by J. A. White
Kara had played this conversation many times in her head, rehearsing all the possible ways she could convince Grace to join them. She hadn’t expected her to simply agree. It was unsettling. Grace was doing exactly what Kara wanted her to do, but Kara couldn’t stop thinking that it was really the other way around.
They sloshed through a shallow part of the river—thoughts bouncing off Kara’s shins like blind fish—and continued across a featureless expanse of paper ground. Now that they had left the garden soil behind, Kara’s and Taff’s thoughts were revealed once more, streaming just beneath the ground and emptying into the nearby river. They made sure to walk behind Grace so she could not read them, which also allowed the siblings to have a silent conversation:
We can’t trust her, thought Taff.
Of course not, Kara answered. But she’s not going to try anything until we get back to Sentium. She needs us to escape.
Did you see her eyes when you told her about the grimoire page?
Taff’s next thought was communicated as a picture: a pair of eyes bursting with flames.
Magic always had the deepest hold on her, Kara thought. That hasn’t changed.
Once the page is in her hands how can we be sure she’ll use it on Father and not on us? asked Taff.
Kara tried to focus her thoughts in a more positive direction, but her true feelings escaped first.
We can’t be sure. That’s why she can’t know I’ve lost my powers. Especially once we get back to the world. If she finds out . . .
Grace’s head started to turn and Kara quickly rushed forward, blocking the girl’s view of the words trailing along the ground.
“It feels like we’re out in the open like this,” Kara said, flinching at the unbidden thoughts that skimmed beneath the ground: Make conversation. Distract her until those thoughts are out of sight. “What happens if we run into any Faceless?”
Though Kara’s primary intent had been to distract Grace, her concern was real enough. A paper desert stretched before them with little in the way of Pages or elevated ground. They would be visible for miles.
“There’s nothing to worry about,” Grace said. “Faceless patrols are very regular. There won’t be any here for hours.”
“You’ve thought about this a lot.”
“I think about everything a lot.”
“Doesn’t seem it,” Kara said, indicating the blank ground. The girl shed no thoughts at all.
Grace smirked with some of her old arrogance.
“I’m the only witch in the entire Well who’s learned to control her thoughts,” she said. “Except for when I sleep, of course. I can’t do anything about that. The Spellfire takes what it needs.” She smiled. “Are you worried about whether or not you can trust me, Kara Westfall?”
“The thought has crossed my mind.” Kara pointed to the words Can’t trust her being scrawled across the ground. “See?”
“I don’t need to read your thoughts,” Grace said. “I can see the doubt on your face. I understand. I make no excuse for the things I’ve done, but my time here has made me realize the error of my ways. And though I may have occasionally been cruel, it was the grimoire that turned me into a monster. You must believe that, at least. I want to help you, Kara. I know what it’s like to lose a father.”
Kara studied the girl’s face but found no signs of duplicity. Does that matter? Grace’s mask of innocence fooled an entire village. There’s no way to tell if she’s lying or not.
“You claim you’ve changed,” Kara said, “but I heard you whispering to that girl in the flower, trying to convince her to use her grimoire.”
“I didn’t have a choice! I have to follow orders. If not, they’ll drag me to the Changing Place and . . .” Grace raised a hand to her mouth, as if just the thought of it was enough to make her physically ill. “Disgusting freaks. The only good thing about working in the garden is the Faceless aren’t allowed anywhere near it. I won’t become one of them. I won’t.”
They continued to walk. Kara tried the conch again to see if she could reach Lucas, but it still didn’t work. I hope he’s okay. I’ll never forgive myself if something happens to him. The memory of how he had almost kissed her fluttered along the ground. She heard Taff stifle a laugh.
“Stop reading that!” she said, blushing. Behind Taff’s smiling face she saw a hint of movement in the distance: five figures sitting astride long, low creatures. They hadn’t seemed to notice the children yet.
“Grace,” Kara whispered, touching her arm. “We have to hide. Faceless.”
“Finally,” Grace said.
Kara could see what was about to happen but although she offered a soft “Don’t,” there was really nothing she could do; Grace was already waving her arms in the air and shouting, “Intruders! I’ve found intruders! Over here, over here!”
Kara and Taff ran. They didn’t get very far at all.
The Faceless threw Kara into a domed cage that seemed to have risen from the very ground itself. There wasn’t enough room for Kara to stand at her full height, so she balanced herself on her knees and shook the bars. They were made from paper but as sturdy as iron.
A second paper cage stood right next to hers. Taff was crouched inside.
“You okay?” she asked.
“I’m fine. I just feel a little stupid.”
“For trusting Grace?”
“Oh, I never trusted her,” Taff said. “Not for a moment. I just figured she would try to trick us after we escaped, not before. Doesn’t she want to get out of this place?”
“I honestly don’t know what she wants.”
“I feel stupid because I kept my hideaway in the sack and not in my pocket. It would be really useful right now. I should have thought of it.”
“You’re absolutely right,” Kara said. “You should have entertained the possibility that masked monsters might imprison us in paper cages.”
This made Taff smile.
“You never know, with us.”
Just outside the cage, the Faceless gathered in a circle. Their tiny neck-arms rotated until each face was fitted with the same mask, a small mouth open wide in a grotesque mockery of talking.
For the first time, Kara heard the Faceless speak, a strange concoction of clicking sounds.
“What are they talking about?” Taff asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe what to do with us?”
“I sure hope not,” Taff said. “That sounds like angry clicking.”
Finally, the Faceless all nodded in agreement and changed back to their bulbous-eyed masks. Kara watched the closest one carefully, trying to catch a glimpse of what its real face might look like, but as the masks rotated, the creature lifted its hands to hide the face beneath. All Kara caught was a brief flash of white between paper fingers, nothing more.
A few moments later, she heard Grace scream.
“No! What are you doing? I helped you! I helped you!”
Dragging Grace by one arm, the Faceless opened the door to Taff’s cage and tossed her inside. She shoved Taff out of the way and pressed her face against the bars of the cage, continuing her entreaties: “You’re making a mistake! Let me out of here! Let me out!”
The Faceless ignored her.
“Is this one of those times when it’s okay to laugh at someone?” Taff asked Kara.
“You’ll get no scolding from me.”
Taff opened his mouth and shook his head. “I missed my chance. Now I’m just mad again.”
Any pretense of cooperation had vanished from Grace’s face. Strangely enough, this made Kara feel more comfortable. At least she was on familiar ground again.
Grace asked, “Did you really expect me to help you?”
“No,” Kara said. “But I thought we could have helped each other.”
Grace’s hair had come undone. She took a deep breath, regaining her composure, and began to steadfastly fashion it back into a ponytail.
“Perhaps,” said Grace, “if there had been the slightest
chance of your plan succeeding. But the Burngates? Honestly, I expected better. Any witch who’s ever had a single thought of escaping has tried that. Hundreds of Faceless gather together to guard them when they open. You wouldn’t have been able to get close.”
Kara saw Taff look away to hide his blushing face. If there was one thing he hated, it was being accused of having an unoriginal idea.
“What about the chosen?” Kara asked. “The ones who pull the new witches into the Well. Surely they have a good chance to slip away.”
Grace sighed with impatience.
“They’re tethered around the ankles. Trust me, the Faceless have thought of everything. There’s no escaping this place.” She shrugged. “The most reasonable course of action seemed to be to turn you in.”
“Why?” Kara asked. “What did you possibly hope to get in return?”
Grace indicated the single paper strip hanging from her ring.
“They remove them sometimes, when you do a particularly good job. For a long time I was the only one with an empty ring, and I wanted to be perfect again. I wanted to be the best witch of all. But these Faceless have made a terrible mistake. They seem to think that I was actually helping you two.” Grace clapped her hands together as an idea occurred to her. “Maybe you can tell them the truth! My plan from the beginning was to turn you in, I promise. Tell them that! It could really help me.”
“All your talk about changing, regretting the past,” Kara said, “I actually started to believe you a little bit.”
“But that was all true,” Grace said. “I do feel bad about the way things turned out. If I had done a better job conserving the pages of my grimoire, I would still be in the World right now, casting spells.”
“What about the people you killed?” Taff asked. “Do you feel bad about them?”
“Of course I do,” said Grace, insulted that Taff would think otherwise. “I should never have hurt them. I was wrong. If I could go back and change things I would.”
“Oh,” said Taff.
“I wasted so many pages on people who were not the least bit important. Once I have a grimoire again I’ll only kill the people who absolutely need killing—I promise you that.” She turned to Kara. “And whose fault was it that I lost control, anyway? Let’s not forget that you were the one who stole the grimoire from me. The need to use it built up and up—you know how it works—until I couldn’t help myself. If you had just minded your own business, Kara, then maybe none of this would have happened. ‘We are all at fault for evil.’ That’s from the Path itself.”
Kara spoke quietly through gritted teeth. “Just be glad you’re in the cage with Taff and not me.”
“Goodness, Kara!” Grace exclaimed, clapping a hand to her chest. “When did you become so violent?”
“What are they doing?” Taff asked, watching the Faceless through the bars of the cage. They had arranged a large rack on the ground, like something one might use for drying clothes, and were currently pulling long strips of paper from their bodies and draping it over the rods.
“Oh no,” said Grace. “This is just what I was afraid of.”
“What?” asked Kara.
“They’re going to change us,” Grace said, her voice trembling. “Make us like them. I’ve seen it done before. We were all forced to watch as a warning. They prepare the . . . skin first. Lay out the paper in strips. They’ll need a lot of it, especially for three of us. After that, they’ll rest so their own bodies can regenerate what they’ve torn away. When they wake up they’ll bring us to the Changing Place.”
“What’s that?” Kara asked.
“A building. A temple, some say. We’ll go in, and when we come out . . .”
“We won’t be us anymore,” Taff said.
Grace nodded, her eyes wide with terror.
“You have to get me out of here,” she said. “I’ll do anything. I’ll undo the curse on your father. For real this time. Just don’t let me turn into one of those things.”
Kara watched the Faceless take turns flaying one another. The paper peeled away from their bodies with a slight sucking sound, like a foot removed from a stubborn boot, exposing gray skin. Soon dozens of strips dangled from the rack. One of the Faceless, the skin of its chest mostly exposed now, knelt down in front of their cage. Neck-arms spun until a new mask fitted onto its face: eyes closed, mouth open in an exaggerated snore. Its arms fell to its side, like it had instantly fallen asleep. The other Faceless did the same thing, until all five were kneeling before the cages in a neat line. Kara could already see their paper skin regenerating, the remaining strips growing taut and then lengthening to cover the missing spaces.
“How long will they stay like this?” Kara asked.
“An hour,” said Grace. “Maybe two.”
“Can they see us?” Taff asked. He waved his hand back and forth in front of the bars, checking for a reaction.
“I don’t think so,” said Grace. “It’s like they’re hibernating. But they can still hear, loud noises at least. That much I’m sure of.”
“Why should we believe anything you say?” Taff asked.
Grace clapped her hands and two of the Faceless whipped their heads in her direction. They stared for a moment—as much as one could stare with closed eyes—and then returned to their previous resting position.
“I was going to suggest rocking the cage back and forth,” Kara said, “but clearly that’s out. Any quieter ideas?”
“What about using the grimoire page?” Taff asked.
Grace curled her long fingers around the paper bars of the cage. “What?” she asked, her eyes blazing. “You have a page from an actual grimoire here?”
So much for keeping it hidden from her, Kara thought.
“It’s for Father,” said Kara. “We can’t waste it.”
“We only need one spell for that,” Taff said. “There are two sides. It’s worth a try, at least.”
Since she didn’t have any better ideas, Kara reached into the inner pocket of her cloak for the page. She knew something was wrong the moment she touched it.
“No,” she said. “No, no!”
It was practically falling apart in her hands, like an old letter left to molder in a trunk for decades.
“That’s from a grimoire?” Grace asked.
Kara nodded.
“Odd,” Grace said. “When I tore a page out of my grimoire it worked just fine. Must have been something you did.”
“You used it just a few seconds after you tore it out,” Kara said. “But this one’s been out of its grimoire for quite some time. I wonder if that makes a difference.”
“Like a leaf,” Taff said. “It can survive for a little while on its own, but eventually it’ll die if it’s not attached to a tree.”
“Great,” said Kara, looking down at the crumbling page. “Something else to worry about.”
“Give it here,” Grace said. “I’ll set us free. Come on. It’s useless to you anyway. Your spells only work with animals. You’re limited.”
Kara started to slide the page through the bars but held it back at the last moment.
“Oh, come on,” Grace said, reaching her hand as far as it would go. “We don’t have time for this. All I want to do is get out of here, just like you.” Grace reached farther, her fingertips practically brushing the page now. “Come on, Kara. Just give me the page. Give it to me.”
“No,” Kara said. “This is a mistake. I can feel it.”
She folded the page carefully and returned it to the inner pocket of her cloak. Grace glared at her with icy fury.
“It isn’t nice to tease. And exactly how do you expect me to fix your father if you won’t let me cast a spell?”
It’s a good question. I’m going to have to trust her eventually—but not yet.
“Any others ideas?” Kara asked Taff.
“Nothing. How about you?”
“Sorry.”
The skin of the Faceless was nearly complete. The centermost one had b
egun to twitch slightly, as though having a bad dream. It wouldn’t be long now before they woke.
What will it be like? Will I be trapped inside my new body? Or will only the monster remain?
“Isn’t anyone going to ask me if I have an idea?” asked Grace.
“Do you?” asked Taff.
“Yes, as a matter of fact. And unlike your idea, this one is going to work. Now let’s hold hands.”
“Huh?”
“Oh!” said Kara, brightening. “I know what she has in mind. Like what we saw them do in the forest to cut down trees.”
Taff tapped his knuckles against his head. “I should have thought of that!” he exclaimed.
“Only you didn’t,” said Grace.
“Will it even work? I’m a boy. I can’t do magic.”
Grace did not bother to conceal her impatience. “It’s not magic. It’s thinking. Boys can think.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Sort of.”
Getting as close to the bars as she could, Kara reached her long arms into the next cage. Taff took her right hand and Grace took her left. Kara saw her brother grimace as he intertwined his fingers with Grace in order to complete the circle.
“I was a Cutter for a little while before the Faceless realized my true talent was in Whispering,” Grace said. “It’s not just a matter of thinking about the right word. You need to attach an image to it to give it strength. So if you’re using the word chop, make sure you attach a memory of someone chopping firewood. Sounds and smells work too—sometimes even better. My thought-cuts are going to be flawless, of course, but it has to be all three of us for this to work. Understand?”
“Can we just start?” Taff asked Grace. “The quicker we get this over with, the quicker I can stop holding your hand.”
“Fine,” said Grace. “Let’s begin.”
Kara closed her eyes, just like she had done when she was first learning to be a wexari, and imagined slicing a potato, heard the tap-tap-tap of the knife on the cutting board. She felt the two hands tighten in hers and the mind pictures sharpened, became more concrete—not just images anymore but a tool to be wielded. She peeked between half-shut eyelids and saw her SLICE moving across the ground toward Taff’s CUT and Grace’s CHOP.