Part 2 (1/2)

Stepmother had never cared for fires. They made her too warm, she said. I had to wrap up when I came into the sewing room to care for her. The sewing room was a sad place then, and I always think a clean-swept grate is desolate.

The light from the window caught at Eldric's wide lion cheekbones, and at a rougher sweep down his cheeks. Whiskers? Did this boy-man shave? Of course he did, foolish, ignorant Briony. He was twenty-two. He'd be shaving away in this room, in the very room where Stepmother died.

I was suddenly aware of him, of the overwhelming Eldricness of him, of his busy London blood pumping just inches away. Of his paper-clip energy and switch-on eyes.

”Miss Briony!” It was Pearl calling-screaming! ”She runned out. Miss Rose runned into the swamp!”

I slammed through the swinging door. I'd done the very thing Stepmother had warned me about. Or rather, I hadn't done it.

I hadn't been caring for Rose.

I hate myself.

You must take care of Rose. Stepmother had said that again and again. Take care of Rose. And I had promised.

I'd learned how to do it. I'd learned I had to hate myself.

I crashed into the kitchen. The cupboard door was ajar.

When you hate yourself, you don't neglect your responsibilities. When you hate yourself, you never forget what you did.

I'd even forgotten about Rose's cough. How little it took, two bright eyes and a couple of paper clips. What if it's the swamp cough and she dies, Briony? How will those bright eyes look then?

Let's review the rules, Briony: What, above all, mustn't you forget?

You mustn't forget to hate yourself.

4.

Such a Pretty Little Rosy!

One hundred eighty-three steps to the river.

I hurtled down the riverbank.

One hundred eighty-three . . .

Other footsteps now, joining mine-no, pouncing over mine, catching me up.

”You can't come with.” I threw the words over my shoulder.

But Eldric was already at my side. ”Your father made a plan,” he said. ”You and I are to search the swamp, while he and my father search the fields.”

One hundred eighty-three steps.

”And he gave me a Bible Ball.”

”Then mind your feet,” I said, ”else the bog will have you for supper.” The Horrors couldn't touch him, not if he carried a Bible Ball.

”Your father says you know the swamp better than anyone.” Eldric ran beside me on quiet lion paws.

But it had been three years. I'd changed; perhaps the swamp had changed. ”Mind your feet.”

One hundred eighty-three steps are quickly taken. We turned onto the towpath, ran beside the river.

”I have Bible b.a.l.l.s for you and Rose,” said Eldric.

The bridge rose ahead. How many steps? Rose would know. Already I was winded. I'd lost the old Briony, that longago wolfgirl who could lope endlessly through the swamp.

I spattered over the pebbles at the foot of the bridge, trying to keep up with myself. My breath grew hot and sharp.

”You can't help Rose if you overtax your strength.” Eldric took my arm, reined me into a trot.

”I know you've been ill,” he said. ”Ill for almost a year. I can't even imagine. Please don't overtire yourself and make me have to rescue you.”

I might have smiled, but the problem with bridges is that they go up before they go down, and I hadn't the strength. It's true, I'd been ill for a long while. I had a queer sort of illness that made me feel as though I were a music box in want of winding, moving and thinking more slowly with every pa.s.sing day. Thinking-that was the worst. I'm used to being clever, not dull.

We tipped over the rise of the bridge. Downhill now, into the swamp.

The swamp hadn't changed. Lucky me, to see it again, before Mr. Clayborne drained the water. It was just as I remembered, a foreverness of mud and water, water and mud, and to the west, a blackness of trees.

”Rose left no tracks,” said Eldric.

She hadn't, she couldn't. The swamp is too oozy and flowy and drifty to hold an imprint. In April, the swamp smells of winter, but the snow has melted; the season of mud has begun. Beyond the stretches of mud and water lay the end of the world, where the air turned blue.

But slow-poke Rose could never run to the end of the world, not in a quarter hour. Unlike me, she's never been quick. I pointed to the blackness of trees.

”She's in the forest?” said Eldric.

”The Slough.” But if she wasn't . . . Stop, Briony. Make a plan.

”There are three bits to the swamp. We're on the Flats now, which is all reeds and shallows. Rose will have come to no harm here.”

Unless one of the Horrors- Stop!

”In another quarter mile, we'll enter the Quicks. That's the bit that likes to gobble you up. If she didn't come to grief there, she'll be in the Slough. Tread only where I tread through the Quicks. It's only two miles, but every step is treacherous. When we reach the Slough, go on ahead.” No need to say I couldn't keep up.

”You'll need your Bible Ball,” said Eldric.

I s.n.a.t.c.hed a crumple of paper from his palm. Strange that a thing so small keeps a person safe in the swamp-unless that person is Briony Larkin, who isn't actually a person, which is the reason she needs no Bible Ball. The Horrors can't hurt her: She's a horror herself.

”You keep Rose's,” I said. ”You'll find her first.”

The wind sang through the reeds. ”Mistress!” said a voice, and another-”Mistress!” And now a chorus of melancholy voices, calling my name. Or, rather, the name by which the Old Ones called me back in the days when I was wolfgirl, back in the days when I'd used to roam the swamp.

”Where hast tha' been, mistress?”