Blythewood (25 page)

“I thought you didn’t care about passing your midterms,” I
said to Nathan.
“I do now,” he told me, winking. “Things have gotten exciting around here.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded that his response to all that
had happened today was that it was
exciting
, and then I suddenly laughed. The girls stared at me for a second and then joined
me.
“What’s so funny?” Nathan asked.
“Don’t you see?” Helen replied, gasping. “It’s taken an attack of killer crows to turn you into a scholar!”
“Come on, then,” I said, squeezing Daisy’s hand and whispering that I was sorry. “We’d best get to work.”

Miss Corey had left us there with a night’s supply of lamps,
firewood, tea, and biscuits. Sarah drilled us on declensions and
spells, history dates and fairy phyla, hunting terms, and potions, making up rhymes and acronyms to help us remember
them.

“You’re so good at this,” Daisy enthused. “Do you plan to
be a teacher yourself?”
I was glad to see Daisy had recovered from my outburst. I’d
been trying all night to make it up to her, which had the extra
advantage of taking my mind off what I’d overheard in Dame
Beckwith’s office.
“Perhaps,” Sarah said, biting her lower lip. “I want to do
something that makes a real difference. There’s so much to be
done in the Order—not just here at Blythewood, but out in the
world.”
“What
does
the Order do out in the world?” Daisy asked,
frowning. “I mean, I understand that we’re meant to know how
to guard the Blythe Wood and keep the fairies and demons
from getting out, but what about the Blythewood graduates.
What do they do?”
“They’re meant to keep a lookout for demons and fairies
that have infiltrated the outside world. They’re all over.” She
lowered her voice to a low conspiratorial whisper. “What they
haven’t told you yet is that there are fairies who look just like
us and pass as humans. They’re the most dangerous ones. We
really should be doing more. All we do here at Blythewood is
maintain the status quo. But I think it’s time for us to take a
more active role and eradicate evil.”
Her fervor reminded me of Tillie and the suffragists I’d
heard speaking from soapboxes in Union Square. I was also reminded of the whispered argument I’d overhead between Agnes and Caroline Janeway.
I wasn’t the only one moved.
“Exactly,” Nathan said, his eyes shining at Sarah. “We can’t
just sit around doing nothing.”
“But what can
we
do?” I asked.
“
We
can continue studying and pass our exams,” Helen said
reprovingly, glaring at Sarah. I don’t think she liked the way
Nathan was looking at her. “Now can you please go over the
bell changes for repelling sprites once again? I never can keep
them straight.”
Sarah complied, but when Helen wasn’t looking, I saw Sarah passing Nathan a note. He smiled when he read it and tucked
it away in his pocket. I tried to concentrate on the two hundred
changes we were supposed to have memorized by tomorrow
and not think about what the note had said—or feel a pang of
jealousy at the way Nathan had looked at Sarah.
We studied through Halloween night, keeping the fire
stoked and the curtains drawn. Even if we had gone to bed it
would have been impossible to sleep. The bells rang every
hour; to ward off any creatures that might try to stray from the
woods, Sarah told us. I felt that we were doing our own part
to keep away the demons, reciting our spells and declensions,
forming a bond against the dark forged out of the camaraderie of a shared task. I was banishing my own demons, too—my
questions about my father and what his connection might be to
the awful Shadow Master—with the laughter and warmth of
my friends.
It seemed cruel to schedule exams after such a sleepless
night, but Sarah explained that it was so we’d get used to performing under pressure. It certainly was grueling. The exams
took up the whole next day. Hours of essay writing and answering questions left us all covered in ink splots and splashes of potions from the practical section of the science exam. Whenever
I felt my energy flagging one of my friends was there with an
encouraging smile or a grimace of shared toil—and not
just
my
friends. A girl I’d never noticed before offered me a pen when
mine broke; another made room for me at her lab table. In between exams I noticed girls whispering in knots. I feared at first
that the details of my past life that I’d told in Dame Beckwith’s
office had gotten out and they were whispering about me working in a shirtwaist factory or being locked in a mental institution, but when we were going into our last exam—in Miss
Frost’s class—one of the girls came up to ask if it were true that
we had saved the school from a shadow crow attack.
“Yes,” Helen answered for us. “I personally slew a dozen of
the creatures and Daisy here beat off an entire murder with her
reticule.” Helen motioned to the embroidered bag, which Daisy
hadn’t let go of since it had been restored to her this morning
by Sarah. “But the real hero was Ava. She mesmerized the birds
with the power of the bells in her head. If not for her, the entire school would have been overrun. There’s talk of erecting a
statue of her.”
“Personally,” Georgiana sniffed, “I would be worried if I
heard things in my head.”
“Personally,” Nate said as he strolled in late, “I’d be surprised if there were anything in your head.”
Georgiana was about to utter a retort when Miss Frost
sailed in, Sarah struggling in her wake with an armful of trays,
and commanded us all to our seats. When we were all seated,
Sarah began distributing the trays.
“After the calamitous attack on Blythewood yesterday,
Dame Beckwith required my consultation late into the night.
I was therefore unable to prepare the written section of the
exam.”
Cam Bennett, sitting behind me, broke into a cheer that
was taken up by the whole class, except for Georgiana, who was
still sulking from Nathan’s insult.
“Yes, yes, there’s no need to thank me for my service to the
school. As my mentor Sir Miles Malmsbury would say, ‘Steady
sails the ship of science.’ The events of yesterday have driven
home to me how vital it is for us to understand our enemy. So,
in lieu of a written exam, you will dissect a lampsprite, identifying each anatomical—”
“No.”
The voice came from my right, but I hardly recognized it as
Daisy’s. She was standing, her reticule clutched in both hands
before her as if she were drawing strength from Mr. Appleby’s
letters inside.
Miss Frost stared at her, her face turning the same purple
as her dress. “How dare you talk to a superior in such a fashion,
Miss . . . er . . .”
“Moffat,” Daisy said in a loud, clear voice. “Miss Daisy
Moffat from Kansas City, Kansas.”
“I do not care what your name is, girl, or from what provincial backwater you hail. You will sit down and do as you have
been told.”
“No,” Daisy said again. “It is cruel to treat the lampsprites
as you have. Even back at our farm in Kansas we treat our
animals better, and these are
not
animals. I have been reading
about them. They’re—”
“They are devious, dangerous demons!” Miss Frost cried,
shaking her fist at Daisy. “It was a lampsprite that led Sir
Malmsbury astray on his last mission, from which he never returned. I will tolerate no sympathy for the creatures. If you do
not sit down and dissect the little demon I will personally see
to it that you are expelled and sent back to the farmyard pigsty
from which you came.”
Would Miss Frost really have that power? I wondered. She
was a sour, drink-addled woman, and yet Dame Beckwith had
seemed oddly tolerant of her in the conversation I’d overheard
yesterday.
“Miss Frost,” I said, rising to my feet beside Daisy, “I
think we all understand how important it is to honor Sir Miles
Malmsbury by continuing his work.” I’d only meant to echo
the words that Miss Frost had used yesterday to remind her of
Dame Beckwith’s patience with her in the hope she would show
a similar patience with Daisy, but as the blood drained from her
face I saw that she guessed I’d overheard her. She was looking at
me with such hate that I heard the bass bell ring an alarm in my
head. Very well then, I thought, hardening my heart to her, let
her think that. I went on in measured tones that were punctuated by the slow toll of my inner bell.
“But would Sir Malmsbury really want us to mutilate the
specimens he worked so hard to collect? Wouldn’t he prefer
that we, er, honor his work by, perhaps, drawing and diagramming them instead?”
When I finished the bell was ringing so loudly in my head I
was sure that everyone could hear it. Any minute now I would
be denounced for practicing magic on my teacher. Wasn’t it obvious? Miss Frost had cocked her head and was staring at me
with a gaze as blank as the dead eyes of the skewered sprite. She
swallowed audibly, then shook herself.
“Sir Miles
did
always admire a well-done sketch.” She
looked at the photo of her mentor on the wall. “As I was saying,
girls, please draw a diagram of the sprite, identifying the genus
and its distinguishing features. Sarah will collect the drawings.
I’ve suddenly developed the most unpleasant headache.”
As soon as Miss Frost left, the class broke out in applause.
“Three cheers for Ava,” Cam cried, thumping me on the back.
“Hip, hip, hooray!” The class actually cheered.
“Thank you,” Daisy whispered.
“It was nothing,” I said, but as I bent my head down to my
drawing I felt my cheeks burning as I thought of how proud
Tillie would be of me. I’d finally earned Mr. Greenfeder’s nickname—I was a fiery girl.

I SLEPT DREAMLESSLY that night and awoke the next
morning to a world transformed. A storm had stripped all the
last autumn leaves from the trees and glazed the bare branches
with frost, like the icing on a cake. Autumn had become winter
and our lives at Blythewood had changed just as dramatically.

The ordeal of the crow attack, the mysteries that had been
revealed to us by the candelabellum, and our night studying together had forged a bond between Nathan, Helen, Daisy, and
me. A bond cemented when Nathan drew us aside the morning
after exams and asked us for our help with a special research
project.

“A
research project
?” Helen scoffed. “Since when have you
been interested in researching anything but gambling and
drinking?”

“Since I learned that those demons took my sister,” Nate
replied, wiping the smile from Helen’s face. “I’m going to get
her back.”

“But you heard what your mother said,” Helen said. “Once a
girl’s taken by a Darkling she’s . . .
changed
. You can’t get Louisa
back, Nate.”

“Ava’s mother came back from the woods. There might be
something in the Special Collections that can tell us how to save
Louisa. As long as there’s a chance, I’m not going to give up.”

“I want us to study in the library the way we did last night so
that I can get into the Special Collections.”
“That’s all?” Helen asked, folding her arms across her chest.
“But Miss Corey is always there. She’s not going to let you just
go down into the Special Collections.”
“She will if Ava bell-mances her.”
“I can’t!” I cried. “I wouldn’t do that to a teacher!”
“You did it to Miss Frost for Daisy.”
“I didn’t
mean
to. And Miss Corey is different. I like her.”
“Fine.” Nathan sighed. “You don’t have to bell-mance her,
just study with me in the library. I’ll find my own way into the
Special Collections.”
To my surprise, Helen turned to me and Daisy and lifted an
eyebrow. “What do you two think?” she asked us both. “Shall
we aid and abet Mr. Beckwith with his illicit quest? If it turns
out like most of his projects, we’ll probably end up sacked from
the school.”
I expected that shy Daisy, who hated even to be caught talking in class, would object, but instead she said, “I think it’s a
very good idea. I’d like to know a thing or two more about the
lampsprites to prove to Miss Frost that they shouldn’t be treated as they are.”
“I applaud your progressive zeal, Miss Moffat,” Nathan said
gallantly. And then, turning to me, “And what about you, Miss
Hall? Anything you care to look up in the Special Collections?”
I thought about all I’d learned in the last twenty-four hours.

The boy who I thought saved me from the Triangle fire might
be a soulless demon. My mother had come back from the woods
covered in black feathers. The man in the Inverness cape said he
knew my father.

From then on the four of us met each day, after classes, in the
library at the long oak table that stood between the fireplace,
from whose mantel marble busts of Homer, Plato, and Sappho
watched over us, and the diamond-paned windows that looked
out to the river, where the ice grew thicker each day until the
river itself seemed to stand still in time. Outside, the highpitched cries of the falcons patrolling the woods and the ringing of the bells tied to their legs echoed in the chill air as though
we were sealed under a glass dome. Inside the library, beside the
fireplace, the books from the Special Collections mounted up
on the table before us as steadily as the ice forming on the river.

I didn’t have to bell-mance Miss Corey; Nate was able to
convince her to give him access to some of the “more harmless”
books from the collections. “Perhaps we’ll find something in
them that will help us ward off another attack,” he argued.

Although Miss Corey insisted that “better minds than his”
had combed through the books, he told her he’d heard what
she’d said at Violet House about making all information available to every student. He even offered to help her bring the
books up the spiral stairs. He was the first to sort through the
books and hand them out to each of us. Gone was his attitude
of boredom and cynicism. He seemed possessed by the desire
to know more about the creatures that had stolen his sister.