Worlds of Ink and Shadow (15 page)

She began to laugh—a low, slow “ha . . . ha . . . ha”—and Charlotte felt a shudder go through her body. She knew that sound, had heard it once long ago. She put her hands over her ears.

The strange woman lifted her fist and began to knock at the mirror glass, so hard it set the dressing table vibrating. Beyond her, the dainty frills and furnishings were gone, replaced with unpainted walls and a single candle guttering on a plain table.

“Go away!” Charlotte said. She stood, knocking over her chair, and shrank back into a corner of her room. She was afraid of this creature, afraid that there was only a thin sheet of glass between them.

The woman's laugh was loud now. It seemed to echo through the parsonage—a mirthless and tragic cackling. She knocked harder and harder upon the mirror. Charlotte's dressing table rocked back and forth. Then—
crack!
—the mirror broke outward, scattering shards of glass onto the bare floor all the way to Charlotte's feet.

EMILY

W
HEN EMILY STOOD IN THE FRONT YARD
she was in town: The graveyard, the church, and the Sunday school were straight ahead, and beyond them were the tavern and the main road leading down to the center of Haworth. Guests and parishioners saw the front yard. When Emily stood in the back, however, she was on the moor, with nothing beyond the low stone wall but rolling heather and heath. The only guests who came here were the wild moor sheep that sometimes wandered in through the wall's gap, leaving behind little tufts of wool caught on the shrubbery. It made sense that Tabby had seen Branwell standing at the wall trying to bargain with Old Tom. For the Brontë children, this was the place where civilization ended and wilderness began.

Emily stood there now. The air hung still and heavy. Even if she hadn't been able to see the dark clouds gathering over the moor, she would have known a storm was coming. The whole world seemed to be waiting for it. She closed her eyes and held out her hand, feeling as foolish as a child. Was it as simple as this? Had her brother and sister simply held out their hands, making offers to Old Tom until one was finally accepted? And if so, what had they given?

Perhaps Charlotte had offered up her beauty. But no, she had been plain for as long as Emily could remember; beauty was not a gift she had to bargain with. What then? Not cleverness. Neither Charlotte nor Branwell would ever give up that. Their health? Branwell and Charlotte
were
rather prone to illness. Emily shivered at the idea. That was a terrible bargain, but it was one she would give to see Gondal again. And Rogue.

Emily glanced behind her and saw Charlotte at an upstairs window. Quickly she looked away so as not to catch her eye. Emily was too close to the parsonage here, too close to town, to her sister's watchful eye. This might have been the right place for Branwell and Charlotte, but Emily had another place she'd always gone when she wanted to feel close to wildness. Without looking back, she climbed over the wall and set out quickly across the hills.

It wasn't until she slowed her pace and began to pick her way down the steep gully of Sladen Beck that she noticed the silence.
The wind was almost always blowing on the moor, and so its stillness seemed eerie. Never before had she been so aware of the sound of her own breath and of the grass brushing past her legs. Around her, purple foxglove drooped, the flowers too heavy for their stalks. In his novels Sir Walter Scott called these deadman's bells, and Tabby said that if you ever found a white one it meant there would be a death.

When she got to the beck she found the water strangely dark, reflecting a sky that was nearly black. She sat down on her favorite stone and looked out across the rolling landscape. Everything was so still. She loved the way the crevasses between the hills grew so green this time of year, hiding secret valleys, but the darkened sky made everything ominous and dim as twilight. Above her a hawk screamed, but somehow it was just a part of the stillness. She could hear its wings beating the air—
whump, whump, whump
.

Something bright caught her attention—a smudge of rust against the green. A fox. He came toward her, bushy tail held straight behind, eyes scanning the ground for movement. How long and sleek he was, what luscious fur, what perfect and precise movements. He seemed to be a visitor from an even wilder place than this.

The fox came within a few feet of Emily's stone, and she held her breath. She could see his sharp needle teeth, his twitching whiskers; she even caught the scent of his musk. Suddenly he
leapt, all four feet leaving the earth. Something squealed. Emily gasped.

A moment later the fox was staring at her, a dead vole hanging from his mouth.

“How beautiful you are,” Emily whispered. “I'd give anything to make a world as beautiful as you.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “
Once there was an island in the middle of the sea. It was called Gondal, and it was a harsh and lonely place
.”

She clasped her hands together. “Old Tom, Old Tom. Everything my sister Charlotte and my brother Branwell have given in their years of crossing over, and everything they will give in years to come, this I offer, all at once, for one passage to my beautiful world.”

She opened her eyes. The fox was gone, with nothing to prove he was ever there but a stain of blood on the ground. Beyond where he had been there was a strange blurriness, a slight warp in the light as if she were looking through a lens. It looked like a rip in the world. She stood up and held out her hand to the rip in the world, palm upward. It hurled itself at her, swallowing her whole.

At first everything was dark, and then a dim light appeared in a great, gray sky, illuminating a flat and empty world. “
The island of Gondal was full of wind and weather
,” Emily said. A wind blew up, and dark clouds poured into the sky. “
Heather and hills.
”

She smiled as what she invoked appeared. She'd had years to
imagine what she'd make, a place like her own moor but wilder—more beautiful and horrible. A warm rain beat down on the brim of her bonnet and she pulled it off, lifting her face to the sky.

“
Foxes and hawks!
” she said. “
Voles and mice and rabbits.
” Her world would have everything she loved best. “
Rocks, crags, linnets, curlews, dogs, cats!
” She broke into a run across the heath, shouting now.

“
Lightning and catastrophe!
”

Thunder cracked, and something bright knocked her off her feet.

“Oh!” She suddenly found herself in the mud on all fours. There was a black circle of scorched earth next to her and the smell of electricity in her nostrils.

She stumbled to her feet. The rain was harder now, not so pleasant as it had been a moment before. Thunder boomed, and another bolt of lightning struck a sapling just ahead, splitting it in two, making her scream.

“Help, someone!” She turned and started to run. Wind and rain drove at her, and she could hardly see where she was going. Ahead of her was a stand of trees, and she raced toward it as another flash blinded her. She ran straight into someone's arms.

Emily lifted her face to dark eyebrows and heavy, brooding eyes. “Rogue?” He was hatless and drenched with rain. “We must run or we'll be struck!” She tried to twist away, but he held her tight.

“It's no use running,” he said. One hand was on her waist
and he moved the other to her cheek, drawing her closer. For a second, Emily thought he would kiss her, but instead he only stared into her eyes. His deep voice seemed to reverberate in her chest. “Listen to me. You made this place. You must make the lightning stop.”

She gazed up at him, heart bumping. His hand was warm against her face. She felt that if he moved it, caressed her in any way or showed her any kindness, she would shake apart into a thousand pieces.

“
The storm is ended
,” she said, pushing out of his grasp. The lightning abruptly stopped. She turned away and looked out over the hills. In all directions, clouds were scurrying away from them, like rabbits who had seen a wolf.

Emily wiped her face with her sleeve. “This is Gondal,” she said without turning around. “It is a wild, lawless place, where ships are wrecked upon the rocks and storms rip the sky asunder . . .”

Thunder rumbled far away, making her give a little gasp. Rogue put a hand on her shoulder. “Yes, yes. I've had an adequate display of the storms.”

Emily stiffened at his touch. “It is inhabited by only the worst criminals and scoundrels.”

“I like it already. Did you make it for me?”

“Certainly not.” She stepped away from his hand, but felt the weight of it on her shoulder even after it was gone.

“And yet I'm here.”

She made no answer.

“Come, come. Aren't we friends now?”

She turned to face him. “Friends? You had your hands around my sister's throat. And a knife to mine.”

He shrugged. “That was in another world, far away. If you will forgive me my many crimes, I will graciously agree to forgive you.”

“Forgive
me
?”

“That's right, little goddess. When we see each other in Verdopolis, we can renew hostilities, if we wish.”

“There is no more Verdopolis,” she said a little sadly. “The other Genii have vowed to abandon it. I fear they mean it this time.”

“Indeed? Well, all the more reason.” He turned and walked away from her down the hill, lifting his arms to the sky. “A new beginning for a new world.”

Emily followed after. Now that the rain had stopped, Gondal began to blossom and burgeon before her eyes. The grass grew greener, and the stand of trees ahead of them burst into pink and white bloom. One tree towered over the others; it seemed too big and old to belong to such a young world.

“This way!” she said, pushing past him. The ground was spongy and waterlogged under her feet.

Before she could reach the tree, its blossoms began to fall, white petals drifting toward her like snow. She laughed,
turning to Rogue in wonder, and saw that the heather was blooming behind him—tongues of purple fire spreading over the hills.

“I can't tell if it's spring or summer,” Emily said, petals swirling around them, getting stuck on their clothes and wet hair. “Everything is happening at once.”

Rogue raised an eyebrow at her and shrugged. “Such things are beyond my understanding.”

I've done it
, she thought.
I've made a world. And it will be so much better than Charlotte's.

“Apple?” Rogue asked. He ducked under the tree's spreading branches, beckoning her to follow.

It was a different place there—dark and holy and still. Emily felt the urge to whisper. It reminded her of her father's church, but it smelled like green moss and blossoms and turned earth. All around them little green apples were swelling and turning red. Rogue pulled one from a branch and tossed it at her.

Emily took a bite. Crisp and sweet. “Just imagine,” she said. “The taste of this apple came from my own brains. I'm really quite brilliant, aren't I?”

Rogue grinned at her and took a bite of another apple, wiping juice from his chin. “A Genius.”

“Now, don't this bring back memories?” said someone. From around the tree slid the figure of an old man not five feet tall. His face wore a sour smile.

“S'Death,” Emily said. “What are you doing here?”

He made a sweeping gesture with his arms. “I have come to see this new-made world.”

Emily knew the character from Verdopolis and was vexed by the interruption, but Rogue only laughed and slapped his friend on the back. “In a world of scoundrels and thieves, I suppose we must expect Mr. R. P. King.”

“Scoundrels and thieves?” S'Death repeated. “Well, I never. You'll pardon me, miss, if I say you don't look the part of neither. Isn't this chit a bit young for you, Rogue?”

Rogue put his arm around Emily's shoulder. “This chit, as you call her, is one of the Genii. She is the goddess who has pulled this new world from the black ether of nothingness.”

“The black ether of nothingness. You don't say.” S'Death raised an eyebrow in doubt, then glanced out over the green and purple hills and shrugged. “It's very pretty, I suppose.”

“Pretty!” cried Rogue. “It's miraculous.”

“To be sure, to be sure. Far be it from me to criticize a goddess . . .” He paused.

“But?” said Rogue.

“Well, if I might inquire: What are the likes of you and I to do in this land of only wicked scoundrels?”

Emily stepped forward. “
You
, Mr. King, may go to the devil.” Both men chuckled at this. “
He
is Alexander Rogue, highwayman and thief, leader of bandits, wickedest of them all.”

S'Death snorted.

“What?” Rogue said. “You don't approve?”

“In the name of murder, you sweet babies, you can't have a world with just thieves and blackguards. You've got to have a few cullies.”

“Cullies?” Emily asked, unfamiliar with the word.

“Dupes, sapheads, people to rob, my lovely,” S'Death said with a leer. “Victims of our wicked outrages.”

“That's true, you know,” Rogue said. “Do make us a few cullies, Genius.” He slapped Emily heartily on the back as he had slapped S'Death. She didn't like it. “And make them rich and fat, while you're at it.”

Emily lifted her chin. “The Genii do not take orders.” But at that moment a man riding a white donkey came up over the hill in front of them.

“Drink to the maiden of bashful fifteen. Now to the widow of fifty . . . ,” he sang. “Here's to the flaunting, extravagant queen and here's to the housewife that's thrifty.” He was obviously drunk. The donkey stopped at the top of the rise, panting. It was a very small donkey to be carrying such a large man, and the beast was further burdened by a dozen saddlebags that looked suspiciously like they might contain gold coins. The man shook his reins, but the donkey only lowered his head and began to crop the grass.