesitated. Questions whirled around inside her head. And yet, a part of her wasn’t quite sure it wanted the answers.
She opened the door and entered the store. Disappointment mingled with relief when she saw a young woman at the cash register.
“What can I do for you?”
“Paint,” muttered Kallie, scanning the space as though she didn’t know where to find it.
“Aisle four,” said the young clerk.
The woman Kallie had been looking for was nowhere to be seen. She took a deep breath and then headed toward the aisle with the dusty containers. She located a tub of black and a tub of white, plus a small brush. It was all she needed to make her cave look realistic.
“You’re in luck,” said the young woman as Kallie placed the items on the counter. “Two-for-one sale on paint today.”
Kallie forced a smile as she handed the woman the ten-dollar bill. She took her change and her bag and turned to leave.
“I’d hoped you’d return,” said a soft voice.
Kallie spun to see the older woman in purple Crocs staring at her.
Part of Kallie wanted to take her paint and leave, but something held her feet steady. There was an awkward moment of silence, and then the woman took a few paces toward her.
“She loved that maroon sweater, you know. The one you wore the other day.”
Kallie could feel her hands trembling and her cheeks getting warm. She nearly dropped the bag of paint. The store around her began to swim.
The narrow aisles that were filled with anything and everything you could think of, the dusty shelves, this woman … They had known her. They had known her mother and she, her only child, had not.
“
How…” was the only word Kallie managed. It came out soft and strangled and full of so many conflicting emotions that Kallie wasn’t sure the woman would understand. But she did.
“She worked here,” said the woman, her eyes crinkling in a sorrowful smile. “Right before…”
“She drowned.”
The woman bristled at Kallie’s abruptness. She stared long and hard, as though she wanted to say something but couldn’t quite find the right words.
“She was a good writer,” she said finally. “Sometimes, when there were no customers, she’d read things to me.”
Anger flared up inside Kallie, though she didn’t know exactly why. Was it because this woman—this stranger—knew her mother better than she did? Or was it the writing again—that part of her mother she’d been trained to loathe. “What things?”
“Oh. Mostly poems. Some stories. She had a wonderful imagination. And a way with words.” She smiled. “I’ve kept them. I’d be happy to dig them up for you.”
Kallie backed away as though the woman were offering her a poisoned apple. There was so much more she wanted to ask. About how her mother had come to work in this shop. About the days leading up to her drowning.
Kallie glanced at her watch. She’d been in the shop longer than she’d promised Grandpa Jess. He would worry.
“I have to go,” she said, clutching the plastic bag tightly. She turned to leave but then stopped suddenly and added, “Maybe. If you find them…”
The woman smiled and nodded. “I’ll have a look.”
* * *
Kallie found Grandpa Jess in the kitchen making bacon-and-cheddar biscuits for what he called his lazy-day dinner.
“Did you get everything you need?” he asked, slipping the baking sheet into the oven and placing the bowl into the sink. He turned and saw the bag she carried with the Dollar Basket logo and the look in her eyes. He sunk into a seat at the table as though the weight of the world had forced him down.
