The Threads of Magic, Alison Croggon [uplifting novels txt] 📗

“I want to see Ma,” said Oni, her jaw jutting ominously. “You can’t tell me what to do.”

“No, I can’t. You’re quite right.” Missus Orphint put on her hat. “I’m requesting you as politely as I can to heed my words. You two should go to bed and get some sleep. We’ve already lost El, and Amina would never forgive me if I lost her daughter too.”

She opened the kitchen door and stood for a moment, looking out. The moon was peeping out from behind the swags of clouds, letting down a silvery light. She stepped outside and disappeared into the darkness. They heard her footsteps retreating, followed by a long silence that was punctuated by the drip drip drip of rain from the trees.

Oni stood up and shut the back door. “I thought she was going to fly. Missus Orphint is an owl-shaper,” she said, as she returned to her chair.

“A what?”

“She turns into an owl. Maybe she thought it was too dangerous to use magic.”

Two hours before, Pip would have been amazed and fascinated, but now he didn’t care what witches could do. None of it was any use if they couldn’t rescue El. It was witches who had caused all this trouble, anyway. It was a witch who had made the Heart.

“Pip.”

He ignored her, so Oni plucked at his sleeve.

“Pip, I’m really sorry. I’m sorry about El. I’m sorry about everything.”

“Like that does any good.”

“Maybe we could try to look for her.”

“You just said you didn’t know how. And anyway Missus Orphint said not to do anything.”

“Missus Orphint said you should try to talk to Clovis.”

“He’s not there. And why would I talk to someone who probably murdered my sister?”

“Try, Pip. Surely it’s worth a try? For El’s sake?”

Pip met her eyes. “Why?”

“You heard what Missus Orphint said. Maybe he needs to be less frightened. Maybe he needs a friend.”

Oni didn’t say out loud what she was thinking, because she was too afraid. Pip was more than sad and angry: he didn’t seem quite himself. And Oni had begun to wonder why.

Maybe Clovis had disappeared from the Heart because he was now inside Pip. Maybe Clovis was beginning to take over Pip’s body, just like Clovis’s father had planned to take over Clovis’s body.

Oni bit her lip, trying to think clearly instead of panicking. All the stories she knew about the Heart said that the child prince wasn’t yet a Specter. They said he had been touched by the Specter’s blood magic but not devoured by it. But now Oni had begun to wonder if it was already too late when Old Missus Pledge made the spell. Maybe the soul trapped inside the Heart wasn’t a little boy: or at least, it wasn’t only a little boy. Maybe Prince Clovis was also the Specter King, and now both of them were inside Pip.

If that were so, then Clovis’s father hadn’t been killed after all. Not properly. Maybe, Oni thought, the cardinal didn’t want the Heart because he was afraid it would destroy the Specters. Maybe he wanted it because it was a way of bringing back the Specter King.

Or something worse.

The longer she thought, the worse the possibilities that unraveled before her. If she could find out more about what was happening inside Pip’s mind . . .

“Pip,” she said, clasping his arm. “Maybe we can help El.”

Pip brushed her hand off irritably. “Don’t do that, Oni. It’s annoying. Of course I’ll try it. I just don’t know where to start.”

Oni sighed with relief. Her fears suddenly seemed silly. He was just Pip: rude, sharp-faced, irritating Pip, the same as always.

“All right,” she said. “Let’s try.”

MISSUS ORPHINT ARRIVED AT THE UNDERCROFT shortly after Amina. The carnival was still in full swing, but Missus Orphint was not in a carnival mood. El’s disappearance had shaken her more than she had permitted Oni and Pip to see. A Rupture in her own safe house? That was bad. That was very bad.

She didn’t like leaving those two children alone either. Oni was smart, very much her mother’s daughter, but not even the most experienced witch knew much about Ruptures. Ruptures were what happened when magic strained the fibers of reality too far and broke them, and they were completely unpredictable. Specter magic, which ignored all the laws, made small Ruptures all the time, although even Specters tried to avoid them. A Rupture that was driven by a mind, let alone the mind of a damaged child — that was something else. Something much more dangerous.

Missus Orphint had some very strong views on what Old Missus Pledge had done when she made the Heart, and none of them were complimentary to Old Missus Pledge. She understood why the witch had taken the risk, but that didn’t mean she approved. But whether she approved or not, it was imperative that the witches find Old Missus Pledge’s spell before the Office for Witchcraft Extermination got hold of it.

At the council tent, a slim, fair girl with deep shadows under her eyes was standing a little distance away from the others. She was dressed in breeches and a shirt, and her hair was wound into ringlet rags. She was obviously the Princess Georgette, but she didn’t look much like a princess without all her finery; she looked forlorn, exhausted, and lost.

Missus Orphint didn’t approve of royals either, and she especially didn’t approve of royals descended from the Specter. But despite herself, she felt a pang of compassion.

“I promise that I wouldn’t betray anyone here,” Georgette was saying. She was holding herself very straight. “I just wouldn’t.”

“How do we know that?” said Amiable. She seemed in an irritable mood. If she had been in cat form, her tail would have been thrashing. “That’s exactly what a traitor would say.”

“Hush, Amiable,” said Amina. “Georgie has no love for our enemies.”

Georgette pressed her hands hard together, trying to control the wobble in her jaw. “They are my enemies too,”