by F. D. Lee
Bea picked up her wine glass and, taking a long gulp, drained it of its contents. “You were right. I should have reported it all at the beginning and dropped the Plot. But I didn’t, and, rightly or wrongly, I’ve seen things now that I can’t ignore. And I don’t believe Seven’s manipulated me. I’m not saying he’s a good person, but I’m not stupid and I agree with him about Sindy and the stories. I think I always have done, that’s why I buried myself so deeply in them, so that I couldn’t see the detail. Does that make sense?”
Melly grunted.
“But even if I didn’t agree with him, I still can’t walk away from all this now. There aren’t really any options,” Bea finished, standing up from the sofa. “If you won’t help me, I’ll just have to find someone who can.”
“Oh, for the love of… Fine. I’ll come to Ehinenden with you,” Melly said. “I’ll find this girl and I’ll help you finish your Plot, too.”
Bea didn’t even try to hide the relief she felt. “Oh, thank you!”
“Well,” Melly said, fishing another cigarette from her case, “one of my best friends is determined to rebel because she’s the first fae to grow a conscious in hundreds of years. It seems to me my choice is to sit here and watch you get Redacted, or try to help you.”
“Oh Melly, thank you,” Bea said again. “We’ll get the Book finished, hand it in and then I promise I won’t ever get into such a mess again. I’ll listen to all your advice, and I won’t-”
“Let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves,” Melly said, smiling faintly.
Bea sat forward, only now remembering the problem at the Grand. “We’ll need to find a way to sneak into the Grand. They’re rationing the Mirrors now.”
“Ahhh, now here I think I can help,” Melly said. “What about the Happy Ending?”
This time it was Bea’s turn to smile. “I think I might have an idea…”
Chapter Thirty-three
Bea yawned, unwilling to shake off the warm blanket of sleep.
Yesterday, when Melly had outright refused to take them back into Thaiana until today, which was Saturday, which was also incidentally the day of the Ball, Bea had been furiously impatient. But the witch had held her ground, stating that Bea smelled dreadful and her dress was filthy and she looked, quite frankly, exactly like she’d been attacked by a forest in the middle of the night, none of which was going to help her inspire a Happy Ending.
Needless to say, Bea had been not a little upset by these comments. Now, however, after having had a long bath the night before and slept soundly in the witch’s wide, well-sprung spare bed – so different from her own narrow cot – Bea had to admit that Melly had been right.
She lay in bed, looking up at the ceiling, trying to organise her thoughts. Melly had said a lot about Seven, and try as she might, Bea was finding it very hard to ignore it.
Was he a handsome stranger? Check.
Did he seem to offer her a way to get her heart’s desire? Check.
Did she feel a strangely powerful sense of trust in him? Check.
Melly said the genies were expert manipulators, but whether that actually meant that she was completely unable to make up her own mind in Seven’s presence, Bea stubbornly doubted. She’d seen the way the humans acted around him, and she was certain she wasn’t like that. She based this on the fact that it was impossible to suggest the time she’d spent in Seven’s company had been a hazy cloud of happiness and agreement, a thing she now found extremely comforting.
The second reason Bea doubted that Seven posed quite the threat that her friend feared was because she was certain there was something wrong with him.
If she accepted he was a genie that meant that he had certain gifts. All the fae tribes had things they were good at, after all. Bea, as a garden fairy, could talk to certain plants. It was always a bit hit or miss as to how much sense she’d get out of them – a carrot, for example, tended to get confused if you started asking it what it thought about the nature of existence – but for better or worse it was her talent. Flower fairies could fly, goblins could work metal. Genies… if what Melly and Delphine had said was true, it seemed genies could do things most of the fae could only dream of.
But every time Bea has seen Seven use his ‘magic’, as he called it, he’d seemed sick afterwards – the first time she’d met him, after he froze John and Sindy, he’d gripped his stomach like he was about to vomit, and Bea was now of the mind that the nosebleed he’d suffered in the woods was a result of moving them both and, not, unfortunately, of her head-butt. And he’d told her he wore the hood and gloves so he didn’t have to hide himself in front of the characters. Bea was certain that he couldn’t use his gifts, though she had no idea why not.
She rolled over.
Regardless of his abilities, or lack thereof, the fact remained that she agreed with Seven’s assessment of her Plot, even if he was an Anti and now a genie. And whatever Melly said, she was also certain he’d been telling the truth when he’d spoken about the girl he’d loved. It just didn’t seem possible to her that anyone could fake the kind of pain she’d seen on his face.
And it didn’t make sense for him to lie about it, even if he had. If he was an Anti, and if he did want to ruin her story, why not just kill her characters? Or her? He was physically stronger than she was, and, even if it did hurt him, he could have just whooshed her a thousand miles away. But instead it seemed like he wanted her to understand his point of view.
Mind you, Bea thought, getting someone to agree with your point of view was probably much more effective than killing them. Just look at the GenAm – they’d even found a way to stop you having any kind of thoughts, let alone dissenting ones, and all without a single execution…
Bea kicked the covers off angrily, telling herself she was too hot and she’d been in bed too long, at the same time knowing that she simply couldn’t stand her own thoughts anymore.
She padded over to the wash basin in the corner of the room. The water was warm and clean, two luxuries she seldom got to enjoy at home. She washed herself well, scrubbing under her nails and behind her ears and all the other forgotten little places. She rummaged around under the stand until she found a little bag of hazel sticks, selected one from the assortment, squashing its end into frays, and began to clean her teeth.
Next, she brushed her hair using one of Melly’s silver-backed brushes, taking her time, remembering to count the strokes as her mother had taught her. There were no mirrors in her bedroom, not unusual in Ænathlin, but for once annoying.
She looked for her dress. It wasn’t on the floor where she’d dropped it the night before, slightly drunk and very exhausted. She scanned the room. Nor was it draped over the armchair or hanging in the wardrobe.
Bea walked over to the bedroom door and opened it just enough to call downstairs without exposing herself. Melly’s cottage was not big; a short staircase ran up the centre of the house, separating the kitchen from the living room and the two bedrooms upstairs. There was a small wash closet off of the kitchen, not quite an out-house but not exactly an in-house either.
“Melly – where’s my dress?” she called.
There was the clatter of plates, and Melly’s face appeared around the edge of the wall at the foot of the stairs.
“I threw it away,” she answered matter-of-factly.
Bea stood, dumb, at the top of the stairs.
“Pardon?”
“It was nothing but rags. You could hardly wear it to a Ball. There’s plenty of other dresses in the wardrobe in your room. One of them’s bound to fit. Hurry up, I’ve made breakfast.”
“Come on Bea, it’s getting cold!”
“You’re going to laugh at me!”
Melly sighed and slammed the plate down on the counter, and marched to the bottom of the staircase.
“For goodness sake. It’s your time you’re wasting, I’m perfectly happy to stay here all day, but I thought you had things to do?”
Melly rolled her eyes as an avala
nche of swear words tumbled down the stairs. She was about to ask Bea exactly how she had managed during her meetings with her character not to swear, considering her almost addictive propensity for it, when Bea appeared through the bedroom door to stand on the landing.
Melly’s jaw dropped.
Bea folded her arms across her corseted bosom, her expression daring the witch to laugh at her.
Melly smacked her lips, trying to think of the right words.
“It’s certainly very… it’s a lot more, er, shiny than I’m used to seeing you in. I mean, I wonder if it’s quite necessary to wear such a wide skirt? But the corset certainly… accentuates… you. Not that it doesn’t suit you,” she added quickly. “All that glitter really makes it. Oh, and the butterfly motif. Very stylish. I just wonder if it’s the most, uh, practical thing you might have chosen…?”
“It’s traditional,” Bea glared.
“Yes, yes, it’s definitely that,” Melly said, the corner of her mouth dancing like a music box ballerina.
“I could hardly wear one of those black dresses. I am a godmother. Sort of.”
“No, no, I can certainly see your predicament.”
“And I’m going to a Ball. I’m sure lots of the guests will be wearing something similar.”
Melly hid her mouth behind her hand and nodded.
“Are you laughing?”
Melly shook her head quickly, her shoulders shaking.
“Do you have a mirror?”
“It’s behind you,” Melly wheezed.
Bea shifted herself around, so she was facing the wall. There was only a painting of a forest. It was large, certainly, and extremely detailed, but it wasn’t a mirror.
“Where?”
“It’s behind you.”
“No it’s not.”
“Oh yes it is.”
“Oh no it’s not.”
“Oh yes it is.”
Bea swung back round, her expression thunderous.
“Will you stop playing silly beggars?”
Melly fanned her face with her hand, as for some strange reason – that had absolutely nothing to do with Bea’s enormous pink and gold dress – she was finding it hard to breathe.
“Come and have some breakfast,” she managed to splutter out after two tries. “Then I’ll show it to you.”
Bea descended the stairs. Or at least, she attempted to. It really was a very wide skirt. They finally made it to the table with a couple of heaves and one broken plate.
Bea could feel Melly’s eyes on her as she concentrated on buttering her toast.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing, nothing.”
Bea reached for some jam. “Where did you get this from? I haven’t seen jam in ages.”
“Oh? Ahh, I made it,” Melly said, her voice higher than normal. She coughed.
Bea placed her knife on the table and looked up.
“Right, come on. Out with it.”
Melly leaned back in her chair, her arm resting against the back. Her eyes were sparkling with unspent laughter.
“I just didn’t realise you had quite so much hair, I suppose.”
“My best kept secret.”
“You’ve certainly managed to make it very big.”
“Well, I didn’t want the skirt to feel left out.”
“No danger of that, I think,” Melly replied, straight faced.
“Do you think the butterflies are a little much?”
“Well, I think a lesser person might have stopped at the corset, but personally I believe you can never have too many glittery butterflies.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Bea nodded. “That’s the real reason the Mirrors are breaking, in my opinion. No one has the courage to really go out there and make use of glittery butterflies.”
The two women looked at each other. Bea, always ready to see the funny side, cracked first.
“I think it suits you, actually,” Melly said, once they’d finished laughing. “Maybe not quite the colour. Or the glitter. Or the butterflies. Or, in fact, the dress. But it’s nice to see you in something well made. Right then. I guess we’d better make a move.”
“How are we going to sneak in at the Grand?” Bea asked.
“We’re not. Just wait here.”
Melly stood up from the table and manoeuvred herself around Bea to disappear up the stairs. Bea spun around on her chair, craning her neck to see where the elf had gone. She couldn’t see anything, though she could hear what sounded like her friend lifting something heavy.
A moment later, she walked back into the kitchen, the painting of the forest from the landing in her arms. Bea quickly moved aside the breakfast things, and Melly placed the painting carefully on the table.
“That’s a painting,” Bea said, confused.
“No. It’s a Mirror. A Mirror-mirror.”
“But… how do you have a Mirror?”
Melly shrugged. “I found it one day. I just thought, well, why not? Anyway, is this where we need to be?” She held her her hands over the surface. The image rippled thickly, reverting back into the inky, milky texture of a blank Mirror.
“Gosh, you did that quickly,” Bea said, surprised.
“Ah well. I’m old,” Melly replied. “Where shall we start?”
“How long will it take you to find Sindy?”
Melly thought for a moment. “Well, if she’s wearing this charm you spoke about, that’ll help. If I can get into her room, even better. Usually I’ve met the heroine earlier in the story, you see. But I can ask the animals as well.”
Speaking to animals wasn’t a witch thing, it was an elf thing. However, given the fae’s abuse of the natural kingdom in Chapters gone by, very few practised it now. Unlike the humans, the animals had never stopped believing. They remembered the hunts too clearly.
“Are you sure? Will they help?”
Melly nodded her head. “Probably. I helped the Great Stag once, and he remembers.”
Another mystery to be solved, Bea thought. She was beginning to realise that she wasn’t the only one who had been keeping secrets in her little friendship group. The thought didn’t make her feel any better.
“If it won’t take you long to locate Sindy, we should probably go into the town first. I’ll need some supplies if we’re going to make this Happy Ending work. I can hardly turn up at the GenAm and ask them for a whole new wardrobe. At least without having to answer some questions first.”
Melly nodded. “Agreed. How are you getting the girl to the Ball?”
“Damn. I hadn’t thought about that. Do you think there’ll be time for me to come back here? That way I could still go through the Mirrors on schedule and set up the coach.”
Melly pursed her lips. “This is getting complicated.”
“What choice do we have?” Bea asked, already feeling exhausted. If I get through this with my head, she thought, I really will set up a vegetable stall in the markets. I’ll steal some seeds from Sindy’s garden and grow cabbages in the dirt behind Ivor’s ears.
“So, to town first, then your heroine’s house, then back here, then to the GenAm. I told the Forest not to give you any more trouble.”
They had too much to do, and too little time to do it in. If this really were a story, they’d be guaranteed a Happy Ending, considering the odds they were facing. Bad luck, then, that this was real life. Melly closed her eyes, her hand resting palm out just above the Mirror’s surface. The thick, gloopy surface rippled again, and an image of Llanotterly’s main square appeared.
“Off we go then,” Bea said.
Chapter Thirty-four
“So how do you want to do this?” Melly asked, closing the connection to her Mirror, back in her cottage.
Out of habit, she started looking around for something to cover the mirror they’d arrived through. However unlikely, it didn’t do to risk observation by the GemAm at the best of times, let alone when travelling illicitly into Thaiana.
Bea tugged at her ear thoughtfully
, trying to work out the best use of their time. The Ball started in eight hours. They needed to get a new dress, meet Ana at her parents’ cottage, find out where Sindy was so Will could go and get her – assuming she was alive and easily gettable; Bea wasn’t sure what they’d do if she wasn’t – and then Bea had to get back to Melly’s cottage, and from there to the Grand to go through the Mirror officially, thus getting her promissory slip for the coach. The GenAm, when the Mirrors had started breaking a few hundred years ago, had taken to keeping the larger Plot items in troll caves in Thaiana. Bea needed the note to get the coach; she didn’t think even she could talk her way around a 200-kilogramme troll.
“How about we split up, get everything we need, and then meet in an hour?”
“Sure,” Melly said. She held out her hand.
Bea stared at it. Somewhat confused by this sudden formality, Bea shook Melly’s hand.
Melly raised a quizzical eyebrow.
“What?” Bea asked.
“You need to give me some money. How exactly do you expect me to pay, otherwise?”
“Ah,” said Bea. It hadn’t occurred to her that the humans used bits of metal to trade for goods and services, a system that to her seemed very abstract.
“Yes,” replied Melly.
“Tricky,” Bea added.
“Very,” Melly agreed.
“You don’t have any…?” Bea asked, hopefully.
“No,” said Melly, dashing said hopes.
“You wouldn’t consider-” Bea began.
“No,” Melly said.
“You don’t what I was going to say,” Bea protested.
“Yes I do,” Melly answered. “Your face said it for you.”
Bea kicked at the dusty floor.
“There is someone who could give us some money… But you’re not going to like it.”