“It’s only me,” said Frederick, laying a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t panic.”
I rubbed my head. “I’m not panicking,” I gasped, turning to face him. “But did you really have to creep up on me like that?”
Frederick was wearing his hair down, and it fell in soft waves onto his shoulders. His pale blue eyes glittered mysteriously, unsettling me more than I cared to admit. Was this it? My first encounter with the faun?
“Sorry,” he murmured, taking a step toward me and lowering his voice to a whisper. “I was just so intrigued.”
“Oh, yeah?”
He smiled his wry smile—the one that, not all that long ago, would have made me go weak at the knees. But now I seemed to be immune to its charms. I took a step backward. “I hear you’ve been climbing out of windows in the dead of night?” I said.
He raised his eyebrows. “I had to meet someone at the castle,” he explained. “And on my way back to the village I decided to take a shortcut through the woods. But then I heard a weird noise coming from the ruins and turned back just in time to see you and Miss Whitfield walking away. Since you left I’ve been poking around trying to find out where the noise came from. But I’d never have thought of that thing with the statue.” He pointed to the three tunnels branching off from the room where we were standing. Nothing about them seemed to have changed since my last visit. “So, what are these?”
“Oh, just some old secret passageways,” I said nonchalantly.
“Wow!”
“I thought you said your family built them?” I eyed him suspiciously. Was he really surprised by the tunnels, or was he just pretending to be? Was he about to tear the mask off his face and reveal a pair of horns sprouting from his head?
“Yes, that’s true. But I didn’t know they still existed! How cool is that?”
Okay, fine. He seemed genuinely surprised to see the tunnels. “Shall I give you the tour?” I asked. Now I was the one to give him a wry smile.
The middle tunnel and the one on the left still formed a loop—no change there, then. But the third tunnel felt broader and higher than the last time I’d seen it. We walked along it in silence until we reached the lord of Stolzenburg’s laboratory. Frederick wandered from bench to bench, his mouth hanging open in amazement. “Crazy! It’s like an alchemist’s laboratory,” he marveled, picking up a dusty vial. “Perhaps someone was trying to find the philosopher’s stone here hundreds of years ago. Or some other way to make gold.”
“Perhaps,” I muttered. But I was slightly distracted, because I’d just spotted a tunnel in the wall opposite me that hadn’t been there before. The hidden mechanism had opened it up in the exact spot where Darcy and I had found the footprints last time. I turned back to Frederick. “Or perhaps they were trying to create a faun,” I said, watching him closely.
Frederick’s face darkened. He pursed his lips for a moment. “It does look as though this place might have something to do with the old legends, doesn’t it?” he said quietly.
I nodded, and so did he, but slowly—almost in slow motion, with a strange, jerking movement.
I felt a sudden urge to get away from him. Was Frederick the faun, just as Gina had suspected? Had I fallen into his trap? Should I make a run for it, before whatever had happened to Gina happened to me?
But Frederick didn’t turn into a faun: Horns didn’t sprout from his head and his feet didn’t morph into hooves. Instead he sank to the floor and squatted there on his haunches with his head in his hands. “Shit,” he said tonelessly.
“What?”
He didn’t answer but went on massaging his temples in silence. He kept his eyes closed. Suddenly he looked exhausted. There were frown lines on his forehead, and his shoulders sagged.
I sat down cross-legged in front of him and touched his elbow softly. “Frederick?”
He didn’t react. Had he even heard me?
“Frederick!” I tried again, louder this time. “What’s wrong?”
He sighed.
“Please, tell me. What happened four years ago? What do you know about all this?”
“Nothing,” he said through gritted teeth.
“Come on, don’t lie to me. What was Gina afraid of?”
Frederick opened his eyes then, and gave me a piercing look. “I have no idea,” he said, enunciating every word a little too clearly, and stood up again. “Let’s go, shall we?”
“But—”
“No!”
“You don’t seriously expect me to—”
“Stop this, Emma! I don’t know what happened to Gina!” he shouted. Then he strode swiftly across the laboratory and disappeared into the new tunnel.
I hurried after him.
I wasn’t going to let him off the hook that easily. The uncertainty of the past few days had nearly driven me crazy, and I needed answers. But Frederick seemed determined not to give me any. He remained stubbornly silent as we continued along the tunnel, which led steeply downhill, deep down into the earth. After a while it came to an end just as surprisingly as it had begun, in front of a roughly timbered wooden door.
The door’s hinges squealed as we pushed it open, and as we closed it behind us we heard a grinding noise far away, as if the stone slab at the foot of the statue were shifting back into its original position. The opening in the wall of the secret laboratory had probably disappeared, too, I thought.
Ahead of us, my flashlight beam fell on brick walls and a spiral staircase that led upward into the darkness. We climbed the steps without a word. It took longer than I’d expected to get to the top, but at last we came to another door. It looked a bit odd: thicker and heavier than an ordinary door. This was probably because—as I realized when we pushed it open—it was not only a door, but also a bookcase. A door disguised as a bookcase, concealed between two other bookcases, with a few old books on its shelves.
“Of course,” I murmured.
“You’ve got a new sofa?” asked Frederick, pointing to the couch Miss Whitfield had given us.
“Mhm,” I grunted, still gazing at the bookcase. So there was another way into the west wing library.
* * *
Over the next few days I couldn’t help feeling there was something about this whole business that didn’t add up. Gina had thought Frederick was the faun, but he certainly hadn’t given that impression when I’d met him in the underground tunnels. And there was a hidden entrance to the west wing library, and a set of footprints in the secret laboratory—but did the footprints belong to Gina? Was it true she wasn’t the first girl to have gone missing in the woods? When was I going to meet the faun? And what did Frederick know that he wasn’t telling me?
I spent most of the weekend flicking through the chronicle, trying to piece together some kind of explanation for this madness. I read through my own entries and the stories about the faun again and again, and I studied the ink drawings and wondered whether somebody I knew, somebody here in the castle, could really be an enchanted beast in human form.
Unfortunately, Charlotte and Hannah had no time that weekend to discuss my outlandish suspicions, because we had our math exam the following Monday. I probably should have spent a bit more time studying. But with the best will in the world, I couldn’t keep my mind on integrals and functions. So, as the three of us sat in the west wing library bent over our math books, I left it to Charlotte and Hannah to work out the answers to the study questions while I cast another eye over the lord of Stolzenburg’s entries in the chronicle. I also reread Eleanor Morland’s first forays into fiction; her early attempts at fairy tales were very interesting indeed.
On Sunday evening, as Charlotte and Hannah cheerfully packed away their calculators, I realized I still hadn’t even glanced at my math. But at least I now had a slightly better understanding of how the chronicle worked. Not wanting to completely mess up my exam, I decided to make a virtue out of necessity and tinker with my test results a little.
It wasn’t really such a big deal if I came up with a few
questions for tomorrow’s exam and worked out the answers ahead of time, was it? It wasn’t as if I was going to use a crib sheet, so it wasn’t really cheating. And next time, I promised myself, I’d work very hard and do plenty of studying. Then I pulled out my pen, turned to the next blank page in the chronicle, and wrote myself a lovely little exam paper.
When I’d finished that, I turned my attention back to my other problems. I was still waiting for the faun to materialize, but in the meantime I thought it might be a good idea to focus on something else. What if Darcy, in the course of his inquiries, were to stumble across a vital clue about what had happened to Gina? Once we knew what had happened to her we’d be able to figure out where she was, wouldn’t we?
Yes—that sounded like an excellent plan.
I smiled to myself and started writing.
August 2017
Today saw the founding of one of the first secret societies in the history of Stolzenburg. Its name is Westbooks, and its headquarters are located in the west wing library, which has been specially cleared out for the purpose. Regrettably, the first meeting of the club’s founding members (who must, of course, remain anonymous) was disrupted by an unfortunate incident. It turns out that Darcy de Winter, who is currently staying at the castle, is a complete and utter moron. Although the club members offered in the most polite and accommodating way to turn down the volume on the literary film they were watching, so as not to disturb his sleep, he announced that his family owned the castle and proceeded to kick the whole club out. (I hope he chokes on the books in the library he stole from us.)
Other than that, of course, Stolzenburg remains the most brilliant school in the world. All the staff and students are back from their holidays, ready for the new school year, and everyone is looking forward to the next few months. Miss Berkenbeck and Dr. Meier in particular seem to be getting on very well lately. They practically kissed in the dining hall today.…
12
“How about a bit of chocolate?” I waved a chocolate bar under Charlotte’s nose, but she merely shook her head and buried her face in her arms. Hannah looked pale, too, and so did the rest of our class. Since our exam had finished twenty minutes ago, we’d been sitting in the conservatory in a state of shock, trying to come to terms with what had just happened. Some people had started crying even before the end of the test; for others, like Charlotte, the panic had only set in after they’d handed in their papers. Some, like Sinan and me, hadn’t even realized there was a problem until the others had told us.
But now we all knew that there had been something wrong with the exam questions—something very wrong indeed. When the chronicle had inserted my new questions into the test, it had somehow combined them with Mrs. Bröder-Strauchhaus’s original questions; the result had been mathematical mash-ups so complicated that even a Nobel Prize–winning mathematician would have had trouble solving them.
I hadn’t even realized there was anything amiss—I’d just sat there filling in the answers I’d prepared beforehand, without even looking at the questions. And to Sinan, who found any kind of math completely baffling, today’s test had been just as impenetrable as any other. But for everyone else, the past two hours had been a form of torture. This was an important exam and Mrs. Bröder-Strauchhaus, who’d delivered the papers that morning and then promptly retired to bed with the flu, was not known for her leniency.
“We never learned any of that in class!” Hannah complained to Jana and Giovanni. The three of them were flicking feverishly through a book of formulas.
“There was something wrong with those questions. How on earth were you supposed to find the value of x in question four?” demanded Giovanni, while Charlotte wept quietly beside me.
I huddled deeper into the sofa and gnawed at my bottom lip. Damn, damn, damn! This whole thing was my fault. I’d caused this chaos. And I felt terrible about it.
Perhaps that was why I’d slept so badly last night—because I’d had a premonition that something like this was about to happen? I’d dreamed that the paper dragonfly had appeared and warned me about the book, telling me to throw it in the river. (I hadn’t taken the warning seriously, of course—and it would have been too late to change anything, anyway.) The dream had felt frighteningly real, though, and the dragonfly had seemed even creepier than usual.…
But never mind all that now: The question was, what was I going to do about the exam? Apologize to the class? Go and see Mrs. Bröder-Strauchhaus and tell her the truth? “Erm, so, I have this magic book that can make things come true and I used it to change the exam questions—sorry”? It didn’t seem like a great idea, unless I wanted people to think I was stark raving mad. Surely Mrs. Bröder-Strauchhaus would see for herself that something had gone wrong and give us a new test. Right? I desperately hoped so. But either way, I knew I had to apologize.
“Er, Charlotte,” I whispered, tugging at her sleeve, “I think I might have messed up. Big time.”
“What do you mean?” Charlotte sniffled. “Have you got a tissue, by the way?”
“Sure.” I fished a pack of tissues out of my schoolbag, but before I could hand them to Charlotte I heard her blowing her nose. Someone had beaten me to it. Someone tall and blond, who was now settling himself on the sofa next to Charlotte.
“What happened?” asked Toby.
As Charlotte told him about the math exam from hell, I studied Toby closely. He looked almost as exhausted as Darcy. There were dark rings under his eyes and his hair was scruffy and unkempt. But something about Charlotte’s presence seemed to have re-energized him. And now—now he was even putting an arm around her shoulder!
“Oh, man,” he said. “Sounds like you’re having a pretty terrible day.”
Charlotte, surprised by the touch of his arm, turned toward him and gazed into his eyes for a long moment before nodding. “Pretty terrible,” she agreed. Then she broke into a smile. Okay.…
I decided to give them some space. “I, um … have to go and sort something out,” I said, and hurried out of the conservatory.
Five minutes later I reached the west wing, where I climbed the stairs and knocked on Darcy’s door. It was a long time before I heard movement on the other side, but eventually a key turned in the lock, the door opened a crack, and Darcy poked his head out. “Emma,” he said curtly. “What do you want?”
“You let Toby off the leash, then?”
Darcy made a face. “He’s my friend, not a dog.”
“Oh—I’m glad you finally figured that one out.”
“I realized I had to let him make his own decisions,” he said quietly. “And since you don’t seem to think Charlotte is doing anything untoward…”
“Charlotte was just worried about me. She was trying to help.”
“By poking around the west wing?”
“You don’t get it.”
“No, I don’t, unfortunately.”
I sighed. “Anyway, I’m glad you’re not trying to come between them anymore.”
He nodded, graciously and a touch too smugly. “Okay. I’m afraid I need to get on now.” Darcy tried to close the door, but I shoved my foot in the way.
“Get on with what?” I asked.
He didn’t answer.
“Listen,” I began, “I know we get on each other’s nerves and we’re not exactly friends or anything. Especially not after what happened on the open day. In the woods, I mean, when you told me that you … but I didn’t…”
“I’m not ashamed of my feelings,” Darcy broke in. “Perhaps my words were a bit clumsy, but they were honest, just like your answer was. I don’t hold it against you. It’s water under the bridge.”
“Er … good. Well then…”
“But I would be very grateful if you’d leave me to get on now, Emma. I don’t see the point in continuing this conversation. And I really do have a lot to do. So. Good-bye.” He edged my foot out of the doorway and closed the door with a bang.
“Wait!” I cried. After all, the main reason I’d c
ome up here was to see whether my latest entry in the chronicle had had any kind of positive effect. “Have you found any more clues?” I called through the door. “I found a secret entrance to the west wing library on Friday night! I really think you should let me help you look for Gina!” Had I really just offered to help him find his sister?
The key turned in the lock again and Darcy’s head reappeared. He looked at me, frowning.
“I’m sure you could do with some help, couldn’t you?” Ever since Miss Whitfield had told me how much Gina’s disappearance had changed Darcy, I’d found his arrogance less off-putting. And I needed answers, too, just like he did. Darcy looked thoughtfully at me for a moment, then cleared his throat. “Would you like to come in?” he said.
The room was unrecognizable. I’d only seen it once before, through the en suite bathroom that led onto the west wing library. But I definitely didn’t remember it being this messy. The four-poster bed in the middle of the room had at least been usable before: Now every square foot of space was covered in stuff. There were piles of clothes and cuddly toys on the bed, and the floor was littered with books, Barbie horses, CDs, several laptops, girls’ shoes in various sizes, board games, dolls, bottles of nail polish, a silk painting frame (accessories included), and various cardboard boxes overflowing with notebooks, photos, and letters.
“Erm…,” I said as Darcy closed the door behind us. I looked from him to a pair of pink sandals on the floor (which were definitely too small for him) and back again. “What is all this stuff?”
“It was Gina’s.”
I surveyed the piles of children’s toys. “I thought she was sixteen when she went missing.”
“She was.” Darcy stepped gingerly across the room, trying not to tread on the bottles of nail polish, and sat down on the floor beside a battered cardboard box. He picked up one of the plastic horses (a unicorn with a pink mane and a glittery horn on its forehead) and turned it over gently in his big hands. “This is pretty much everything she ever owned. Everything I could find, anyway. I brought some of it with me from England, but a lot of it was still here in the castle. Packed away in one of the lofts.”
The Forgotten Book Page 17