13 Curses

by Michelle Harrison

  “It’s risky,” said Red.

  “But there’s no other way,” Tanya argued. “Listen, I can run fast. Let me do it. As long as my path is clear to the door, I can make it in a few seconds.”

  All three of them stared at the distance from the scaffold to the door. It wasn’t far. Tanya’s plan sounded very possible.

  “Be quick,” said Red, handing the pouch with the bracelet to Tanya. Then she and Fabian made their way to the door with Oberon, kicking the path to the door clear from obstructions—workmen’s tools and a couple of unused scaffold poles.

  Tanya climbed onto the lower level of the scaffold, nearing the charm. With a last glance at the door, she took the bracelet out and held it to the protruding silver Staff. As it attached itself she drew her hand back carefully, allowing the length of the charm to slide out of the crevice. A fine, powdery dust came with it as a section of the crumbling brick shifted.

  “I’ve got it!” she called, tucking the bracelet tightly into her hand and rolling off the scaffold. As her feet met the ground, a heavy thud confirmed that a brick had fallen free from the wall and onto the wooden scaffold. Before the second brick could fall, Tanya was already halfway across the church.

  Fabian, seeing her near the door, held it open wide for her to make a clean exit. No sooner had she cleared it to join them safely outside than Oberon, unable to bear the thought of uneaten cookies, shot through the door in a flash, bounding toward the scaffold. Behind it, several bricks slipped from the wall, hit the wooden platform, and then crashed to the floor.

  “Oberon, NO!” Tanya cried. Before Red or Fabian could react, she was hurtling back into the church.

  “Tanya, get out of there!” Fabian yelled. “You’ll get yourself killed!”

  Grabbing the wretched cookies from the scaffold, Tanya flung them with all her might, ducking as more chunks of flying stone came her way. The packet soared through the door and landed clear outside, joined a moment later by Oberon, who proceeded to gobble them down without a second thought.

  Tanya was neither as fast nor as lucky. She made it partway to the door when a section of brickwork came toppling inward, skidding across the scaffold, and crashed to the floor in front of her, forcing her to stop. Its destruction left a gaping hole in the top part of the wall. More sections disintegrated.

  Within seconds the wall came down, falling like a shoulder drooping in defeat. Its collapse heralded the end for the stained-glass window too, for with nothing to support it, it came soaring into the church and shattered. Almost at the door now, Tanya cried out. A terrible, ominous creaking sounded from above. Helpless, Red and Fabian could only encourage Tanya to keep moving, but she had frozen and was looking skyward.

  “Get away!” she gasped. “Away from the door! The roof—”

  If she finished her sentence, Red and Fabian never heard it, for with a sound to rival a clap of thunder, a section of the church roof plummeted toward them, blocking off all access to the door—trapping Tanya inside.

  “TANYA!” Fabian cried, rushing forward. Red caught him and held him back.

  “The window!” she hissed.

  They ran round the back of the church, past the half-demolished wall, and to the window where Tanya had first gotten in. Fabian cupped his hands together and shouted, calling her name. Red joined him, and Oberon, who had suddenly realized his mistress was missing, began to bark in distress.

  After a minute of shouting, there was still no reply. Red heaved Fabian up to the window, straining under his weight as he looked through. Oberon barked relentlessly. For once, Red did not mind—it was a sound that was likely to comfort Tanya… if she could still hear it. Fumbling with the flashlight, Fabian shone it through the window.

  “There’s so much dust,” he croaked, coughing suddenly. “Tanya!”

  “I can’t hold you for much longer,” Red grunted. “Plus, we don’t know how stable this wall is now!”

  “I can see her!” Fabian said suddenly. “She’s by the storeroom door, on the floor!” He choked back a noise like a sob. “She’s… she’s not moving. She must have run for it when the roof came down. Tanya, wake up… please!”

  Red’s strength gave out, forcing her to let Fabian go. He continued to call while she shook out her aching arms. Still, there was no answer. Another crash came from inside the church. More of it was collapsing.

  “We’re running out of time,” said Fabian. “We can’t even go for help—the whole building could come down.”

  “She’s probably just unconscious,” said Red. “If only we had some water to throw on her face—it might bring her out of it.”

  “Water…” Fabian repeated. “The well!” He ran back in the direction of the graveyard, vanishing beyond the front of the church. Minutes went by, during which Oberon’s barks became whines, and more thuds sounded from within the church as its walls creaked and shifted. Finally Fabian reappeared, carrying a pail of well water.

  Garnering the last of her strength, Red lifted Fabian up to the window again. This time it was even harder, with the added weight of the full pail, plus by the time Fabian had steadied himself, a good pint or so had slopped all over Red and was dripping icily down her face and neck. Giving it his best aim, Fabian launched the water through the window, the bucket bouncing on the other side of the wall as he dropped it.

  “She’s moving!” he cried. “Tanya! Tanya! Get up!”

  A groggy voice answered him.

  “Fabian? My head hurts….”

  “No, don’t lie back down, you’ve got to get up, now!”

  There was a shuffling sound, followed by a fit of coughing.

  “I feel dizzy.” Tanya’s voice was weak.

  “Of course you’re dizzy,” said Fabian, panicking. “You’ve got an enormous gash on your forehead and—ouch!”

  Red, desperate to shut him up and with no hands free to pinch, had nipped his leg with her teeth. “Don’t tell her that, you idiot!”

  “Well, it’s not that bad, really,” Fabian gabbled. “Just a scratch. Now, climb onto the chair and take my hand.”

  The chair scraped across the floor and clattered. Red groaned as Fabian’s weight shifted.

  “Steady,” he said. “Try again. Just take it slowly.”

  “Not too slowly,” said Red, through gritted teeth. Her hair was in her eyes and, worse, Fabian’s bottom was in her face. A groaning, creaking noise had started in the roof. “Hurry up!”

  “That’s it,” said Fabian. “Now grab hold of me. Good!”

  Twisting her head, Red saw that Tanya’s head and torso were through the little window, her arms draped around Fabian’s neck. She looked dreadful—and as Fabian had described, there was a horrible cut on her head. Her face was smeared with blood.

  “I feel sick,” she moaned. “It hurts.”

  “Just throw up if you need to,” Fabian said, trying to sound cheerful. “But only if you really, really need to.”

  Her arms burning, Red could hold on no longer.

  “I’m letting go, hold on to her!”

  Fabian slipped out of her grasp, bringing Tanya tumbling down on top of him. As she slid through the window the rough stone tore her top and scratched her skin, causing her to cry out again. Fabian was on his feet at once, and together he and Red half lifted and half dragged Tanya away from the wall, away from the church, and through the graveyard, Oberon bounding along beside them.

  They paused only to seal the entrance to the secret tunnel—for none of them wanted to go back through it. While Red and Fabian shifted the slab back into place, Tanya staggered out of the graveyard and heaved the contents of her stomach into the grass. Though the front of the church was intact, there was a final, obstinate crash from the back as the wall collapsed altogether.

  Dirty, disheveled, and stunned, they left the graveyard and headed for the manor. Above them, the edges of the sky blushed pink as daylight dawned along with the realization that they had been out all night.

  In the bathroo
m that adjoined Tanya’s room, Red tended to Tanya’s wounds. Fabian hovered in the doorway, refusing to go to bed. Watery sunshine filtered through the window. Were it not for their dirty, bloody, and drawn faces, the night would have seemed nothing more than a bad dream.

  “How are you feeling?” Red asked.

  “Better,” said Tanya. She lifted her hand to touch the makeshift bandage that Red had made by ripping up one of Florence’s clean white towels.

  “You look better,” said Red. “But it’s a nasty cut. You’ll need to get it looked at.”

  “But that means I’ll have to tell my grandmother,” Tanya said.

  Red hesitated.

  “I know. And I think… I think it’s time she knew. About everything. Because this is getting way too dangerous.”

  “But she’ll stop us from searching for the charms,” Fabian protested. “And we’ve still got three more to find.”

  “She can stop you two,” Red answered evenly. “But she can’t stop me, because I’ll be gone.”

  Tanya looked up and Fabian opened his mouth to interrupt, but Red carried on.

  “I don’t think the last three charms are in the house. I think they’re in the places we discussed—Elizabeth’s old cottage and the Highwayman. I’m going to them today. Alone.”

  “But that’s only two,” said Tanya. “What about the third?”

  “I think I know,” said Red grimly. “But you don’t need to worry about that.”

  “Red?” Tanya asked in a small voice. “When you find James, what will you do? I mean, where will you go? You’ve been on the run for so long… what’s going to happen to you when you’ve got James to think of ? You can’t carry on living like this. What if you’re both put back into care?”

  “I’m not going back,” Red said sharply. “And neither is James. I’ll find a way, some way for us to disappear. Maybe we can join some travelers, find work… keep moving around. I don’t know, I’ll think of something. But I’m not going back, not ever.”

  She ignored the worried glances Tanya and Fabian gave each other and got up, walking back into the bedroom. She pulled her bag out from under Tanya’s bed and began methodically checking its contents.

  Fabian followed her out of the bathroom.

  “You’re leaving now?”

  She nodded, draping the fox-skin coat over the bag and checking the bracelet once more.

  “I’ll take the first bus.”

  “I suppose you’ll be wanting the directions then,” Fabian said quietly. He crept out of the room, leaving Tanya and Red alone.

  “So this is good-bye,” said Tanya.

  Red rubbed her nose awkwardly. “For a time, maybe.” She tried to smile. “Perhaps not forever. Who knows? When we’re older, and people have forgotten about me, maybe one day it’ll be safe for us to meet again.”

  Fabian returned, offering Red a scrap of paper with his spidery writing all over it and a rolled up ten-pound note from his money box.

  “Here. You’ll need the money for your bus fare. The cottage is the farthest. You’d be best going there first and working your way back to the Highwayman.”

  Red squinted at the paper, trying to decipher Fabian’s scrawl.

  “I know this village,” she said slowly. “Knook… My aunt lives there—I can’t remember where exactly, it’s been too long. Or at least, she did live there. I don’t know if she still does.”

  “Your aunt?” Tanya said in surprise. “I didn’t realize you had family. In the summer you said you had nowhere you could go.”

  Red shrugged.

  “It’s true. She’s the only one. My mother’s younger sister, Primrose—or Rose, as she insists on being called. She’s the oddball of the family. I never had much to do with her when my parents were alive, even though I liked her. But my parents didn’t like me visiting her for some reason. When they died, I hoped that she’d take me and James in. By the time the children’s home contacted her, it was too late.”

  “Maybe you could still try,” Tanya said. “If you went to see her… perhaps she could help.”

  Red looked unsure. “Perhaps.” She threw the last of her things into her bag and refilled her flask with water from the bathroom. She looked in the mirror over the basin. Her eyes were raging red from lack of sleep, her face thin and drawn. Her hair stuck up in short, elfin tufts. Finally, she fastened her bag and lifted it onto her shoulder. It was time to go.

  Tanya and Fabian watched from the porch as Red slipped through the gates of Elvesden Manor onto the dirt track. Soon she was out of sight.

  “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Tanya asked Fabian softly.

  “If what you’re thinking is that we carry on looking for the charms, then yes,” said Fabian fiercely. “I can’t just do nothing when my father is being held prisoner—we have to keep searching.”

  “Then we need to leave the house before my grandmother and Nell are awake,” said Tanya. She gestured to her head. “Once they see this, the game is up.”

  “I think the game might already be up,” said Fabian. “I didn’t say this in front of Red, but when I went back into my room to get the directions to Elizabeth’s old cottage, the notes we made about the charms—and their locations—had been disturbed. Someone’s been through my things.”

  “Let’s go now, before anyone has a chance to stop us,” said Tanya.

  Fabian nodded. “If we head straight for the Highwayman, we should have located the charm by the time Red doubles back. That way we can wait for her and we’ll know whether she was successful at the cottage.”

  “And whether she’s safe,” Tanya finished. “And then, we’ll get her to tell us where she thinks the final charm is so we can all search for it—together.”

  The first bus to Knook left just after eight o’clock. With time to spare, Red walked the lanes from Elvesden Manor to Tickey End in order to save money, and was on the bus for five minutes as it sat in the station, ready to leave. In moments, she was dozing, for the next hour drifting in and out of sleep. When it finally crawled into Knook, she hurried off the bus with a mumbled thanks to the driver and strode off in what she hoped was the right direction.

  The village had little to attract outsiders. Parts of it were even older than Tickey End, though here the tumbledown buildings were mainly cottages, and there was a distinct lack of the shops and inns that kept Tickey End thriving. At a public drinking fountain, Red consulted a small freestanding map of the village, and after working out which way to go, headed off.

  After a wrong turn and a lengthy backtrack she eventually found the street she was looking for—Magpie Lane—and began making her way along it. The cottage she was seeking had a name rather than a number, and though Fabian had warned that it was likely to have changed over the years, he had helpfully noted that, on the old maps at least, it had been the only cottage to be completely detached. The others on the street were married in pairs or huddled together in little terraced rows.

  “Honeysuckle Cottage,” she murmured to herself. “Where are you?”

  She was less than halfway down the street when things began looking familiar. She stopped, taking in a small pond adorned with ugly little gnomes in one garden, and a weathered swing seat in another. She stared at it, noting the flaky remnants of paint that had been bright, fresh blue the last time she’d seen it. She knew this street. She had been here before. A figure moved in the window behind the swing seat, and the net curtain twitched. Red moved on, keeping her head down. Memories stirred in her head: herself, five, maybe six years old, swinging her legs in the back of her parents’ car as it drove down this very road.

  “An hour, and then we’re leaving,” her father had said. “And if she asks for Rowan to stay over, just tell her we’ve got plans.”

  “But you know she’ll just keep asking,” Rowan’s mother had answered, with a fretful glance back at her daughter. “She always does.”

  “Then we’ll just keep telling her no,” her father said. “She’s
got to understand.”

  “Why can’t I stay at Auntie Primrose’s?” Rowan asked absently. She had just seen two children on a swinging garden seat. It looked fun, and Rowan longed to have a go, but soon the car had driven past and she forgot it, her child’s mind looking for the next distraction.

  “It’s Rose, darling,” her mother corrected. “She doesn’t like being called Primrose, remember?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Rowan. “I like Auntie Rose. She’s got red hair, like me.”

  “Of course you can stay at Auntie Rose’s,” her mother replied. “Just not tonight. Another night, perhaps.”

  “That’s what you always say,” Rowan whined. “I like her house. I like all the animals. Why can’t we have a pet?”

  Her father muttered something that she did not hear.

  The memory ended there, and Red stopped a little way in front of the only cottage that stood completely alone, a cottage that looked no different from the last time she had seen it, many years before. A wooden gate, painted crimson, opened onto a stone path leading up to a door of the same color. The walls were white, though in the shade of the heavy thickets and trees that surrounded the cottage, it appeared almost blue. A sign on the door, painted with familiar red berries to match those in the garden, read ROWANWOOD COTTAGE. It was Aunt Rose’s house.

  The knowledge filled her with a heavy dread. Her aunt had lived here ever since Red could remember, yet all the while it had been the cottage that Elizabeth Elvesden had lived in. The coincidence was extraordinary, yet Red was aware that it had to be more than that. The bracelet had led her to this point, to this place, for a reason.

  The curtains were all open, yet Red did not dare to knock at the door. Somehow she had to get into the house without being seen, but she did not know whether her aunt was even in or not. Taking a chance, she slipped through the gate and headed around the side of the house, where there was a second, larger gate of wrought iron that led to the back garden. Fixed to it was another sign, and this one read, BEWARE OF THE DOGS, GOAT, AND GEESE!