Part 5 (1/2)
”There's only one way to find out,” said Fern. She thrust her hand into the nearest candle flame. Gaynor saw her face whiten and her lips clench and cried out in protest. Fern withdrew it, trembling: her palm was red and already puckering into blisters. But as they watched the blisters sank, the angry ridges smoothed, the red dimmed to pink and vanished altogether. They stared at each other, incredulous and amazed. Then Fern got up and fetched a fruit knife from the kitchen. ”It works for burns,” she said. ”Let's try something different.” She jabbed the blade into her finger. The cut opened, filling with blood-and closed, flesh binding with flesh, leaving no scar.
”Please don't try breaking any bones,” Gaynor begged. ”I've never been into self-abuse, even if it's someone else.”
”I don't think I could,” said Fern. ”It may heal straight after, but I feel pain first.”
They were still discussing the implications of their discovery when a glance at the clock showed a startled Gaynor that it was past three. ”Stay over,” Fern suggested. ”You left your washcloth behind anyway, and I think the Body Shop night cream must be yours.”
Gaynor was already in bed when Fern appeared in the doorway, silhouetted against the light beyond. Gaynor could not see her face clearly, but she was somehow aware that it had changed. ”If the river healed my hand,” Fern said, ”supposing-supposing it healed Morgus?”
”She was dead,” Gaynor insisted. ”You said she was dead.”
”She was alive when she crawled to the river and threw herself in. I never saw the body. I should have thought of it before. She knew the power of the river: that's why she did it. And if it worked-if it healed her-then she must be invulnerable now, mustn't she? Completely Completely invulnerable. Invincible.” invulnerable. Invincible.”
”We don't know know,” said Gaynor unhappily.
”No, we don't,” Fern agreed. ”It's late, we're tired, this may be only a brainstorm. In the morning everything will look different . . .”
”I hope so,” Gaynor said.
In the morning it was a gray, ordinary sort of day, the kind of day on which it is difficult to believe in witches and dark sorcery and impossible to believe in summer. But Fern had seen many such days and she was not to be deceived, even in the heart of London: she could sense the evil moving under the skin of the city. She left Gaynor with a.s.surances that she would tell her everything and went to work, trying to focus on the forthcoming magazine launch, and failing. Lucas rang just before lunch, saying could she come to the clinic that evening. The a.s.sumption that her time was his annoyed her, but instinct told her she was being petty so she agreed.
”She's in love,” opined a colleague, watching her through a gla.s.s part.i.tion. ”She has all the symptoms: abstraction, absent-mindedness, personal calls from unknown men . . .”
”She doesn't have a glow of happiness,” said a PA.
”Happiness? What's that got to do with love? You poor innocent girl . . .”
Fern, oblivious to the speculation she aroused, retouched her makeup before leaving the office and took a taxi to the Queen Square clinic. Lucas was waiting for her in reception. She registered privately that he was definitely attractive, or might be if he smiled. He did not smile. He said h.e.l.lo, thanked her for coming, and suggested: ”Call me Luc,” when she greeted him formally. L-U-C, he explained, like the French. Poser, she decided. They went up in an elevator, pa.s.sed an office where a male nurse nodded a greeting, and walked the length of a corridor to a private room with an impeccable display of flowers and the customary array of life support systems. There was a view over the square, a white glimpse of sky atop the buildings. The obligatory water jug was untouched, the bed linen drawn up smoothly under the sleeper's arms. Fern found herself thinking: This is how my family felt, when it was me. This is what they saw. She had seen herself in dream or vision, when her spirit was far away, and it seemed to her this girl's face was the same, pale and empty, a wax mask framed in the dark shadows of her hair. She was sure now, if she had ever doubted, that Dana Walgrim's soul had been stolen, torn from its fleshly home and sent who knew where. But there was one difference that struck her disagreeably. Fern knew she had been watched over, protected-by onetime wizard and present tramp Ragginbone, by her father, her brother, her friend; by the local vicar and his wife. Her vacant body had been constantly guarded and cared for. Yet Dana seemed to have only her brother and the nurses. The flowers had been professionally arranged. There was nothing personal in the room, nothing disordered. No one had sat on the bed or moved the chairs all day. ”Where are the rest of your family?” Fern asked. ”Surely there should be people here-relatives, friends?”
”She didn't have any real friends,” Luc said, not noticing the insidious past tense. ”My father comes now and then. His helplessness distresses him.”
”Yes,” said Fern ambiguously. ”It is distressing.”
”Her best friend went to Australia about a year ago.”
”Call her,” said Fern. ”Fly her over here. You can afford it.” A statement, not a question. ”It's important for her to know that she's loved, that people want her back.”
”Do you think she can see see-?”
”Maybe.” She remembered the Atlantean veil that Gaynor had knotted round her shoulders, a scarf of protection. Dana could have no such thing, but there were other possibilities. ”Does she still have a special toy from when she was a child-a favorite teddy or something?”
”I never thought of that.” Luc frowned. ”Stupid of me. There was a teddy bear that used to belong to my grandmother; it was called William-never Bill, always William, I don't know why. One of its ears fell off and the au pair sewed it on again the wrong way around. I suspect it's an antique, probably worth a fortune in today's market. Dana might still have it. I'll go over to her flat later.”
”Good.”
”It won't help to find it, though, will it? Are you just giving me something to do? Keep him occupied, keep him from panicking, make him feel useful useful.” The light eyes held hers.
”I told you,” Fern said, ”it will help her to know she's loved. She has to want want to come back, or she may not be able to.” to come back, or she may not be able to.”
”I've tried to be here for her.” His tone was level, but the words sounded faintly defensive.
”And before?” Fern inquired, almost without thinking.
He did not answer. He was holding his sister's hand, looking down into her face. ”Have you any idea where she's gone?”
”I have an idea,” Fern admitted. ”I just don't know if it's the right one. I saw someone last night who told me something that might be relevant.”
”Research, or coincidence?”
”Not research, but . . . there are no coincidences, only patterns. Fragments, so they say, of the greater pattern. It depends on what you believe.”
”No pattern,” Luc said bleakly. ”Just chaos.” And then: ”What did you learn?”
”I'm not sure yet. I need you to answer a couple of questions.”
”Okay.”
”What's the name of your father's country house where your sister fainted?”
”Wrokeby,” he said. ”With a W.” He saw the slight alteration in her expression. ”Was that what you wanted-needed-to hear?”
”I'm afraid so.”
”Afraid?”
”Never mind. It ties in, but there's still too much I don't understand. At that party, were there many people you didn't know?”
”About half of them, I should think. Anyway, I told you, everyone was in fancy dress. Costumes, wigs, bizarre makeup, masks. I couldn't always recognize the ones I did did know.” know.”
”The person I want would be a woman-”
”That really cuts down the list of suspects.”
Fern ignored his sarcasm. ”Perhaps dressed as a witch.”
”There must have been several witches. No pointy hats: the glamorous kind. Come to think of it, Dana went as a witch of sorts. Yards of ragged chiffon and hair extensions. Medieval meets New Age. Not Morgan Le Fay, but some name like that. She'd been reading T. H. White.”
He saw Fern stiffen; for a moment, her face was as pale as the girl in the bed.
”Morgus?”
”I think so.”