Path of Night Page 20

  The students and ghosts of the Academy were lined up on the stairs watching. I realized how upset Harvey must be when he glanced over and scarcely seemed to care there was an audience.

  “Sabrina wouldn’t ask her boyfriend not to talk to people.”

  Harvey looked to me for confirmation. My gaze dropped. “I had to—”

  “If you couldn’t trust him, you shouldn’t have been dating him!” Harvey’s mouth twisted. “But you couldn’t trust him. He wasn’t worth trusting. When we were dating, you didn’t ask me not to talk to Roz and Theo!”

  My hands clenched into fists. “Considering what happened with you and Roz,” I said in a small cold voice, “maybe I should have.”

  Harvey’s eyes went dark with shock. My heart seemed to sink to the bottom of a lake, tumbling too deep ever to get back.

  Aunt Zelda’s voice rang from above.

  “Sweet starving Medea, are we now enacting teenage drama in the hall with an audience choking up my stairs? Hells below, I hope somebody brought popcorn!”

  She stormed down the steps, Academy students and ghosts retreating from her with speed. Quentin dematerialized right through the banisters.

  Aunt Zelda’s gaze, flying sparks like a comet, traveled over the hall and fastened on me. I didn’t know what she saw in my face, but under her bronze tea dress her shoulders bunched like a tiger’s. I thought she might lunge down the stairs at Harvey.

  “I may be forced to entertain the pestilential children of my coven. I may be invaded by ghosts. I will no longer endure mortals distressing my niece! Why are you always here?”

  Every one of us saw Harvey flinch. Even Aunt Zelda bit her ruby lip. I reached out, but Harvey started back as if he thought I’d hurt him.

  “I was just leaving.”

  “Harvey, no—”

  “I’m going, ’Brina!” Harvey turned, almost tripped over Lavinia and Quentin, then closed his eyes for a frustrated instant, as if resigning himself to feeling ridiculous. “And I’m taking the ghost children with me. Not because I’m ghost kidnapping them. They follow me around.”

  The slam of the door echoed through my head.

  “Begone,” Aunt Zelda told the Academy students.

  “Where?” Melvin asked.

  “Follow Nicholas Scratch to hell, for all I care,” snapped Aunt Zelda, and I put my head in my hands. I heard the confident stride of my aunt’s heels on the stairs, and felt her arms come around me.

  “Sabrina,” she murmured. “Don’t weep. I’ll make his blood into a nourishing soup for you.”

  I buried my head in her shoulder. “Don’t do that!”

  Aunt Zelda rocked me. “I know this is a trying time. Hilda and I have been occupied holding together the shattered fragments of our coven. And you’re used to having your cousin at home to hatch absurd plots with.”

  “You miss Ambrose too.”

  “Well.” Aunt Zelda stroked my hair. “I know you must be troubled with the revelation of who your father is, but you can always come to me. You’re not alone.”

  “It doesn’t change anything, who my father is,” I whispered. “I won’t let it. You made me. He didn’t.”

  Aunt Zelda held me. She’d held me on the night Harvey put Tommy down and broke both our hearts. She’d held me on the first day of the new year. I knew she’d hold me every day for all the years to come.

  “I know I’m not alone,” I said. “But—Nick is.”

  If I was trapped in hell, my family would come for me. But nobody was coming for Nick. He only had me.

  “Ah, you’re weeping about another boy. I suppose when you’re sixteen, it’s always true love,” Aunt Zelda murmured, with a touch of scorn.

  Stung, I jerked back.

  “Why not?” I demanded. “How did marrying for power work out for you, Aunt Z?”

  Outraged silence was Aunt Zelda’s answer. She stood, her shadow falling over me.

  “What’s wrong with wanting to love people?” I asked. “What’s wrong with wanting to trust them?”

  “Nothing,” answered Aunt Zelda. “If you can trust them. Can you?”

  Nick lied. Harvey slammed the door on witches and their wicked ways.

  “You say you want to save people, not hurt them,” whispered the silver birds. “So why is there devastation all around you?”

  I jumped up and fled to my room. I scrambled onto my bed, sobbing, reaching blindly under my pillow for Harvey’s drawing.

  No, the picture of Nick.

  Only it was both. I stared at the paper in my lap, the lines of Nick’s face blurring as tears rose and spilled down my face. Fury burned as hot as hell inside me. I ripped the drawing into a dozen pieces, devastation all around me as usual. I cried, homesick for the past, when Edward Spellman was my father, when Ambrose was always here, when I would only ever have one love and that love would be true.

  “’Brina?” Harvey whispered from the door.

  I scrubbed at my face with both fists, like a little kid. Harvey stood on my threshold outlined by light. In his hands was a slender branch infused with silvery radiance. The sacred bough.

  “Harvey?” I faltered. “You came back.”

  Harvey shrugged awkwardly. “I had to give you this.”

  I nodded, swallowing a sob. Harvey walked into my room. He didn’t sit beside me. He knelt, laying the luminous bough at my feet and gazing up into my face. Despite his flannel shirt and battered jacket, he seemed like a knight in shining armor to me. He caught hold of my hand, and I clung.

  “Don’t cry,” Harvey murmured. “I—I can’t bear it. I don’t like what he did, but I’ll go anywhere. I’ll do anything. As long as you don’t cry.”

  I wiped away my tears with my free hand, trying to stop as soon as he asked. Harvey bit his lip.

  “What you said before, about Roz …”

  “I’m sorry!”

  “You know when I was dating you, I never looked at anyone else,” Harvey said earnestly. “I never thought of anyone else. You believe me, right?”

  “I believe in you.” I twisted my hands together. I didn’t want to lie. “I … did have thoughts, about Nick. But I would never have done anything to hurt you. I adore you.”

  Harvey’s mouth trembled into wounded crookedness as I spoke, but as I finished speaking, the ends of his mouth curved upward. Only slightly, but it made all the difference.

  “I adore you,” he said, then cleared his throat. “As a friend.”

  I nodded vigorously. “We’ll always be friends.”

  “Always,” Harvey echoed. “But just to let you know, if Nick calls me Harry after you get him back from hell? I will punch him in the face.”

  My throat was clogged with tears, so the laugh stuttered, but laughter felt good. “Who’s Nick? Names are really hard to remember.”

  Harvey laughed too. He was kneeling at my feet, his whole clean heart in his eyes. I could reach out and touch the lapel of his jacket, the ends of his hair, with infinite tenderness. The way I used to.

  He noticed when trouble touched my face. “What is it, ’Brina?”

  “Everything’s so difficult and complicated now,” I said in a low voice.

  “Yeah,” said Harvey quietly. “But if we love each other as much as we can, if we try as hard as we can … surely there’s a chance everything will work out. Don’t you think?”

  There were tears in my eyes, and his. I let my back bow under the weight of my burdens, rested my cheek in the crook of his neck and shoulder, and whispered: “Harvey, I do.”

  His hand stroked my hair, once. Then he scrambled away.

  “I’d better go. If your aunt Zelda sees me in this house after she banished me, she’ll turn me into a frog.”

  “She would never …” I stopped. “I would never let her do that.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I know the quest was tough, but it’s almost over. Tomorrow morning, when dawn remakes the day, I go to the Lake and the Lady. I find the grail, give her our gift
s, and get the weapon we need.”

  “I’ll be with you.” Harvey hesitated, then leaned down and kissed my cheek. “Sleep well, ’Brina.”

  I nodded mutely, sitting among my tangled blankets and the torn fragments of paper, as the door closed. My hands were still lifted, fingers half-curled, to hold on to him. I listened to his steps on the stairs, and the sound of my front door closing.

  Then I was off the bed, hurtling down the stairs after him. I raced out into the shadows of the porch and saw his retreating back and opened my mouth to call his name.

  Around the curve of my road, under the moon and past trees gone black in the night, my best friend came running.

  “Harvey!” Roz called. “I was worried. I went to your house, and then … I knew you’d be here.”

  Harvey dived toward her, wrapping her up in his arms.

  “Rosalind,” he said into her hair. “You came for me. Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

  I stopped with my hand resting on the toad statue guarding my porch steps. Roz was one of my touchstones for goodness and warmth, for the best of mortality. And I was a wicked witch. I’d hurt Harvey too much. I couldn’t be in love with him anymore. Harvey and Roz were in love with each other. I was in love with Nick.

  And as a wicked witch, I had the power to get Nick back.

  A demon rushed at me through the night, a dragon with huge eyes, razor-blade wings, and something satanic about its leering face. I lifted a hand and burned it to ash and walked through the falling ashes to my door without a glance behind me.

  Once in my room, I laid the sacred bough down in my drawer with the magic jewel and the cloak of feathers, the gifts my friends had brought me. I gloated over them like a dragon over its treasure.

  In my mirror ringed with white roses, I saw the light of the holy bough catch my eyes and turn them suddenly to silver to match my hair. Magic made me shine like moonlight on snow, burning as pale as a morning star. I was ready to embrace any power to save him.

  I smiled for the glass, as I always smiled for Nick.

  * * *

  My friends came with the dawn. I crept out of my house to join them.

  Elspeth stirred from her nest of blankets in the hall and saw me, my arms filled with feathers, the jewel, and the bough.

  “Are you going to commit naughty deeds in the woods?” she asked. “With props?”

  “That’s … exactly what I’m doing,” I answered. “You can’t come.”

  Harvey, Roz, and Theo were standing at the foot of my steps. I beamed at the sight of them.

  “Harvey!” I said. “Guys! Let’s do this thing.”

  The silver birds flew around us like attendants, the rays of the rising sun catching their wings. As we headed into the trees, another demon hurtled toward me. I raised my eyebrow and watched the demon crumble into ash and smoke.

  “You seem cheerful today, Sabrina,” said Theo. “Which is great! Though confusing.”

  “I’m really happy,” I told Theo. “You all got glimpses of Nick, or heard him.” I nodded toward Harvey. “And Nick heard Harvey too!”

  “Wow, did he?” asked Roz.

  “Who knows,” said Harvey.

  “The veil between us and hell is growing thin, like the Lady said,” I continued. “Today is my turn. Today I might see Nick!”

  “Oh, joy,” muttered Harvey.

  Roz hit him on the arm. Harvey rubbed his bicep, making a mock-reproachful face, then grinned down at her.

  “Surely he’ll see me too,” I went on. “Nick said once he and I have a connection.”

  “Smooth,” said Theo. “Uh, but I’m sure he meant it.”

  “You have more of one than he and I do, since we don’t have one,” said Harvey. “And I’d honestly prefer if Roz didn’t have one with him either.”

  “Not my type,” murmured Roz.

  “Thank God,” said Harvey.

  Another demon flew at us. Harvey reached for his gun, but I transferred my bundle of quest objects to the crook of my arm and waved airily. The demon collapsed with a slow, sad moan, as though it had always been a hollow thing.

  “Your eyes have a silver sheen to them,” Theo told me. “They’re cool, but they’re not contact lenses, are they?”

  I shook my head.

  “She’s doing her Dark Phoenix thing,” Harvey said.

  Theo, better acquainted with comics than I, though not a full nerd like Harvey, frowned. “Gaining incredible power until she gets stabbed by a dude with claws that come out of his hands? Or, uh, sacrifices herself?”

  Roz and I exchanged a doubtful glance.

  “That’s the made-up bit,” said Harvey. “In stories, people come up with reasons why they have to cut down a girl with power. Why hurting her is a good thing to do. Like that’s how the story always has to be.”

  “These patterns reinforce the inherent misogyny of the system,” said Roz.

  “Right,” murmured Theo. “What Roz said, yes.”

  Harvey sent me a sweet little smile. “So we help the girl with power instead.”

  “I just love you guys,” I sighed, and burned five more demons to cinders, turning my face up to the sun as it rose and flooded the woods with warmth.

  We reached the hollow of light by the dark river, and I spoke the words to summon the Lady.

  The pool of light spread, as before. The light changed to water and rose. I waited, holding my breath.

  Roz gave a cry, her eyes flickering the way they did when she had her cunning visions. “Everybody, run!”

  We knew better than to ignore Roz’s warnings.

  We scattered, racing wildly back from the pool of light, into the trees. We moved just in time. Light and water coalesced into a flood. The cracking earth collapsed with a groan like a dying man and fell away. Trees toppled. The ground beneath us shuddered, tipping us over as we shouted warnings and ran as hard as we could. I clutched my quest objects to my chest, seized Roz around the middle, and threw a web of magic onto a nearby bush. Both of us landed safe in shimmering lines and leaves, magic our safety net.

  “’Brina!” Harvey shouted. “Roz!”

  “We’re okay!” Roz called back. “Sabrina has me!”

  “Did the earth move for you guys?” Theo yelled.

  The earth had stopped moving. Roz and I scrambled out of the bush, and Theo and Harvey let go of the tree they were holding, everybody windblown and scratched. Half the terrain was now pointing at the air, as though we stood on the deck of a huge ship broken in half.

  The silver birds flew over the edge of a white precipice, leading down to a huge dark lake. The piece of ground on which we stood, a clearing of a few bushes and trees, had been cut out from the surrounding woods and lifted high as a tower. On every side was a sudden terrible drop. The silver birds circled like seagulls waiting to be fed. I had a bad feeling we were on the menu.

  “Oh, a huge cliff,” gasped Harvey. “Why, magic? These look like the Cliffs of—”

  “Dover?” said Roz.

  “I was gonna say the Cliffs of Insanity,” said Harvey. “From a movie.”

  “I wish I had a broomstick,” I murmured.

  “You’re a cliff of insanity,” Theo said, affectionately headbutting me in the arm.

  We peered over the edge. It was a long way down. Depending where we jumped, we would either hit the ground or the lake.

  Even from a distance, I could feel the chill emanating from the water. My aunt Zelda had told me a tale about the coldest lake in the world. Bodies were thrown into that lake, froze as they sank, and were never found. The lake lay like a cold black stone far past our feet.

  “This is the last stage of the quest,” I said. “Mine is meant to be the hardest part. I need to find the grail. Roz, you said you had faith and found the jewel. Theo, you said you got the birds to help you by telling the truth. Harvey, what did you do?”

  “Just … my best,” said Harvey.

  “I’m going to jump,” I announced. “I believe in m
yself. I can make the birds believe in me too.”

  “And make the birds believe in you in midair?” asked Theo. “What happens if it doesn’t work?”

  “I’ll decide what to do on the way down.”

  I shook out the cloak, each feather blade shimmering in the dawn light. I placed the magic jewel on the fork at the top of the sacred bough. The facets of the jewel reflected the bough’s glow, turning them into a scepter I could wield. The wind ruffled the cloak on my shoulders. Currents of air lifted the cloak and me with it.

  I’d tangled with a river spirit at summer’s end, and researched protection charms in the dead of winter. On the edge of spring, I reached into the pocket of my witchy little black dress and produced a pearl.

  “No fire, no sun, no moon shall burn me,

  No water, no loch, no sea shall drown me.”

  I swallowed the pearl and stepped to the edge of the earth.

  “I don’t know about this, Sabrina,” murmured my best friend, her eyes full of visions.

  “Have faith, Roz!”

  “I do.”

  “I know. That’s why I love you.”

  I smiled for her, and leaped.

  The winds caught the ends of my feather cloak and the jewel in my scepter caught the light. Below me stretched my woods and the Lady’s waters, turned to gold by dawn.

  Having stepped off the high mountain, it seemed I saw all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. For a shining moment, I hung suspended as a morning star. I felt I could fly into the heart of the sun.

  Then I plummeted down into the dark.

  Nick dragged himself along, hand against a cavern wall. He wasn’t able to walk without support, wasn’t sure where he was going or why he was trying. When he looked back, he saw he’d left a trail of blood, not bread crumbs.

  When he looked ahead, he saw Prudence stepping out of the shadows. Her cropped hair and her scimitar of a smile caught the red lights of hell.

  That surprised a weary laugh out of Nick. “I suppose you’re here to rescue me?”

  “Yes, Nicky, I’m on a selfless mission to liberate your soul from hell,” purred Prudence. “Like I care enough to bring you a glass of water from the next room, let alone hurl myself into the abyss. No, the real me is somewhere indulging in glorious wickedness with either my sisters or Ambrose Spellman. This is a hallucination. But you knew that.”