Tressa, who had ceased crying, gave an odd sniffle and whispered something to Avery that sounded like “It can’t be me…”
He nodded stiffly, a tear in his eye too…or maybe not as it was gone before I could look twice.
No one had time to react.
Avery flipped his knife so that the point was suddenly on the offensive, then he whirled around and stabbed out at Tressa.
I didn’t see how badly he hurt her, only the mask of shock, pain, and a peculiar resoluteness as she clutched at her stomach, and stumbled backwards.
The knife was coated in blood, as were Tressa’s hands as she numbly removed them from her wound, mouth an O of surprise.
It had all happened so fast none of us had time to call out, before Tressa’s knees gave way and she fell awkwardly into the Boundary without anything to break the impact.
The Boundary gave an odd shudder – then Tressa was gone, the instant she touched it.
I realized the deafening noise was our screams at Avery, but I realized then that he too was gone, vanished as if he had never been.
There was a rip, lurching us back into the estate, but I didn’t notice. All I could see was the knife.
17
“Urgh, that was an awful excuse for a night’s sleep,” I groaned, stretching and wiping the remnants of a dream from my aching eyes. They were red and puffy as if I had been crying, which wasn’t surprising given the terrible nightmare I had experienced. “You wouldn’t believe what I dreamt about; it was horrifying! So real…”
The vision of Tressa’s pain and defeat as she fell limply towards the Boundary was still a fresh memory, as was my shock that it had been Avery who had caused it before he too had vanished. Thank goodness, it had just been a dream!
I poured some sludgy water into my washbasin in vain attempt to cleanse my mind from the plagues of the night. Splashing it onto my face, I caught a glimpse of myself as I reached for the towel to dry off.
It was not the sallow unhealthiness that nearly made my heart stop. It was the fact that I was still wearing my full day dress instead of my nightgown, and that it was coated with dust as if I had been outside recently wearing it.
“Impossible,” I gasped, eyes dropping to my dirty hands with mounting panic.
It was only a dream! There was absolutely no possible way that it had been real. I was crazy.
I rushed to Tressa’s bed to prove myself right, my breathing accelerating to hyperventilation.
The bed was perfectly made. The pillows plumped invitingly at the iron headboard. The duvet had been smoothed down to the last crease, just as Tressa routinely did every morning before breakfast, as she hated the sight of a crumpled bed.
The basin on her table lay parched of water, hairbrush untouched, and her powders undisturbed in their designated jars.
“Tressa?” I called, trying to stay calm. The curtains were already open, and that was when I noticed the clouded sun was not low in the east, as it was every morning. It was setting towards the west, as if was evening time.
“Tressa!” I yelled, cupping my hands around my mouth so to enhance my cry even more.
“Penny!”
I started, glancing wildly around for the source of the voice. It came from the other side of the chamber, so I hitched up my skirts and ran towards it, realizing along the way that my shoes (why would I wear them to bed?) were trailing mud across the floor as I ran as if I had been in the woods.
“Penny…” Evelyn sobbed, embracing me into a tight hug as I rounded the L bend. She was wearing her daytime clothes as well, her eyes swollen. “Tressa isn’t coming, Penny.”
“No. This is just another trick. The Master’s only playing with us again, and she’s probably just downstairs with the others. Avery wouldn’t…” I viciously shook away from her, tearing out of the chamber and slamming the door behind me as I went. The corridors blended into one as I sprinted, refusing to believe this nightmare was coming true.
“Tressa!” I screamed, throwing open the front doors into the dying evening light. “Tressa!”
I kept running into the dying gardens, not noticing the wilted plants or dull chipping bricks of the manor house, trying not to see the bizarrely thriving rhododendron bushes at its walls.
Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw Beatrix’s tombstone silhouetted against the Boundary woods. It was not alone.
There was a tall black granite block there, smooth as ice and crafted into a pyramidal point at the top; much thinner than the gravestone but equally as tall, as if remembering someone who’s name needed no mention.
I choked back a sob, lowering myself down to the yellowing grass in front of the monument. Only one; nothing for Avery, who was clearly still alive and well wherever he was.
In that colorless world of greys, blacks and dull browns, there was suddenly no emotion either.
There was a soft frost on the ground numbing my knees as I knelt, but I could feel nothing except the overwhelming pain inside my chest – the pain that threatened to destroy everything I had worked so hard to repair after we lost Beatrix. The strands of my grief had begun to heal, and now they had once again been frayed into pieces. Perhaps one of the reasons I felt so empty and desolate was that Tressa had not been killed by Him, like Beatrix; it had been one of our own. Avery. If I ever saw him again, I swore, I would – kill him? Did I really have that in me? Maybe not, but I’d make him sorry. All those things he’d said to me in the empty room, all that stuff about feeling regret for how he’d acted… What had that been, then? A cover up, so we wouldn’t suspect his actual plan? And how on earth had he known what to plan for?
I reached out and stroked the glossy black granite with shaking hands, crying as I leant my forehead gently against the hard stone. Why was it that whenever someone had ‘betrayed’ us then made amends, they were brutally murdered? Why did Tressa not deserve the same remembrance as Beatrix?
Pushing myself away from the memorial, I let my head hang back so that the dark grey clouds of the infinite sky filled my eyes, then fell to the ground and closed my eyes.
Flashes of memories came to me as I lay there on the ground; Tressa’s exasperated reminder of Penny – no one can open the Boundary. Beatrix’s warning to me: You are jeopardizing not only your life, but all your friends lives too. The Master’s monotone, amused predictions: The true punishment is coming, and it is you who has brought it upon yourself. Do you know what rhododendrons represent? They mean ‘beware.’ It’s not a coincidence that they are the only flowers still alive on the estate, they are here to deliver an important lesson to you children. I suggest you take heed, unless you want to be the next grave in my collection…
Tressa standing in the clearing, a tear trickling down her face: Oh, Avery, what have we done?
My eyes jerked open, heart hammering. Drowning in my sorrow had done nothing last time except isolate me from my friends, and perhaps because of that we had lost Tressa. They had turned on each other, and I – I who had brought the trials upon them in the first place – had done nothing to fix it.
For Beatrix, I would stay strong. For Tressa, I would get us out of here. I slowly uncurled myself from the ground, admittedly feeling rather petty for acting so pathetic. Tressa would have been horrified! I imagined her with her sharp face, soft hair, and tall, elegant figure standing disapprovingly in front of me.
“You know, Penny, whining like a toddler is going to get you nowhere. You need to come up with a plan, and pull yourself together at the very least! I’m embarrassed for you, giving up so easily like that just because I’m not around anymore to tell you otherwise!”
I cracked a half-smile at the apparition, dusting myself off dutifully and even pulling an unpracticed curtsey at her memorial. It was then that I felt the crumple of paper against my leg, and realized that my note had been replaced by another, thicker piece of a quality paper: D!
My hands shook as I scrambled to pluck the letter from my pocket and unfold it enough to read; wondering all t
he while if D had been able to see the tragic events, which had so rapidly passed from wherever he or she was.
Dear Penny,
You must understand; these questions are very difficult for me to answer. I do not know what will happen to you if you fail, though I am alone, I suppose, though not entirely in the way you probably mean. Therefore, Beatrix is not with me. I will not address now the issue of your departed friend Avery, or indeed Tressa (who, incidentally, was not killed). What I said before about isolation is true; you need to listen to me this time, or else next time the fallen will include you. Also, forget the dreams. They will only bring you harm – whatever you do, DO NOT tell Madon.
D.
“All right, then,” I muttered bleakly, put off by the impatient tone of the writing. It was almost as if D was getting frustrated with me, as if I was bringing catastrophe upon myself. The reference to the dreams did nothing to convince me of their redundancy, exactly what had happened when Beatrix tried to convince me of the same thing; instead, it only did more to make them seem important.
Yet there was a benefit in all of this, if D was correct. Somehow, after falling through the Boundary, Tressa was still alive! Where was she now, then? And where was Avery?
It started to drizzle, and I realized from the goose bumps appearing on my arms that I was cold. I gave one last longing look at Tressa’s memorial with watering eyes before turning on my heel and heading back towards the manor, tucking D’s letter back into my pocket before the rain made the ink run.
Once I had shut the doors, I debated between returning upstairs and going to the dining hall for the main reason of confronting Him at dinner, or to simply go to the library and write a reply as soon as possible. I instantly rejected the second choice, deciding that it was still too early for any face-to-face action between Him and myself yet, and then proceeded to eliminate the former in fear that their tears would only coax out my own.
“Penny?” called a voice from upstairs. I craned my neck to see Fred peering over the banister with hollow eyes, his clothes on the looser side rather than tighter for the first time in years. “Where were you?”
“I needed some fresh air,” I replied, listening to my voice echoing in the vast foyer area, D’s warning of isolation still reverberating in my mind.
“We were outside for over an hour,” Fred contradicted, sounding very tired.
Fred waited for a moment for me to take back my answer, waiting for me to remind him that despite all that had happened we were still the same inseparable friends that had lived here together before the trails, sharing a common cause.
But were we? Were we all still friends like before?
Something snapped inside me then. I was sick of all the secrecy and scheming we had done to try and protect ourselves. We had been downright selfish, and contrary to what D might have said, I thought now that perhaps it had been the isolation that had lost us Tressa, and that it was certainly not the way to freedom. No one was perfect, and that included D. Perhaps he or she was wrong in that respect, and maybe the best thing to do was bind myself closer to my friends. After all, D hadn’t succeeded, but failed. Maybe that was why.
“Fine,” I sighed, glancing around as if D was going to dart out of the shadows to yell at me for talking to him. “I went to go and find Tressa…but all I found was a memorial next to where Beatrix is buried. It’s true. She’s gone.”
“I know, I saw it out of the boys’ chamber,” Fred acknowledged hoarsely, though his mouth twitched into a contented half-smile that I was finally being open with him. “It’s funny, but I felt more stricken when Beatrix died. Now I just feel empty. Is that wrong?”
I nodded to myself, understanding the feeling. I didn’t feel empty though, not in the way Fred meant. In fact, a grim determination filled me like never before, desperate to show Him that He did not own us, and that we had the power to escape no matter what he threw our way. The loss had made the dangers more real, but had also given me something with which to fight.
“No, it’s fine,” I comforted him, just as a fuzzy static feeling shocked through my pocket; a rip. D had sent me another letter, and I had a feeling that it was not going to be a pleased tone. My correspondent was really watching me (an oddly disturbing thought) and hadn’t bothered to wait for my reply before correcting my friendliness. “I – I don’t think Tressa is actually dead. I don’t know where she is, but I just have a niggling feeling that—”
“I know. Well, I don’t know for certain, but I feel the same way. Normally things disintegrate when they touch the Boundary, not disappear. Lucas pointed it out, but…oh gosh, it’s just too much at the moment. I’m going early to bed, see you in the morning.” Fred yawned loudly, slinking away from the banister to retire.
What he said was true, and much more logical. It made the emptiness shrink a little bit, giving me the courage I needed to face D. I waited for him to leave, before tearing the letter from my pocket and unfolding it like a guilty child caught redhanded.
My eyes scanned the loopy handwriting with mounting surprise, then elation. It was not at all what I had been expecting; it was fantastic!
Penny,
Before you jump to conclusions, I am not writing again to yell at you for talking to that boy, Fred, whatever his name is, though I do strongly discourage your actions and once again implore you to stop talking with your friends. I have to strike a deal with you, which could play greatly to your advantage. ‘Ripping’ (as you have called it), Penny, is the key to Madon’s power and is the entire bones of the Boundary. If you can master it, then you will be able to put your own stake in things and give the tables another dimension in terms of who is holding the monopoly. For yes, it is possible for anyone inside the Boundary to harness this ability, if they have proper instruction. Focus in on moving the very fabric of the air, see the magic in the in-between spaces and use it to move things. Concentrate. It seems simple, but it is not at all easy. You will not, for many reasons, be able to manifest or destroy, only move, but for now you will find that quite enough. In return for this advantage and further teaching, you must promise me to protect and isolate yourself.
D.
“Ahh…” I gurgled, the words stuck in my throat before forming coherent sounds. This was not possible. This could not be.
With few sentences, those few simple instructions, D was suggesting that I could be like them – like Beatrix, and Him.
The possibilities were endless! All of us, we could protect ourselves. I remembered D’s condition dryly, mulling only for a moment on whether I should actually listen; but I was born a rebel, and when it came to my friends I was willing to risk the anger of just about anything on earth to keep them safe. I had lost Tressa, and essentially Avery, and I was not about to lose anyone else.
My eyes fixated suddenly on a delicate vase filled to the brim with the wilted brown remains of what were once daisies. It was made of bone china, perched atop a simple wooden table beside my favorite armchair.
I cocked my head at the vase, a curious grin lighting up my face. Scrunching up my nose, clenching my palms, I focused in on the edge of the vase until everything else disappeared into a hazy blur and the silhouette became astonishingly clear. After a few seconds, without blinking, everything began to swim as if the air itself was moving – as if it could be broken or ripped.
“Here goes,” I muttered to myself, unsure if it would work or not.
I pictured the air splitting around the vase, pictured forcing it into the air, but still nothing happened.
I cursed, eyes stinging from the strain, until finally I gave up and looked away. “Darn it!”
The letter crumpled into my fist, disappointment overwhelming me.
Of course, what was I expecting to happen? That I, ordinary little me, could match the Master’s power? It was laughable!
Half-heartedly, I tried again, and my poor eyes watered and ached. Then a real rip resounded, causing me to stumble and retch from the force of it. I had, in my preoccup
ied stupor, nearly forgotten what a real rip was like for those who were close enough to experience it. My heart almost stopped beating. At the front doors, only a few yards away from where I was standing, He had appeared, casually unbuttoning His travelling coat and ripping it away with a lazy wave of a hand.
I looked away, using the old I-can’t-see-you-can’t-see-me theory, staring at the vase as if we might both rip away to safety.
“Penny!” came a calm, accusatory voice from behind me, and I heard the horrifying noise of boots crossing the marble with awful clapping sounds. I gave a little squeak of terror…and the vase smashed.
In my frozen guilt, I had subconsciously levitated it off the table a few inches, and then broken the bond when He had distracted me.
I had made a rip.
Slowly, I pivoted round; my face flushed a deep red from both excitement and fear. The Master’s black eyes were boring in on me, and I could not read what He was thinking, but it didn’t matter. I had ripped!
This adrenaline gave me the courage to do something I had never done before: turn my back on Him and run as fast as I could past Him up the stairs.
I nearly skidded over as I ran, panting with the rush, stopping at the top only to thrown a nervous look down at the Master to see His reaction. He had not moved, but His eyes remained trained on my sweaty face and a flash of anger crossed his features. Then, He whipped gracefully around, and ripped away.
I supposed that there would be no dinner tonight. What a shame.
18
There was a moment of static, then a dainty crash. A stunned silence, then a hesitant round of applause.
“Well. Um…I suppose this changes things,” Fred managed to say in a shaky voice.
“Not really.” I shrugged, keeping an outer impression of modesty. “I don’t see how manipulating objects will come of use. But it is a pretty trick, isn’t it?”
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