by Leo Hunt
“And it’s totally safe?”
“Oh, of course. We don’t even have to let it out of the mirror. Very safe.”
She holds my gaze without blinking.
“All right,” I say.
We eat eggs and toast, sitting up on the counter with our plates, and I’m done by the time Elza reappears, her hair wet and hanging over her shoulders.
“Eggs?” I ask.
“Maybe not,” she says. “I feel a bit sick.”
“Do you want some milk or something?” Ash asks.
There’s a silence. I watch steam coiling from the spout of the kettle. The horizon has blushed vivid pink. Sunrise can’t be long.
“Just some water,” Elza says at last.
Ash nods and turns to the sink.
I take a shower, and then we make our way outside to wait for sunrise. Ash leads us through the back garden of her blank house, and into the fields beyond Pilgrim Grove. The mirror is propped against one of Ash’s white patio chairs, pointed toward the eastern horizon. The Widow is waiting beside it. She gives me a shallow bow.
I look into the mirror’s surface. The Fury is just beneath it, floating like an oil spill, watching us all through the glass. I remember it eating the Vassal, cutting him apart with its whip and swallowing his spirit down. I remember it hiding in my body, chasing Elza, trying to make me kill her with my own hands. I remember my mother sliding a knife into my chest. The world will be better off without this particular spirit; I’m sure of that.
I raise my hand and, making sure the demon is watching, wave good-bye.
The creature doesn’t react.
Dawn is close now. The sky is lightening by the minute, a wash of purples and pinks, with a seam of gold behind the trees. I watch a pair of rabbits cavorting at the other end of the field. There are birds singing in the forest. Nobody says anything. Elza’s hair is still soaking wet, and she looks strange without it fluffed up by hair spray.
I’ve got way too bad a headache for a ritual like this.
“I think it should be time,” Ash says, looking at her phone.
“All right,” Elza says.
“You remember the incantation?” Ash asks her.
“Of course. It’s hardly complex. You remember what you’ve promised to do for Luke? The Lethe waters?”
“You have our word,” the Widow says.
“Just making sure we’re all on the same page,” Elza says. She takes the witch blade out of her pocket and steps up to the mirror. Her reflection and the demon’s black form occupy the same surface area, fighting each other to be seen.
“About a minute now,” Ash says.
Elza raises the knife above her head. The Fury watches us all, expression unchanging. If the demon feels a trace of fear, it doesn’t show.
The sunrise flows along the knife, turning the white bone to gold.
“Now,” Ash says.
“Let the dawn’s light be the end of this darkness,” Elza says, and brings the witch blade down into the center of the mirror.
There’s a ringing sound, like crystal being struck with a hammer. My head starts to throb even harder. The surface of the mirror allows the witch blade to pass through, burying itself up to the silver hilt. Then the knife sinks deeper, and Elza’s arm sinks with it. She turns to look at me.
“Luke —”
“Is this . . . what?”
Elza’s right arm is stuck elbow-deep into the mirror.
Her eyes widen.
“It hurts!” she says.
“Elza!” I try to reach out to her, but I can’t move.
My body feels ice-cold.
I look down, and there’s a spear sticking out of the middle of my chest.
“Hush, boy,” the Widow says, just by my ear. “Be still.”
“No,” I say, “Elza . . . you . . .”
Elza tries to pull her hand back out of the mirror. She’s terrified. “It hurts . . . Luke . . . !” She shrieks like a siren.
I can’t look away. I try to pull the spear out of my chest, but my hands go through it.
Bloodred fire, hungry fire, explodes from the surface of the mirror. Elza is wreathed in flames. She screams and tries to pull away, but she’s stuck.
She turns to Ash. “You piece of shit!” Elza snarls, fire coursing over her face. “You —”
Ash doesn’t say a word.
Elza screams again, and the flame spouts up out of her mouth and eyes, a fountain of demon fire.
My body feels like ice. I’m so heavy —
Elza falls to the ground. She’s crumpled on the grass in front of the mirror. Blood-colored flames are oozing over her skin.
I try to reach out to her, but I can’t.
“Be still,” the Widow hisses. “This must be.”
Ash looks down at Elza’s burning body, her expression unreadable. Elza’s hand came out of the mirror as she fell, but the witch blade is still stuck into the mirror’s surface. Ash takes hold of the silver hilt and pulls. The knife comes free, sliding from the surface of the mirror as if it were water, and with it comes the nonpareil.
The nonpareil is the size of a grapefruit or an orange, and at first I think it is a fruit, although that word doesn’t seem to do it justice. It’s like a fruit, or maybe a beautiful egg, some kind of seed bursting with potential and promise. It has a sheen to it, like a pearl, and it changes color as I look at it, like the coating that crow feathers have. At first I think it’s mainly white, like fresh snow, and then I become certain that the nonpareil is green, the green of summer grass, but that leads me to see the blues in it, blues like the most perfect tropical ocean you ever saw. I see the silvery scales of a fish, the smooth cool black of finely worked onyx. I see the red of ripe apples and a yellow that makes me think of hay bales, of the sun itself. The nonpareil looks like sunlight hitting fresh water. It looks like someone took your favorite song and gave it a shape.
I think the best way to describe the nonpareil is this: While Ash is holding it in her hands, I completely forget that Elza is lying on the ground in flames. I forget the Widow just stuck a spear through me. I forget my own name.
Ash pulls the witch blade out of the nonpareil and tucks the knife back into her coat, then carefully wraps the nonpareil in a dark cloth. As its light is extinguished, my fear and pain and grief come washing back like a lead-gray wave. The Widow twists her spear in my chest, and I fall to the ground. I feel like my heart is stopping. My arms and legs won’t work.
“Elza,” I say. The Widow looks down at me, her face impassive. Her black eyes have no pity in them. They’re like empty graves.
Ashana Ahlgren leans over me. I want to tear her throat out with my teeth. I can’t even blink. She doesn’t look happy. I want to strangle her.
“Sorry,” Ash says.
I manage a gurgle.
Ash reaches down and gently closes first one of my eyes and then the other.
I wake up inside the mirror. I suppose I’m alive, suppose that my body is alive somewhere, because I still have a life cord sticking out of my chest. I have that much to be thankful for. It’s the same black space I was in before, barely bigger than a coffin, with the far wall transparent, so I can see what’s outside the mirror. Of the previous prisoner, the Fury, there’s no trace at all.
I’m out in the forest somewhere. There are no landmarks I can see, just pine trees. It must be around midday. I can see new bracken, tree trunks, some rocks. I can see a cardboard sign leaning against the tree opposite my mirror prison. It reads:
SORRY
NO CHOICE
YOU WERE GOOD TO ME
There’s no signature. It hardly needs one.
I feel sick just looking at the sign.
Sorry? You’re sorry?
Say that to Elza. Say that to her while she’s screaming, with flames —
No. I don’t want to think about that.
I don’t know what to think about.
You know the worst part? I was actually starting to li
ke Ash. Despite myself.
No, the worst part is that I didn’t see this coming.
It was so obvious.
Was it obvious? I cast my mind back over the past few days: Ash smiling at us, Ash begging us for help, Ash crying as she looked at her comatose sister. Ash handing me a fresh cup of coffee. The way she asked us, So how long have you guys been a thing? With a cheeky little smile, like she cared about us. Like she didn’t know that Elza would —
That Elza would get hurt.
She must have known. I don’t want to believe she did. But she must have.
I remember Ash’s face after she read the Book of Eight. I remember her throwing up in my bathroom.
She knew. Ash knew what would happen to Elza.
Flattering her. Elza said she wasn’t going to be won over by Ash praising her photographs, but when someone gives you a fancy magic knife and tells you you’re descended from Lilith . . .
Was that how Ash got her?
Ash got us both through me. The Book of Eight. I didn’t want to go crazy.
I don’t think that’s unreasonable.
Elza is still alive. I’m sure of it.
It was just a burst of demon fire. I’m sure she’ll be all right.
I wonder where she is.
I can’t believe that Ash —
That Ash what? That Ash lied to us?
I knew she was a liar. It was right there from the start.
“Ashley Smith.”
“The William Goodman Foundation.”
She was a liar in plain sight and she showed me her sister and told me how sick her sister was and how hard their lives were and I couldn’t wait to fall for it.
I was just being a good person.
YOU WERE GOOD TO ME.
I was, and look where it’s gotten me. Stuck inside a mirror, no idea if Elza is even alive, no idea what time it is, what day it is . . .
I remember hugging Ash in Ilana’s room, me and Elza hugging her, and the whole time her secret was inside her like a worm in an apple — she knew she knew she knew. Ash knew she was going to betray us.
She knew for days.
Maybe that’s why she was crying.
No, she was crying for Ilana. That’s all Ash cares about.
I saw that from the start, too.
Me and Elza were both just a means to an end for her.
Now she doesn’t need us anymore.
What even happened to Elza? It looked like the demon attacked her somehow . . . but then it must’ve died, since the nonpareil . . .
I should’ve asked Ash exactly what would happen.
I did ask her. She told us it was safe.
Why did I believe her?
I trusted her.
I’m sorry, Elza. I’m so sorry.
YOU WERE GOOD TO ME.
NO CHOICE.
I can’t take this anymore.
I just want to see Elza again.
I just . . . Is that Ham?
It is Ham. How can that be Ham? I left him at my house. . . .
There’s no mistaking the identity of the beast approaching through the trees. Long-bodied, long-limbed, a noble head topped with a ridiculous tuft of fluff. It’s undeniably Ham. He’s trotting along with uncommon purpose, heading straight for the mirror. There’s nobody with him. I can see he’s wearing his collar, the name tag jingling as he lopes through the undergrowth. He makes his way right up to the tree my mirror is propped against.
His big shaggy head looks into the mirror, his marmalade eyes wide and sad.
“Hello, boy,” I say.
Ham whines.
“How on earth did you get out here?” I ask.
No answer.
“Ham, you need to rescue me. Go and fetch . . .”
Who on earth can Ham fetch? Mum? She’d just see a mirror.
Can Ham even hear me? He can definitely see me.
“Where’s Elza, eh, Ham?” I ask.
Ham whimpers again.
I need someone to smash this mirror for me.
“Look, go and find some bored little boys who like vandalizing stuff.”
Nothing.
I’m really starting to wish we’d gotten a super-dog, the type that rescues people from wells and burning barns. Where do you buy those dogs?
“Seriously, how did you find me?” I ask. “I’m in a tough spot, Ham. I need some help.”
Ham leans right into the mirror and presses his snout against it. He starts to breathe in and out. The surface of the mirror mists over around his wet black nose. The skin of his lip is pulled upward, revealing his weird little Dracula teeth.
“What on earth are you doing, boy?”
He whimpers and breathes in again, deeper, and I feel a slight breeze inside the mirror.
Ham’s breathing through the glass somehow.
He sucks air into his nose again, and I feel the air of this prison stir.
I went into Ham’s body once before, to cross a magical barrier that I couldn’t pass on my own. It seems I’m being invited back.
On his next inbreath I’m ready, and I slip out of the mirror, through the glass, carried by his breath, flowing up into Ham’s snout and then into his head.
Am Ham. Am Luke. Am sad. Sad sad sad. Girl hurt. Hurt very bad. Love girl. Find girl. Ham run. Run run run. Hello fields. Hello trees. Hello bad rabbit. Want to chase rabbit. Will catch rabbit. Make him squeal.
No Ham. Bad Ham. Am Luke. Find girl. Run run. Busy beast. Must run. Sad sad. White hair girl bad. White hair girl very bad. Must bite. Want to bite.
Through stream. Splash splash. Nice stream. Paws wet. Through woods. Am Ham. Sun bright. Nice woods. Through bushes. Scrape scrape. Rustle rustle. Smell bad deer. Hear her in woods. Naughty deer. Run deer run. Is gone now. Will catch one day. Ham love to chase.
Am Luke. Get deer later.
Run field. Wet field. Jump wall. Small wall. Jump over. Love to jump. Ham run. Run run run. Mud in field. Mud go spoosh. Jump wall.
Now sheep. Bad sheep. Lots of sheep. Want to chase. Tractor man shout at Ham. Get out! Not want to get out. Ham like sheep.
Man stop tractor. Time to run. Run run.
Go fast Ham. Am Ham. Run run run. Find nice girl. Am sad. Miss girl. Where is girl? Nice girl. Will kiss girl. Am Ham. Ham run. Run run. Very fast. Busy beast. Find girl. Girl hurt. Girl burnt. Very bad. Must find.
More field. Big long field. No sheep. No rabbit. No nothing.
Bad place. Unplace. Unplace very close.
Bad house. Bad bad place. Am Ham. Ham brave. Am brave. Want to go back. Big brave Ham. Must go on. Am brave Ham. Unplace. Fog all over. Unfog. Bad fog.
Am scared!
Am Ham. Am Luke. Am bravest. Unplace bad.
Unfield.
Unpeople.
Bad bad bad.
I come out of Ham’s body in a rush. I didn’t mean to stay in there as long as I did, but there’s something intoxicating about being a dog on a sunny day. My worry and fear felt far away, like they’d happened to someone else. That lasted until we came within visible distance of the Pilgrim Grove housing development, and then Ham got scared himself. There’s something wrong here.
Although it’s a bright afternoon, the field is dimmed by gray fog. The fog sits like a giant amoeba over the whole building site and doesn’t seem to be moving with the wind. I’ve seen fog like this once before, in Deadside.
“That was some good familiar-ing,” I say to Ham. “Good boy.”
Ham whines anxiously.
I glide across the wet grass, Ham following behind me at an uneasy trot. The fog oozes around us. We reach the edge of the new housing development, and we make our way through half-finished houses, past fog-shrouded cement mixers and the dull-yellow dinosaur shapes of backhoes. The day grows even dimmer as we approach the site of Ash’s blank house. The fog is thickest here, dirty-linen white, bloated like a growth of spectral fungus. The house itself is invisible. I turn to Ham.
“Wait here,” I say, and plunge into th
e white fog, heading for the house.
The fog grows thicker still, and there’s a strange ringing, a high-pitched chime. The fog is so thick, I can’t even see my hands anymore; all I can see is white, and then, bizarrely, I get a flash of a black sky above me, filled with glittering cold stars. I move farther, faster, rocketing through the blank white void . . . and find myself face-to-face with Ham. I’m in the exact spot I started from.
“What happened?” I ask him. He whines.
I turn and plunge into the fog again, heading for where I know the front door of Ash’s house would be, but as soon as I get to the place where the front yard should start, everything vanishes. There’s no ground, no sky, no wind, nothing but fog. On a whim I plunge downward, finding no earth to sink into, just bleak endless void, and then, at a depth that should be far underground, another glimpse of a dark sky, stars. The chime sounds, the fog thickens, and I find myself flying right at Ham again. I come to a halt.
Where has Ash’s house gone?
I make my way in a circle around the site. The fog is emanating from the exact spot where the house used to stand. Everything else seems to be in place, and it’s only the house that’s missing. I can even find part of the wall that separated Ash’s backyard from the fields beyond, but past this wall, the fog congeals into its thickest state and nothing beyond it is visible. Is this a ward, like the line of glowing blood the Fury drew around my house? It’s clearly magic of some type.
When I loop back around to Ham a third time, there are human figures standing next to him in the fog. If I had skin, I would jump out of it, but Ham doesn’t seem afraid, and as I get closer, they resolve into shapes I recognize. Three boys, a little older than me, with wet-gelled hair and bleached jeans, white sneakers. The tallest one is wearing a pink polo shirt.
“Oh, look who it is,” he says.
“Hello, lads,” I say.
These three are some of the town ghosts, residents of Dunbarrow. They died in a car crash a few years ago, and they’ve been hanging around ever since. Their names are Jack, Ryan, and Andy.
“Thought that was your dog,” Andy says.
“Yeah,” I say. “Listen, I’m in a bit of trouble. You lads seen my body anywhere?”