Mistress of the Storm (21 page)

Verity juggled the wooden ball in her pocket. She giggled. ‘They weren’t expecting that,’ she said. Her good humour broke the ice. Jeb smiled broadly and laughed.

‘Anyone’d think they’d never seen a car before,’ he said.

He was a good driver: fast, but steady.

‘Is it safe for you to pick me up from school?’ Verity asked, fastening her seatbelt. ‘Won’t Grandmother find out?’

‘She knows there are people waiting for her in Wellow,’ said Jeb, pushing a stray lock of hair out of his eyes, ‘and I expect she knows which side you’ll be on. Only have to take one look to see you’re a Gallant through and through.’

‘I meant, isn’t it dangerous for
you
?’

‘She’s beaten the Tempests before.’ Jeb gripped the wheel grimly. ‘She won’t see me as no threat.’

‘Do you mean your father, Isaac?’ asked Verity.

‘My grandfather,’ corrected Jeb. ‘Isaac’s my grandfather.’

‘Oh,’ said Verity, wondering.

‘My pa’s dead,’ said Jeb. ‘Isaac brought me up.’

‘Oh, I – I’m …’

‘ ’S all right – it were a long time ago. When I were a nipper.’

‘How did he die?’ asked Verity, wishing the car wasn’t so noisy that she had to shout every question at top volume.

‘Your grandmother killed him too,’ Jeb replied with characteristic brevity.

Verity felt terrible, as if it was somehow her fault that
Grandmother was so murderous and hateful. And she felt scared.

‘Ain’t nothing to do with you,’ said Jeb, shifting up a gear. ‘She’s cruel and vengeful and covetous … seems to me it’s greed that drives her.’

‘So what did she kill your father for?’ Verity asked. She would never usually be so blunt, but with Jeb it seemed natural.

‘When I was born, apparently he was dead set on going abroad to make his fortune,’ said Jeb more expansively. ‘Isaac told him to give the Mistress a wide berth, but he must have decided he could handle her.’

‘I’m so sorry …’ Verity didn’t know what else to say.

Jeb shrugged, as if to draw a line under the subject. ‘So your grandmother won’t be surprised to know I’ve found you. And she won’t be worried; won’t think I’m a match for her.’ He grinned as he pressed his foot to the accelerator. ‘But I take after Isaac. So who knows, maybe I’ll give her a run for her money …’

‘You know she’s not really my grandmother?’ Verity said. ‘I mean,’ she added hurriedly, ‘we’re not related by blood or anything.’

Jeb nodded. ‘I know.’

‘I just … I wouldn’t want you to think that I might be like her in any way.’

Jeb turned briefly to face her. His green eyes looked directly into hers. ‘I don’t think that,’ he said.

Verity felt herself go unaccountably pink. ‘I expect you
know more about my family than I do,’ she said, changing the subject.

‘Seems that way,’ agreed Jeb.

Of course, Verity realized excitedly. Jeb must have the answers to dozens of the questions buzzing around her head. ‘Why do you think my father never says anything about my grandfather?’ she asked.

‘I expect he were still angry about it. He were Rafe’s son too. But Rafe just up and left after Ruby died, hell-bent on revenge.’

Verity wondered why it hadn’t occurred to her previously. It was funny how so often your parents just seemed to be your parents, rather than real people with their own thoughts and feelings. ‘He must have been very hurt,’ she said sadly.

Jeb nodded evenly. ‘Rafe were always impetuous. But your father were just three at the time.’

‘So who brought him up?’ asked Verity. She thought of Father, alone and abandoned as a little boy.

‘He were passed around a bit at first, from one sibling to another – Rafe had a lot of children before he married Rose – then eventually he settled with his sister, Edie. She were quite strict, were Edie. She had views.’

‘No wonder he doesn’t like to talk about it.’

‘Di’n’t make him look too favourably on the Gentry either,’ said Jeb. ‘Not that he’s the only one: there’s not much love lost by the Twogoods either.’

Verity smiled, thinking instantly of her sceptical friend.
‘Henry will be mad with jealousy when he finds out you’re allowed to borrow your grandfather’s car.’

‘Isaac knew I’d take care of it,’ said Jeb simply. ‘He knows I’m good at taking care of things.’

When Verity arrived at the club, Miranda Blake was already plaguing the other girls while her parents attended to some essential business in the bar.

‘Gallant,’ she said with satisfaction as Verity came into the hall. ‘So pleased you’re here. It’s quite the most exciting part when you take to the slipway: everything shakes in such an exhilarating way.’

Verity had both hands shoved in her coat pockets. She gripped the strange wooden ball in irritation. She’d had enough of Miranda’s snipes and jibes. ‘I’d be careful if I were you,’ she said coolly. ‘You may be pure poison, but you’re still only half the size of me.’

Miranda smiled mysteriously. ‘Feeling a bit bolder, are you?’ she lisped. ‘You are funny, Verity. Only you could take comfort from such a motley gang: Shorty Twogood, that odd girl with glasses you picked up recently – and the Tempests, of all people.’

Verity moved to brush briskly past her – then came to an abrupt halt. On the lapel of Miranda’s coat was a brooch – the brooch Grandmother had been wearing on Christmas Day. The image was etched on her memory: enamel centre, dark-haired lady, starlit backdrop, gold frame set with pearls.

‘Where did you get that?’ she demanded.

Miranda glanced down at it with a superior smile. ‘Wouldn’t you like to know?’ she replied.

‘Well, yes,’ said Verity carefully. ‘That’s why I asked.’

She stared anxiously into the little girl’s eyes. Could Miranda really know Grandmother? And if so, did she realize what terrible danger she might be in? Verity was no fan of hers, but Miranda didn’t deserve to be mixed up in the old lady’s plans, whatever they were.

‘Seriously,’ she said gently, ‘are you sure there’s nothing you want to tell me? There are things happening in Wellow. Dangerous things.’

‘Some of us are popular enough to receive these things called
gifts
, Verity,’ said Miranda superciliously. ‘If you had any worthwhile friends, you’d know that.’

There’s no point being nice to Miranda
, Verity reminded herself.
She just uses it as an opportunity to put you down
. Watching her move on to her next target, Verity realized that if she were receiving gifts from Grandmother, it probably meant she was reporting back to her too. So now she would know that Jeb had brought her here. A wave of panic swept through her. Who else was in her grandmother’s pay? What did she know? Father was already behaving peculiarly. What else was she planning?

Verity was finding the idea of being a character in a live story more than a little unsettling. Did it mean that she wasn’t in control of her own actions? Sometimes when she was walking along a street, she would wonder if the
steps she took were of her own volition or whether her grandfather’s story was driving her along. Now she felt as if everything was closing in around her; as if nothing and nowhere were safe any more.

Winter was turning gradually to spring. The first snowdrops had been and gone, and all around Wellow daffodils and crocuses were optimistically poking their heads above ground. Verity couldn’t bring herself to share in their hopefulness. She was finding it increasingly difficult to escape the house and the attention of Grandmother, who seemed determined to keep her close to home and away from her friends.

No sooner had she finished one task than the old lady would helpfully suggest another. Occasionally she would try to sneak out, but she was no match for Grandmother’s astonishingly good hearing. Each time she got as far as the door, the old lady would appear silently, like a gust of malevolent wind, with another chore at the ready.

‘It’s for the best, my dear,’ she was fond of saying in a clear voice. And Verity would silently acquiesce, unwilling to leave her mother on her own now that the pregnancy was taking its toll. She was finding movement very difficult, and sleep eluded her.

‘Oh,
bother
,’ snapped Mrs Gallant in exasperation as she
knocked over the tea caddy. Verity quickly grabbed a dustpan and brush and began sweeping up the leaves from the floor.

‘Hurry, child,’ goaded Grandmother. ‘You can hardly expect your mother to clear up this mess.’ Turning to Verity’s mother, she added in a cloying tone, ‘You should be taking more care of yourself, dear. Go to the sitting room and Verity will bring you a warm drink.’

‘It is really very trying that pregnancy makes you so clumsy, when you are least able to pick things up,’ fretted Mrs Gallant.

‘Try not to worry about it,’ Verity soothed, ignoring her grandmother.

Mother sighed, clearly exhausted.

So Verity stayed at home, mindful that her family were unwittingly dependent for their safety on her co-operation with Grandmother. She thought of the baby her mother was carrying and wondered what it would be like. Another brother or sister – she found it impossible to imagine. Sometimes she wished she could be more enthusiastic about the prospect, but it just seemed so hard to grasp.

Fortunately life at Priory Bay had become easier of late. Since Jeb arrived to meet her, many of the girls had become a lot friendlier.

‘Never knew you had it in you,’ said one admiringly.

The clothes sent by Alice helped too. Her old friend had been so generous that Verity never wanted for stylish new outfits now. Her current favourite was a plaid pinafore
dress, which she liked to wear with a cream turtleneck jumper and her black patent shoes. It was silly, she reflected, how much more confident she felt knowing what she wanted to put on in the morning.

Not that being teased at school was her main concern these days: it rather paled in comparison to the prospect of having to defend her family from an evil witch and act out a story she didn’t know the ending of.

Verity, Henry and Martha had been spending every spare minute researching the legends of both the Mistress of the Storm and the Keeper of the Wind. Martha was adamant that preparation was going to be the key to success. But it was slow work, and each new reference or snippet they unearthed was more worrying than the last. Verity wasn’t convinced it was helping.

‘I think your grandmother’s scared of you,’ said Henry one Friday afternoon as they sat in the library reading room when they should have been attending games.

‘She does a very good job of hiding it,’ said Verity glumly.

Martha pulled a sympathetic face. ‘It must be difficult,’ she said. ‘But you’re actually in a position of power. She’s the one Rafe vowed revenge upon.’

Verity nodded. ‘But if that involves her death, then I have to kill her,’ she pointed out. ‘And she’s immortal … and a lot more powerful than me … and evil.’

‘Rafe Gallant was a famously clever man,’ Martha said. ‘He may have put you at the heart of the story, but
I’m sure he wouldn’t have planned to just leave you to it.’

‘He let Ruby die at sea,’ Verity countered. ‘And then abandoned my father.’

‘The story threatens your grandmother. Perhaps it’s simply a case of waiting for things to come to a head. Or for her to do a particular thing that will result in her death – don’t you think, Henry?’ Martha gave him a swift kick under the table.

‘Ow,’ he protested. ‘What did you do that for? Ow. Oh. Er, absolutely,’ he agreed, finally realizing what Martha required of him.

Martha patted Verity reassuringly on the back as she got up to put some books back on their shelves.

Verity sighed. ‘It wouldn’t be so bad if she hadn’t got to Father. Often he doesn’t seem to know who I am; he’s so distant. At Christmas, when she was bullying me on the stairs, it was as if I weren’t there.’

‘Perhaps she’s sent him mad,’ said Martha absent-mindedly, looking for the correct slot.

‘What?’

Martha looked round. ‘Oh,’ she said, realizing she had piqued her friend’s interest. ‘Er, well, apparently the wind can send you mad if you’re exposed to it too much … I’m sure I read that somewhere.’

‘Why didn’t you say so before?’ demanded Verity. ‘That must be what she’s done.’

‘Possibly …’ conceded Martha doubtfully.

Verity’s mind raced. ‘Maybe I should get him away from the house?’

‘You can’t do that,’ said Martha, slightly patronizingly.

Henry nodded in agreement. ‘You’ll just make your grandmother suspicious.’

Verity glared at them. ‘Thanks for being so sympathetic,’ she snapped angrily, putting on her coat and striding towards the door.

‘Verity, I’m sorry. That was badly put,’ said Martha anxiously, running after her. ‘Promise me you won’t try anything dangerous.’

‘There’s no need to do anything hasty,’ said Henry earnestly.

‘That’s easy to say when it’s not your father,’ shouted Verity, slamming the red double doors on her way out.

She stormed away angrily, tears streaming down her face. How could they be so insensitive? Neither of them knew what it felt like to be her. She looked back, but neither Henry nor Martha were there. She just wanted something – anything – to be the same as before. If she could make Father normal, things would be better, she knew it.

Verity heard the sound of a car approaching. It was Jeb. Spotting her, he pulled up at the kerb. She quickly wiped her face with a sleeve, hoping her eyes weren’t too red.

‘You OK?’ he asked with a concerned look.

Verity nodded. ‘Fine, everything’s fine,’ she said brightly.

‘Things getting on top of you a bit?’

Her lip quivered. Tears pushed at the corners of her eyes.

‘Come on, get in,’ Jeb said. ‘I know a place that’ll cheer you up.’

Verity debated for a split-second and then hopped in. She turned her face to the window and let the cold air rush over her. They were heading for the top of the town, then turning carefully and slowly onto a brick-walled track whose entrance she had never even noticed, it was so overgrown.

‘Where does this lead to?’ she asked.

‘The Manor,’ Jeb told her. ‘Rafe’s house.’