Blythewood (22 page)

“Violets and Monkshood,
Say the bells of Blythewood.
Here comes a lampsprite to lead you astray,
And here comes a Darkling to steal you away.”

WE WALKED OUT of the village and onto River Road. Miss
Corey walked on ahead at a brisk clip, glancing anxiously at the
western sky, where the sun was sinking over the mountains on
the other side of the river. Miss Sharp walked between Helen
and Daisy, and I trailed behind with Mr. Bellows, who seemed
too busy checking his pocket watch and whistling the bells tune
he’d sung with Uncle Taddie to talk. Helen, too, was distracted,
peering ahead on either side of the road as if she was looking
for someone. For Nate, I guessed. She must have been wondering if he had already left the village or would be stranded on the
road after dark.

Only Daisy felt compelled to trade social niceties. “I liked
your aunts, Miss Sharp,” she said.
“Yes, they’re old dears. I’m sure they liked you, too.”
“It’s sweet they take care of their brother.”
“Yes, fortunate, too. I’m not sure what we’d do with Uncle
Taddie otherwise.”
“Is that why they didn’t marry?”
Miss Sharp didn’t answer right away. I could see Daisy fidgeting with her reticule nervously. “I’m sorry,” she said after a
few awkward minutes, “I didn’t mean to pry.”
“No, it’s perfectly all right. As my grandfather would have
said, young people deserve to know the truth. My aunt Harriet meant to marry. She was engaged to a young man of one
of the One Hundred—a Driscoll, in fact—but when Taddie became . . . disturbed, the Driscolls insisted her fiancé break off
the engagement. They were afraid, you see, that madness might
run in the family. According to the old ways it’s irresponsible to
have children if there’s a taint in the bloodline.”
Beside me Mr. Bellows had ceased whistling, and up ahead
Miss Corey had slowed down.
“But that’s . . . that’s . . .” Daisy spluttered.
“Unfair? Cruel? Yes. You can see why my aunt Harriet has
no fondness for the old ways.”
Even Daisy’s repertoire of cheerful homilies was exhausted
by this comment. She lapsed into silence. Miss Sharp resumed
her inspection of the woods. Miss Corey walked on at an even
brisker pace. Mr. Bellows walked with his head bowed, scowling at the ground. I kept my eyes on the lengthening shadows at
the side of the road and thought about tainted blood. Aunt Harriet had only to have a brother who chattered harmlessly about
fairies to be denied marriage. What if the Order knew about the
dreams I had about the Darkling? Were they signs of madness?
Or were they part of a spell the Darkling had cast over me to
lure into the woods? But would a sane woman be susceptible to
the lure of a Darkling? Georgiana’s mocking words came back
to me. “Nature protects those of the best blood from undesirable matches because impure mates will appear repugnant to
the truly pure woman.”
So did my desire for the Darkling mean I was
impure
?

Or was it my mother who was mad? After all, did a sane
woman shun her rich relatives and live in poverty with her
daughter?

Did a sane woman drink laudanum?
Did a sane woman hear bells in her head . . . ?
As I did now.
The bass bell had been chiming in my head for some moments now. But for what? There was no danger here. There was
nothing in the woods but a large crow rustling its feathers as it
alighted in the low-hanging branches of one of the giant sycamores that lined the road. It was joined by another crow . . . and
then another. A dozen of them were amassing in the trees, like
bits of the gathering dusk made visible. A flock of them—only
that’s not what you called a group of crows . . .

“A
murder
!” Vionetta Sharp said with a quick intake of
breath. She had come to a stop a few feet ahead where the road
curved just before the gate to Blythewood. She held out one
arm to keep us back and with the other she reached forward to
grab Miss Corey’s arm, her fingers digging deep into the other
woman’s flesh.

“Ah yes,” Rupert Bellows said, ambling forward. “My favorite of the collective nouns. A murder of . . .” His voice died
as he reached the two women. I edged forward to see what they
were looking at.

They were staring at the gate to Blythewood. The black
wrought-iron scrollwork stood out starkly against the indigo
and violet sky, especially the spikes on top.

Only there hadn’t been spikes on the gate when we left this
afternoon. I took a step closer and the spikes
rustled
. The top of
the gate was lined with huge black crows, so packed together
that they jostled against one another for purchase. There must
have been fifty of them.

“Those . . . are . . . not . . .” Miss Sharp said slowly, carefully
enunciating each word, “
ordinary
crows.” She turned her head
to Miss Corey, who was staring at the gate. “Lillian, I am going
to do a mesmerism spell. When I’ve drawn them away, take the
girls and run to the hall.”

Miss Corey turned her head to her friend, opening her
mouth to object, but she snapped it shut when she met Miss
Sharp’s eyes. She nodded once and turned to us. Helen and
Daisy had reached me now and stood on either side of me. I felt
Daisy’s hand slip into mine as Miss Corey whispered to us.

“I want you three to stay perfectly still until I give you the
signal. Then we will run straight for the house being very, very
careful not to trip or to look back. Do you understand?”

We nodded our agreement. Helen grasped my hand and
squeezed. I looked over Miss Corey’s head to Miss Sharp.
She and Mr. Bellows were whispering together. Mr. Bellows
reached into the pocket of his tweed coat and drew out a long
silver dagger, its hilt decorated with opalescent stones, its blade
inscribed with strange runic designs. He handed it, hilt first, to
Miss Sharp with all the aplomb of a knight handing his sword
to his lady in order to be knighted. The crows stirred on the
gate, black feathers rustling against each other with a sound
like dry paper crackling. Miss Sharp swung the dagger into the
air in a long graceful arc, as if she were swinging a tennis racket
back to serve. A hundred pairs of jet black eyes followed the
motion. She swung the dagger back down and around, drawing great looping patterns in the air. The runic inscriptions on
the blade seemed to dislodge from the blade and float free in the
clear evening air . . .

“Don’t look at it,” Miss Corey hissed in my ear. “You’ll be
mesmerized, too.”
I dragged my eyes away from Miss Sharp and looked at the
crows. They were swaying in unison, their eyes following the
motions Miss Sharp drew in the air . . . and then they rose from
the gate in one long black stream, like smoke rising from a fire,
and swooped toward Miss Sharp.
“
Now!
” Miss Corey shouted. “
Run!
”
We ran under a stream of crows, so thick in the air that they
darkened the ground, through the gate. Miss Corey was ahead
of us. Behind us I could hear the birds’ hoarse, raucous caws
rending the air. There was something fierce in the sound—and
angry—as if the crows knew they had been deceived. It seemed
to grow as we ran instead of fading with the distance. Had Miss
Sharp been successful in luring them away? Or were they following us? I itched to turn around and look, but Miss Corey
had said not to.
We were climbing the rise, running so hard I could feel my
heart pounding in my ears. Or was it the sound of the crows,
gaining on us, about to swoop down and peck at the exposed
flesh of our necks?
Daisy’s hand slipped from mine and she let out a sharp cry.
Helen was pulling me forward, but I broke away and turned to
see Daisy stumble and fall, a black shape beating about her head.
I swatted the crow away and grabbed her hand. Something
thumped hard against the back of my head. Daisy screamed
and swung her reticule at the bird, but it clung to me, icy claws
digging into the nape of my neck. I had the horrible feeling that
the crow was clawing its way under my skin. I stumbled and
began to fall, Daisy’s face and the world around me going black,
my ears ringing . . .
Bells were ringing in my head, but they weren’t dispelling
the cold wave rushing over my body, numbing me to the tips of
my toes. I could see Daisy’s face above me, her eyes wide with
horror, lips moving, but I couldn’t hear her. The world had gone
quiet except for the bells. Dark shadows were creeping over the
lawn where I lay, over Daisy’s face, across my eyes . . .
I fell into the darkness as though falling down a well. It
was very cold and full of echoes. I heard voices—or rather one
voice, a voice that was somehow familiar—chanting a singsong
rhyme to the rhythm of the bells inside my head.

“No!” I screamed, thrashing out in the dark. “That’s not
true!”
The well filled with the sound of beating wings. My hands
struck against something smooth and . . .
feathered.
The talon
grip on my neck suddenly loosened and melted like ice water
rushing down my back—cold, but instead of numbing me, it
woke me up. I opened my eyes.
I was looking up into a darkened face surrounded by a
halo of light. Enormous black wings blocked out the sun. Dark
shapes wheeled in the glare—as if feathers from those wings
had been torn loose and sent spinning through space. I heard
bells . . .
Only this time they weren’t in my head.
The winged creature turned his head to listen to them and
I recognized his face in profile—the same face I’d seen carved
white as a cameo, now carved out of ebony against the glare of
the sun. It was the Darkling.
My
Darkling. He’d come for me—
but what did he want?
His turned and his face was in shadow. I couldn’t see his expression, but I could tell from the bend of his head that he was
looking at me. His gaze felt like a warm bath after the ice claws
of the crow—a warmth that was healing me from the attack.
I wanted to move closer to that warmth. I reached out and felt
his hand grasp mine. The shock of warm solid flesh shattered
the last shards of ice from my body. I rose feeling light and free.
Then his hand was wrenched out of mine and he spun
around. There was a flash of steel, then wings beat the air and
knocked me backward. I was blinded by the flurry of black
feathers. When I opened my eyes Nathan was standing over
me. He was holding a fire poker.
“Nathan! How . . . ? What . . . ?”
I wanted to ask why he’d attacked the Darkling who was
saving me, but my lips were still numb, my body still weak from
the alternating waves of ice and fire I’d just been through.
“I was on the roof when I saw those birds attack you,” Nathan cried, his voice full of the horror he must have felt at the
sight. “I ran to the tower and rang the bells. It seemed to do the
trick. They melted.”
“Melted?” I asked, recalling the sensation of freezing water
running down my back and the long cold plunge into the dark
well. My mouth was full of a coppery taste. Had they melted
inside me? Had I swallowed them?
“But then when I got down here I saw that monster crouched
over you. I hit him with this.” Nathan brandished the fire poker
proudly, his face glowing. I’d never seen him with so much
color in his face. Or looking so . . .
happy.
How could I tell him
that the Darkling hadn’t been trying to hurt me? He’d been
the one to save me from the crows. Or at least I’d
thought
he
was saving me.
“And a jolly good job you did!” Rupert Bellows had reached
us. He clapped Nathan on the back and then looked down at me.
Miss Sharp came up behind him and let out a little cry when
she saw me. She knelt down and laid her hand on my forehead.
“Don’t just stand there, Rupert, help me carry Avaline inside.”
“I can walk,” I objected, although I was none too sure that
I could. The thought of being carried by Mr. Bellows, though,
made me go hot and cold all over. I struggled to my feet with Nathan’s and Miss Sharp’s help. Stinging prickles ran up my legs
as though I was standing in a briar bush. Helen was suddenly
there, slapping dust away from my skirt, tugging my waistband
straight and patting my hair neat. Ordinarily I would object to
her fussing, but her brisk hands were bringing life back to my
limbs.
“When I looked back and saw that you’d fallen I ran right
back. But then that monster landed . . .”
Why did they keep calling him a monster when he’d saved
me? I tried to correct her, but Miss Sharp cried out.
“Where is Lillian?”
“She went on to the hall to tell Dame Beckwith what happened,” Helen said. “Look, they’re coming now.”
Everyone turned to the house except for me. I spied my
posy of violets where it had fallen and knelt to pick it up. As I
stood up I looked down the drive to the gate and felt my heart
stutter in my chest.
Standing in the center of the open gates was a lone dark figure of a man in an Inverness cape.
“Look!” I said, turning to Nate. “It’s the man who was in
the Wing & Clover.”
“What man?” Nate asked.
I turned back to point at the figure at the bottom of the hill
but he was gone, melted away as quickly and completely as the
murder of crows.

I WANTED NOTHING more than to go back to my room,
wash my face, lie down, and think about what had happened
in privacy. What were those crows? Were they the same ones I
had seen circling the Triangle building the day of the fire? The
Darkling had been there then, too—did he summon them? But
it seemed that the Darkling had come to save me from the crows
and I’d felt that rush of warmth in his presence. I’d
wanted
to go
with him.