Julia Vanishes (16 page)

“You're hurting him!” cries Bianka.

Professor Baranyi looks at the two pieces of the pen, and at the cat.

“Breaking the pen used to write the spell ought to be sufficient to break it,” he says.

“I don't know,” says Bianka, still holding the handkerchief to her nose. “I'm not in the habit of writing spells at all, let alone breaking them.”

“Such a powerful spell may require a more complete destruction of the writing implement,” says Mrs. Och. “Immolation, perhaps.”

“I could write another spell to change him back,” says Bianka. “Later, perhaps. I don't think I could manage it right now.”

“He seems all right for the moment,” says the professor, looking anxiously at the little owl-cat, who sets about washing his paws.

“I asked you this before, but I must ask again,” says Mrs. Och. “Please, try to remember. Did Gennady give you anything—anything at all—that you still have with you?”

“I've told you, nothing,” says Bianka, exasperated. “He wasn't the sort to go in for jewels and love poems and that kind of thing. He was just…well, he was himself, and that is what he gave me.”

“I know the sort of man he is,” says Mrs. Och, rising abruptly. “If you will excuse me, I must go and lie down.”

“She lies down a good deal, doesn't she?” says Bianka after Mrs. Och leaves.

“She is not well,” says Professor Baranyi in an odd voice.

“I could use a rest myself,” says Bianka. “I don't know about your poor owl, but that took a bit out of me. My head is pounding.”

Theo creeps closer and touches my cheek. “Lala,” he says very seriously. “Abla ba ba ba. Lala.”

I pull a lock of hair free of my cap and dust his nose with it, feeling an odd kind of elation. Bianka is a witch, just like my mother, and whatever else, she loves her son, just as our mother loved us. Theo giggles, then hoists himself up using the edge of the divan and goes wobble, wobble, wobble over to the fireplace. I look anxiously at Bianka and the professor, but neither of them is paying any attention to Theo.

Bianka is staring up at the ceiling now, still holding the handkerchief to her face. She talks as if to the air, in her slow Nim accent. “Gennady told wonderful stories. He built a little cabin right by the water, and he always smelled of the sea. His performances were odd, a bit slow-paced for Nim's audience, his sense of humor unusual. He never seemed to make much money. He wasn't my type, really, but he made me laugh. We were careful. I wasn't expecting Theo. And then all of this, and yet I can't bring myself to regret it. Being with him, I mean.”

Theo is crawling alarmingly close to the fire, blinking at the flames. I want to shout:
The baby is about to crawl into the fire!
I should, of course. I should stage a dramatic awakening. Say I fainted while dusting (except I am not supposed to be dusting in here), opened my eyes, and there he was. My heart thuds in my throat, but I say nothing. I watch, paralyzed with horror, as he reaches out to touch the flames.

An awful howl as he falls backward, and Bianka is on her feet, rushing over to him.

“We have some salve,” says the professor, leaping up also.

“It's all right,” says Bianka, examining his hand. “He pulled it out quick.” She laughs wryly. “That answers one question. I hadn't been able to bring myself to check, you know.”

“If he would burn?” asks the professor.

“It's not bad, but he'll have a blister,” says Bianka. “So that settles
that.
” And almost absentmindedly, she passes her own hand through the flames, slowly. Then she hoists the crying baby onto her hip and takes him over to the desk.

“Lala!” he half sobs, pointing at me over her shoulder. I can't help myself—I pull a silly face at him. Even through his tears, he gives me a wobbly smile.

“Well?” Florence backs me against the wall as soon as she sees me on the landing.

“Well,” I say. “Well what?”

“Are you going to pretend you've just been doing your job? I've been searching high and low for you.”

I sigh. “It doesn't sound like you've been doing
your
job, if that's the case,” I say.

“That
is
my job, in part,” says Florence. Her little eyes are flashing with anger and triumph. “I am in charge here.”

“You know, Mrs. Och never mentioned that to me when I started,” I say. “She told me to do as Mrs. Freeley said. She never told me, ‘You will report to Florence and follow her instructions.' Why do you suppose that is?”

Her jaw hardens. “I'll speak to her,” she says. “I'm going to tell her how you disappear all the time, how you do not do your share of the work here. I could have you fired if I wish.”

“Mrs. Freeley has no complaints about me,” I say, sounding more confident than I feel.

Florence narrows her eyes and steps in front of me as I try to go past her. With a not insignificant effort, I master the urge to shove her down the stairs. It's not her fault that she's stuck being pious, ratty Florence, after all.

“What's the matter with you?” she demands.

“Nothing,” I say. “Look, I'm not feeling well and I took a short nap. I'll make it up.”

“You didn't,” she says. “I checked our room.”

“Of course you did.” I try not to roll my eyes.

Her expression changes slightly. “It's Mr. Frederick and Bianka, isn't it?” she says.

“What is?” I am so preoccupied that for a moment I truly have no idea what she's talking about. But she is starting to look a bit pitying, and it hits me. “Oh. Oh. No.”

“You should have known better,” she says. “Mr. Frederick is above you in every way. It would never have worked. And it's been hard on Chloe and me, you know. Having to pick up your slack.”

“I'm sorry,” I say. I almost mean it; she looks so put upon. I know what hard and miserable work it is here, and she doesn't have the luxury I have of knowing she's getting out soon and will have a nice pile of silver in exchange for her treachery. “Are they actually involved? Frederick and Bianka, I mean?”

“I wouldn't know,” she says loftily. “But you've seen the attention he pays to her at dinner. He's obviously in love with her.”

I shrug, although there's a surprising little sting to that. I hadn't noticed at all, but then my attention has been elsewhere. Not that I mind, really—I don't have feelings for Frederick—but I suppose it's always nice when someone takes a fancy to you.

“I won't go to Mrs. Och this time,” she says magnanimously. “But you're going to have to pull yourself together and start doing your job properly. Especially as I may not be here much longer.”

“Oh?” I follow her down the stairs to the scullery. “Have you found another position?”

She looks around to make sure the scullery is empty and then turns to me again, eyes dancing suddenly as if I am her best friend. “I'm engaged to be married,” she says.

I am so startled, and can't imagine what kind of man would want hard-edged little Florence, that for a moment I say nothing. Then I manage, rather insincerely, “Congratulations! That's wonderful.”

“I'm sorry. I know it's hard for you to hear right now,” she says, which is laughable, but I don't contradict her. “We probably won't get married until the summer.”

“Who is the lucky man?” I ask with just the slightest hint of sarcasm, which of course she doesn't pick up at all. She is eager to confide, as if she hadn't been threatening to have me fired less than a minute ago.

“He has a grocery,” she says. “Well, it's his father's grocery, but he basically runs it, and he's going to inherit it. It brings in a decent wage, and I'll work there once we are married, as his mother died this autumn.”

“Oh, what a shame,” I say perfunctorily.

“Well, that's why he needs a wife,” she says. “To help in the shop.”

I try not to laugh. “Is that the reason?”

“Well, and for having children.” She smiles a very superior sort of smile. “I'm not a romantic like you. I don't go chasing after impossible prospects. We'll both have better lives once we're married.”

“Then I'm very happy for you,” I say. I am starting to feel rather sorry for Florence and her practical grocer, but she brings me up short.

“The problem with your way is that it gets you nothing but pain, in the end. The wrong man, and he won't commit to you, and then when somebody prettier comes along, he'll forget you. With Nil…well, he's solid. I know he's honest, and he'll take care of me. I can trust him. I don't mean to say that Mr. Frederick is not honest. But men can be fickle, and finding a good man who will stand by you is no small accomplishment in a place like Spira City, where there's always a fresh face. Oh, look, these are things you have to think about….”

I turn away from her. I'm thinking about what Dek said.
You can't trust him. He's out a lot.
I'm thinking back to the Cleansing, that flash I saw of Wyn with his arm around the waist of a laughing Arly Winters. I'd convinced myself it didn't mean anything, but that poisonous doubt is worming its way back into my heart.

“You'll find a good man someday,” says Florence comfortingly. I resist the urge to strike her hard across her smug, pointed little face.

I
t is the coldest night of the winter so far. The snow has frozen underfoot, and the crunching beneath my boots as I walk is the only sound in all the city, it seems. The river is frozen solid, the moon a yellow sliver in the sky. Even if it weren't for the murderous thing terrorizing Spira City, nobody would be out tonight besides soldiers; it is too cold. I see the soldiers all over the Scola, huddling in their blue and white, stamping their booted feet, their breath rising up into the frigid air in great white plumes. I take the side roads, the unlit roads, where the frozen snow piles up high, blocking the doorways.

I have been shivering since I stepped out of the house, but now I feel as if the cold has seeped deep into my bones, like I have ice on the inside, radiating out from my core. I can barely use my fingers when I arrive at the flat. I can see I am holding the key, but I don't feel it. I fit it into the lock and fumble it open with nearly as much difficulty as if I were picking it. One foot heavy in front of the other; though I try to walk softly, I cannot tell if I am quiet or not. Lifting my legs is painful in a distant sort of way, all the way up the narrow stairs to Wyn's attic flat, and here I do have to pick a lock with frozen fingers.

The room is dark and cold, but I do not light the fire. I walk from hearth to table to bed, touch the icy sheets. It is midnight. I want to lie down in the bed but instead I find my way to the far corner and sink to the floor. It is no warmer in here than outside, but I am one with the cold now. I disappear. My eyelids fall closed, heavy as anvils.

I have loved Wyn half my life now. I loved him immediately, like everyone does. But I was like a little sister to him, of course.

“You'll marry me when you grow up, won't you, Brown Eyes?” he'd tease. “I can tell you're going to be a beauty.”

While I may not have become a beauty, I am not bad to look at, and though I got older, he didn't seem to see it. I was still a little girl to him, and I didn't know how to make him see me any other way. Then I saved his life, which is not bad, as aphrodisiacs go.

I wasn't supposed to be on the job at all. It was, according to Esme, a very standard burglary. There were no guards, only dogs, and that was no trouble—animals adore Wyn. Some Prashan jewel thief had turned up in West Spira and bought a house, looking to sell his stolen treasure. Wyn was the best crook in the Twist when it came to scaling a wall, picking a lock, cat burglar stuff. I loved to see him, so fluid and fearless on a job. As a pathetic ploy to spend time with him, I had made myself his apprentice. I swore I wouldn't slow him down. I said I would stay vanished the whole way. He said no. “Not this time, Brown Eyes. I need to focus.” I went anyway. He couldn't see me, after all.

The wall wasn't a problem. Nor were the dogs. He had drugged some meat; they went for it right away and then went to sleep. He slipped in through a window, and so did I. He found the safe in the basement and broke the lock apart with some of Dek's quiet explosive powder. I had assigned myself the task of keeping watch, but really I was watching Wyn, watching his profile in the shadows as he pulled a heavy bag out of the safe and opened it to have a look at what he was stealing. Then we both heard the thick voice from the corner of the room: “Before I shoot, you haf anything to offer me for your life?”

A shadow with a pistol stepped forward. We formed a triangle in the room, the Prashan, Wyn, and me. I was the invisible corner. They saw only the line between them, the line the bullet would travel.

“Give me a moment,” said Wyn. “I'm sure I can think of something.”

I remember how steady his voice was, and my own terror that I would see him die.

“Not good enough,” said the voice.

I didn't think. I pulled the knife from my boot and threw it. I was aiming for the Prashan's chest, but it caught him in the shoulder. He swung toward me, but I was on him already, grappling for the gun. His grip was poor, perhaps because of the knife in his shoulder. I got the pistol easily enough but lost my balance wrenching it away and fell to the floor. He lunged after me. I had never fired a gun before, but I shot him. The recoil and the smell of gunpowder and the horrible scream from the Prashan all jolted me so badly, I must have dropped the gun. At least, I was not holding it anymore, and Wyn had me by the arm, hauling me up. We were running, a mad scrambling, sliding sort of run, up the stairs, out the door, past the sleeping dogs. I hadn't killed the Prashan, for we could still hear him roaring, and then a gunshot overhead, and another. But we were out in the street, tearing out of there. Wyn never let go of my arm, turning down one street, then another, then another. I had no idea where we were until we emerged on the road by the river.

Wyn leaned against a wall and stared at me for a long moment. Then he began to laugh. He laughed and laughed. I laughed too, with what breath I had left, shaking and laughing from sheer relief.

“Bleeding Kahge, Brown Eyes! Where did you come from?”

“I told you, I wanted to go,” I said.

“You could have been killed.”

“You
would
have been killed.”

He got a funny look on his face then. “So I owe you my life, is that right?”

I was giddy and bold. “You owe me something.”

“What's that, then?” he asked. He was so close, half bending toward me. He used the sleeve of his jacket to wipe the Prashan's blood from my face. I went on my tiptoes and kissed him.

He laughed, and I kissed him again, a chaste sort of peck on the mouth.

“You need kissing lessons,” he said.

“So give them to me.”

I was a quick study.

I wake with a start. A crashing sound has me half scrambling to my feet before I remember where I am, and it is only the door anyway. I slide back down against the wall, vanishing again.

His voice. That gorgeous voice, gentle and smooth, only sharpened a little by Spira's hard vowels.

“Kahge's hounds, it's cold!” he says.

“Light the fire.”

And even though I knew, of course I knew, my heart sinks like a witch through dark water. I bite my frozen lip to keep from crying out.

He fumbles with matches, and soon the fire blazes up. He lights the lamp by the table. Arly Winters—of course it's Arly Winters—stands shivering by the door in a heavy fur that can't possibly be hers, a fur hat squashing her dark curls. Wyn is wearing a fur coat as well. They look half animal in the firelight.

“Come on close to the fire,” he says, pulling her to him. “It'll warm up soon.”

“We shouldn't've been out at all,” she says. “It's dangerous, with a madman on the loose!”

“You're safe with me,” says Wyn, taking his pistol out of his pocket and giving it a spin before putting it down on the table. “And how else were we going to get these fantastic furs?”

She giggles.

“And this too!” He takes a dark bottle from his pocket, pulling out the cork and swigging from it.

“Think I would have died on the way here without it,” she says, and he hands it to her. She takes a swig and giggles again. “It's strong.”

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that he isn't with her for her wit and scintillating conversation. I have to stop biting my lip before I bite it off. I release it slowly, and it throbs. Instead I clench my teeth together, all my rage in my jaw.

“Have a bit more,” he says. “Warm up. That fur is very becoming, but you'd be even more so without it.”

“You're such a scoundrel,” she says, and has another swig.

“I am no such thing,” he says. “Come here, my beautiful, dark-eyed girl.”

As the fire blazes, the room slowly warms and my bones begin to thaw and ache. I have seen what I came to see. I have seen enough. But I do not leave. I stay and watch the whole thing. The furs falling to the floor at last. His familiar, tender look, the way he touches her face and then slides his hand down her neck and farther down, the way he unbuttons her dress with one hand while he holds her chin in the other hand and kisses her softly. She is beautiful, milky white with heavy curves, laughing and tossing that dark mane back. I watch them the way I watch every Cleansing. I do not leave until the fire is down to embers and they are sleeping underneath their furs. It is not in my nature to turn away. Not I—I look my nightmares in the eye. And if my nightmares should look back, they see nothing but shadow. I am not there.