Extraordinary

by Nancy Werlin

  The flowers. Their colors whirled before her eyes; their scents dizzied her. A few bees seemed to levitate above them; one drifted down into the petals of a half-open rose as if hypnotized, and Phoebe thought dazedly, Me too.

  Nothing that the Rothschilds’ own gardener had come up with was ever like this.

  Finally she tore her gaze from the flowers and looked down. Yes, those were her feet. Her own regular size seven feet. She was wearing clunky red clogs that long ago, this morning, she had thought fun yet practical for a light snowy day, and a good way to start edging out of dressing entirely in black. But now, looking at them, Phoebe was forcefully reminded of the feet of the Wicked Witch of the East, which had stuck out beneath Dorothy’s house in Munchkinland and looked so completely ridiculous that it didn’t matter to you that she’d been horribly, brutally killed.

  Had Phoebe now somehow entered Oz? Some magical place? But there were no such places. Not in the real world. Cautiously, Phoebe put more weight back against the archway. It felt solid and real. It was supporting her . . .

  She closed her eyes and rubbed them. Dropping her fists, she kept her eyes closed because, when she did open them, she decided, she would be in a regular bedroom, Ryland’s bedroom. With her eyes closed, plausible theories came easily. Mrs. Tolliver had slipped her a hallucinatory pill. Somehow. For some reason. Or maybe Phoebe was actually home, in bed, and asleep. With a fever.

  Did dreams have scents? Did hallucinations? Phoebe could smell the flowers, feel the breeze and the sunlight, hear—was it birdsong? Insect buzz? Both? Yes.

  “One, two, three,” Phoebe whispered, and then she opened her eyes. There were her red feet again, solidly planted, and beneath them, the stone path. She turned to look at where the door of the room ought to be, just behind her. It was still there, weird in its ordinariness. She reached back for the knob and kept her hand—one hand—securely upon it.

  Then she looked out again at the garden.

  In the very center of the garden, ringed by the flower beds, lay a circular clearing or terrace, paved with the same mellow gray stone. Just beside this terrace, a large oak tree lofted its shapely branches high into the sky. And beneath those branches, in the perfect place for a little pagoda or a small pond or even a simple bench, stood a throne.

  Once you saw the throne, you couldn’t believe you hadn’t noticed it before, for it was imposing; it commanded attention. Yet at the same time it fit completely and easily into the landscape, for it was made of trees and flowers.

  A little table sat beside it, and on that table were a couple of stacked books. And as Phoebe stood with her mouth open, a plump little hermit thrush alighted on the top of the books and cocked its head to the side, its bright black eye seemingly fixed upon her.

  Something about the bird jogged Phoebe’s mind, and, one-handed, she groped for her phone. Click. The bird flew as she photographed the throne, the oak tree, the flower beds, and her red shoes on the path. Click, click. More flowers. The mountains in the distance. Click. She even stuck her arm out and got a shot of herself before the stone archway.

  Taking the photos steadied Phoebe. She checked to make sure the camera had worked properly and that she had the pictures—she did—and then she released the doorknob behind her. Still clutching her phone, she stepped forward into the garden, slowly but compulsively following the stone path down the short flight of steps onto the terrace and up to the throne.

  Her gaze was drawn to the books on the table. The one on top was familiar: The House of Rothschild, Volume 1: Money’s Prophets: 1798—1848, by Niall Ferguson. Beneath it she could see Volume 2: The World’s Banker: 1849—1999.

  Of course these were books she knew.

  And now, finally, she was afraid. She was overwhelmed by fear, in fact; it swelled inside her throat. She had meant to take one more photograph, a close-up of the books, but she didn’t. Instead, Phoebe turned and fled. Reaching the archway, she grabbed the doorknob again—miraculously, she remembered to grope for the light switch and press it off—and she was out. She was back.

  Back in the dim hallway of Mrs. Tolliver’s normal little ranch house.

  chapter 13

  Once Phoebe was back in reality, she was tempted to whip around, reopen the door to Ryland’s bedroom, and peek in again. Instead she clutched her phone more tightly in her hand. She had evidence.

  It was then that she realized she was wheezing, and that her chest felt tight. The next second she remembered that she didn’t have an EpiPen with her. Where was her inhaler? At least she had that, but where? In the little front pocket of her backpack, which was, where? Phoebe remembered taking the backpack from her car. She’d had it with her on the doorstep outside the house when she’d rung the bell. Then Mrs. Tolliver had opened the door, and she’d come in—and she’d dropped the backpack in the living room.

  She felt dizzy. With one hand on the wall, she walked rapidly toward the living room and Mrs. Tolliver and her backpack. She knew better than to panic. Panic made things worse. And there was no cause for panic; she knew what to do. The only thing that made this asthma attack different from any other time was that she’d just been in that magic garden—or that she had just hallucinated a magic garden—or dreamed it—or whatever.

  Maybe she was allergic to something in that garden. Did that mean the garden had to be real? Could asthma be triggered by something imaginary? Actually, yes. Because wasn’t anxiety imaginary? And anxiety had always been able to trigger Phoebe’s asthma.

  She reached the living room, and none too soon, either. The wheezing had stopped—she did not have enough breath to support it.

  Which was bad, bad, oh, very bad.

  Blurrily, Phoebe saw Mrs. Tolliver lying on the sofa, curled up on her side facing away from Phoebe. Phoebe ignored her and scanned frantically for her backpack.

  There it was, a black lump on the beige carpet. She collapsed on the floor beside it and pulled it toward her. There were excruciating seconds of groping blindly inside before she closed her shaking hand around the familiar shape of her inhaler, dropping her phone in exchange.

  Now, okay. Now she knew what she was doing. Sit up. Secure the spacer on the inhaler. Breathe out hard. Raise head. Lips around spacer, fingers on trigger. First puff, and with it, the good feel of the medication spray on the back of her throat. Wait; count. Breathe out hard again. Second puff. Normally she’d stop there—but now, a third puff.

  Phoebe clutched her arms around her knees and put her head down on them, closing her eyes. She felt the smallest tear trickle out of one eye and moved her shoulder slightly to wipe it away. Mrs. Tolliver hadn’t even stirred off her sofa to see what was wrong with Phoebe; maybe she was asleep. It didn’t matter. Phoebe could take care of herself and she would. She had. She would take another couple of puffs soon. She was already recovering too. The tight feeling in her chest was beginning to ease. Wasn’t it?

  She just needed to sit still now. Sit still and breathe. And be calm.

  Phoebe did not remember the next few minutes. It was as if she were a black dot in the center of an entirely white, entirely empty dream landscape. She focused only on her tight chest and her breathing, hearing nothing, not even thinking.

  Then suddenly noise impinged on her—a door opening and closing, the stamp of feet, the rumble of voices saying words she couldn’t make out. It was almost, Phoebe thought fuzzily, as if the voices were speaking some lilting, foreign language. But of course this was only because she was still so out of it. She knew, a moment later, that it was Mallory and Ryland who were speaking. Relief filled her.

  Mallory was there. It was all right now, because her friend Mallory—Mallory the calm, Mallory the cool, Mallory who loved her—was there.

  And yes, Mallory was kneeling beside her, arm around her shoulders, saying her name, grabbing her hand that was still clutching the inhaler.

  “Oh my God, Phoebe. Are you okay?”

  Phoebe tried to look up but could only manage to turn her head
a little.

  “She’s bad, Ryland,” Mallory said. “Out of it. I’m calling 911.”

  Phoebe couldn’t understand the words Ryland said in reply. A spurt of alarm filled her, because this must mean she was sicker than she’d thought. She managed to get her head up so she could look at Mallory. Mallory was looking at her brother. “No,” she said to him distinctly. “We have to take care of Phoebe. She needs human medicine.” Then Mallory’s eyes went back to Phoebe’s face.

  “I. Understand. You,” Phoebe told her.

  “Of course you do. Don’t talk, Phoebe. You’re all sweaty. Your breathing sounds awful.” Mallory had her phone out and was pressing numbers. Phoebe relaxed as she listened to Mallory giving crisp, accurate information to the emergency operator, even taking hold of Phoebe’s inhaler and spelling the name of the medication Phoebe had taken.

  “I’m. Okay,” Phoebe got out, when Mallory hung up.

  “Shut up. Yes, you will be okay. At the hospital. Now I’m calling your dad.” Two seconds later, Mallory was speaking into her phone again. “Mr. Vale, Phoebe had an attack at my house. She’ll be fine. I’ve called for help.”

  Phoebe tuned out and closed her eyes. She didn’t have to listen or worry anymore. Mallory would do everything perfectly. Her dad wouldn’t even be panicked because he knew Mallory had dealt with Phoebe’s attacks twice before. He would trust her, just like Phoebe did.

  The ambulance would come. The medics would give her oxygen. They’d probably make her go on a stretcher even if she thought she could walk. At the hospital, they’d give her medication, keep watch, and in the end she’d get to go home to her own bed by tonight. Because she was fine. She was going to be fine.

  She could feel Mallory’s hand on her forehead.

  “Your dad will meet us at the hospital, Phoebe,” Mallory said. “Everything is under control.” Her voice was gentle and almost chatty. “You know, you were a fool not to call 911 yourself. I hope you weren’t thinking my mother would have the sense to do it.” A slight pause, after which Mallory made a little impatient, resigned noise. “Okay. I’m just going to make sure she’s breathing too, which I’m sure she is. Oh, wait.” She pressed Phoebe’s arm. “Hear the sirens? That’s your ambulance. I’ll get the door.” Phoebe felt her move away.

  The sound of the sirens got louder, nearer.

  “Phoebe.” It was a soft breath of air on her left ear.

  Turning toward it, Phoebe opened her eyes. She knew before she did so, though, that it was Ryland.

  What she hadn’t expected was that he would be so close. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor mere inches in front of her. How long had he been there? Phoebe’s startled—and then guilty—eyes met his. She saw his thin, mobile lips moving in a smile, even though the expression in his green eyes was indecipherable.

  As if it were entirely natural, Ryland took Phoebe’s hand. His palm was hard, and his hand was large enough to swallow hers up.

  Then, with his other hand, Ryland reached forward to run his fingers through Phoebe’s flyaway, russet hair. She felt a tug as he detangled something and pulled it out. Then he held it up before her eyes.

  It was a delicate new leaf of green ivy, the same ivy that had been entwined over the stone walls and archway in the secret, magical garden she had entered through Ryland’s bedroom.

  Ryland’s gaze held Phoebe’s. She would have looked away in shame if she could have, but she could not.

  “Poor little Phoebe-bird,” Ryland whispered. His hand tightened on hers. “You can’t even sing. What spring woodland were you wandering in?”

  CONVERSATION WITH THE FAERIE QUEEN, 7

  “Yes, it could have been a disaster, my queen. But it won’t be. In fact, I believe it will end up an advantage, that the girl entered Faerie for a few minutes.”

  “I was interested to see her. She is not at all like my Mayer. She’s dull-witted and fearful. I am glad. It is—easier when one is not fond.”

  “Yes, my queen. She is exactly what we need. I don’t know how my sister could have failed to guide her properly. But I won’t fail. She’ll come to me now, and soon. Whatever the price, I will induce her to say the words we need.”

  “And your sister?”

  “I will still need her help for a time with the girl, but also with the woman. Then I will ease her out. Her return to the court will restore some share of energy and balance to you. I regret it cannot be more.”

  “Any measure will stretch what time we have. None of this will take much longer, I hope.”

  “No, my queen. A month, perhaps two. You will be as beautiful as ever you were.”

  “I no longer care about beauty, Ryland. I have been thinking, however. I now understand what my Mayer did, and why. Before, I did not. My own situation is similar now in some ways to his.”

  “He imperiled us for his own survival.”

  “He did not know that he did so.”

  “No.”

  “I was the one who misjudged the situation, Ryland. I was the one who offered him the bargain, and I was the one who accepted his adjustments to it.”

  “You were not alone. For many years, we all misjudged the cost of our end of the bargain. Any year now, we thought, balance would be restored.”

  “And we behave now as my Mayer did then, taking from others because it is the only way to save ourselves. But we know fully what we do, which he did not. And we use guile, which he also did not.”

  “Yes, my queen. It is ironic, but necessary, and not even worth thinking or talking about now. We must do what we must do.”

  chapter 14

  It was a blessedly quiet weekend. Phoebe was forbidden by her parents to go anywhere or do anything but rest at home. Even though she had recovered from her asthma attack and would normally have protested her confinement, or at least insisted that Mallory come visit, this time Phoebe did neither. And although she did not bother to put her feelings into words, they showed in her actions. Basically, wherever Catherine was, Phoebe wanted to be there as well.

  Luckily, it was not one of the times when Catherine was away, something that tended to happen nowadays about one week in four. In between, she worked at home or in her Boston office, or used quick day trips to New York City and Washington, D.C., for meetings that, for reasons having to do with confidentiality and security, needed to be taken face-to-face.

  It still sometimes felt strange to Phoebe when Catherine was gone, because, for the first twelve years of Phoebe’s life, Catherine had rarely been away from her. Anybody who absolutely needed to speak with her in person had simply been forced to travel to Boston.

  This weekend, after the asthma attack—and really, after what had happened with Ryland, though she wasn’t quite ready to think about that, and her heart beat a little too fast when by accident her mind drifted that way—Phoebe wanted that feeling again. She wanted, though she couldn’t express it, to feel like a child; an important, even spoiled child for whose happiness and convenience the adults made automatic, massive adjustments, and who never, ever, not even for a moment, would not be safe. So she followed her mother from room to room at home, and when, on Sunday afternoon, Catherine mentioned planning to go into her office in Boston to work, Phoebe blurted, “Can I come too? I’ll bring my laptop and do homework. I won’t bother you.”

  “All right,” Catherine said, after a moment of consideration. “And we can have dinner out afterward in Boston, if you’d like. Just us.”

  Phoebe’s face lit up. “But will Dad feel hurt?”

  “I wouldn’t think so. We’ll just tell him we want some mother-daughter time.”

  “Okay,” said Phoebe happily. “Can we go to the North End?”

  “Sure.”

  Phoebe hadn’t been to Catherine’s office on Rowes Wharf for a while, and enjoyed being there again. The office building was attached to a big hotel on the waterfront. Catherine’s suite held a reception area with sofas and a desk for Catherine’s assistant, a meeting room with a big oval
table and high-backed, softly padded chairs on wheels, and a small kitchen and bathroom, along with Catherine’s actual office, which had been deliberately designed to impress and also to intimidate. All of the rooms except the kitchen and bath had windows that overlooked Boston Harbor.

  Phoebe went into the meeting room and stood watching the boats and activity in the harbor below. The water taxi arrived at the hotel marina and unloaded passengers who had just come from the airport. As Phoebe observed one man talking on his phone, she realized that she had taken her own phone out and was clutching it. Again.

  She sighed as she tucked it back in her jeans pocket.

  None of the photos that she had taken of Ryland’s garden were any good. Oh, the pictures were there. It was simply that they showed only gray lumps and gray shadows against a gray background.

  There was no evidence. Phoebe had not even so much as a leaf in her hair anymore for proof that the garden had been real.

  But she knew it was real. In a way, the fact that the photos were useless was evidence. It was real enough to need to be concealed. Magically concealed, perhaps. It was evidence, at least, to Phoebe herself.

  Her stomach churned a little with a feeling that was part excitement, part fear, and part something secret that she didn’t yet feel able to examine closely. When she let herself think, questions came to her, questions that were, like the water-needles from an expensive shower, sharp and stimulating. Who was Ryland? What was going on? What did Mallory know? And what was she, Phoebe, to do? Should she talk to Mallory, ask questions, confide? Or should she go directly to Ryland?

  No. Not Ryland. Phoebe couldn’t. She felt hot with embarrassment and . . . something . . . even thinking of that. When she couldn’t stutter out a normal conversation with Ryland before all this, how would she talk to him now?

  Poor little Phoebe-bird, can’t even sing.

  His hand on hers.

  God. Was she blushing?