If each one contained another captured spirit, and too many spirits made Pinchbeck weak, then maybe . . .
Elation and hope propelled Charlotte along faster than ever. Everything was beginning to make sense. The book. The rats that were everywhere Pinchbeck went. The strange comment to Charlotte about how she should have been a man instead . . . as if she could have chosen. What if she had? What if she hadn’t always been in that body?
‘The bag—’ Charlotte started. There wasn’t enough time to explain and she was breathless from the effort. ‘More Cabinets. More Cabinets make her weaker.’
‘Yes!’ Leander shouted. ‘We can open them all. Then she’ll be too weak to fight off the men.’
‘There was a secret picture.’ She stumbled and had to grab on to a wall to take the weight off her ankle. ‘Ouch.’
‘Here, I’ve got you.’ Leander came to her side and put his arm round her waist. ‘Lean on me.’ She placed her arm over his shoulder and he helped her walk.
‘There was a picture in the spellbook. A secret one. It showed a man turning into a rat. There were pictures. Of our Cabinets.’ She winced in pain. ‘Your story – the Rat King. I think it’s her.’
‘In the fairy tale . . . the Rat King used up all his magic and was stuck as a rat for ever,’ finished Leander.
It was impossible. Surely it was impossible. And yet . . .
‘Run ahead,’ said Charlotte. ‘I’m too slow. I’ll catch you up. Run and open the Cabinets.’
‘I don’t want to leave you,’ said Leander.
‘Go! Felix needs us!’
‘Felix!’ Leander appeared round the corner of the street, waving the violin case in the air. He stood by the wheel of Lord Litchfield’s carriage and set down the bag of Cabinets very gently, afraid of damaging them. With trembling fingers, he unlatched the violin case before quickly starting to open the sack of Cabinets.
Felix’s eyes closed in relief and he melted away from Pinchbeck’s grip, vanishing to nothing. A murmur of confusion and fear rippled over the onlookers.
‘Exsisto!’ Pinchbeck roared. Felix had no choice but to emerge, taking solid form again beside Leander.
This led to much shouting and the horse, thoroughly spooked, reared up on its back legs and bolted. The constable’s men threw themselves back into the bushes to avoid being trampled as it clattered off through the crowd.
Pinchbeck grabbed a pitchfork. The men recovered and advanced on her once again, but she swung and jabbed, forcing them back.
But now something else was happening. Pinchbeck’s command hadn’t only summoned Felix. Gradually, one by one, other shapes began to take form around Leander and Felix.
Charlotte’s plan was working!
Slowly, the spirits solidified, some taking longer than others to find their substance. Each was different – some poured out like treacle and others crackled into being. How long had these pour souls been trapped? A tall, wiry boy with red hair and a crooked nose. A lad with deep brown skin in a red embroidered suit. Two children with white-blond curls and matching frock coats. Shock and wonder painted their faces.
‘Abeo!’ shouted Pinchbeck.
Felix disappeared. The other spirits also vanished, forced back inside their Cabinets. But not Leander – his Cabinet was still lost. There was no time to spare. He jumped back into action.
‘The sack,’ Leander urged Felix. ‘Help me open the Cabinets.’
Reaching into the bag, he pulled out a glass jar and strained to remove the stopper. He bit the old cork and pulled it free with his teeth. Next a silk purse. His fingers fumbled at the muddled knot in the string. With their Cabinets open, the spirits inside were free to emerge.
And then Felix appeared again.
‘Here,’ said Leander, passing him Isaak’s box. Felix desperately pulled at it, trying to open the warped lid.
At last Charlotte arrived. Leander was overcome with relief and hope that the three of them were finally back together. Charlotte hobbled over to them and immediately began to help, pulling out a square tin and prising off the lid.
‘Devils!’ screamed Pinchbeck, her voice already hoarse and limp. She was hunched over now, her eyes completely black, the white of her hair seeming to spread over her flesh.
It was true. She was the Rat King, and her magic was about to run out.
Pellar laughed a dark, hearty, vengeful laugh, still holding the gun. Could he see it, too?
‘Abeo!’ croaked Pinchbeck, but with no real power now. The spirits once again became vapour, swallowed into their Cabinets, but it was futile. With their Cabinets open, they reappeared at once, unwilling to be contained a moment longer. Leander lifted out the last Cabinet – a leather spectacle case – and snapped it open.
Pinchbeck howled. Leander looked up in time to see her staggering backwards into the stable, pitchfork trembling in her twisted fingers, shoulders stooped, all fight draining away. More than that, she was changing, every part of her body twisting and stretching and shrinking, fur spreading, eyes growing darker. She was no longer human, halfway between woman and rodent. The weight of all those captured souls was draining the last of her magic and she was transforming. Surely Pinchbeck would release them now, if such a thing was possible. Surely she would save herself from becoming a rat.
Only Felix wasn’t looking at the transformation of Pinchbeck. Instead, he was staring at the shimmering, transparent form of a small boy who had emerged from the battered wooden box Felix had at last managed to prise open. Felix sank to his knees and put his arms out to the boy, who ran to him, becoming more solid with each step.
‘Isaak!’ Felix cried.
‘You shan’t take me alive,’ Pinchbeck croaked, snatching the oil lamp and casting it to the floor. In an instant, the straw and wood were engulfed in flames.
The constable leaped back from the fire and the stable door swung shut. A final image of Pinchbeck was seared in Leander’s brain: her skirts encircled by tongues of flame, as though hell itself had opened up to claim her.
She’s dying!
Charlotte clung to Leander’s shoulder. Pinchbeck would be consumed by the fire. They had won, and they were going to die anyway.
25
Death:
Endings, Transition,
Metamorphosis
Shoving, shouting, crying. Was it over? Was this where he would die?
In an act of foolish heroism, some men tried to get into the stable, to save Pinchbeck or to catch her – Leander wasn’t sure which.
‘Get her!’ the men were shouting. ‘Take her alive!’
The newly rescued spirits of ten or twelve children cowered and wept, wandering between the frightened and baffled locals.
Lord Litchfield fought his way through the people to his niece. Leander was bundled out of the way by people carrying water in buckets and jugs in a useless attempt to douse the flames. The fire was already reaching its long fingers up the walls and threatening the roof. Pinchbeck could not possibly survive.
Charlotte sat on the step of her uncle’s carriage, crying in long-overdue sobs, and Lord Litchfield lifted Felix’s chin to check he hadn’t been cut by the knife.
Leander was the only person who remembered Edmund Pellar.
He watched in dumb silence as Pellar walked calmly towards the stable and bent to scoop something up, which he then dropped into a small sack. He tied it with a knot and tucked it into the pocket of his greatcoat.
And then Pellar strode away.
Leander chased him down, catching up with him in the next road.
‘No need to follow me, child. You did it.’
‘The fire – it will kill her. We’ll all die!’
‘It shan’t kill her because she isn’t there.’
Leander opened his mouth to argue. Pellar took out the sack from his pocket. Inside Leander could make out the bulging, wriggling shape of a rat. ‘She’s safe with me.’
‘That’s Pinchbeck? The rat?’
‘Aye. The rat.’ Pe
llar’s eyes sparkled, and the whisper of a smile played on his lips as he put the sack back.
‘How? Why?’ The shadow in the cell, the hairs on her cheek . . .
‘You left her no choice. The spirits were out, her magic exposed. Perchance she could have held out a little longer, but capture was inevitable. What then? The gallows? Not Augustina Pinchbeck. Better to go on her own terms.’
‘But if she could turn into a rat why didn’t she do it before? When she needed to escape the cell?’
‘Think, boy. The only way for her form to change was for her to give up all her precious captives. Everythin’ she’d worked for. Do you think she’d do that if there was any other choice?’
‘Is that really her? Are you sure?’ Leander had seen her changing with his own eyes, but he could hardly believe it. And she had been so much bigger, and the fire had spread so quickly.
‘I’d show you, but the other lad took the thing—’
‘This?’ Leander drew the hagstone from his pocket and peered through it. Sure enough, there was an odd misty- purple glow around Pellar’s pocket where the rat was. ‘Oh.’
Pellar nodded, and held out his hand for the stone. Leander gave it back.
‘So what now? Are we free?’
Pellar threw back his head in laughter. ‘Free, child? Can’t you tell? Can’t you feel it with every ounce of your being?’
And Leander could. Underneath the cold and the ache and the exhaustion, there was a pleasing hollowness in his chest, as though he was breathing a little deeper. ‘Is it truly over?’
‘For you, it is over. For Pinchbeck –’ he reached into his greatcoat and pulled out the writhing sack again – ‘maybe not.’
‘Are you going to kill her?’
‘Oh no. I shall show her the same mercy she showed us. A lifetime in a cage should be a good start.’
‘Why didn’t you tell us what to do?’ asked Leander. ‘That we only had to release the other spirits to weaken her power so much that she’d have no choice but to set us all free?’
‘I had no inklin’ there were so many, nor that Augustina would be so desperate. You were clever, and you were lucky. I should know. I was in the business of luck. Here.’ He shoved the rat bag back into his pocket and unpinned something from his waistcoat. He pressed it into Leander’s palm. ‘For luck, with my gratitude.’
It was Leander’s locket, chain intact.
‘Where did you—’
‘No more questions, child. Some things in this world should remain mysteries. Now go! Go to your friends! Taste your freedom! Rejoice in it!’
Then he walked away into the night.
Leander rubbed his fingers over the cool, reassuring shape of his mother’s locket.
‘Leander?’ came Charlotte’s voice from far away. ‘Leander!’
And Leander started running for what he hoped would be the last time.
26
Kings of Cups:
Generosity, Kindness,
a Father Figure
The fire raged as though the earth itself was determined to burn away any memory of Pinchbeck and her crimes. Charlotte’s uncle tried to usher them to the warmth and safety of the inn, but the children refused to go until the wood was consumed and the stable no more than a skeleton of glowing charcoal.
Pinchbeck was reduced to the vile rodent that she was. Leander explained Pellar’s intention to keep her caged and tormented. A just end? Not quite as much as she deserved. All those years she had dragged Felix up and down the country, letting him believe he was searching for his brother. And she’d had him captive all along. There were a million things he needed to say to Isaak, but the only words Felix could find were, ‘I love you.’
Eleven other spirits had been released. Eleven stolen lives. Eleven shattered families, not counting the three broken Cabinets they carefully pieced together from the shards at the bottom of the sack. Felix recognized some of them as the poor children Pinchbeck had stolen during their time together. Others, it seemed, were far older.
Felix didn’t even know how to feel. Elated. Angry. Betrayed. Overjoyed. Even a little sad – he knew Pinchbeck deserved her fate, but he had cared for her, and the fire hadn’t been quite strong enough to burn away every trace of those memories.
The other spirit children were disorientated. Some were older than Charlotte, others little more than toddlers. Why would Pinchbeck steal such small children? What possible use could they be? Some cried while others laughed and leaped into the air, delighting in their physical form again. As the hours passed, they gradually became aware that they were free and could no longer disappear into their Cabinets. A joyful notion, but one that raised more questions. Most of the children were far from home. All had been imprisoned for many, many years – most even longer than Felix. Their families were likely dead or scattered to the wind. Some of the children didn’t know their own last names. Three spoke no English. Reunion with their loved ones was impossible.
The owner of the inn was not happy when asked to provide lodgings for fourteen children. It was a tiny place, not accustomed to more than the occasional traveller. A good deal of money exchanged hands to allow them to sleep higgledy-piggledy on the floor of the inn’s two guest rooms. They couldn’t very well wander the streets all night, Charlotte’s uncle said, and nothing useful could be done until morning.
Leander and Isaak supped on hot gruel, side by side. Felix sat with them, but found it hard to eat. All he wanted to do was stare at them.
‘What are you thinking?’ said Leander. ‘You’re miles away.’
‘I was thinking how lucky I am to have my brothers back.’
‘Brothers?’ said Leander with a smile.
‘Brothers,’ said Felix. ‘I’m glad you came along and messed everything up.’
‘Me too,’ said Leander.
Isaak reached across the table to squeeze Felix’s hand. He hadn’t spoken since the fire, but Felix wasn’t worried. They were together now. Safe. Isaak was probably bubbling with the same confusing mix of emotions as Felix. He would speak when he was ready.
One by one the spirit children – Just children now, Felix supposed – were taken up to the two tiny bedrooms upstairs to sleep. Felix went outside with his violin to try to make sense of what had happened.
He lifted the bow and let his tale spill out through the still night air. He played quick, high notes like tiny, pattering paws, and long, slow, lamenting wails. Felix closed his eyes and let the music tell the story of the Rat King, and three stolen children running through the night, and a long, long journey home.
‘I heard you,’ came Isaak’s voice when the last note hung in the air. ‘I always knew you were looking for me.’
‘I had a promise to keep,’ said Felix.
Though she was exhausted, Charlotte’s mind was too busy to sleep.
The other children had settled at last. Felix and Isaak slept curled together like cats, while Leander burrowed beneath soft blankets. The housekeeper, Mrs Smart, had been instructed to take care of the little ones, but the woman was as gentle as limestone and soon became impatient with their fretting. Charlotte soothed them into a big shared bed, and a little before dawn they were finally all asleep. Among them was a small, fair-featured little girl Charlotte had never expected to see again. Rosa. The last of Pinchbeck’s victims, at least until Leander came along. Charlotte pulled a blanket up over Rosa’s sleeping frame. It was a miracle, as though she had risen from the dead.
Charlotte wandered into the hallway and sat down on the bare wooden stairs, still covered in the mess of her adventure. She rested her head against the panelling and picked at the loose threads on her dress.
‘May I join you?’
Charlotte jumped up.
‘Sit down,’ said her uncle. ‘Rest.’
She sat on the stair and he creaked and groaned his way down beside her.
‘You were lost in thought,’ he said.
‘I was trying to make sense of everything. I can�
�t believe we’re together finally. And yet nothing will be the same as before.’
‘No. I am grateful nevertheless.’
They sat a while, content. Dry mud on the hem of her dress was beginning to flake off. It was calming to think of mundane things like cloth and mud. Far easier than thinking of flames and magic and a dozen children without homes.
‘I’m so sorry,’ said her uncle at last.
‘You had no way to find me.’
‘More than that, Charlotte. It was my fault you were taken.’
‘I traded her my lantern. That’s how she caught me.’ Charlotte didn’t know how to explain. It all sounded so impossible. ‘We argued, do you remember? I wanted to go to the parties and you said . . .’
‘You were too young.’ The old man nodded.
‘You’d been so busy with work. I thought you were going to send me away.’ She sniffed. ‘I wanted an adventure. It sounds so stupid now. I only thought we might be gone a few days. I wanted you to miss me, I suppose.’
‘It wasn’t your fault.’ Litchfield sighed. ‘She stole you for a reason, Charlotte. To hurt me. Revenge for my misdeeds.’ He dabbed at his eye with the corner of his handkerchief.
‘No,’ said Charlotte. ‘It wasn’t like that.’
She put her small hand into his bony one, skin as soft and thin as chiffon. He had wasted away without her.
‘Do you remember the work I did? My writing?’
‘You wrote about mediums, and how they were frauds. I remember some of them coming to the house, even though you would never let me watch. Pinchbeck was one of them.’
‘The fashion for seances disgusted me. It started as a harmless game, I’m sure, but it went too far. These mediums who claim to talk to the dead, they’re all charlatans. The worst part is how they prey on grieving families. Using their pain for profit. It’s unforgivable.’
Charlotte felt heavy with guilt. Unforgivable. For so long, she had pushed aside her doubts about their work – she had no choice but to take part – but, now that it was over, years of regret and shame waited to overwhelm her.
The Vanishing Trick Page 21