17

17

C lover.

The voice came from a long way away—so far, in fact, that I wondered if it weren't from my own head. I couldn't place it. I couldn't place myself. The world beyond my closed eyes was slippery, amorphous. I had a vague sense of being home, in my childhood bed and my childhood body, in those safe days before the war, but when I reached out to draw it closer, it slipped through my fingers.

"Clover!"

My name again, more insistent. Not from inside my head. Outside it. My head itself was pounding in sick glass-splintered waves; I forced open my eyes and saw only a vague blur. I rolled over with difficulty, wincing, stifling a moan, and the blur resolved into something not entirely unlike Alden Lennox-Fontaine.

"That's it." His voice was a sigh of relief. "You're fine."

I wasn't sure if it was a question or a command. I nodded, putting a hand to my throbbing forehead as I did so. "Ow… Yes. Yes, I'm all right."

My glasses were on the floor beside me. I fumbled for them, put them on. My surroundings came back into focus, painfully sharp—not my old bedroom at all, but the east wing at Ashfield. The sun was peeking over the horizon, and its grey light illuminated the battered state of the room. It looked as though a storm had ripped through, thrown everything in the air, and set it down again crooked. The floor where I lay was littered with dead leaves.

I sat up, and saw Eddie doing the same by the wall, white and clammy and dazed. Hero was sitting on the couch, her head in her hands, looking very much as though she were fighting not to be sick. The edges of the world felt wrong, off-kilter, and my entire body throbbed. My mind fumbled for what we had been doing.

"The door." The touch of the memory was like a shock of electricity. I straightened at once, ignoring the stab behind my eyes. "Is it—?"

"It's closed. For good, this time."

I let my eyes shut, partly in relief, partly against the spinning of the room. God, what we had nearly done… I thought of that vast, teeming mirror-kingdom seething behind the wall, the burning force of will pushing through, the shimmer of magic in the air, and my stomach churned. How had we been so stupid? We'd had no idea. We could have split open the world.

Alden was saying something I couldn't hear, or at least understand. I had to ask him to repeat it.

"I said, why did you do that?" The relief that I was alive had faded from his voice. It was hardening, solidifying, settling somewhere between accusing and hurt. "Thomas was right there! We were so close."

I blinked, too surprised for the moment to feel anything except dull confusion. "We were close to that thing getting out! It was going to take your body, or perhaps mine. It wasn't going to give you Thomas back."

"He was there. I could see him."

"There was nobody there, Alden!" My confusion was beginning to sharpen into anger as the memory of those last few minutes bled through. "I'm sorry about Thomas, truly, but we hadn't made a deal. What do you think? The faerie was just going to let him walk out on his own?"

"Well, we'll never know, will we? You closed the door. It's subject to the Accord now. It won't open again."

"Please," I said, far too calm, "tell me you didn't already try."

"If it's closed, then so much the better," Hero said, looking up for the first time. "It should have been closed years ago—we should have closed it this summer. I can't believe you were so unutterably stupid —"

"And you tried to stop us from opening it, I suppose!" Alden snapped.

"I never said I was any better!" Her voice had been shaky; now it was stronger, surer. "I'm the stupidest of the lot, if it comes to it. You trusted your own ego, as always. I trusted you, and I knew better than that. You knew the circles no longer worked, didn't you?"

He sighed, and just a little of the fight ebbed from him. "I suspected. I should have told you, I know. I didn't think it would matter."

"You more than suspected," I corrected him. He had as good as admitted it, in the frenzy of those moments when the door was opening. "That's why you were so focused on finding a safe way to summon the fae, weren't you? How long had you known? Before the imp window?" A terrible thought struck me, like a blast of cold. "Alden. You opened this door at the start of the war. You said the circles hadn't worked since before Amiens. Did you know before Amiens?"

There was a just a fraction of a pause. It would have been unremarkable in anyone else. But I had never once heard Alden lost for words.

"It warned me," he conceded. "That last summer of the war. It was always trying to get me to open the door when I was home from Crawley, to bargain again. I wouldn't. I wasn't worried about the circles then—I was only trying to perfect the deal, to make sure I could save Thomas without letting it free. That summer, its tactics changed. It told me that it had learned how to escape the circles on its own—that the next time someone opened a door, it would be free. It told me that if that happened, and I hadn't dealt with it by then, I would never see Thomas again. Last chance. Amiens was a week later."

"And you never said a word to anyone."

"I never thought it was telling the truth! It said all sorts of things—it always has. Even after Amiens, I hoped it was just… I don't know, a different faerie, a mistake, a coincidence, somehow. It wasn't until that imp broke through that I knew it wasn't. I couldn't have prevented Amiens."

I tried to accept this. I almost could. There was enough to blame Alden for without adding Matthew to the list. Still, I couldn't help but understand the real, unspoken reason why he had told nobody: He couldn't have done so without admitting he had opened that door in the first place. He had kept quiet to save himself, as much as anything else. If he had only told somebody what he had done, what the faerie had threatened… If the possibility could have been investigated, if there had been advance warning…

"You knew," Hero repeated. "And you let us open those doors."

"You knew too," he returned. "At least, you guessed. Clover certainly did. Eddie told us it was dangerous."

"That's right," Eddie said. He had pulled himself into a sitting position in the corner, quiet and watchful, his grey eyes impossible to read. "I did. And none of you listened."

"For God's sake." Alden had recovered some of his equilibrium. "Nothing bad happened to any of you! Clover made her deal. She can save her brother now, just as she always wanted. I'm the one who's lost mine. Seven years of waiting and planning and that thing trying to drive me mad, and it's over."

"It was already over, Alden!" I retorted. "I had to close it."

"And if it had been your brother on the other side of that door," he said, "would you still have had to?"

I never had the chance to reply. There was a knock at the door.

It was almost comical—the way the four of us froze, silent and rigid, as though we'd been caught stealing from the local shop or in a compromising position behind the library shelves. My eyes swept the room, looking for anything that might betray what we'd been doing. The room was in a mess, but that could be for any reason. The leaves, similar, in a house full of magic.

The circles on the floor. The evidence that someone had been performing a faerie spell.

Alden had the same thought. " Mundo ," he whispered, and with a sweep of his hand the chalk lines shook themselves and disappeared.

It was Morgan, the butler, at the door.

"Forgive me," Morgan said. If he noticed we were all in our clothes from the night before and the room behind us was in chaos, he was far too well-trained to show it. "There's a telephone call downstairs for Miss Hill."

I'd never had such a thing in my life. It took a moment for the words to even make sense. "But… I don't know anyone who owns a telephone. Present company excepted."

"Well, perhaps somebody bought one," Alden said. He was very good—it sounded light, inconsequential, the barest hint of an edge. Nobody would have guessed they had interrupted a furious row. "Why don't you go find out?"

I hesitated, torn, unwilling to leave. But if there really was a call, it had to be from home. Nobody else knew or cared where I had gone for the summer. If home were calling me, they had gone to trouble to do so—the nearest telephone was at the post office in town. It would have to be an emergency.

"I'll be back soon," I said, to Alden or Hero or Eddie or all of them. I couldn't work out why that sounded almost a threat, and then I realised. I was worried about what Alden might do left in the room with the closed door.

The phone was in the downstairs hallway, an incongruous object of brass and wood amidst the oil paintings and old furniture, the wide round circles of the bells and receiver giving it a look of perpetual surprise. I raised the receiver to my ear uncertainly. This, of all things, felt like magic.

"Hello?"

"Clover?" It took me a moment to identify the voice—one of the middle girls, but they sounded similar enough in person, much less funnelled through acres of wire. Then I heard the tiny stammer and knew with a tightening of my chest that it was Holly. "Is that you?"

"Yes. Yes, it's me. Are you all right? What's happened?"

There was a rush of static as Holly sighed. "Oh, thank God. Clover, how far away are you? You need to come home right now."

I could hear Alden and Hero arguing all the way up the stairs. It should have been a familiar sound, but there was an edge to it this time, a sharpness that pushed beyond exasperation. I didn't care anymore. My heart was pounding; everything else was numb. Last night already seemed a terrible dream.

Nobody noticed me as I opened the door. I had to clear my throat before I could speak.

"It's Matthew," I heard myself say. My voice sounded very small and far away to my own ears; everything else seemed to be receding down a long, dark corridor. Far away at the other end, the others quieted and turned to me. "That was Holly—she drove into town to use the telephone. Something went wrong with the curse last night. They couldn't wake Matthew this morning. They think it's taking him."

"My God," Alden said softly. His anger at me drained away at once. "I'm sorry."

I couldn't stop to acknowledge the sympathy. I was walking a tightrope—if I didn't keep my eyes fixed ahead, I'd fall and break.

"I have to go home," I said. "At once. I hate to leave you after all this, but—"

"I'll come with you," Eddie said. He was already standing, pale yet composed.

"You don't have to—"

"I want to." I couldn't remember the last time he had ever interrupted me. "Please. It's your brother. Two Camford scholars there are bound to be better than one."

I couldn't answer, just nodded quickly around the lump in my throat.

Hero got to her feet, gingerly. "I'll drive you to the station."

"Thank you," I managed.

Alden was looking at the wall where the door had been with great attention. As the three of us started to leave, he seemed to suddenly remember our existence. His head snapped around.

"Wait!" He sounded brisk now, almost businesslike, and that was far more disconcerting than his earlier grief and fury. "Before you go, we need to agree on one thing. We all need to promise never to mention what we've done tonight to anyone. If anyone asks, we went to bed early last night, around ten, and nothing happened. All right?"

"Obviously," I said, as dryly as possible.

"I mean it, Clover. I need you to promise."

"I said yes!" The numbness from the telephone call was starting to wear off. "What do you want, a binding curse?"

"It might be an idea." He must have seen the disbelief on my face. "Of course that won't be necessary. I trust all three of you with my life. We just need to be sure, that's all."

"Alden, my brother might be dying!"

"Mine might be dead!" His anger flashed unexpectedly to meet mine, like a blade. "Yours you at least made a deal to save. There's still a chance it might work. We closed the door before we could do as much for Thomas."

"It doesn't look like the deal's worked out so well for Matthew, does it?"

He didn't answer that. "I'm just trying to keep this from causing any further damage. It's for your sake as much as mine. We could be arrested if this gets out. At the very least, we'd be expelled from Camford."

"I don't bloody care about Camford right now!"

"And that's why I need you to promise," he said. "You will, sooner or later. I need to protect all of us."

"You need to protect yourself, you mean." I was truly angry now. It might have been at least partially self-defence—anger was a far easier emotion than fear or shame or the horrible dread curdling my stomach—but not entirely. "Would you really care if I told, as long as I kept you out of it? I don't have time for this…"

Alden's fingers were around my wrist before I could turn. I pulled back, furious and indignant, and they held fast.

"It's better for everyone if there's nothing to be kept out of ," he said. "Please, Clover. It may be that nothing comes of this. If it does, though, then we need our stories straight."

"Get off me," I said coldly. He didn't move.

A frightening doubt surfaced. Alden had been standing right in the centre of the ring beside me, after all, and the faerie had come very near to breaking through. I had pushed him from the ring; he would have just had time to get back in. Perhaps it had been too near. Perhaps…

But it was Alden. I was looking him dead in the eye. This wasn't the faerie in his body. He hadn't been possessed. I had seen Matthew in the grip of enchantment; I knew what it looked like. I knew my friend; I recognised him now. And I wished with all my heart that I didn't.

"I promise," Eddie said into the silence. It might have been his usual talent for keeping the peace coming to the fore, but there was something in his look—a darkness, a flash of warning—that I hadn't glimpsed before. I remembered, out of nowhere, that he had been expelled from school for fighting. "Let her go, all right? I promise."

"So do I, of course," Hero said. If my voice had been cold, hers was ice. "I have no burning desire to incriminate myself, especially when we're more likely to be arrested than expelled. I suppose I may leave in my own car now?"

Something wild and trapped flickered in Alden's eyes. Then he heaved a sigh, frustrated, and it was gone. He dropped my wrist and stepped back, raising his hands in surrender. "Of course. I wasn't going to kidnap you, for Christ's sake. I was only saying—"

"I know exactly what you were saying. Come on, you two, before I change my mind and walk out on all of you."

"We went to bed around ten," Alden repeated. "That's the story if we're asked. Do you all have that? Eddie?"

"I'm not stupid." Eddie turned unexpectedly. His fists were clenched. "You never quite believed that, did you, even back in school? I'm really not. I was the one, if you remember, who told you not to do this."

"I know you did. But—"

"And I'll tell you something else, now we've seen it. That was the same dryad that was at Amiens. I couldn't have guessed that—neither could Hero or Clover. But you could. You'd seen it before. Dryads almost never come through the doors. The moment we worked out that it was a dryad at Amiens, you had no more excuses not to know that it was the same one. And you never said a word. Why not?"

Again, that uncharacteristic hesitation. "I didn't know. I never saw it properly when I was twelve—I never realised what it was."

"Right." Eddie snorted. "Now I know you think I'm stupid."

"I don't think you're stupid." He had gathered himself again quickly, but not quickly enough. The cracks had shown, and something had peeked through. "I think you've never told a lie in your life."

"Well, I'm about to start, aren't I? We went to bed at ten o'clock and we didn't nearly let a powerful faerie into Ashfield. Will that do?"

"Yes," Alden said quietly. "That will do. Clover—"

I couldn't give him my word. I was too furious, too hurt, too sick with worry and magic and the blood-metal taste of betrayal. Instead, I gave him a short, sharp nod. Then I turned on my heels, and I left.

It was a silent drive to the train station. God knows none of us felt like talking. My head was pounding and my stomach was acid—I had to close my eyes once or twice when the car took a tight bend or bumped over a pothole. Hero's face was pale and set, fixed on the road ahead; I couldn't see Eddie in the back seat, but I was willing to bet he didn't look good. It was more than that, though. The air shimmered with resentment and guilt, like a heat haze. Talking about it would only solidify it further, and yet I couldn't imagine talking about anything else.

"Do tell us how he is, won't you?" was all Hero said as I clambered out of the car. Her voice was strange—coolly formal, when Hero's anger always blazed hot—but I took comfort at least that she had spoken.

I nodded, miserable. "Thank you. And—I'm sorry."

I didn't know what I was sorry for—for convincing them of this nightmare, for being convinced myself, for knowing the risks and lying about them, for running out on them now, for some vague unspecified harm I didn't want to think of—only that I was. I was so, so sorry.

The train was half-empty—we found a carriage easily, and as soon as we did Eddie curled up against the window, buried his face in the crook of his arm, and closed his eyes. I sat opposite him, back to the engine, and rested my head against the glass as the track receded and the wheels picked up speed. I was going home, I reminded myself. I had the faerie's spell—that at least I had gained from last night's adventure. Perhaps I could save him.

Please. Please, let me save him.

"Your plants," I said to Eddie, at least three miles too late. We had each grabbed a very small bag from our rooms. Everything else was still back at Ashfield. "The ones you brought with you. Are they—?"

It took him a moment to stir. "They'll be all right. The gardeners at Ashfield will take care of them for a day or two. When I get a chance, I'll send word home and one of our gardeners will go and pick them up."

Eddie always seemed so beyond class and money and Family. I forgot, sometimes, that he was as wealthy as Alden and Hero, that his home was a great house like Ashfield and had gardeners too. I had a flash of him, younger than Little John, crouching by their sides as they trimmed hedges and planted herbs.

"Are you angry with me?" I tried to say it as reasonably as I could. "I just want to know—I understand if you are. I know you didn't want to go ahead with the door, and you agreed because of us. Because of me. And I misled you. I told you it would be safe."

"I'm not angry at you." I think he meant it. It was difficult to tell with his face hidden in his sleeve and his eyes closed. "You didn't mislead me. You misled Hero, maybe. I didn't believe you."

I wasn't sure if that made it any better. "What about Alden? Do you really think he knew who that faerie was all along?"

"I don't know. He said he didn't. Please, I really don't feel well. I just want to sleep."

I left him alone. I still felt sick myself, but there was no way I could rest.

There was nobody to meet us at the station again, of course. They didn't know when I would be here, and none of them would leave Matthew's side to wait. It occurred to me, in a brief flicker, that this was the first time any of my friends were seeing my home, that I should probably worry about what Eddie would think of the bare platform and the dirt road leading to town. But I didn't care, and anyway, Eddie showed no sign of thinking anything in particular. He had recovered himself by the time the train stopped; as it pulled away, he took my hand comfortingly. His face was back to normal—only a little pale and quiet, as if privately resigned to something he was going to put out of his mind for now.

"It'll be all right, Clover," he said. "I'm certain it will."

I found a weak smile. "Come on. It's this way."

The walk was long and hot, the grass dry in the summer sun. Fortunately Eddie was used to walking for hours in the country. He kept up easily, even when my house at last came into view and I broke into a run.

Someone was obviously watching for me. The door burst open before I could reach it, and Iris and Little John were there. It was like my last homecoming, only so very different. Their faces were tear-streaked and frightened, and they clung to me as if to a life buoy at sea. I dropped my bag and wrapped my arms around them, my heart thrashing like a caged bird in my chest.

"It's all right," I said, trying to be calm, torn between wanting to comfort them and longing to know what was happening. "I'm here. Where's Mum?"

And there she was, standing in the doorway, her face tight and worn, her hair falling from its pins. Her sleeves were rolled up—they always were when things were serious, as though she could pull us through with hard work alone.

We had spent months not speaking; I had spent those months reliving our last fight whenever I had thought of her, alternately furious and guilt-ridden and self-pitying. It didn't matter. I knew that as soon as our eyes met, and in the midst of everything I could have sobbed with relief.

"You came," she said.

"Of course I did! This is Edmund Gaskell," I added, though I wasn't sure if Mum had even seen he was there. "He's a friend of mine from school. He wanted to help."

"Hello, Mrs. Hill," Eddie said. "Don't mind me, really, I don't mean to be any trouble."

"We're glad to have you," Mum said, but absently, the way she might offer a cup of tea. Her mouth found the right pleasantries; her mind was up with Matthew, and her eyes were fixed on me. All her worries about the posh students at Camford, and when it came to it she didn't even care that one was standing right in front of her.

I took a deep breath. "I'm sorry for what I said—"

Mum was already shaking her head, grabbing my hands in hers. "Never you mind that. Water under the bridge. I'm sorry too, for what that's worth. Our Matty will be so glad you're here."

I knew things were bad if she was calling him Matty. "How is he?"

Mum's hands tightened around mine, the only sign of any strong feeling. "Poorly," she said. "Very poorly. He's been unwell all year—spring was very hard on him, and the midnight at midsummer lasted nearly two days. I almost wrote to you afterwards, even though he wouldn't have it. This was different, though. I did what we always did: I tied him up, I waited outside the door. It was a lovely night, soft and golden, nothing sinister at all. Not until twelve, when the winds picked up. Strange winds, they were, and when I looked out the window, the fields were covered in silver. Shep was barking, and the sheep were screaming. Matthew never made a sound. Maybe that's how I should have known. Maybe I should have opened the door and checked on him. But we never open the door."

I didn't have the words to ask.

"When I went in to let him out at dawn, I couldn't wake him up," she said. "And the… the mark's spreading. The curse mark, the part of him that's turning to wood." I couldn't remember her ever saying that aloud before. It was too strange, too surreal. She preferred to think of it as a war wound and nothing more. "It's been creeping up his neck and across his chest all day. It hasn't got far to go before it touches his heart. He'll die then, won't he?"

"I don't know," I said faintly, then shook myself. "Yes, he will. Is he awake?"

"Not since I found him. He called out a few times in his sleep at first. He's gone quiet altogether now." She hesitated. "Can you do something?"

We had done something, the four of us. We had opened a door. And straight away, the message had come from home that Matthew was dying.

"I'll try everything I know." I returned the squeeze of Mum's hands and found a smile. "Let's go see him."