Eternal (17 page)

Books and papers were strewn al over the floor. What had she been searching for? “And I hear that poor Helen has had a mishap too,” Miss Dalrymple went on. “You must be so concerned for her. After al , you’re so close, aren’t you?

Almost—” Her voice quivered. “Almost like sisters.”

Without warning Miss Dalrymple gripped my arm so tightly that I gasped in pain. “We’re watching you,” she whispered. “You need to be very, very careful if you don’t want to get into more trouble than you can handle.”

“Don’t touch her,” said Evie, flaming up in anger. “We know who you are and your disgusting friends. We’re not frightened of you or your precious Priestess or whatever she cal s herself now.”

Miss Dalrymple’s face registered a flicker of surprise; then she pul ed herself together. She let go of me and assumed her usual, sickly sweet expression. “I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“But what about Miss Scratton? What have you done to her?”

“What have I done? Sarah dear, I think you must be feverish. You need to calm down. If you carry on with your wild accusations, you might end up in trouble. And if you must know,” she added with a bright smile, “our dear High Mistress is in the hospital at Wyldford Cross. Such a dreadful accident. Such a shame.”

She shut the door in our faces and left us standing there, completely stunned. A single night and a stupid prank had changed everything. First Helen, then Miss Scratton had been struck down. Which of us would Mrs.

Hartle and her minions attack next?

So it looks as though the coven has worked out that Miss Scratton is not one of them,” Evie said.

“And Mrs. Hartle must be behind al this, acting as the Priestess or whatever she wants to cal herself now,” I added.

We were sitting at the door of the shepherd’s hut the next day, talking to Josh and Cal in the early morning sunshine. Evie and I had gone there before breakfast on our ponies, accompanied by Josh. We had told the boys everything that had happened.

“So you think this road accident was part of a plan?”

asked Cal.

The news had been announced at evening prayers the night before. Apparently the minibus in which Miss Scratton and the students had been traveling on the way back from St. Martin’s Academy had skidded across the road when a deer had leaped out in front of the vehicle.

The girls had been taken to the Wyldford Cross hospital with minor cuts and bruises, but Miss Scratton had been admitted with serious head injuries. It was sickening even to think about it.

“I’m sure it must have been set up deliberately,” I said.

“Helen and Miss Scratton both have ‘accidents’ the day after Velvet stumbles into working a spel to release the spirits of the dead? It has to be Mrs. Hartle attacking them.”

Cal frowned and looked puzzled. “But I thought that Miss Scratton had some kind of power. How could she be ambushed by Mrs. Hartle?”

“Miss Scratton is a Guardian,” I explained. “She has lived at different times in Wyldcliffe’s history, using different names, playing different roles. She’s been a teacher, a healer, and a sister in the old convent. That’s al we know, and she wasn’t supposed to tel us that much. But I don’t think she can just step in and put everything right. We have to do it for ourselves. She can guide us, that’s al .”

“But wouldn’t she be able to protect herself from attack by Mrs. Hartle?” added Josh.

“I don’t know—not if she was taken by surprise, maybe.

Anyway, she’s not invincible, is she? Her spirit might be from the mystic realm, but she lives in the human world.

Her bones can be broken in a car crash like anyone else’s.

It sounds as though she’s real y hurt. I just hope she’l be al right.”

“Didn’t she say something about not being al owed to stay in Wyldcliffe?” Evie asked. “Because she had told us her secret—do you think this is how she is being taken away from us?”

We had so many questions, and there was no one to answer them for us. My head was throbbing from anxiety and lack of sleep. I tried to grasp hold of something positive.

“Even if we assume that both Helen and Miss Scratton have been attacked by the Priestess,” I said, “the fact is that she didn’t actual y kil them. So that must be good news for us. Either the Priestess wasn’t strong enough, and they managed to resist her, or . . .”

“Or perhaps she doesn’t want them dead yet,” said Cal.

I shuddered, and he put his arm around my shoulders with awkward pride, conscious of the others watching us together. Evie looked across at us and smiled encouragingly, but Josh suppressed a sigh. He was being so patient with Evie—just good friends—but I could sense how much he longed to have the right to embrace her.

He got to his feet and looked out over the val ey. “So Mrs. Hartle is back and Miss Scratton is out of the way, Helen’s had a mysterious accident and Velvet might be involved as some kind of rogue element. It’s not looking good, is it? You and Sarah are vulnerable to attack, Evie.

You need to work together to be safe. You need Helen back with you.”

“I agree with Josh,” Cal said. “We have to do something to help Helen, not just for her own sake but for al of you.”

I remembered what Miss Scratton had said the previous term: If you stay true to each other, you will be strong enough for anything. . . . And her more recent words now seemed to hold another message: Do not break the Circle.

She was right. We were linked together, and we needed one another. If one of us was hurt, we were al hurt.

Our sisterhood was our bond and our strength.

“I brought this,” I said, taking the Book out of my bag. It looked faded and insignificant in the sunlight, but I felt a vibration in my fingertips when I touched it. “I’ve found something that might help Helen get better quickly.” A thought struck me. “You don’t mind, Evie? I mean, it’s okay to show the Book to Josh and Cal?”

“Of course. They’re part of this now.” She glanced up at the boys. “If that’s what you want. Are you sure?”

“Yes,” said Cal. “I’m sure.”

“I’d walk through fire for you, Evie, you know that,” said Josh, with sudden intensity. “And what I told you about Martha and Agnes might help. I belong in Wyldcliffe.

Whatever I can do, whatever is inside me—it’s al for you.”

Evie blushed and said faintly, “Thank you, Josh—thank you so much.”

He stepped back and tried to shrug the moment off, forcing his emotions under control. “Hey, I’m just glad to be here, if it helps. And I’m glad Cal has come back too.”

Josh looked at me and smiled with understanding in his warm brown eyes. “So, Sarah, what do you want us to do?”

I had already found the page I wanted. “A Charme to Cure a Friend.” It wasn’t a complicated ritual or spel , just a recipe for a simple cordial of the kind Martha might have made, and her mother and grandmothers before her. In my bag were the necessary ingredients and equipment—a bowl, some sealed jars, and a tiny green glass phial—

which I had taken earlier from Agnes’s little treasure store.

Her secret study was stil open in the attic, and I had got up at dawn to raid it in preparation.

“‘Distille the essence of Lavender for Cleansing, and Hawthorne blossom for the Heart, and add to a Mixture of Rosewater and Honey. All the time saying the Incantation of Friendship, and burning aromatic Woods. The Flame of Friendship must heat the Mixture, and all due Ceremonie must be kept. Add the Secret Spices and offer all with Prayers and Supplications. . . .’”

Cal quickly made us a smal fire in a ring of stones in front of the hut, and Josh watched in fascination as Evie and I prepared everything. We asked the boys to keep a lookout for other riders from the school, or anyone else who might be out early—farmworkers or enthusiastic hil walkers. They took up their positions, and then Evie and I reached into ourselves for faith and hope. We chanted the incantations under our breath as softly as the wind sighing over the bright hil s. “Let Helen be as free as the air,” I begged. “Let her be liberated from sickness.” Step by step we fol owed the instructions to make the healing potion, and a little while later the glass phial was ful of pale liquid.

We put out the fire and cleansed the area, so that no one would suspect what we had done there.

“Bless this healing remedy,” I said, and gave the phial to Evie for her blessing. She took the little bottle in her hands and prayed fervently, “Let it make Helen wel again.” Then she glanced over at Cal, who was stil scanning the land for any unwanted intruders. “Your blessing, please, Cal.”

He looked slightly surprised, but took the medicine from her and examined it. “Let it do its work,” Cal said simply, then passed it to Josh.

The green phial lay on Josh’s open palm. His hands were broad and strong, but I had seen the delicate carving of a horse that he had made as a gift for Evie on Valentine’s Day, and how sensitively he handled the living animals under his care. Now he touched the glass bottle lightly with the fingertips of his other hand and said, “Helen, come back to us.” A flash of light flared out from the phial, and I saw the wonder in Evie’s eyes and realized that she hadn’t quite believed that Josh could be connected with Lady Agnes until that moment. “Let this bring healing,”

Josh added, handing the bottle back to Evie.

“Let it be so,” she whispered, and I saw so clearly that we were al connected, in one endless circle of life and death and renewal, an endless circle of love.

My mind pul ed back sharply to the present. “Thanks so much, everyone,” I said in a businesslike voice. “Now we need to get in to see Helen and give her this. We’d better get back to school.”

We rode back in pairs, Evie and Josh fal ing a little way behind.

Cal stayed close to me. “I hope this medicine helps Helen, but everything stil feels so fragile,” he said. “You need something more to protect you, Sarah. If Mrs. Hartle is on the loose again, anything could happen. I can’t bear to think that you might be the next one she attacks. Let me sneak into the school grounds tonight. I could sleep in the stables to be nearer to you.”

“No, if you get caught they’d set the police on you! You mustn’t risk it.”

“They can’t stop me being with you when you’re in danger,” he growled.

“If she’s going to attack me next, it could happen anywhere,” I answered. “You can’t always be there, ready to defend me. Evie was right about one thing; we have to be able to live, not creep about in hiding. I’ve got to finish this, Cal. I’ve got to put a stop to it once and for al so that we can al live in peace.”

“Why don’t you come away with me and get out of al this?” he asked abruptly. “We could join my family on the road, and be free in the ancient ways, with nothing to keep us apart.” My heart beat fast. I saw myself riding pil ion on the back of Cal’s horse, my arms wrapped round his waist, or driving together in a beat-up truck, making our way on the old trails across the countryside, laughing with his sister and uncles around a campfire, tel ing tales and singing songs, then lying together in a narrow bed and waking up together in the morning. . . .

“No, I can’t, it’s impossible.”

“Why not, rich girl?” he teased. “The Romany life too hard for you? Parents wouldn’t approve?”

“It’s not that. I’ve made a promise. To be true to my sisters and to be faithful to the gifts of the Mystic Way, wherever they might lead me. I have to see this through.

And your mother said a promise can’t be broken—”

“Except with a curse. You’re right.” Cal sighed. “But I wish you weren’t.” He slowed his horse to a walk, and we twined our hands together and rode side by side, not speaking, listening to the beating of our hearts.

When we got back to school, we left the boys at the gates with the horses and hurried to the dining hal for breakfast. As soon as the meal was over, Evie and I flew straight to the infirmary. We were eager to see Helen and give her the healing cordial. But the nurse barred our way.

“Helen’s not at al wel , I’m afraid,” she said disapprovingly, as though any sign of il ness was a criticism of her professional care. “She’s got a high temperature and needs to rest. I can’t possibly let you see her.”

“Has she seen the doctor?” I asked, sickeningly disappointed.

“The doctor came late last night and said it’s probably just shock—a reaction to the fal . He’s given Helen something to make her sleep. I’m sure she’l be better soon.”

“Has she said anything, has she been talking? Did she ask to see us?” Evie asked.

“No, no, and no,” the nurse answered. “Now stop pestering me. I’ve nursed enough Wyldcliffe girls to know what to do. The best thing you can do for your friend is stop worrying about her.”

It was easy to say and impossible to do. For a wild moment I suspected that the nurse was a secret member of the coven and was deliberately obstructing us from seeing Helen so that she could do some harm to her. But I had no reason to believe that. I put my hand on the nurse’s starched sleeve pleadingly. “Please, Sister McFarlane,” I begged. “Let me just see her for two minutes. I know you’re looking after her beautiful y, but we’ve been so frightened, it was such an awful shock. If you let me see her just for a moment, we’l stop worrying and we won’t bother you anymore.”

The nurse pursed her lips, as if making up her mind; then she relented. “Wel , if it means so much to you. It’s nice that you care so much. Just one of you, mind, and not for long.”

“You go, Sarah,” said Evie quickly, slipping the phial into my hand. “I’l wait here.”

I fol owed the nurse into the bright, sunny infirmary.

Helen was lying on her back in the nearest bed with the covers pul ed to one side. She looked hot, and although her eyes were closed she didn’t seem properly asleep.

She moved her head restlessly, and her breath was quick and shal ow.

“I think the sun is in her eyes,” I lied, and the nurse bustled over to the window to adjust the blinds. As quickly as a conjurer I touched Helen’s lips with the glass phial, and a few drops of the liquid slipped into her mouth.

“Wel , you’ve seen her now,” said the nurse kindly, turning back from the window. “You can see she’s in good hands. Come back later, and I’l tel you how she is.”