Evermore (21 page)

"I love you too." I had to shout it. The wind
was so strong, trying to drag me in all directions, trying to break
me apart and scatter my pieces. "Goodbye, Jacob."

We held each other as the gale screamed and
roared, blowing the last of the remaining spirits into nothingness.
There was just Jacob and I, and we could not hold on for much
longer. I closed my eyes and buried my face in his chest. His arms
held me against him, but soon even they loosened. I opened my eyes
and was shocked by how transparent he looked. But it was me who
drifted away from him, not the other way round.

"Emily!" His voice was no more than a whistle
of wind.

"Jacob!" I tried to scramble back to him but
the force pulling me away was too strong. I was sucked into the
bright whirlpool of light again, then everything went still, quiet.
The wind stopped. There were no voices, no sounds. I couldn't see
anything except the light above but even that grew smaller until it
was a mere speck.

Jacob. Where was Jacob? I tried to call his
name but my voice didn’t work.

Then suddenly even the light was gone.
Snuffed out like a candle. I was surrounded by deep, blackest
dark.

Nothingness.

CHAPTER 12

"Emily. Emily, wake up," Celia said. "Emily,
can you hear me? Please, my precious girl, wake up."

"Here, let me try."

My body shook violently. It took me a moment
to realize somebody else was doing the shaking. I opened my eyes,
startling George who released me and stumbled backward.

"Emily!" Celia jerked me to a sitting
position and threw her arms around me. "Be gentle," said Mrs.
White. She stood behind me, but I recognized her voice. "She'll be
weak for some time."

"Did you do it?" George asked, urgent.
"Emily, did you speak the curse?"

I closed my eyes and held
myself very still. I couldn't talk. If I did, I might break into
pieces. I had delivered the curse that had destroyed the
Otherworld. Destroyed Jacob. It was all so terribly,
horribly
wrong
.

Someone in the corner of the room laughed.
"You're too late." It was Price, but his laughter quickly ended.
The sickening sound of bone smacking bone replaced it.

"Be quiet," growled Louis. "Do not give me a
reason to shoot you."

Whimpering came from the same direction, out
of my sight. It was a woman, not Price. Mrs. Stanley?

"Emily, you must answer
me," George said. His face and clothes were covered with mud, his
hair a wild tangle. He'd been riding, I remembered. He'd gone to
the gypsy camp with my father. "
Did you
deliver the curse
?"

"I did." My whisper raked down my throat like
sharp nails. God, it hurt. Everything hurt. "Jacob..." I tried hard
not to cry. I wanted Celia to comfort me, but she was suddenly not
there anymore.

"We have to hurry," said George. "Mrs. White,
are you ready?" He removed his jacket, waistcoat, and shirt,
throwing them on the floor in a heap. I expected Celia to protest
that he should not appear in such a state in front of me, but she
was actually helping him.

The world had gone mad in my absence.

"Sit," Celia said, shoving him into a large
armchair.

George was barely settled when Mrs. White
jabbed him with the syringe. I watched, appalled, as his eyes
closed slowly. Is that how I'd looked moments before? Like I was
merely going to sleep?

"W...what's going on?" I could hardly form
the words. Hardly think. My mind was numb, my body aching. Every
bone felt like it had been ground in a mill, every vein opened
until I'd bled dry.

But worse than the aches was the memory of
Jacob, fading to nothing. It would haunt me until the day I died.
That day had almost been today, but I had enough presence of mind
to realize Mrs. White had saved me and brought me back to life. My
sister had succeeded after all, although she had not done it
alone.

"Mrs. Stanley tricked you," Mrs. White said
to me. "She and Leviticus."

"I know." My voice sounded thick, hoarse.
"I'm sorry, I thought it was you. But...George...?"

"We bought the counter curse from the
Romany," Louis said. "It didn't cost us as much as we had expected.
It seems they didn’t like the thought of the Otherworld not being
there when they die either."

I remembered what Mrs. Stanley had said,
about her people respecting death and the afterlife. It seemed she
did not respect it as much as her tribe, or perhaps something else
was stronger than her beliefs.

I turned a little to see Louis watching
Price, the pistol pointed at his chest as he sat like a statue, his
face stony. Mrs. Stanley stood at Price's side, her hand on her
lover's shoulder. She did not look at me, but Price's cold gaze
didn't waver from mine. Louis was as muddy as George and looked
just as exhausted, but he glanced back at me and smiled
reassuringly, although it wasn't reflected in his eyes. Worry had
settled there. Worry and grim foreboding. I wished I could smile
back to thank him for his efforts, but my heart was too sore. If
George didn't succeed, if it was too late to deliver the counter
curse, I would never smile again.

"That should be long enough," Louis said.
"Bring him back."

Mrs. White had been busy filling another
syringe. She injected the clear liquid into George's arm.

Nothing happened.

"He's not coming back," Mrs. White said,
panic making her voice shrill. She tapped his cheeks but George's
head lolled to the side, lifeless.

Price snickered. "He can't. The curse worked.
It's too late for him now. You did it, Miss Chambers. You destroyed
your lover and sent your friend here to his own destruction.
Congratulations."

I turned my face into the sofa cushion. I was
too exhausted and too heart-sore to cry. A great hole opened up in
my chest and sucked all my energy into it. It felt like I was
caving in on myself.

"He's coming back!" cried Mrs. White.

"Mr. Culvert," said Celia. "Mr. Culvert, can
you hear me?"

He moaned. I turned to watch and held my
breath. The air in the parlor grew dense as we waited for him to
regain consciousness.

Then out of the corner of my eye, I saw
something move so fast it was a mere blur. Louis shouted in alarm.
Mrs. Stanley shouted too, but in a foreign tongue. She had the
pistol, snatched from Louis' hand while he was distracted. She
pointed it at each of us, yet none of us, her hands shaking. She
uttered something in Romany over and over, interspersed with the
very English and very angry, "Stay back or I will shoot."

My father didn't heed her. He lunged.

She screamed.

The gun went off.

I screamed.

"Louis!" Celia cried.
"No!
No
!" My
sister raced to him and grabbed him from behind, spinning him
around. "Louis!"

He wrapped an arm around her and she burst
into tears. His other hand held the gun. It was pointed at Price. A
dark stain bloomed on Price's waistcoat.

"Leviticus!" Mrs. Stanley
fell to her knees at his feet. "No!" She tried to cover his wound
with her hands, tried to staunch the flow of blood. But it was no
use. He was slipping away. "Save him! Do something. You!" she
shouted at Mrs. White. "He is your husband,
do
something!"

Husband?

Price did not look at his lover as he died.
He looked at me, an unreadable smile on his face. A moment later
his spirit rose from the body and hovered near the ceiling.

"I wonder what awaits me," his ghost said,
looking up. "Did your friend succeed, I wonder?" He did not sound
afraid but curious and quite pleased with himself.

"If he didn't, you are going to become
nothing," I said. "And if he did, then you will go to hell. Either
way, I wouldn't want to be you right now."

He swooped down and stood in front of me, too
close. I pressed myself back into the cushions, but he didn't try
to hurt me. "It doesn't matter. I got revenge for my Fred. Beaufort
is dead. That's all that really counts. The rest would have given
me satisfaction, but I'll settle for Beaufort watching you grow old
from up there." He drifted off then disappeared entirely. For a
brief moment I thought about summoning him back to ask him
questions, but I didn't want to see him again. Good riddance.

Mrs. White touched Mrs. Stanley's shoulder as
the landlady stared at her hands, smeared with Price's blood. "I'm
so sorry," Mrs. White said. "I truly am."

I expected Mrs. Stanley to berate her, even
curse her, but she did not. She surprised me by allowing herself to
be comforted by the wife of her lover. I suddenly understood why
she had set aside her gypsy beliefs to help him—love is powerful,
and we are merely its mindless tools. She could no more stop loving
Price than I could Jacob.

"Emily," Celia said, crouching beside me.
"Emily, are you all right?"

"Of course." I sat up. "George?"

He waved weakly from his chair. "I did it,
Em. I delivered the counter curse."

I couldn't breathe. My chest felt tight. He'd
done it, but... "In time?"

"We'll have to wait and see."

We all looked to the ceiling, as if the
Waiting Area was up above. Nothing happened. No spirits came.

Jacob...

"Tell me everything," I said. "Talk. I need
to be distracted." At least until I knew for sure if Jacob was all
right, or that he'd crossed over. I would not try to summon him. I
dared not. Anyway, if the Waiting Area had survived, he may have
crossed upon Price's death. "Price killed Jacob, didn't he?"

Mrs. Stanley emitted a single loud sob.

"He was my husband, Leviticus Seymour," Mrs.
White said. I still couldn't think of her as Mrs. Seymour, married
to that monster. It didn't seem right somehow. "I stopped loving
him long ago, and he me." She watched Mrs. Stanley as she spoke,
her arm still around the other woman's shoulders. "I had moved out
of our family home but remained in contact, for Fred's sake. All
contact ceased when Fred died. He killed himself." She shifted her
weight but remained on the floor. She did not cry, not even a
single tear, but the faraway look on her face told me she had not
put aside her son or his death, and probably never would.

"Because Jacob wouldn't be his friend?" I
asked. "I don't understand. Did Frederick not have other friends?
And if he didn't and that is what pushed him over the edge, how is
that Jacob's fault? He cannot be held accountable."

"I don't," she said. "At least, not anymore.
At first I blamed him a little, but not now. Because, you see, it
wasn't Jacob Beaufort's friendship he craved. It was his love."

I blinked at her. My sister gasped. Even Mrs.
Stanley stopped crying and stared at Mrs. White.

"You mean...he was in love with Jacob?" I
asked. "A forbidden love?"

"Good lord," George said quietly. "He loved
men."

"Not
men
," Mrs. White said. "Man. One.
Jacob Beaufort. He was obsessed, but neither Leviticus nor I knew
it at the time. Not until after his death and we read his diary. It
was all laid out in there. His private thoughts and desires, his
attempts to get Mr. Beaufort to notice him, and his agony when he
failed. Then his final desperate days when all he could think about
was ending it all."

"How sad," Celia muttered. "How very, very
sad."

"You say you were angry only at first," Louis
said. "But your husband's anger lingered, didn't it?"

Her gaze slid to Price's body. She showed no
emotion whatsoever. "Leviticus continued to blame Jacob Beaufort.
He wanted him to suffer the way Frederick had suffered. He took his
life, but it wasn't enough. He was still angry, so he decided to
take his revenge out on those Mr. Beaufort loved. His family, then
later, you, Miss Chambers."

"The amulet?" Celia asked. "Did you sell it
to me?"

"Not me." Mrs. White nodded at Mrs. Stanley,
who did not look up.

"The disguise was excellent," Celia said.
"Unfortunately." She picked up George's clothes and handed him his
shirt.

"I didn't know anything about Leviticus's
tactics until that night you came to the school and sent Mr. Blunt
away. Indeed, I wasn't sure of his involvement until the next day
when he came looking for Blunt and we spoke. I hadn't seen
Leviticus for many months, since Fred's death. He'd gone mad in
that time."

"He was not mad," Mrs. Stanley said, moving
away from the comforting arm of Mrs. White. "He felt things deeply.
The loss of his son hurt him. I understood that hurt. I lost a son
too."

"I'm very sorry," Mrs. White said, but Mrs.
Stanley turned her face away. I felt a rush of sympathy for her.
She'd lost a son and now her lover too.

"If you weren't helping Price then, why help
him now?" George asked. "Why do this to good, innocent people?"

"Innocents?" Mrs. White said. "You mean you
and Miss Chambers."

"And the orphan who died after you injected
him."

"That was a terrible tragedy." Mrs. White
shook her head and tears welled in her eyes.

"What happened after that night Blunt left
the school?" I asked. "You decided to leave too, but why not tell
anyone where you were going?"

"I was afraid of Leviticus, of what he might
do. My attempt to hide from him was for naught, however. He found
me again last week and asked me to...kill him and bring him back to
life." She screwed up her nose, as if the thought of what she'd
done disgusted her. "He said he'd do it anyway and Mrs. Stanley
here would bring him back. I couldn't let that happen. She has no
medical training, but I at least have some. He already had the
poisons and antidotes. He got the ingredients from the Society's
storerooms but made the concoctions himself. He used to be a
pharmacist. I believe he'd been experimenting for some time on
rats."