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Miss McCleethy’s voice is low and sure. “Haven’t I? She was one of us—a sister of the Order. She died trying to protect you, Gemma. I would honor her memory by looking after you.”

“She didn’t want me to be part of your Order. That’s why she kept me hidden in India.”Advertisement

Gently, Miss McCleethy secures the errant hair behind my ear, where it has the bad manners to obey her by staying put. “And yet, she asked your father to send you here should anything happen to her.”

I’ve been so certain these past few days, but now my thoughts feel mud-soaked, and I cannot see the way clearly. What if they are right and I am wrong?

“What will you do, Gemma? How will you manage all on your own?”

“But you’ve not been inside in twenty-five years,” I say, coming round again. “You are the one who doesn’t know how it is now.”

She stiffens. That motherly smile fades from her lips. “You’d be wise to listen to me, Miss Doyle. You may believe you can show largesse to these creatures, befriend them, join with them, but you are deceived. You’ve no idea what terrible acts they are capable of committing. They will betray you in the end. We are your friends, your family. There is only one way—our way—and it must be exercised with no exceptions.”

The clock tsk-tsks in time. The brown spot in the wood seems to grow. I can feel Miss McCleethy’s eyes upon me, daring me to look. Her voice softens once more to that motherly coo.

“Gemma, we’ve been protectors of the magic for generations. We understand its ways. Let us carry the burden. We shall bring you into the Order as one of our own. You’ll take your rightful place.”

“And if I refuse?”

Miss McCleethy’s voice turns razor-sharp. “I can no longer protect you.”

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She means to frighten me. But I shan’t give up so easily.

“Miss McCleethy, there is something I must confess,” I say, still staring at the floor. “I cannot enter the realms. Not anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

I force myself to meet her gaze. “I’ve tried, but the power has left me. I was afraid to tell you. I’m not who you thought me to be. I’m sorry.”

“But I thought you’d bound the magic to yourself.”

“I thought I had, too. But I was wrong. Or it wouldn’t take in me after all.”

“I see,” she says.

For the longest moment of my life, McCleethy holds my gaze while I try desperately not to flinch, and the clock measures our unspoken hate in ticks and tocks. At last, she turns her attention to a small ceramic angel figurine perched near the edge of a side table.

“Miss Doyle, if you’re lying, I’ll know in time. Such power can’t easily be hidden.”

“I’m sorry to be such a disappointment,” I say.

“Not half as sorry as I am.”

She tries to move the angel back from the table’s edge and nearly drops it. It wobbles precariously, then stops.

“May I go to bed now?” I ask, and she dismisses me with a wave of her hand.

“Gemma. Pssst!” It’s Felicity. She and Ann have hidden in Ann’s bed. She pops up like a jack-in-the-box in hair ribbons. “What happened? Did McCleethy bite you with her fangs?”

“In a manner of speaking,” I say, pulling at my boots. I loosen the tiny loops from the hooks. “She wanted me to become one with the Order and follow their training.”

“She wanted you to give them all your power, you mean,” Felicity scoffs.

“Did she mention taking us into the Order?” Ann asks.

“No,” I say, leaving my stockings on the floor in a heap. “She only wanted me.”

Felicity’s eyes narrow. “You told her no, then?” It is not so much a question as a demand.

“I told her I no longer held the power and that I couldn’t enter the realms at all.”

Felicity snorts in delight. “Well done, Gemma!”

“I don’t think she believed me,” I warn. “We shall have to be very careful.”

“She’ll be no match for us.” Felicity bounds out of Ann’s bed. “Till morning, mes amies!”

“Mawah meenon ne le plus poohlala,” I say with an affected bow.

Felicity laughs. “What, pray tell, was that?”

“My French. I daresay it’s improving.”

Ann falls asleep within minutes, and I am left to stare at the cracks branching off left and right in the ceiling. What if Miss McCleethy is right? What if the realms don’t choose my friends or the forest folk? Whom will they blame for that? Then again, Miss McCleethy tried to force me to take her into the realms once before. She’d say or do anything to return the realms to the Order. pqdm.com