Magic and Miracles, page 56
“Alone, sir?”
Carter looked back to Mason and smiled with a confidence he hadn’t felt in a very long time. “I won’t be alone. Trust me.”
After searching his gaze, Mason must’ve seen enough to finally nod. “Yes, sir.”
Carter pulled the silver key off the chain around his neck and handed it to Mason. “I’ll knock—two long, three short—if you don’t see me coming. I hope to return with my mother, and then I’ll be gone. See that everyone stays to the house and the path to the river. I’ll bring news as soon as I’m able.
“Take care, Mr. Carter.” Mason bowed.
“Same to you, Mason.” Carter, feeling anxious to find his mother and see that she and Miss MacBride were well, strode out the door and followed the river toward the back road the marble carriage had taken. He paused, tipping his head.
A faint trill whistled through the air. A trill he recognized.
“Whistle,” he whispered. Then he took off with haste through the undergrowth.
Not far off, he came upon his mother on the same velvet cushion, now lying on the forest floor. The marble carriage was gone, and the only trace of Miss MacBride and the orb was a lazy fall of sparkles where she might have just disappeared.
I stayed as long as I was allowed. She is well.
Carter’s shoulders slumped. The disappointment of missing Miss MacBride again mingled with the relief of finding his mother well and seemingly watched over until he’d arrived. “Mother.” He crouched down and touched his hand to her cheek. Her eyes fluttered and she moaned.
Slowly, her watery eyes met his gaze. “Carter? Where are we?” She swallowed as if parched. “So thirsty.” She shivered and he tucked the coverlet around her tightly before lifting her once more. The velvet cushion disappeared.
“You’ll have a drink soon. I’m taking you where there is safety and rest,” he assured her and himself, as well.
“I met a delightful girl,” his mother said, though her eyes were closed again, and her trembling hadn’t ceased. “I wish . . . to introduce you.”
He couldn’t help his smile nor the shake of his head. “First things first, Mama. Tea and rest.”
Her brows pinched and her hand felt for his as he walked through the trees. “Son,” she breathed. At her weak touch, he paused.
“Thackery,” she whispered. “He is after silver . . .”
He waited for her to finish, but she seemed to be fighting sleep. “I know, Mama. He’s after Silvervale. I’ll do my best to stop him.”
“No,” she said on a breath. “He’s after silver . . .” She coughed on the dryness in her throat. “Your father . . .” her trembling increased.
He pressed a kiss to her head. “Rest, Mama,” he whispered, and hurried his steps.
She quieted and was soon safely ensconced in the bedroom up the stairs at the end of the hall, the servants tripping over themselves to see to her comfort and care.
He took Mrs. Johns aside and gave her the bottle of laudanum. “She must be weaned off the dosage Thackery was giving her, gradually, but surely.” He huffed a sigh. “I know little of this.”
Mrs. Johns took the bottle. “Don’t you fret, Master Carter. I helped my brother dry up after he took to the bottle during the war. Can’t be much different than that, can it?”
Carter ran a hand through his hair. “Bless you, Mrs. Johns.”
She nodded. “Bless us all. Oh, there’s a bundle of food for you on the table downstairs. I didn’t know when you’d be returning to us. Hope it’s sooner than later.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Johns. For everything.”
“It’s you who’s led us here. It’s you who is taking a stand. Your father would be right proud.” She waved her finger at him as if he were twelve. “You take care, dear boy. After what they did to Flip, I—” She pressed her fingers to her mouth.
He bowed to the woman who had been feeding him biscuits on the side longer than he could remember. “I’ll take care. I promise.”
She waved him off with a watery smile and turned back to his mother, giving the maids gentle commands. He watched a moment, then descended the stairs, took the bundle from the table, and with a nod from Mason, left the stone house in the birch wood and wound his way back toward Silvervale. He paused upon entering the quiet of the stables, remembering the terrible skirmish that morning. Removing the chain from his neck, he used the key to unlock his workroom and entered, breathing in the scent of cut wood and the memory of Flip’s good-natured taunting. He locked the door behind him and crossed to his workbench, emptied the bundle of food on its surface, and ate, washing it down with a flagon of tea.
The whole time, he felt as if time were ticking down to something. His chest was fraught with tension, and his exhausted limbs ached to keep moving. After donning a fresh shirt, he pulled the drape from the figure he’d been carving.
He bent forward, studying her features with new eyes. His hand came to his forehead, his eyes wide at the wonder of the woman emerging from the wood. If there had been any doubt, any question of his memory or the absurdity of the idea, it was dashed. He was looking at a true rendering of Miss MacBride. From the width of her brow to the point of her chin.
“What magic is this?” he murmured with a shake of his head. He reached tentative fingers and brushed lightly along her nose and cheek. Along her brow. “How could you be in here—” he flattened his hand upon his chest, “—before I even met you? Before I knew you existed, even in a bubble? How can this be real?”
I don’t have all the answers, Carter Goodwyn.
Carter spun, snatching his hand away from the carving’s surface as if it was a forbidden act.
He was still alone. But he had questions, and he wanted answers. “Bridgida Mae MacBride,” he called, “I need you.”
He crossed his arms and paced as the sparkles did their whorl-ing thing and the orb appeared and the shimmering slid down the inside surface. Only then did he stop and give the specter his full attention. It seemed to shudder and lag, instead of hovering brightly.
Alarmed, he stepped forward, pressing both hands to the orb’s surface. “Bridgida?”
She lifted her head, her features pale and drawn. “Carter.” She’d been curled up, shivering. Whistle was in a ball, pressed against her chest. She drew up to her knees, meeting his hands with her own. “I dinnae know what is wrong.” She looked about her and Carter followed her gaze.
The orb had taken on a red swirl to its surface, mingled with lines of black smoke.
“Are you ill?” he asked.
She shook her head wearily. “If I were, it would be the first time in centuries. ‘Tis more exhaustion than illness. An . . . instability. As if whatever has been keeping me alive in here . . .”
Her eyes met his, filled with uncertainty.
“What can I do?” He remembered what she’d said earlier, of the fanciful examples of how life doesn’t really work. Understanding lit his thoughts. “You are trapped.” He motioned to the orb. “Like the maiden in the tower.”
Her eyes became glassy with unshed tears.
His fists closed in determination. “I’ll wish you free of this curse.”
With a sad smile, she shook her head. “I cannae grant wishes. I’m here to help fulfill yer heart’s honorable desires, but the means by which ye attain those are as much a mystery to me as they are to ye.”
“The key,” he said.
She nodded. “The carriage.” She sat back on her heels. “The servants are safe. Yer mother is safe. And next . . .”
Carter’s mind raced to remember the third thing he’d desired.
Silvervale restored.
He lifted his gaze to meet hers, but she was staring over his shoulder.
“What is that?” she asked on a whisper.
He felt heat rise to his ears, realizing what she viewed. “Oh. That.”
Her orb moved around him.
“It’s not as you think—” he said, scrambling for an explanation.
“Is it not a carving of me?”
He followed her to the worktable. “Well, yes, it is what you think, but—”
“When did ye have time for this?” She studied the likeness as closely as she was allowed. “Nobody has ever solved two riddles in one day, let alone all the challenges ye’ve undertaken in the last several hours. Surely ye could not have—”
“I’ve been working on it for a month. But I’ve been dreaming of you for nye a year.”
She paused and stared up at him. The orb was lower than it had been before, and for the first time, she looked up, studying him with those green eyes, now rimmed in red. “How is this possible?”
He swallowed and lifted a shoulder. “This coming from a beautiful witch in a floating orb.”
She nodded, eyes still upon him. “Ye saw me. Before I came to ye.”
His heart thumped hard in his chest at the suggestion. At the truth of it. “I cannot explain it. But I knew you. I knew your face. And your heart. You were there in the block of wood, and I—”
“Ye freed me.” She wiped a tear as it tracked down her cheek.
“Well,” he shuffled his feet. “It’s a freeing in process.”
“’Tis lovely.”
“You’re lovely.”
She gasped. “Carter, I dinnae—”
A roaring blast ripped through the air and shook the ground. Carter’s tools rattled on the table. The orb shuddered as Carter fought to steady himself. Whistle chattered loudly. Then all quieted.
“What was that?” Carter asked, breathless. “Are you all right?”
With her nod, he ran outside and she followed.
A great plume of dust and smoke rose from the cliffs just beyond his father’s grave.
Carter remembered Price’s words. “They’re mining,” he whispered in disbelief. “They’re not digging for a garden. They’re blasting Silvervale.”
A second explosion shook him to his core. His father’s grave. The river. The woods.
In an instant he raced for the cliffs.
“Do you need help, Carter Goodwyn?” Bridgida called out pointedly.
He halted, then spun. “Will this be it, then? My last riddle?” His last riddle, and Bridgida trapped forever?
She shook her head. “I can’t be sure.” I hope not.
I need you, he thought.
She straightened upon her knees and took a deep breath. Even visibly weak, her spirit shone. “In a circle I forever run, chasing moments never done. Though I gallop, I remain in place. What am I in this eternal race?”
He blinked. Could it be that easy?
I’ve never given a third riddle before.
“Then you shall have the answer, dear lady.”
Her mouth curved into a shadow of a smile at his words.
“The eternal race is time,” he said.
“I testify to that,” she said.
He smiled in return. “The answer is the hands of a clock.”
With that, Carter heard a familiar whinny from the stalls. There before the wide door stood his father’s steed, the shining red chestnut that had disappeared the night of the fire, kitted out for a ride. “Rowan, you are a sight.” He reached for the reins. “Where’ve you been, old boy?” Rowan knickered and brushed at Carter with his nose. The warmth and scent of his father’s horse, the leather of the saddle—it tugged at Carter’s senses, urging him to act.
He mounted Rowan and turned to Bridgida. “I know what I must do. Will you come with me?”
She nodded. “I believe I must.” I cannae leave ye just yet.
“Nor I you,” he murmured as he urged Rowan into a gallop toward the dark plume still lingering in the late-afternoon sky. Checking over his shoulder, he observed the orb following along, skimming the ground and shifting erratically, strands of red and black streaking menacingly through its surface. But Bridgida leaned forward, determined and focused.
9
Not since she had first awakened in her swirling orb centuries ago, compelled to bring help to those in dire need, had Bridgida been so uncertain of her fate. The disorientation of being so low to the ground was nothing compared to the uncertainty of what would become of her should her tower collapse.
If only she’d been able to discover how to undo combined spell of that fateful day. Bridgida didn’t even know the name of the witch who’d attacked her, nevermind the power behind the woman’s magic. Evil, likely. But whether it was born of the elements, the stars, animalia or of a demon pact, or some other origin, all the counterspells Bridgida had tried were rendered impotent inside her shell.
But upon the completion of Carter’s second riddle, something had cracked. The steady warmth, the clean air, the solidity of her orb had become unsteady, cold, and . . . hungry.
She could think of no other word to explain it. She had done without food for eons. Without water. And those pangs that had disappeared even as memories were trickling in, not just as a growl of her own stomach, but as if the orb itself were thirsting. Hungering, craving for . . . something.
Bridgida shuddered to think what.
As for her, she was thirsty and weak. And as she jolted along the ground after Carter on his horse, she fought the feeling that she was racing to the end of her existence.
Was she ready?
She scooped Whistle into her arms, the poor thing trembling with their bumpy ride.
Carter looked over his shoulder and she met his concerned regard.
Before today, she might’ve been ready to face her end. To race toward release in any form. Her existence was barely that. And though helping people was the silver lining to it, she did not live. She floated above lives. She posed riddles and observed responses, and she’d held hope until her arms shook with the weight of it. A weight she’d let go of a long time ago.
And here was this man. This Carter Goodwyn who in one day had shown her more wits, more selflessness, and more heart than any other person she’d crossed paths with since the curse.
She saw her own self, her heart of long ago, reflected back to her in his eyes. And she missed it.
All of it. The struggle, the joy, the laughter, the tears, the fight. And people.
Well, all right, perhaps not people. But a person.
She didn’t want to cease to exist. She wanted to fight. To battle out the answer to the riddle: Could this curse be broken? And she wanted Carter Goodwyn to help her do it. She wanted him to be there when she succeeded.
She wanted to live.
If it were at all possible.
Carter slowed, his command soft as the horse obeyed. Carter dismounted and beckoned Bridgida to follow. Hushed, they approached a half-moon clearing at the edge of the birch wood. In the center stood a marker of basalt, the tall, four-sided stone likely taken from the cliffs beyond the river. Three sides of the column maintained their natural state, while the fourth side had been polished smooth. Four simple gardens radiated out from each side, low upon the ground. Creeping thyme, Forget-Me-Nots, Aconites, and Candytuft.
“For time, for memories, for sunshine, and for the sweet,” Bridgida whispered.
Carter nodded, approaching the stone. He ran his thumb over the name and dates etched into the polished stone, then stood back. After glancing about, his head dropped with a sigh of relief.
“No damage?” she asked quietly.
He shook his head.
With that, another blast, much louder now that they were close, shook the ground, the horse stepping nervously. A crack sounded amidst the noise of distant falling rocks, and Carter lunged for the marker. As the earth steadied once more, a low growl tore from his throat, morphing into a cry of rage.
Bridgida leaned nearer. The stone marker had split top to bottom, a fine fissure directly through the etching. George Lionel Goodwyn. The best of sons, husbands, and fathers. The best of men.
“They’re taking it,” Carter said, barely controlling his rage. “They’re taking everything.”
“Let us do something,” she said. “Let us take it back. Now.”
He mounted Rowan, his nostrils aflare and eyes bright. He nodded. “Now.” With a “Yah!” he urged Rowan into a gallop.
Bridgida wiped the cool sweat from her brow with a shaky hand, took in a deep breath, and followed, trying to ignore the ever-increasing locks of red swimming through the orb’s surface, the wave of black velvet, the flash of a silver eye, and crimson lips in an open silent scream. And the hunger. The hunger.
Ahead of her, Carter pulled up his steed and lifted himself tall in the saddle. He turned to her. “I see them. Can you cross the river?” His eyes widened. “What is happening?”
“I dinnae know. The orb seems to be . . . sick. But if ye need me, I’ll cross the river.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, panic in his voice.
It does not matter if I am sure. Do you believe in me?
He watched her, steadying Rowan. “I believe in you more than I’ve believed in anything else.”
Her throat tightened. “Well then.” She swallowed. “Off we go.” She moved ahead of him, clenching her jaw as she dropped over the riverbank and skimmed the water’s currents. The horse’s hooves splashed behind her, urging her on. Her head shook. “Of all the times to weaken, ye do so now? During a third granting?” In the corner of her mind, something clicked.
A third riddle solved. A third granting. She’d never witnessed three.
The opposite bank rose before her and she surged her palms upward. Never had it taken this much effort to guide her vessel. It went where it was needed, yes, but she had power enough to steer it around, under, and through. In this case, up and over. She stalled a moment on the ledge, leaning with all her might. A small bump nudged them over to flat land again. Whistle pawed and ran at the inside of the orb, his small claws grabbing at the surface, rolling it as he bounded along at her side.
“Well done, Whistle.” She wiped sweat from her brow, winded.
“Bridgida!”
The orb abruptly stopped, throwing her forward along with Whistle, who squealed in protest. She grunted, and struggled to right herself. In an instant, Carter was by her side, lifting the orb enough to help her.
