Guardian of the Gate (5 page)

I take my time dressing as I ponder my strange trip to Birchwood. Daylight has done nothing to clarify the experience. Reason
tells me that I must not have been traveling at all, that it must have been a simple dream, for between the two dimensions
of the astral Plane and the physical world is a veil that cannot be lifted. One can only see what is happening on the Plane
by occupying it, and clearly Alice was in the physical world while I was on the Plane.

Yet I am certain that I
was
traveling. That Alice
did
know I was there. She said so herself. I am wondering what to do with this newfound knowledge when a knock sounds from the
door.

I am not surprised, even in my state of half-undress, when Sonia steps into the room without waiting for me to answer. We
stopped standing on ceremony long ago.

“Good morning,” she says. “Did you sleep well?”

I reach past the elaborate velvet gowns hanging in my wardrobe, opting instead for something simple in apricot silk. “Not
exactly.”

Her brow furrows. “What do you mean? What’s wrong?”

Sighing, I clutch the gown to my bosom and drop onto the bed next to Sonia. I feel unexpectedly guilty. I have not been honest
with Sonia lately. I did not tell her of my terrifying travel to the river the night I saw Samael and awoke with a cut on
my cheek. I did not tell her of my vision of Alice the night I saw her on the stairs here at Milthorpe Manor.

And ours is not an alliance that will tolerate secrets.

“I traveled to Birchwood last night.” I say it quickly before I can change my mind.

I do not expect the anger that flushes her cheeks. “You are not supposed to travel the Plane without me, Lia. You know this!
It’s dangerous.” Her words are a hiss.

She is right, of course. It has been our habit to travel the Plane together and only when necessary for Sonia to teach me
how to use the gifts that are mine. It is for my own protection, for there is always the danger that the Souls might detain
me long enough to sever the astral cord that binds my soul to my body. Should that happen, my greatest fear would be realized
and I would be stranded in the icy Void for all eternity. Still, Sonia’s agitation surprises me, and I feel renewed affection
for her in the face of her concern.

I place a hand on her arm. “I didn’t go intentionally. I felt… summoned.”

She raises her eyebrows, worry creasing her forehead. “By Alice?”

“Yes… Maybe… I don’t know! But I saw her at Birchwood, and I think she saw me.”

There is no mistaking the shock on Sonia’s face. “What do you mean she saw you? She cannot see you when she is in this world
and you are on the Plane! She would be in violation!” She hesitates, looking at me with an expression I cannot fathom. “Unless
you were the one using forbidden power.”

“Don’t be ridiculous! Of course I wasn’t. I may be a Spellcaster, but I don’t have any idea how to conjure such power, nor
do I want to know.” I stand, pulling the gown over my head and feeling it fall over my petticoat and slide over my stockings.
When I emerge from the yards of pale silk, I meet Sonia’s eyes. “And I don’t think Alice is very concerned about the Grigori
right now, though I suppose I should have expected as much.”

“What do you mean?”

I sigh. “I believe I saw her. Here, at Milthorpe Manor. I woke up in the middle of the night and saw someone on the stairs.
I thought it was Ruth or one of the other maids, but when I called out, the figure turned and it… it looked like Alice.”

“What do you mean ‘it looked like Alice’?”

“The figure was faint. That’s how I knew it wasn’t a physical being. But it was her.” I nod, surer by the moment. “I’m certain
of it.”

Sonia stands, walking to the window overlooking the streets below. She is quiet for a long time. When she finally speaks,
the mixture of awe and fear are unmistakable in her voice.

“So she can see us, then. And possibly hear us, too.”

I nod, though Sonia’s back remains turned. “I think so.”

She turns to face me. “What does it mean for us? For the missing pages?”

“No Sister of the prophecy would willingly hand over the location of the missing pages to Alice. But if she has been able
to observe our progress, she may try and beat us to them, either to use them to her own gain or to keep us from reaching them.”

“But she can’t cross into this world, not physically. Not for the time it would take to pursue us all that way. She would
have to take a ship to London and follow us in person, and that would take time.”

“Unless she has someone do it for her.”

Sonia meets my eyes.

“But what can we do, Lia? How will we stop her from reaching the pages if she can trace our movements from afar?”

I shrug. The answer is simple and not difficult to find.

“We will have to get there first.”

I hope Sonia cannot tell that my words are stronger than my conviction, for the knowledge that I might soon face my sister
causes me deep disquiet.

That Alice is ready to meet me, that she seeks to put the gears of the prophecy in motion once again, leaves me only with
a sense of foreboding. In the face of my sister’s power, my preparations seem meager indeed.

But they are all I have.

Sonia and I sit outside on the small patio at the back of Milthorpe Manor. It is not as sweeping as the grounds at Birchwood,
or as quiet, but the lush green shrubbery and lovely flowers are a refuge of sorts from the chaos and grit of London. We sit
side by side on identical chaises, our eyes closed to the sun.

“Shall I fetch us a parasol?” Sonia asks, I think, out of some semblance of propriety, but her voice is lazy and I know she
does not really care whether we have cover from the sun.

I don’t open my eyes. “I think not. The sun is fleeting enough in England. I won’t do a thing to shield myself from its warmth.”

The chaise next to me creaks, and I know Sonia has turned to look at me. When she speaks, I hear the laughter teasing her
words. “Surely London’s porcelain-skinned girls are cowering for cover on a day such as this.”

I lift my head, shielding my eyes. “Yes, well, pity for them. I’m ever so grateful not to be one of them.”

Sonia’s laugh travels on the breeze floating through the garden. “You and me both!”

We turn in the direction of the house as shouted voices drift to us on the patio. It sounds like a disagreement, though I
have never heard the staff argue before.

“Whatever is going — ” Sonia does not have time to finish her thought, for all at once there is the scuff of impending boots
as the voices become louder and nearer. Rising, we look at each other in alarm as we catch snippets of the argument.

“. . . quite ridiculous! You do not need to…”

“For goodness sake, don’t…”

A young woman rounds the corner first, Ruth quick on her heels. “I am sorry, Miss. I tried to tell her — ”

“And
I
tried to tell
her
that it is not necessary to announce us like strangers!”

“Luisa?” There is no mistaking the aquiline nose, the lush chestnut hair, the full red lips, and yet I still cannot believe
my friend is standing before me.

She does not have time to answer, for two more figures appear quickly behind her. I’m so surprised that words fail me entirely.
Thankfully, they do not fail Sonia.

“Virginia! And… Edmund?” she says.

I stand there a moment longer, wanting to be certain it is
real and not an afternoon dream. When Edmund smiles it is but a
trace of the one he had readily available when Henry was still alive, but it is enough. It is enough to shake loose my shock.

And then Sonia and I are squealing and running for them all.

After a round of excited greetings, Aunt Virginia and Luisa join Sonia and me in the parlor for tea and biscuits while Edmund
sees to the bags. Cook’s biscuits have been known to crack a tooth or two, and I wince as Aunt Virginia bites into one of
the granite-like cookies.

“A bit hard, aren’t they?” I say to Aunt Virginia.

She takes a moment to chew, and I think I hear her gulp as she forces the dry piece of biscuit down her throat. “Just a bit.”

Luisa reaches out to take one. I know there’s no stopping her, no matter how much I might like to warn her. Only Luisa’s own
experience has ever been able to temper her exuberance.

She bites into the cookie with a loud crack, but it only stays in her mouth a moment before she spits into her handkerchief.
“A bit? I think I may have lost a tooth! Who is responsible for such a culinary atrocity?”

Sonia stifles a laugh behind her hand, but mine escapes into the room before I can stop it. “Shhhhh! The cook makes them,
of course. And be quiet, will you? You’ll hurt her feelings!”

Luisa straightens her back. “Better her feelings than our teeth!”

I try to make my expression disapproving, but somehow I know that it is not. “Oh, I
have
missed you all! When did you arrive?”

Luisa sets down her teacup with a dainty clink. “Our ship docked just this morning. And none too soon, either! I was sick
almost the entire way.”

I remember the rough crossing Sonia and I made from New York to London. I am not as prone to motion sickness as Luisa, but
even still, it was not a pleasant journey.

“We would have met you at the wharf had we known you were coming,” Sonia says.

Aunt Virginia measures her words. “It was a rather… sudden decision.”

“But why?” Sonia asks. “We didn’t expect Luisa for quite a few months and, well…” Sonia’s voice trails off as she avoids being
rude.

“Yes, I know.” Aunt Virginia sets down her teacup. “I’m quite sure you were not expecting
me
at all. Certainly not any time soon.”

Something in her eyes makes my nerves rattle with fear. “So why
have
you come, Aunt Virginia? I mean, I
am
pleased to see you. It’s just that…”

She nods. “I know. I told you it was my duty to remain with Alice, to see to her safety despite her refusal to act as Guardian.”
She pauses, staring into the corners of the room. I have the feeling that she is not here in London at all, but back at
Birchwood,
seeing something strange and terrible. When she speaks again it is in a murmur, almost as if she is talking to herself alone.
“I must confess I
do
feel a bit guilty for leaving her, despite everything that has happened.”

Sonia shoots me a glance from the wing chair near the fire, but I wait in the empty space of Aunt Virginia’s silence. I am
in no hurry to hear what she has to say.

She meets my eyes, pulling herself from the past as she speaks. “Alice has grown… unusual. Oh, I know she has long been difficult
to fathom,” she says when she sees my look of incredulity.
Unusual
is hardly a strong enough word to describe my sister in the past year. “But since you left… well, she has become truly frightening.”

Until recently, I have been largely insulated from Alice’s activities, and I find I am hesitant to let go of my relative naïveté,
however false. Still, experience has taught me that knowing one’s enemy is key to winning any battle. Even if that enemy is
one’s own sister.

Sonia breaks in first. “What exactly do you mean, Virginia?”

Aunt Virginia looks from Sonia back to me, lowering her voice as if afraid to be overheard. “She practices her Spellcaster
craft at all hours of the night. In your mother’s old chamber.”

The Dark Room.

“She conjures fearsome things. She practices forbidden spells. Worst of all, she grows powerful beyond my imagining.”

“Can’t the Grigori punish one for using forbidden magic? For using
any
magic here in the physical world. That is what you said!” I hear the hysteria rising in my voice.

She nods slowly. “But the Grigori only have dominion over the Otherworlds. The punishments meted out can only limit one’s
privileges there, and the Grigori have already banished Alice. I know it’s difficult to fathom, Lia, but she is very careful
and very powerful. She travels the Otherworlds without detection by the Grigori much as you travel while avoiding the Souls.”
Aunt Virginia shrugs. “Her disobedience is unprecedented. There is little else the Grigori can do to one who occupies this
world. Otherwise, even they would be crossing boundaries that should not be crossed.”

I shake my head in confusion. “If the Grigori have banished Alice from the Otherworlds, she should already be in check!” Frustration
causes me to practically spit the words from my mouth.

“Unless… ,” Sonia begins.

“Unless what?” Panic fizzes in my stomach, threatening to make me ill.

“Unless she simply doesn’t care.” Luisa finally speaks from the sofa next to Aunt Virginia. “And she doesn’t, Lia. She doesn’t
care what the Grigori do or say. She doesn’t care about their rules and punishments, and she doesn’t need their permission.
She doesn’t need their sanction to do anything at all. She has grown far too powerful for that.”

We fall silent for a time, sipping our tea as each of us contemplates a powerful and unrestrained Alice. It is Aunt Virginia
who breaks the silence, though not with talk of Alice.