Prophecy of the Sisters (17 page)

Mrs. Harding’s face sets even further. She reaches into her pocket, withdrawing something from it and dropping it into Madame
Berrier’s hand. The Madame’s fingers close quickly around it, but not before I see a glint of silver and realize it is a key.

“Merci, Mrs. Harding. I shall return it when I am finished, as always!” Madame Berrier calls over her shoulder, already making
her way to the back of the library.

Sonia and I are spurred from our reverie by a scowl from the librarian directed, this time, at us. We rush forward to catch
up to Madame Berrier, already halfway down the hall leading toward the back of the building. When we finally reach her, she
has opened the back door of the library and is standing outside on a small porch.

Sonia shakes her head in confusion. “Where are we going?”

Madame Berrier waves to the well-groomed garden behind the library. “The answer you seek, my dear, lies not in the carefully
catalogued books within the library but in those cast aside, hidden in shame behind it.”

There is no time for further questions. Madame Berrier steps off the porch, and we scramble to follow as she leads us through
the manicured garden, beautiful even with the approaching winter. I think we have come to the end of the property when we
step around a potting shed that, for all its diminutive size, is still better kept than the decrepit building to which Madame
Berrier crosses.

She takes the key given her by Mrs. Harding and inserts it into the lock hanging from the door. It catches with a click, and
Madame Berrier pulls open the doors with a great heave and creak. We follow her in, our eyes drawn upward.

“Oh! It is… it is unbelievable!” I cannot keep the amazement from my voice, but there is sadness, too. Father would have wept
to see the books piled high in every direction with so little thought to their care. “What is this place?”

The ceiling soars three stories above us. Even from the ground, I see small holes in the roof. It is clear from the damp smell
permeating the building that no one minds the rain leaking onto the books within these walls.

Madame Berrier’s neck is stretched, taut and white as a swan, as she surveys the room with equal awe, as if, even knowing
what it holds, she cannot help but be impressed. “It is an old carriage house. It was used when the library was still a home.”

“Yes, but… all these books! Why aren’t they catalogued and kept with the others?” It is a question my father would have asked,
though with a good deal more anger, I’m sure.

She smiles sadly at us. “These are the books the town does not want sitting in full view beside the more… traditional offerings.
They cannot destroy them altogether, you see. That would not be good for appearances. But they can, and as you see, do, keep
them separate from the others.”

Sonia’s eyes shine in the dim light of the carriage house. “But why?”

Madame Berrier sighs. “Because these are the books about things people do not understand, things you and I know are as real
as the world in which we stand this very minute. Books on the spirit world, on witchcraft and the history of it, sorcery…
anything that does not fit into a neat and tidy box, I should say.” She walks farther into the room, startling a bird that
rises toward the ceiling, disappearing in a flutter of wings somewhere above us.

The sudden movement shakes loose my awe. “I don’t understand what this place has to do with the keys, Madame, though I must
confess to being quite astonished at the sight. My father would have had a conniption!”

She meets my eyes, smiling. “Then I’m quite sure I would have been very fond of your father, dear girl.” She gestures for
us to follow. “As to your question, I think there may be a reference to Samhain in an old Druid text I have seen lying about.
As far as I know, I am the only one who comes here. I’m quite sure it will be just where I remember it.”

Sonia and I follow her farther into the building, past stacks of books streaked with bird droppings and mildew. We step carefully
over anything we cannot identify and almost bump into Madame Berrier when she stops at one of the warped and leaning bookcases.

“Let me see… I think it was near here. This may be it.…

No. Not that one. Perhaps it was over here.” She mutters to herself as if we are not present, crossing to different shelves
several times as we look helplessly on. “Ah! Here it is. Let me have a look.”

Balancing the book in one hand, she turns the pages with the other. It is an incongruous site — the elegant Madame looking
entirely at home surrounded by such filth and disrepair. I flash Sonia a nervous smile, afraid to interrupt whatever thought
process seems to go along with the Madame’s muttering.

“Ah! Yes, yes! I knew it! Here it is! Come closer, girls, and we shall see if this might be of help.” We shuffle closer, stopping
as she begins to read. “Since twenty-three hundred B.C. the Beltain Fires have signified the beginning of Light, that joyful
season when the days shall be full of plenty and the nights full of passion and new life. The Season of Light, or Beltain,
begins on May first and lasts for six months until Samhain, the Season of Darkness. Following the harvest and Celebration
of Light comes a time of Darkness, that sorrowful season when night reigns and darkness rules the land, and when the veil
between the physical world and the Otherworld is thinnest and most transparent. Samhain and the time of Darkness begin each
November first.” Her words echo through the carriage house. They inspire a kind of reverence, and we stand silently for a
moment, side by side, before Madame Berrier lifts her eyes from the book and speaks. “Does it mean anything to you? Could
it be a clue to the keys you seek?”

I shake my head. “I don’t think so. It means nothing to me. Nothing at all. I —”

“It’s my birthday.” Sonia’s voice is a whisper. “At least, that is what Mrs. Millburn tells me.”

Her words do nothing to clarify my thinking. “What do you mean? Your birthday is November first?”

She nods. “November first, eighteen seventy-four.”

Madame Berrier looks as puzzled as I feel. “Might it be a coincidence?”

Chewing my lip, I wonder if she is right. I drop onto a bedraggled stool, ignoring the plume of dust that rises from its seat
as I try to push down a tide of anguish. All of this and we have found next to nothing.

“Do not despair, Lia. We shall figure this out, you’ll see.” Sonia’s voice is calm and reassuring, and I wonder how she can
always be optimistic when I should like to throw something at the walls and scream.

I look up at her. “But we still don’t know where to find the keys. The date… Well, that November first is your birthday is
interesting, but it doesn’t tell us a single thing about the keys. I had hoped…”

“What, dear girl?” Madame Berrier is still holding the book, looking down at me with sympathy.

“I don’t know. I suppose I had hoped Samhain was a landmark of some kind, a city or town or something. I hoped it would lead
us clearly to the keys.”

I am ashamed to feel tears burn the backs of my eyelids.

They are not tears of sadness, but of frustration, and I blink rapidly, inhaling the dusty air and trying to compose myself.

“All right,” Sonia says, “we shall simply file this bit away for now, that’s all. The reference to Samhain clearly refers
to a date. Perhaps that will be important later. There’s still the next bit, is there not?”

I nod, pulling James’s notes from my bag and peering at them in the dim light of the old building. “Yes. All right, then.
Let me see… here it is:
‘Birthed in the first breath of Samhain, In the shadow of the Mystic Stone Serpent of Aubur.’
” I look up at Madame Berrier.

She holds out a hand. “May I?”

I hesitate. My shock at realizing first I was the Gate and now the Angel has made me feel that no one is what they seem. Certainly
not Alice or I. And not Father, either, working all those years to protect me while I remained ignorant. Even still, Madame
Berrier has tried to help us, and it is obvious we must widen our circle if we are to have a chance of finding the keys.

I hand over the notes. “Perhaps it will make sense to you.”

She lowers her head, the proximity with which she holds the paper to her face making me wonder if she is nearsighted. She
reads for a moment, eyebrows knitted together in concentration, before handing the notes back to me across the darkness.

“I am most sorry, but… I’m not sure. That is, it sounds rather familiar, but only in the sound of the word itself, not with
any sort of recognition.”

Sonia shakes her head. “What do you mean?”

Madame Berrier sighs. “ ‘Aubur’ sounds English, or… perhaps Celtic. But I don’t recognize it as the name of a town or place.”
She brings her other hand to her mouth, tapping there as if this will bring to mind the answers we seek. “Let me ponder it
a bit.” She moves past us toward the door. “And let us leave this place. We have been thinking too long and hard on the prophecy.
I should like to get back into the sunlight, away from the shadows of the past and the things yet to come.”

We stop in front of Madame Berrier’s building before leaving. A biting wind lifts her hat, and she places a hand on top of
it to keep it in place, glancing at Edmund a few feet away before speaking.

“There is one thing I feel I should say.…”

I swallow the apprehension that rises in my throat. “What is it?”

“If what I have heard is true, the simplest thing you can do to protect yourself from the Souls is to guard against wearing
the amulet.” Her words are said with such nonchalance that they take me off guard.

“The amulet?”

Madame Berrier gestures with one hand, as if it is obvious to what she is referring. “The amulet. The bracelet. The medallion.
The one with the mark.”

My gaze slides to Sonia. I have not made a point of telling her about the medallion because I knew not its place in the prophecy.

“The medallion?” I try not to betray any emotion. “What of it?”

“What of it indeed!” Madame Berrier is aghast. “My dear, it is said that every Gate comes into possession of a medallion,
a medallion that matches perfectly the mark on her wrist. The Souls can make their way back only when the mark on the medallion
is aligned with the mark on the Gate. But for you… well, for you the medallion is even more dangerous. You are the conduit
for Samael himself. The small protection you have is to shun the medallion, avoid wearing it, though even this may not be
enough.”

Her words are not the surprise they should be. I knew instinctively that the medallion was in some way connected to the pathway
back for Samael. Still, this new proof brings forth a question that has teased the darkest parts of my mind. One I have not
dared speak aloud until now.

“There is something I don’t understand, Madame. Even if I were to wear the medallion, how might Samael pass into our world?
He is but a spirit thing, is he not? An empty soul. How would he move in our world without a body?”

“That, my dear girl, is rather simple.” Madame Berrier presses her lips into a grim line before continuing. “He will use yours.”

I cannot keep the disbelief from my voice… “What you say is mad! What havoc might a thing wreak in the body of a young girl?”

Madame Berrier eyes me solemnly.

“Once here the Beast and his Army may change into any form they desire. It might be a man, a demon, an animal, even a simple
shadow. But you… well, once your body has been occupied by the spirit of the Beast, the astral chord will be severed. And
your body lost to you forever.”

“I’m sorry, Sonia. I didn’t… I truly didn’t know until just last evening.”

Sonia does not answer as Edmund navigates the street toward her residence. Her silence plants seeds of fear in my belly. Fear
that she will no longer be my ally, my friend, for who would align themselves with someone like me?

“If you and Luisa wish to work together, I shall understand.”

She turns to me. “Do you feel yourself the Gate? Do you feel anything… untoward?”

My face feels warm, and I am glad she cannot see me clearly in the darkening carriage lest she should take my blushing cheeks
as a sign of guilt. “In truth, I feel like myself most of the time, though a good deal more confused and uncertain.”