The Hawkweed Prophecy (19 page)

Before examining the clock, Mr. Bryce put on his spectacles, then held it right up to his long nose.

“Where'd you get this?” he asked gruffly, his eyes narrowing as he scrutinized Leo's face like it too was broken and needed restoration.

“It's not stolen. I swear it.”

Mr. Bryce raised his eyebrows suspiciously.

“A friend gave it to me, to get it fixed.” Mr. Bryce picked up a magnifying glass and peered at the clock again. “Look, can you fix it or not?”

“I'll give you fifty for it?”

Leo blinked. Fifty—that could last him for weeks. He could get used to eating pot pie and chocolate again. He could buy a
sleeping bag from a store. He could buy Poppy dinner somewhere, act like a normal guy taking out a girl. But then Leo remembered Ember's face when she'd shown him the clock and how she'd trusted him to get it fixed, and he felt his mind soften and his purpose weaken. There weren't many people in the world who would trust him like that.

“I told you. It's a friend's,” he said.

A look of surprise crossed Mr. Bryce's face, then one of irritation. “You tell your friend then. It's an antique, this one, a collector's item. Tell them to come talk to me, unless you can decide for them?”

Mr. Bryce held Leo's stare, waiting expectantly. As Leo stared back, he felt the few quarters he had left sitting in his pocket and thought how many quarters there would be in a whole fifty, how there'd be so many they wouldn't fit into both his pockets. Then Leo gave a slight shake of his head and Mr. Bryce said, “Give me a few days then,” taking off his spectacles with liver-spotted fingers to reveal resigned, watery eyes. “I'll fix it up like new.”

Leo spent the rest of the afternoon earning the fee for the repair, working in the storeroom, sweeping up, polishing the old pieces of furniture that Mr. Bryce had restored until they gleamed, unpacking boxes, and lugging the heavier items on and off the van out the back. He did all this so he could see the pleasure on Ember's face when her clock told the time again. Yet while he toiled, he thought of Poppy—how she was, where she was, when he might see her once more.

If his day had been long, Leo's evening had been even longer. He was shattered, every bone and muscle aching, and he longed
to sleep early. But each time he laid his head down to get some rest something came along to disrupt him and he had to move on, searching for a new place to sleep. Mourners were keeping a vigil by a grave near the garden door, so he couldn't even enter there. In his other favored spot, someone had peed and Leo hadn't yet fallen so low to be able to ignore it. He then persuaded a couple of guys to let him join them under the arches, but ten minutes later he was woken up by yells that the police were coming. They all grabbed their stuff and ran for it.

In the next hangout, the crazy ranting of an old, white-haired street performer made it impossible to sleep, even for Leo, who had learned early on to block out noise. Finally he was uprooted by the jeers of an approaching gang of drunken office-types. He knew from experience the suits were the worst—so civilized and buttoned up by day but, at night, wild and vicious as savages.

Leo had never slept in the park before. It was considered too dangerous in there. A guy had been beaten up near the pond last year, and by the time he'd been found by an early morning jogger, it had been too late to save him. Leo preferred to have people around, safety in numbers, even if often they were out to cause trouble. But by now Leo was desperate and he could think of nowhere else to go.

When he entered the park, Leo realized immediately why he'd never ventured here before. It wasn't so much the danger than the utter loneliness of the place, like it was a habitat for ghosts, not for the living. But he was so exhausted, his lids drooping over his eyes, that he was almost asleep on his feet and could not comprehend turning back and starting his search afresh. He headed for
the playground, remembering the one in his old town that Jocelyn used to take him to, how she used to push him on the swing and turn him on the merry-go-round. He saw her grinning face as she ran around and around, before she was ill and still had life in her, spinning him faster and faster, laughing as she went.

Leo lay down in the shadows beneath the climbing frame, telling himself that no one would find him there, telling himself he was invisible. He shivered under the blanket. The weather had turned properly cold now, and Leo knew with a sinking stomach that this month was just a small taste of the bad weather ahead. He would have to get his hands on a proper sleeping bag if he was going to survive the winter.

He always found it hard to sleep when the temperature was so low. The cold would keep nipping at him, biting at his skin, chilling in his chest. But tonight he was so shattered that, though his mind registered these attacks, his body refused to wake for them. In his dreams a warmth arrived from nowhere and spread down his back and through his limbs. It was so sweet and welcome that he held it tight, praying it would never go.

The birds started singing well before dawn had broken. It was still pitch black, and their song seemed out of place and out of time. For Poppy, they were her alarm, signaling her moment to go. Much as she longed to, she couldn't bring herself to wake Leo. He still looked so very tired, with shadows under his eyes and breathing that was heavy and slow, like even sleep was a labor. It
seemed cruel to disturb him. So instead, very carefully, Poppy slid out from under the blanket. Leo stirred in his sleep, then shivered as he felt her warmth leave. Poppy took off her coat, stuffing the contents of her pockets in her bag, and laid it over him, satisfied he would recognize it and know she had been there.

Leo soon settled beneath it, his body still, his breathing steady. Poppy's teeth started chattering before she reached the park gates, but she didn't care. She had slept by Leo's side and this would see her through the day.

Sorrel watched the girl depart, wishing she could take her place next to the boy. He would hardly notice, one warm body for another. But what if he woke and saw her and realized it wasn't Ember next to him? The other girl had taken her chances. She'd been careful not to wake him, but then she'd left her coat. This puzzled Sorrel. The night was a cold one, to be true, but this would reveal her identity after taking such measures to keep him unaware. Perhaps the girl believed the boy would not recognize the coat but only wonder how it came to be placed on him.

The girl was light on her feet and she made no sound as she shut the playground gate and ran away down the path. When she had disappeared from sight, Sorrel moved closer to the boy, her eyes soaking in his features, so vulnerable in sleep. She realized with surprise that he was most likely younger than she and it made her feel like a fool for fearing his reaction to her. She could kill him right now, stop his breathing with a spell, and he would
never have a chance to defend himself, let alone be shocked by her presence or disappointed by her looks.

Empowered by this knowledge, Sorrel laid down next to him and put her body where the girl's had been, stretching her arm around him as she'd seen her do. Sorrel held her breath and waited. Her body tingled with a feeling she'd never experienced before. It was more than excitement, more than anticipation. Then she breathed in his scent and felt dizzy with it. In these few moments she was not the future queen; she was not the daughter of the great witch Raven. She was merely like Ember, having a secret, making a mistake. Sorrel felt the boy's heart beating in time with her own. She heard the rhythm, so loud she wondered why it didn't wake him. But the boy didn't move a muscle. His hand didn't reach for hers. He didn't hold it to his chest. He just lay there, breathing, in and out, as if she didn't exist at all.

When she left, Sorrel took the coat. She did it to spite the girl whose hand he'd held. And she did it to spite him. She had gone to such lengths to find him, channeling all her power and knowledge as well as risking her mother's wrath for leaving the camp, and for so little reward. At first she hadn't wanted him to notice her, but as it turns out, not being noticed at all felt worse. Stinging with resentment, she stuffed the coat into a park trash can as she left. It would be found the next day by an old lady with newspaper shoes who would give a toothless grin of delight at her good fortune. She wouldn't think to wear it, just push it around in her shopping cart with the rest of her treasures.

C
HAPTER
N
INETEEN

P
oppy spent the following days working harder than she'd ever done before. Any spare minute, she would memorize spells and remedies so she knew them by heart and practice magic so it became second nature. Her mouth was constantly moving as she chanted charms under her breath, so much so that her classmates began to believe that Poppy had finally gone crazy. She wasn't scandalous or freakish anymore; she was just sick in the head. Poppy walked around school in such a haze that even the teachers couldn't fail to notice. Ever vigilant, they began to worry she might be under the influence of alcohol or drugs. A couple of them asked her to stay behind after class, hoping she would open up to them and offer an explanation for her behavior. They came away empty-handed, though, as Poppy stayed quiet and offered nothing. She just ever so lucidly and stone-cold soberly denied any problems.

Witchcraft was at the forefront of Poppy's mind, but at the back of it was Leo. He was always there, a part of her, and it felt odd she hadn't seen him for a while. She had expected him to
return the coat and thank her for it. She had it all rehearsed—how she would refuse to take the coat back, showing him the new one she had bought from the secondhand store; how he would insist; how she would give him her old sleeping bag instead. She had needed to stand on a chair to reach it from the highest shelf of her closet. It was still in its plastic bag, never used, bought for a camping trip that, like so many of the trips planned with her dad, had never materialized. She had dusted it off and stuffed it under her bed where it lay waiting, as she did, for Leo.

As the days passed by and Leo still didn't show, Poppy allowed herself to drift further away from the day-to-day reality in which Leo and the coat and the sleeping bag existed and into the realms of her own mind, stretching it to the limits, venturing into the unchartered frontiers of her imagination. She dimly recognized that she was becoming obsessed, “training” like an Olympic athlete, needing her fix like a junkie, powerless to stop even if she wanted to.

And she didn't want to. Since Minx's death, something had taken hold inside of her. It was as though she had been empty of magic for so long that now that she felt full, she could never go hungry again. When Poppy succeeded in a spell, she felt complete, fully alive, like her whole self was present in that moment. And she felt triumphant—like she could fell a tree with her bare hand, or dive to the darkest reaches of the ocean and still have air to spare, or conquer the tallest mountain without tiring.

The only thing that could pierce this high was Leo. Whenever Poppy's mind strayed and touched on him, she felt her powers fade and found herself plummeting back down to earth. Magic didn't
seem to hold the answer for the butterflies in her stomach when she thought of him or the confusion clouding her head when she remembered Ember's feelings for him. Leo was a distraction, an itch that if she started scratching, she would never stop. Poppy didn't want to spend her time wondering where Leo was and why he hadn't come to see her. She didn't want to doubt herself just when she was starting to believe. She wanted to climb back up to those dizzying heights where she felt like she could conquer anything.

Ember hadn't made it to the dell for days, but one evening she came over the top of the hill, picking a pathway down the slope, carrying in her arms a big bag brimming with treasures. She handed over the latest ingredients to Poppy and then, rather nervously, a new book. This one looked even older and more precious than the rest, and Poppy felt a thrill run through her when she saw it.

“It's my mother's,” Ember told her in a voice strained with worry.

She seemed reluctant to let it go. Her fingers tightly clasping it, she made Poppy swear she would give it back soon and not leave a mark upon it.

“I know how precious it is,” Poppy reassured her as she gazed at the book in reverence. She gave the book a slight pull so Ember had to release it. Quickly flicking through the pages, her eyes feasting on the ancient ink, Poppy could feel Ember wincing. It annoyed her, Ember's possessiveness. She tried to joke, “I am allowed to read it, aren't I?” but didn't bother to wait for Ember's reaction.

Poppy had already returned to the book, absorbed in what lay within. Simply seeing the words without even comprehending them transported Poppy to some higher plane that felt almost spiritual.

Ember, meanwhile, was feeling low, stuck in the mires of the mundane. Her complaints were of the coven—the cousin who wouldn't leave her be; the endless washing and mending clothes; the tedium of the long, lonely evenings; the reports of another foreign clan traveling closer, soon to be on these shores; fears of how this clan uprooted their tree and intended harm to her family. At this, Poppy's ears pricked and she looked up from the book.

“Another clan? How many are there? Are they everywhere?” Poppy could hear the excitement in her voice, and Ember heard it too and she looked at Poppy as if, momentarily, she didn't recognize her. “I'm sorry,” Poppy quickly added. Then, for good measure, she continued, “I am sorry for the threat of this clan, I am. But your aunt will keep you all safe. You did say she was the most powerful, didn't you?” Then Poppy drifted off into her own imaginings for a moment before returning and finishing wistfully, “It's just I had never thought there'd be so many others.”

“Why is that a good thing?” Ember remonstrated. “You wouldn't even like most of the witches I know. And the Eastern clan, they are truly wicked. They'd cut you down and boil your bones for their spells.”

Even this gruesome detail sent a strange spark through Poppy. But she just said, “I like you, don't I, and you're a witch?”

Ember shut her eyes for a second, then gave a small smile. When she spoke next, it was of Leo and it became clear to Poppy
this was what Ember had really wanted to talk about all along. Leo was the true cause of her anxiety—how she might see him again, when she might see him again, and why she hadn't seen him already.

With a shudder, Poppy realized how these thoughts mirrored her own. How pathetic she could become if she let herself. Poppy quickly glanced back down at the book, and soon Ember's words became as distant as the babbling stream beyond the dell and the breeze in the highest branches of the trees. Yet again, magic was her salvation. Poppy murmured some half-felt, sympathetic noises, and when finally she sensed a pause for breath coming, she pushed another list of supplies into Ember's hand. Ember looked at the scrunched-up piece of paper with dismay, and Poppy had to beg and plead that she try her best to gather them for her.

“It's working, Ember. I'm getting stronger. I can feel it.”

Ember hung her head as she walked away, and Poppy felt a pang of pity. Perhaps she could find a spell to lift Ember's spirits and bring her better luck. Poppy's mind began to whir as different symbols and chants sprung to her mind that she might use. By the time she reached the outskirts of the town, all thoughts of her friend, or the sleeping bag for Leo, or the endangered cousin and foreign clan had evaporated. There was only the magic.

Leo, in the meantime, was pretending his feelings weren't hurt. He was fine that Poppy hadn't come to find him; he didn't need a thank you for all his help—he and Poppy, they were above all
that. She would show up when she was ready and he was happy to wait until then. At least that's what he told himself, over and over as though he were reciting lines from a speech that someone else had written. However, it was hard to say the lines with any real conviction when the disappointment of Poppy's absence kept tripping him up and making him falter.

Leo spent a lot of his time beyond the graveyard walls, figuring this was still his place, and if Poppy happened to be there, then that was her business. He sat by the stream for hours, quiet in the solitude that until recently he'd found comforting but now just felt lonely, trying not to think forward or back, trying not to have any expectations. It didn't work. His head kept turning at the slightest noise. It was always simply the rustle of wildlife in the bushes—a squirrel snapping a twig, a fox in a thicket, a bird's cry splitting the air—but Leo couldn't help himself but look, just in case . . . just in case it was her. And every night Leo left for the town, feeling foolishly surprised Poppy hadn't walked through the old, creaking door in the wall with an apologetic smile on her face and a sheepish wave of the hand and that he hadn't had the chance to forgive her instantly, despite knowing he should be more aloof.

Leo wondered why Poppy didn't, at the very least, come to visit the cat's grave. He worried she might have fallen into some kind of trouble. Yet deep inside he felt it was important that Poppy come to him this time. It wasn't a question of turns, or pride, or resentment. Leo wanted the two of them to feel balanced, like they fitted, like they could walk in step and in time. It was so very tempting, though, to go to Poppy's house or school, just to get a
glimpse of her. But with his mind set, Leo waited, and the days ticked by and life just got slower and dimmer and grayer without her.

Ember's clock, however, was ready, and at last Leo had a purpose. He set off for the dell, walking faster and taller than he had done in days. He pictured Ember's face when she'd see the clock, and the thought made him feel brighter until his mind returned to the possibility that Poppy might be there and his face grew somber again and his step slowed. But, he reasoned, if they met today, it was not by his doing. It was beyond his control. Besides, it was Ember he was going to see.

As it happened, Poppy wasn't at the dell and Leo didn't turn around in expectation at any of the rustles or crackles from the woods, and when he left, he didn't feel disappointed. It was Ember who appeared there, whose face lit up with a smile upon seeing him, who raised her arm and waved in greeting. Her happiness, fresh and clear as the water that sprung from the mountainside, turned out to be the perfect tonic for Leo's troubles. The hours he spent with Ember felt as natural and simple as life should be, not distracted by the past or anxious for the future, no sudden highs or lows. What you saw with Ember was what she felt and what you received.

First, she helped him collect more scrap to sell, humming a tune as she searched. Then she showed him the river and lent him her homemade soap to wash his hands. The soap smelled of happy, carefree days. It smelled of Jocelyn. Chatting away so effortlessly in her singsong voice, Ember told him the names of all the plants and trees. There wasn't one she didn't know. She shared the nuts
she carried in her pockets. They tasted so much better than any he had tried before. And when he shivered at the fierce north wind, Ember gave him a scarf she had knit. She wound it around his neck and looked so pleased to see it on him.

Only then did Leo realize that he hadn't given her the clock. Her face when she saw it was just as he'd imagined. And then she kissed him.