Dead Voices

by Katherine Arden

  “Who?” said Brian, peering at her phone over Ollie’s shoulder.

  “He disappeared on the mountain a few years ago,” said Coco. “Nothing to do with the orphanage at all. They never found him.”

  Brian and Ollie read the article together. When he’d finished, Brian looked up. “Coco,” he said, “didn’t you say the—person—maybe ghost—you saw on the road was . . .”

  Coco had been waiting for someone to say it. “Was wearing a blue ski jacket,” she finished. “With a ski mask, but no gloves.”

  “Gabriel Bouvier was wearing a blue ski jacket,” Ollie said, scanning another article. “On the night he disappeared.”

  “Another ghost?” Coco asked, saying aloud what they were all thinking.

  “Too many,” said Brian darkly.

  Ollie tried to click to another article. Frowned. “Hey, Coco, your phone says no service now. Not a single bar.” Coco took her phone back. Ollie and Brian pulled out theirs. No service, said all three of their phones.

  A chill of memory ran down Coco’s spine. When the three found themselves in the world behind the mist, their phones had also stopped working. No, she reminded herself. This isn’t the same. We were alone last time. Now we have our parents, and the Wilsons and Mr. Voland.

  There was a crash from the front desk in the lobby. The trio looked over. Mrs. Wilson had slammed a phone receiver down. “Landlines are out,” she said. “Storm must be knocking over phone lines too. If it goes on much longer, I guess we’ll be buried here.”

  She said it like she was trying to make a joke. No one laughed.

  Ollie’s dad squinted down at his own phone. “I had service earlier today,” he said. “Not anymore.”

  “Do you have a radio?” Coco’s mom asked Mrs. Wilson. “A satellite phone?”

  Mrs. Wilson, coming back into the dining room, shook her head. “They were going to be delivered on Thursday,” she said. “I never dreamed . . .” She looked kind of helpless. Coco figured that she’d been ready to handle hordes of guests, but she didn’t know what to do when they were snowed in without lights, heat, or a way to contact anyone.

  “Okay,” said Mr. Adler firmly. “This is fine. You hear me, kids? We are completely fine. Not a good time for nerves. You guys aren’t nervous, are you?”

  They were, but not in the way Mr. Adler was thinking.

  “No, Dad,” said Ollie clearly. “We’re not nervous.”

  She gave Brian and Coco fierce looks, as though she were daring them to contradict her. Don’t go worrying my dad any more than he already is. They didn’t say anything. Although Brian looked like he really wanted to say something.

  “Sue, you said there’s plenty of firewood?” Ollie’s dad asked.

  She nodded.

  “Great,” said Mr. Adler. “And there’s lots of food, I imagine, since you were planning on a lot of guests. Let’s take a moment while we still have daylight and stack more firewood here near the hearth. We’ll pile up blankets and spare batteries, sleep down here, and keep cozy near the fire until . . .”

  Mr. Adler kept talking, making plans. But Ollie, Brian, and Coco had stopped listening. Ollie marched over to Mr. Voland. Brian and Coco followed her. He was standing apart from the other adults, and not helping them with the planning. He was watching the lobby stairwell.

  “Mr. Voland,” said Ollie, planting herself in front of him. “Do you think a ghost is doing it? Making the heat and power not work?”

  “I imagine so,” said Mr. Voland, not looking away from the stairs.

  “Mother Hemlock?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Why?” asked Coco.

  “I don’t know,” said Mr. Voland. “Perhaps only to frighten us. Weaken us. Ghosts like it when you’re afraid. It means you acknowledge them.”

  Somewhere out of sight, the bird clock whistled the hour.

  And Ollie’s watch began beeping again, frantically.

  7

  THE FOUR OF THEM jumped. The other adults were too far away to hear. Mr. Voland stared at Ollie’s watch. “You need to tell me about that device on your wrist,” he said.

  Ollie put a protective hand on the watch face, muffling the noise. Brian and Coco stood silent on either side of her. “Why?” she demanded.

  Mr. Voland looked stern. “I believe we are in danger,” he said. “We cannot leave. We don’t have light, we don’t have heat, and the ghost upstairs is strong, and will only get stronger as the sun sets. I do not know what she wants. Are you willing to bet that she’s harmless?”

  The three didn’t say anything.

  Mr. Voland went on in a softer voice. “We need every advantage,” he said. “That”—one long finger pointed at Ollie’s watch—“is no ordinary device; I’d stake my life on it.” The watch was beeping so fast now that it was almost like a continuous buzz. Ollie glanced down and saw letters rippling over its pale gray surface faster than ever. But they didn’t stop long enough for her to make sense of them.

  Still Ollie hesitated. Except for Brian and Coco, she’d never told anyone about her watch. Not even her dad. It was too strange, and too precious, and too painful. But she met Mr. Voland’s strange two-colored eyes, and abruptly she found the story spilling out.

  “My watch helps me,” she said. “When I—when we were in danger the last time, my watch told me what to do. My watch was—it was my mother’s. I think she talks to me with it. I think she’s trying to warn us now.”

  Brian and Coco were silent, although Brian was frowning.

  “Ah,” said Mr. Voland with a sigh. “That explains it. You have a very powerful object there, Ollie. I trust you keep it safe?”

  “Yes,” said Ollie. She was on the edge of tears, and she almost never cried. “But I don’t know what to do now. I don’t know what it’s trying to say.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Mr. Voland. “We’ll contact your mother and ask. Perhaps she will tell us what is happening and what we must do.”

  Brian just scowled at Mr. Voland. “How are we going to do that?” he demanded, just as Ollie asked, “Now?”

  “Tonight,” Mr. Voland. “I have a method. We’ll have to do it after dark, unfortunately. It’s not something you can do when the sun is up. But as soon as we can, after the sun sets. And I will show you how.”

  Brian opened his mouth, closed it again. Ollie nodded once. “Let’s do it. Just—don’t tell my dad.” Ollie didn’t know what her dad would do if she told him she was going to try and talk to her mom. Would he be happy or sad or angry, tell her not to, or want to help? It was better, Ollie decided, not to worry him. Not until she knew.

  “Very well,” said Mr. Voland, “but I think there are plans afoot for everyone to spend the night in the lobby. Because of the chill. We will have to be very quiet if you wish to hide this from your father, Ollie.”

  “I don’t like it,” Brian said abruptly. “Why should we lie to Ollie’s dad?”

  “Do you want to explain it to him?” asked Mr. Voland coolly.

  “We could try,” said Brian, stubborn. “Maybe he’d listen.”

  “Or maybe—” began Mr. Voland, but just then, Ollie’s dad interrupted them.

  He and Ms. Zintner were putting armloads of firewood by the fireplace. He called across the room, “Ollie-pop, can you three go upstairs and nab all your warm clothes and the blankets off your beds? We’re going to have to sleep near the fireplace tonight. It’s the only proper heat source, with the heaters not working.”

  They all went tense. No one wanted to go back up the stairs. But Ollie’s dad had already bounced outside to pick up another armload of firewood without waiting for an answer.

  “What do we do?” Ollie asked.

  “There is a good deal we don’t know,” said Mr. Voland. “But certainly we must neither be foolhardy nor give in to panic. We do need coats and blankets.
Clean socks and phone chargers. Better we go upstairs now than after nightfall.”

  The three of them nodded reluctant agreement. Ollie stared across the lobby, toward the staircase. It disappeared upward into thick blackness. Why is it so dark up there? Ollie wondered. Much too dark. It can’t be that close to sunset yet.

  “Let’s go now,” Mr. Voland said. “The sooner the better. Don’t worry, I’ll come with you.” He gave the kids a sudden, warm smile. Ollie found herself feeling better. “I advise you to hold hands,” said Mr. Voland as they headed for the stairs. “And,” he added under his breath, almost too low for the kids to hear, “whatever you see, don’t let go.”

  * * *

  —

  The rattling closet was quiet as they passed it. There were no strange shadows on the floor, and no dark figure at the end of the corridor. The four of them held hands, and they walked quickly.

  And walked.

  And walked.

  The corridor never seemed to get any shorter.

  It was Brian who whispered first, tugging on their hands, “Guys. Guys, shouldn’t we have gotten to the rooms by now?”

  They all halted. “It’s true, we have been walking a long time,” said Mr. Voland doubtfully. “But—”

  He looked around him. The light was a deep charcoal-gray. It was not perfectly dark, but not far from it either. The only illumination came from the fading, snow-filled daylight in the big windows at either end of the long hall.

  Suddenly Coco asked, “Are anyone’s feet wet?”

  “How could they be?” asked Brian reasonably. “None of us has been outside.”

  “Then,” Coco said in a small voice, “who made the footprints?”

  Ollie looked down the hall and saw what Coco had—that a line of wet footprints followed them.

  “Are you three sure no one has tracked in snow?” asked Mr. Voland.

  “No!” Brian snapped. His voice cracked with anxiety and impatience. “If we said we didn’t, we didn’t. None of us has been outside.”

  Ollie’s eye kept tracking the line of wet footprints.

  They stopped right next to her.

  Ollie looked up. A big mirror hung across from them. In the dark hall, their reflections were only shadowy outlines.

  There were five outlines.

  But there were only four of them in the hallway.

  It took Ollie a moment to understand. She spun in a circle, searching. “Guys!” she cried. “Look, the mirror! Someone’s here! Someone’s in the hall with us!”

  Coco was still clinging to Ollie’s left hand; Ollie had Brian’s cold fingers in her right. She couldn’t see anyone around them. Not in the hallway. Just her and Brian and Coco and Mr. Voland. But in the mirror, a fifth shape stood among them.

  “What is it?” cried Coco.

  “It’s only in the mirror,” said Brian.

  Brian was on Coco’s left, Ollie realized. He wasn’t next to her at all.

  “Whose hand am I holding?” Ollie whispered. She looked to her right and saw nothing. “Whose hand am I holding?” she cried. She couldn’t see anything. But icy fingers still gripped hers tight. Ollie looked straight in the mirror to see, dimly, a torn blue ski jacket, a face hidden by a ski mask.

  All four of them saw it. They stared, frozen.

  Mr. Voland said to the fifth reflection, in a shaken voice, “Whatever you are, can you talk to us?”

  No answer. Just a silhouette, black in the darkened mirror.

  “Can it hurt us?” Coco whispered.

  “I don’t know,” Mr. Voland replied. He took a step closer, peering through his glasses.

  “Run!” cried Ollie. “Guys, run—I can’t move—it’s holding my hand!” She tugged, but the thing wouldn’t let go. A creeping horror started to overtake her: a feeling that, if she stayed there long enough, she would become a reflection instead of a girl. She felt herself take an involuntary step toward that dark mirror, then another.

  But she didn’t take a third. Instead Mr. Voland pushed her aside, wrapped his jacket around his hand, and smashed the mirror.

  The cold grip on Ollie’s hand relaxed and vanished, leaving white spots on her skin, almost like frostbite. The mirror was broken, and they were alone in the hallway. Ollie couldn’t stop shivering.

  “Look,” said Coco in a strained whisper. “We were at the end of the corridor, after all. Our door—our door is right here. It was right here the whole time.”

  Ollie remembered suddenly the rest of a warning she’d heard in a nightmare.

  Stay out of closets. And don’t look in the mirror.

  She looked down, but her watch face was still blank. Her hand hurt, and she couldn’t stop shaking.

  8

  THEY GRABBED BLANKETS, coats, knit caps, and warm socks, and hurried back to the lobby. They didn’t look into any mirrors; they didn’t stop at any closets. Mr. Voland went last, casting cautious glances over his shoulder the whole time. Ollie was grateful for Mr. Voland. A line of cuts ran across his knuckles from the broken glass.

  In the lobby, the first thing Ollie saw was the silly canoe with its three paddling raccoons; their unexpected, sharp-toothed smiles gave her a jolt. The canoe was sitting next to the front desk, facing the stairwell, as though the raccoons were guarding the bright bowls of candy and matchbooks on the front desk. Hadn’t the raccoons been over the fireplace before? Maybe Mrs. Wilson had moved them.

  Whatever. Ollie, tired of weirdness, marched over to them, grabbed a matchbook and a handful of candy, and shoved them both in her pocket. Never knew when matches would come in handy. And even if she was still cold and shivering from what had happened upstairs, she wasn’t going to be afraid of stupid stuffed raccoons.

  The raccoons looked like they were laughing. Ollie swerved away from them, headed toward the double entrance doors, shoved them open, and went outside. She stood in her sneakers under the dry, freezing portico, glad to breathe the outside air, even if it was full of snow. The wind had dropped. But the snow hadn’t let up. Not even a little. It fell down in sheets as fast as rain. It lay in drifts almost as high as the dining room window. Ollie couldn’t even tell which lumps in the parking lot were Susie or Mr. Voland’s car. She scrubbed her right hand, the hand the ghost had touched, hard in the snow.

  Coco poked her head out. “Come on, Ollie,” she said. “You okay? Come inside. It’s freezing.” Coco had already put her ski jacket on over her sweatshirt, and she still looked cold.

  But Ollie didn’t move; she was staring out over the parking lot with longing. Maybe, she thought, we can dig out Susie and sleep in her, with the heat going. But even as she thought it, Ollie knew they couldn’t. They needed the gas to get home. They were stuck inside the lodge. Reluctantly, she followed Coco back inside.

  Ollie’s dad was wearing his ski jacket and knit hat indoors. The tip of his nose was bright red with the chill. “Shut the door!” he called to Ollie as she came in.

  Ollie pulled the door shut. Her dad was kneeling in front of the fireplace on the lobby side, and he had gotten the fire going a little better. It glowed yellow instead of red and threw out a small circle of heat. There was the friendly sound of logs snapping. Someone had also collected a lot of battery-powered lamps and set them up around the hearth. The lamps pushed back the shadows, made a ring of warm light. Ollie went toward the fireplace. Brian, Coco, and Mr. Voland were already there, putting down their loads of coats and blankets.

  “Thanks for grabbing these,” Ollie’s dad said to them, clambering to his feet. He helped them make a neat stack of blankets and pillows near the fire. “You guys want to be in charge of bed setup later on? Great, excellent.”

  He didn’t wait for answers, but headed at once over to the kitchen. They could hear him talking to Mr. Wilson. Since the gas wasn’t working, they had to decide what cold stuff would be best for dinner.
“How’s your stash of peanut butter?” her dad was asking brightly.

  “Thanks for breaking the mirror,” said Ollie awkwardly to Mr. Voland. “It—whatever it was—didn’t let me go until you did.”

  Mr. Voland was shaking out a blanket.

  “Don’t mention it,” he said. “You were very brave.”

  “We’ve seen worse,” said Ollie. They had. The mirror had been bad, but the scarecrows behind the mist had been worse.

  Mr. Voland’s eyes narrowed. But he didn’t ask. Ollie was glad he didn’t. He put the blanket down next to the fireplace and flexed his cut hand. “Although,” Mr. Voland added with a faint smile, “I do not know how I am going to explain the broken mirror to Sue.”

  “Say it was a ghost,” said Ollie.

  “I guess I’ll have to,” he replied, and they both laughed a little.“The three of you should stay downstairs and stay together for the rest of the day,” Mr. Voland added to the whole trio. “Promise?”

  All three promised. But then Brian, scowling, headed over to the front desk and grabbed the whole bowl of candy. “Okay, but I need some candy,” he said.

  “Are we allowed?” asked Coco.

  “Today we are,” said Brian, plunking the bowl down on the hearth by the fire and starting to make himself a blanket nest to sit in. “No skiing and ghosts? There is no limit to the peanut butter cups that I am allowed to consume.”

  “Seconded,” said Ollie, and reached for one. “I just had a ghost grab my hand.”

  Coco shrugged agreement and ate a Snickers. She’d brought her travel chess set downstairs with the blankets. “Ollie, want to play?”

  Ollie didn’t really feel like chess, but it was better than peering into the shadows or sitting and watching the light fade out of the dining room windows.

  Ollie and Coco played for a while, trading matches back and forth, neither of them trying very hard. Brian watched them play and read The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Ollie kept stealing glances at the dragon-headed ship on the book’s cover. She wanted to be on a ship right then, with no walls, only water, and a hot sun overhead.