by Holly Webb
The magic seemed to flow into the room suddenly, as though a huge fire had burnt up in seconds, swallowing her mother so that her red hair glowed and spat like real flames. Instead of heat, though, the real, fairy version of her mother gave off a delicious sweet coolness.
Emily sighed as the soft breeze lifted her hair. She felt so sleepily peaceful. She curled herself down against her pillow, twitching the edge of her sheet in her fingers, and closed her eyes. She could see her mother as a dark, reddish shape on the other side of her eyelids, dancing and dipping as she wove the spell.
Faintly, Emily could remember that she had meant to resist, but the spell-sleep was so soft and inviting that she couldn’t. She sank deeper and deeper, and only woke when something touched her cheek with a butterfly lightness.
Emily’s eyelids fluttered open, and she saw that her mother was sitting next to her. She had kissed her awake.
And the spell was cast.
Emily lay in bed that night with her sketchbook propped up on her pillow. She was trying to draw the river girl from the painting, before she forgot what she looked like. It seemed so long since she had helped them to escape on the banks of the river. And now she might never see her again! Emily didn’t even know her name.
What would happen if those huntsmen caught her?
But her drawing had none of the urgency and life from the painting in the gallery. It was just a girl with greenish hair.
Emily sighed. She was going to have to ask Robin or Lark or Lory. They were going to be furious. Lark and Lory had already had to rescue her once, and if the gallery attendant hadn’t stopped her, Emily was almost sure she would have gone inside that painting – that the river girl’s magic had recognized her, and called her to help. If she had touched the canvas for just a little longer, the magic would have pulled her in. Then she would have been in some other world, stuck with a band of fairy hunters. They might even have been the same ones that the Ladies had sent after her and Lark and Lory before.
It would have been so much easier if she could just dream her way back to the gallery (carefully making sure not to dream any security guards), and just grab the girl and run.
Even in Emily’s not-very-good drawing, the girl looked miserable. However slowly time went in that painting, Emily suspected she could still feel. She might be shut up inside the painted version of her story for years, waiting for the hunters to catch her! Emily shut the sketchbook with a slam. She didn’t know! Maybe the painting meant nothing at all – it didn’t really make sense that everything stopped when no one was looking, did it? Perhaps they’d already caught her.
Emily let out a little whimper of fright and crept out of bed. She’d talk to Lark first, she decided. She was the person least likely to shout.
It was still almost light, a hot summer evening. Emily was sure Lark wouldn’t be asleep. She was most likely to be awake and chatting to Lory, which was a pity, because Lory would be angry when Emily told them what had nearly happened. But there was nothing she could do about it. She padded across to the door, shivering a little in the eerie moonlight. It turned her room into something strange, so that for a moment she wondered if the spell had failed, and she had already been asleep, and dreamed herself to another place.
Then she stopped, seeing a pool of dark shadow under the moonlit window, by the seat. It was where Gruff had been sitting as her mother cast the spell. Where she had moved him, so that he wasn’t caught up in it.
The spell wasn’t fixed to Emily! It was fixed to the bed where her mother expected her to sleep, and dream. Emily looked at the cushions on the window seat, frowning to herself. Could it really be that simple?
She had a moment of guilt as she curled herself up on the cushions. Her mother had trusted her – they had never thought that Emily might purposely dream her way out of the house. But she shook it away.
Emily had never tried to dream before. It was surprisingly difficult. She dreamed almost every night, although she didn’t usually remember what had happened in her dreams. Only glimpses of odd journeys or places.
In the weeks before she’d found out about her family, her dreams had been even stranger than usual. She had seen things that felt real, while she knew that they couldn’t be. She understood now that she had been gradually slipping through the thin veil between home and the other world where her family truly belonged.
She wriggled herself back into the cushions that she’d piled up and tried to imagine herself into the painting. But that was all she was doing – imagining. She could open her eyes any time and still be in her room. It was useless. And the more she worried about the girl and the hunters, the more useless it got. Emily stared miserably into the black glass of the window, her eyes dry and itchy with tiredness. She was weary, but she just couldn’t seem to let go and sleep. It was so late now that the night was thickly dark through the window, so dark that she could only make out the faint orange glow of the street lamp across the road. The dirty yellow light mixed with the shadows inside the glass, building great towers of darkness that piled up against the sky.
Emily blinked, and shivered, as she watched the lights travelling slowly around the battlements of the dark palace. It seemed just the sort of place that whoever sent out the huntsmen would live. There would be night-dark dogs with burning eyes, and teeth that shone in the blackness under the trees…
She was there. The smell of woods was all around her, and she could feel dry leaves under her bare feet.
The trees rustled and creaked as the dogs padded hungrily under them, and Emily drew herself behind a massive trunk, hoping that the huntsmen’s hounds would never smell a dream-girl.
She should have been pleased that she had managed to dream her way in after all, but she was too scared. She almost wished she was still awake. What happened if you got eaten in a dream?
One of the dogs came sniffing hungrily past her hiding place, and Emily held her breath. If she breathed out, she would scream… She could hear its hoarse panting getting closer and closer, and she dug her fingers into the tree bark and squeezed her eyes tightly shut. Should she run? Or stay stone still, and trust to it only being a dream?
At last the dog seemed to give up, and she heard its paws padding heavily away through the bracken. Emily let out a shaky breath and started to edge slowly around the tree. She had to find out where she was. Had those dogs been hunting the girl? She suspected so – in which case she would need to follow them. She would have to try and get in front of them again. The thought made Emily feel sick, but she had to find her.
She inched her way carefully around the tree, pressing her fingers into the ridged bark. It seemed so safe here now, and the bark was almost friendly under her fingers. She hated to pull herself away. Reluctantly, she lifted her hand from the tree trunk – and touched something warm, something that flinched away from her in shock.
Emily stifled her scream, burying her knuckles in her mouth to muffle the noise.
“Who’s there?” came a panicked whisper. A girl’s voice – not a slavering hound. Unless the dogs could talk, of course. Emily gave a sharp gasp.
“Who are you?” she whispered.
“I asked first!”
It was true … she had. Emily swallowed. “I’m Emily. I came looking for someone.” Someone, come to think of it, who was probably hiding, just like she was… She paused, and added doubtfully, “Is it you?”
The frightened person next to her in the dark was silent for a moment. Then she whispered, “You’re the girl from the house?” There was a sudden hope in her voice.
“Yes!”
“I thought it was you… I felt you – just a scrap of magic, but it was close somehow. I didn’t understand. Were you by the mirror?”
“No, I think it was another door. A secret door. One of those doors that aren’t really allowed.” Emily stumbled over the explanation. “It was in a painting. There w
as a gallery full of paintings, but I could feel you calling me out of one of them. I don’t know how it ended up there. I suppose someone must have brought it back from your world.”
“It’s a very powerful spell, to make someone’s picture,” the girl whispered faintly. “I didn’t think you’d come.”
“I wanted to! I wanted to come before, but that man grabbed me. And then it was so hard to get back. My parents made the spells stronger, you see, when they realized I’d gone through the doors. I promised I wouldn’t do it again,” she added hesitantly.
“You shouldn’t have done,” the girl agreed, and her voice sounded weary. “It’s too dangerous. I shouldn’t have called to you, but I was desperate, and I felt you close by. I’m sorry…”
“Of course you should have done!” Emily gripped the girl’s cold hand. She could feel her shivering. “You helped us before; it was my turn. And I could tell how scared you were. I wanted to help you.” She paused, suddenly feeling rather stupid. All she had been thinking was that she must get to the river girl and help her. She hadn’t thought any further, and now both of them were stuck in a dark wood, with hunters and dogs circling around them. She had no idea what to do next.
“You can’t rescue me,” the girl said gently. “I’m running from the Ladies’ huntsmen.”
“But we have to be able to do something,” Emily whispered urgently. “Can’t we find somewhere to hide? Until they’ve given up on you?”
“They won’t give up! The hounds never give up on a quarry!”
Emily shook her head, confused. “But what are you going to do, then? You’re worn out already. You can’t just keep running for ever!”
“That’s all there is. Better that than being chased down by the hounds.”
Emily put her hand up against her mouth, feeling suddenly sick. “They wouldn’t … hurt you?”
“They would.”
Emily took a deep, steadying breath and shook her head angrily. “No. And I don’t care if it’s against all the laws.” She wrapped her arms tightly around the river-fairy girl and begged all the magic in the house to bring them home.
Emily was back on the window seat, shaking, and staring into the darkness. The cushions were still piled up around her as if she had never moved.
So it had been a dream – she had been here all the time. But surely she had brought the girl back out of the dream with her? She must have done. It couldn’t all have been for nothing.
“Are you there?” she breathed, not daring to speak above a whisper. If it had worked, who was to say that the girl was all she had brought?
There was a waiting, anxious silence. And then someone shifted at the other end of the window seat, and the faintest shimmer of silver uncoiled itself and stood in front of her.
“Are we in one of the other places?” the river fairy asked, her voice breaking and squeaking a little. She sounded terrified.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done it,” Emily whispered. “I couldn’t see what else to do. You were so frightened, and so tired. I didn’t want them to catch you. Or me either,” she added honestly. “I was dreaming, but it felt properly real. It felt like those hounds could have sniffed me out too.” She reached out shyly to take the girl’s hand again. “I’m so sorry.”
But the river fairy knelt down in front of her, and her skin shone silvery in the dark, so that Emily could see she was smiling. She caught Emily’s hands.
“I’m not angry. Please don’t think that! You were right; I couldn’t have run for much longer. It feels strange to be here –” she shivered a little “ – but better here than thrown to the hounds.”
“Uuurgh! They’d let the hounds eat. … Oh no!” Emily pressed her hand to her mouth, disgusted.
“You really don’t know?” The fairy girl stared at her, and then smiled, seeming to find her innocence truly funny. “They only eat what they catch. That’s why they’re always hungry, and they never give up on a quarry.”
Emily put both hands over her face now, her shoulders shaking. “How could they? And Ash and Eva come from there! My parents! They would never let anything like that happen.”
The girl looked at her in surprise. “I suppose Lord Ash left to guard the ways before the Ladies began to grow so strong. The king stays shut away in the palace so much now – perhaps your parents don’t know what it’s like any more.” She frowned. “But our world is a hard place. Cruel, sometimes.”
Emily nodded. She’d had a glimpse of that, when her father told her so firmly that the worlds must be kept apart. “What are we going to do?” she asked in a small, tired voice. “If I tell my family you’re here, I don’t think they’ll be happy. No one is supposed to come through the doors without them knowing.”
The girl glanced up at her. “They’ll have seen us, then, the Lady Eva and Lord Ash.” She looked round at the door anxiously, as though she expected someone to come storming through it, to send her back to the hounds.
Emily shook her head. “I don’t think so… My mother made a spell, but it didn’t work, because I cheated.” She glanced down at her hands. “She laid it on my bed. It was to stop me dreaming – that’s why I slept here by the window, and then dreamed my way through the window glass to the woods, and you.”
“You cheated one of her spells?” the girl asked, her eyes widening.
“I think so,” Emily admitted. “Do you know her, my mother?”
“Of course. She’s one of the great Ladies. There are stories about her. And Lord Ash is a prince – one of the king’s highest courtiers.”
“Really?” Emily blinked in surprise. Her dad spent most of his time shut up in his study under the stairs, typing and occasionally throwing things when work wasn’t going as it should. He didn’t seem princely at all. Although – she remembered his fairy form, the soft ash-grey of his skin and hair, the diamond blackness of his eyes. Perhaps he was.
“If you twisted your way out of her spell, there must be strong magic inside you,” the girl said, squeezing Emily’s hands. But it didn’t make Emily feel much better.
“What are we going to do?” she asked again. When she’d set off on her daring rescue, she hadn’t imagined bringing the girl back with her. She was just going to help, somehow, and that was all…
“You’ll have to hide me,” the river fairy murmured, looking around the room. “I’m not supposed to be here. There’ll be trouble for everyone if I’m caught.”
“Everyone?” Emily frowned. “Only me and you. It was me who brought you.”
The girl sighed. “But who’s going to believe that? You’re a human child, you see. You aren’t one of us, and you shouldn’t have any magic. Lady Eva and the prince, that’s who’ll be blamed, if anyone finds out where I’ve gone. Or your sisters, perhaps.”
Emily swallowed, suddenly seeing the truth of this. “You’re right. Lark and Lory are already in trouble. Lots of trouble. My mum had to go and grovel, my father said.” He’d explained it all to her only yesterday. It seemed an awfully long time ago. “It’s because they came and dragged me away from the Ladies…” Emily leaned down and looked sharply at the river fairy. “Why were the huntsmen after you?”
The girl sighed, and her head drooped, the greenish-silver hair falling over her face. “They found out.”
Emily’s eyes widened, and she gripped the girl’s hands tighter. “About you helping us escape? You mean you’re in all this trouble because of me?”
The river girl didn’t say anything, but Emily knew that it was true.
“Just because I got angry and ran through the doors by mistake…” Emily’s voice shook.
“Yes.”
Emily straightened her shoulders and tried to breathe, and think. “Will the huntsmen try and chase you here?” she asked, remembering the power and fearsomeness of Lady Anstis and the others. She couldn’t imagine them giving up. “They
shouldn’t be allowed through the doors, but we did it, somehow. If we left traces, could they follow us?”
“I suppose they might,” the girl agreed, glancing over her shoulder at the stormy glass in Emily’s windows, and shuddering.
“But they don’t know this place,” Emily told her determinedly. “I’ll hide you. We’ll find somewhere, and we won’t tell my parents either, in case they have to send you back.” She shook her head. “I don’t think they would. I don’t see how they could be so cruel.” But her dad had said, hadn’t he? No mixing between the worlds. And her family had to live by the rules, Emily understood that. It didn’t mean that she was going to let them give the girl back. “You hide for now – and then we’ll find somewhere for you to go. To stay…” Her voice trailed away.
“Where can I hide?” the girl asked, looking around Emily’s little room with a frown.
“What about the mirror on the landing?” Emily asked. “I saw you in it before. You were looking out at me, and I almost came through. Is it a mirror on your side too?” she asked curiously.
“No.” The girl laughed. “Well, I was looking at it like a mirror. It was just a patch of sunlight on the water. It was glittering, and I looked in, and I saw you walking past. I could tell you were a human child. So I’d go back to look, in that same place. It didn’t always work, but quite often I saw you, and I wondered who you were. Then one day you looked back.”
Emily laughed. “You were the first fairy I saw. Or the first one I knew about, anyway. Would another mirror work? Could you hide in it?”
“Maybe. But it would be better if there was some way you could keep me with you – if the huntsmen chase us down through your magic, I won’t leave you to fight them on your own.” She looked hopefully back at Emily. “Do you have any jewels?”
“Not really. I mean – bracelets and things. Is that what you mean?”
“Ye-es. Something small, that you can carry with you. I can work a spell to hide myself, I think. Especially if you help.”