Star Cursed: The Cahill Witch Chronicles, Book Two

by Spotswood, Jessica

  p w="1em">“She’s your sister. After what she’s been through, she belongs here, with you,” I say firmly. “Does anyone besides Lucy and Rory have relatives in Harwood? Maud, your cousin is there, right? Caroline, was it?”

  “Yes.” Maud grins.

  It turns out that Sister Edith’s niece is a patient there, too, and we agree to bring her and Caroline back with us.

  “What about me? I can come, can’t I?” Tess frowns up at me from her spot on the flowered rug.

  “You are twelve, aren’t you?” I point out. I’ve been avoiding this for days.

  Her thin face flushes as she toys with the end of one blond braid. “Yes, but—”

  “No. You’re a brilliant witch—and so are you, Lucy, and you, Rebekah—and I daresay you’d all be an asset, and I shall regret not having you there. But I won’t risk your safety,” I explain. “Please don’t fight me on this.”

  “I think Cate is right,” Sister Sophia says gently.

  “We need to fit into three carriages coming back,” Elena decides. “Fifteen seems like the right number. What do you think, Cate?”

  “Er—yes,” I agree, still flabbergasted that she’s asking for my approval. “We’ll need a pair to cover each wing of the asylum, plus several waiting in the front hall to guide the patients. I imagine some of them will just run, and I can’t blame them—but we should remind them that the Brothers may hunt them down again if they go home.” We don’t want a repeat of our mistake with the Richmond Square prisoners.

  “You’ll need us. Pearl and I are more familiar with Harwood than anybody.” Addie pokes her drooping spectacles up on her nose. Next to her, quiet Pearl bobs her head in agreement.

  In the end, we have almost twice as many volunteers as we need. We settle on Elena and the two governesses who offered to drive a wagon; Sisters Sophia and Edith and Mélisande; Rory, who will look after Brenna; Rilla, who’s brilliant with illusions; Addie and Pearl and Mei, who are all familiar with Harwood’s layout; and Vi, Daisy, Maud, and me. Elena dismisses the rest of the girls, and the Harwood team stays to discuss details and divvy up our posts.

  I nab Tess by the elbow. “You understand, don’t you?”

  She nods. “I didn’t think you’d let me go, honestly. I hoped I was wrong, but—”

  “We still need your help. You’ve got to stay and tell us more about the safe houses.”

  Eugenia taps me on the shoulder. “May I speak to you for a minute, privately?” she asks.

  “Of course.” I assume she has some concern about commandeering her father’s delivery wagon, and I can’t say I blame her for it. I trail her out into the hall, and we watch as girls tiptoe back to their rooms, careful not to wake their sleeping neighbors. At the far end of the hall, the door to Sister Cora’s rooms is shut tight. Sophia said she could go any moment now. I close my eyes and say a silent prayer that it will be quick and peaceful.

  When the last girl disappears downstairs, Eugenia turns to me.

  “Since when are you and Elena such bosom friends?” she hisses.

  “I—what?”

  Her mouth stretches like a storybook monster’s, and I back away. Eugenia’s straight brown braids turn a vibrant red, her brown eyes become a piercing blue, and her spotty complexion turns into my sister’s smooth skin.

  “Maura.” I stare at her, horrified, bumping against the green floral wallpaper. “What did you do with Eugenia?”

  “Oh, Genie’s fine.” Maura waves a hand, unconcerned. “I did a freezing spell on her and shoved her in her armoire. I’ll let her out in a few minutes. I’m glad I came to your stupid meeting and found out what you and Elena have been up hafreezito. Look at all those ninnies, just falling over themselves to impress you!”

  “They’re not trying to impress me; they’re doing what’s right,” I point out.

  “You’re so sanctimonious, it’s sickening.” Maura crosses her arms over her ruffled blue nightgown. “I can’t believe you’re working with her. I thought you hated her!”

  I bite my lip. “She cares about you, you know. She’s sorry for hurting you.”

  Maura stares down at the wooden floorboards. “Not enough to be on my side in this.”

  “Two people can disagree and still care for each other,” I point out.

  “Like you and Tess care about me?” Maura shakes her head, red curls flying. “No. I’m alone in this. I ought to be used to it by now, I suppose; I’m always alone.”

  “That’s not true,” I snap, planting my hands on my hips. “Stop feeling sorry for yourself.”

  “You wouldn’t understand. People just flock to you,” Maura accuses, and I gape at her, remembering how many times I’ve jealously thought the exact same thing about her. “Is Finn involved in this?”

  “He is,” I say, warily. “Why? Looking for more information to blackmail me with?”

  “You shouldn’t let him. This is your fight, not his.” Maura’s blue eyes meet mine solemnly. “He shouldn’t have any part of it.”

  “Well, he insisted, and I’m trying not to forbid people things these days. It never seems to turn out well.” I give her a small smile. “Look, I know you’re angry with Tess and me, but this is bigger than just us. These girls need our help. If you and Inez succeed tomorrow night, you don’t know what the Brothers will do to them.”

  “Neither do you,” Maura points out, fidgeting with the white lace at her sleeve.

  “I know it’ll be awful. The Brothers will make examples of them—torture them or kill them. I can’t just stand by and let that happen.” I look at her imploringly. Even now, part of me hopes that she’ll see reason, that she’ll join us instead of Inez. “Whatever the Brothers do to retaliate, it will be on your head, Maura. Yours and Inez’s. Can you live with that?”

  Maura stares at me. “It’s their choice how they respond. If they resurrect the burnings, it will show people how awful they really are. The Brothers are our enemies, Cate. We can’t work together. The sooner you realize that, the better off you’ll be.”

  • • •

  Harwood Asylum squats like a dark monster on the hillside, blotting out the stars. The barred windows of the upper levels are sinister and shadowy; only a few gas lamps glow in the front hall and the nurses’ first-floor sitting room. Fear twists my stomach as the carriage sways up the snowy gravel drive to the guardhouse. Elena, Rilla, Rory, and I have not said a single word to one another since we left the convent. The snow muffles the horses’ hooves; our tense silence is relieved only by soft creaking as they shift in their leather harnesses.

  After an interminable wait, the guard calls out, voice sharp with authority, and Finn responds, low and calm and self-assured. Across from me, Elena’s black boots tap out an incessant, impatient beat against the floorboards, and she leans forward as though poised to perform magic at a moment’s notice. Rory bounces on the leather seat like a child. But Finn’s new ring of office and the Brotherhood’s seal on the carriage must carry weight even at this late hour. The next sound is the screech of the gates swinging open.

  I am here of my own volition, and yet I cannot help the irrational fear that swamps me again, the nightmare vision of the gates clanging shut and trapping us inside.

  The carriage sthe thorops halfway through. I open the door and lean out.

  “What’s the matter, sir?” the guard asks.

  Leave the gate open. Don’t stop anyone who tries to come or go, I command, and he sways back into the guardhouse with a shambling, drunken gait.

  Our carriage rolls up the hill, coming to a halt outside the wide front doors. I jump to the ground, taking a moment to trace the hard new angles of my face and—strangest of all—the brown whiskers covering my cheeks. Rilla’s illusion is still in place.

  The matron opens the door. This one is fat and jolly-looking, with blond sausage curls and red chipmunk cheeks. “Good evening, sirs,” she says. “I’m Mrs. Harris, the night matron. Can I help you?”

  “Yes, we’d like to�
��” My voice comes out high and effeminate, and I cough.

  “We’re here to carry out an inspection of the oracle. Covington’s orders,” Elena says, in a husky voice that matches her now-considerable girth.

  “The oracle?” The matron’s pale eyebrows shoot up to her hairline.

  Finn steps forward. “Brother Robbins,” he lies, bowing officiously. Elena’s glamoured him, too, so that no one will be able to give a proper description of him. “Good evening, ma’am.”

  “I wasn’t told to expect anyone, sir. It’s very late. Most of our patients are abed by now.”

  I frown. I’d rather bluff our way in, if we can, and save the mind-magic for later. “We’ve been busy day and night with the annual meeting, but Covington wants us to take a look at her before we leave town. We’ve been trained in psychological disorders.”

  Finn steps forward, lowering his voice as if to shelter us from unpleasant truths. “I understand the Brothers who were here earlier lost their temper with the patient for being uncooperative.”

  Mrs. Harris gives Finn an uneasy look. “She’s bad off. Begging your pardon, sir, but it seems harsh for men of the Lord to handle a woman that way.”

  I shiver, imagining Brenna bloodied and beaten. When Finn met us on the street behind the convent, he told me that she refused to cooperate today and had been punished accordingly. What have they done to her, for Mrs. Harris to risk speaking up against it?

  “You forget yourself. That girl is a damned witch,” Finn snaps, his voice harder than I have ever heard it. “She is a detriment and a danger to New England, and it is only by our mercy that—”

  “Forgive me. I didn’t mean to cast aspersions on your judgment, sir.” The matron looks at him with fear in her pale eyes. Finn gestures to the ground, and she kneels before him, knees cracking as she settles on the cold stone steps.

  Finn lays a hand on her frilly white cap. “Lord bless you and keep you this and all the days of your life.”

  I take a step back, horrified, at the Brothers’ words coming out of his mouth.

  Oh, he must loathe this. I loathe watching it. It’s not him, not my Finn at all.

  “Thanks be,” she murmurs, head bowed.

  “We clear our minds and open our hearts to the Lord.”

  The rest of us join in on the refrain: “We clear our minds and open our hearts to the Lord.”

  “Get up.” Finn gives her a scornful look. “And do not doubt your betters again.”

  “Yes, sir. Please. Come in, sir.” She ushers us inside. “Miss Elliott is on the third floor, in the isolation wing. There’s a nurse outside her door.”

  Finn’s boots ring out against the warped wooden floorboards as he strides across the empty front hall.

  The matron ducks behind her desk. “Wait!” she calls out, and I freeze, terror coursing through my veins, certain she’s seen through the e th frontire charade and is pulling out her pistol.

  She only holds up a candle. “Here, sir, take this. It’ll be pitch-dark upstairs. Patients aren’t permitted fire, you know. Can be downright eerie up there.”

  “Thank you.” I take the candle, and the matron lights it for me.

  We scurry up the shadowy stairs. When we step into the isolation wing, the night nurse is peering into Brenna’s cell. She whirls on us when she hears our footsteps.

  Her mind feels easy, pliant. I compel her to go help in the uncooperative ward, on the instructions of Mrs. Harris, and erase her memory of ever having seen us. She walks away from her post without a word of resistance. It’s terribly simple, and I don’t even feel exhausted afterward.

  My magic has gotten much stronger since I’ve arrived in New London. This spell would have incapacitated me before, and now it’s nothing.

  The cell that held the little blond girl is empty now. I wonder if she’s been sent back to the uncooperative ward.

  “Make sure there aren’t any other girls in this wing. I’ll get Brenna and then we’ll pull the alarm,” I say. Rilla releases my illusion, and I use my magic to unlock Brenna’s door and slip inside. She’s curled up in her nest of blankets on the floor, wearing the same white blouse and brown skirt as before. But now one of her eyes is blackened, her lip cut and bloodied.

  “You came back,” she says, peering at me with her good eye.

  “I said I would, didn’t I? So here I am.”

  Brenna struggles to her feet. “I had a vision today, but I wouldn’t tell.” She holds her left arm close to her body, like a wounded bird.

  “They hit you for it.” I don’t know why I’m surprised. It’s what they did to Thomasina. It’s what they would do to Tess.

  “They said I was insubordinate.” Brenna holds out her left hand, and I gasp when I see the way her pinky and ring fingers are bent at odd, unnatural angles.

  “Rory’s here. She’ll take you downstairs in a bit, and Sister Sophia can heal you.” I pause. “What you saw—did it have anything to do with my sisters? Or me?”

  Brenna fidgets with her long, chestnut braid. “I told you before, remember? I remember. We were in the graveyard.” She lowers her voice. “Sacrifice.”

  “Like leaving Finn?” I ask, hopefully. “That turned out all right.”

  “The worst sacrifices are yet to come. Three sacrifices. And—” Brenna cocks her head at me, the candlelight casting shadows over her wasted face. “You’ll bring death.”

  To whom? I drop my eyes to the floor.

  “I told you that you wouldn’t like to know.” Brenna eyes me sadly. “Is it time? We ought to go. The war is about to start.”

  I freeze in the midst of opening the door. “War?”

  “It will start tonight,” Brenna says.

  My pulse races. I think of Tess, playing chess with her friends in the sitting room, and of Sister Gretchen, keeping vigil over the dying Cora. What if it’s all gone wrong at the Head Council meeting, and Maura’s been captured, and we’ve all been exposed?

  No. I can’t think about that. I have to see this through.

  “We’re going to ring the fire bell in a minute. Don’t be scared—it’s just to get all the nurses in one place. Rory will stay with you, and then you’ll go get her sister. You remember Sachi?”

  “Three sisters,” Brenna muses. “One brings healing and death. One brings ruin. The strongest will bring peace, but it will require a sacrifice. That’s what the prophecy says.”

  The hair on my nape rises at the word death. I cannot stop my limbs from trembling, my teeth from chattering.

  I flee, spooked, without another word to Brenna. Rory swings in the door behind me, and I hear the cousins chattering, happy at their reunion. In the hallway, I take deep breaths. I can do this. I only have to get them out, and then we will go home and face whatever comes next. There will be no murder and no sacrifice tonight.

  Elena pulls the fire bell, which lets out a series of piercing clangs. The alarm runs on ancient ropes and pulleys throughout the asylum; soon we hear its echo from downstairs. Rilla re-creates my glamour, and she and Finn and Elena and I hurry out into the hallway. The two uncooperative ward nurses and the isolation wing nurse are already halfway down the stairs, and I wonder what they would do if there were a real fire. Would they let the patients out or leave them here to burn? On the second-floor landing, Mrs. Harris and the rest of the nurses are all gathered.

  “I’m so sorry to interrupt your examination, sir,” she says to Finn, obviously having identified him as our leader. “We hope it’s only a false alarm, but it wouldn’t be the first time one of the girls got hold of matches and tried to burn the place down.”

  Elena slips her hand into mine, offering me her power. I take a deep breath. Ten subjects. Even together, can we manage so many? But this isn’t the time for hesitation.

  Follow us into the uncooperative ward, I command. That’s where the fire is.

  All ten of them turn and rush upstairs.

  “Oh, dear,” Mrs. Harris says, her double chins wagging. “Those g
irls would burn us all in our beds if we gave them half a chance. What have they done now?”

  I sway going up the stairs, dizzy from the magic, and have to hang on to the railing for dear life. Finn notices and falls behind me, making sure I don’t tumble back down, ready to catch me as always.

  “I’m fine,” I whisper, and he brushes a hand against the small of my back.

  Mrs. Harris takes the brass key from around her neck and unlocks the door to the south wing. They all rush in and then stop abruptly, faced not with a cloud of smoke but with dozens of unusually alert prisoners stampeding toward the door, which Finn holds open.

  “What are you doing? Shut the door, before they get out!” Mrs. Harris scolds Finn.

  “That’s what we want,” Finn confesses. “They’ve been trapped here long enough.”

  “You’re not real Brothers, are you?” one of the nurses demands, her dark eyes terrified.

  “No.” Elena turns to the patients. “Don’t be frightened; we’re witches, and we’re here to help you escape. This is your chance.”

  “The witches are here! The witches have come for us!” the patients shout, pushing and shoving each other in their frenzied excitement.

  Zara has obviously spread the word of our escape.

  “Lord save us.” One of the nurses kneels, while the rest form a befuddled huddle.

  “Bless you. Thank you,” some of the patients mumble, but most are understandably intent on escaping this room that has served as their cage. I grin as I spot little Sarah Mae skipping past. A few women still lie curled in their beds, but other patients help them up.

  Elena rips the key from around Mrs. Harris’s neck, breaking the chain.

  “What are you doing?” Mrs. Harris yelps, her hand flying to her wrinkled neck.

  “You won’t be needing these anymore,” Elena says, and another key flies out of a nurse’s pocket and into her waiting hand.

  “It’s your turn to be shut up in here now!” One of the patients shrieks, shoving a nurse to the ground as she passes. “We ought to set the whole place on fire!”

  “No—no—don’t let them have uet he patiens,” one of the nurses begs, scrambling for the door.