The Doorway and the Deep (4 page)

“Why is Keats so sad?” she asked.

Oliver turned a page without looking up. “I'm reading something sad.”

“Lord Byron,” said Eliot, reading the words embossed on the spine. “What're you reading sad poetry for?”

“Same reason I read happy poetry,” said Oliver, closing up the book and tossing it inside the yew trunk. He hopped off the branch and landed gracefully in the long grass.

“You're through early,” he observed.

“Mr. Wilfer was busy,” said Eliot. “He had to leave for a meeting with the Seamstress.”

Lottie stared at Eliot. His lie had been as smooth as one of the Seamstress' satin gowns. Lottie was grateful. She didn't want to revisit the subject of what a failure she'd been at sharpening.

“I see you've found Trouble.”

Lottie started. Oliver was looking at the left pocket of her periwinkle coat, and something was indeed moving beneath the tweed fabric. Lottie reached inside. Her fingers curled around a bundle of feathers.

“Trouble!”

She tugged him out with a relieved cry.

Trouble cheeped and rustled his black feathers, settling into Lottie's palm.

“Where have you
been
?” Lottie demanded.

Trouble tilted his head. He chirruped, unperturbed. Then he swept from Lottie's hand and joined Keats in his circular dance.

“That's super rude, Trouble,” Eliot called. “She was worried about you!”

Lottie, however, was distracted. There was something else in her pocket that had not been there before—something cold and hard-edged. She pulled it out.

It was a key. It was small, just the length of her index finger, and looked like an ordinary house key. It was only when Lottie turned it over that she saw the little black diamond embossed on its top.

“THE MARK
of the Northerly Court.”

Fife gawked at the key in his hand, poking at the black diamond etched into brass.

“This is the weirdest thing,” he said. “What unsavory characters has Trouble been hanging around?”

They were all sitting inside the boys' yew tree, circled around the pillowed floor. Lottie had called them there to discuss the appearance of the strange key in her pocket.

“Trouble was gone for less than a day,” said Lottie. “He couldn't have just flown into Northerly Territory and back again. Could he?”

“Gengas can be quite fast,” said Adelaide.

“Or it could be from spies in these parts,” said Oliver.

“What, like those Northerlies, Roote and Crag?” said Fife. “Or Dorian Ingle?
The Barghest?!”

“Fife,” said Adelaide, “I swear to Titania, if you go into another one of your Barghest frenzies . . .”

Adelaide was referring to Fife's recent obsession with the fact that the fiercest beasts in all of Albion Isle had made a vow of obedience to the Fiskes. This led to Fife getting very worked up about the possibility of Lottie commanding a whole army of Barghest and developing a special howl that could be heard across the Isle. Adelaide called these Fife's “Barghest frenzies.” He indulged in one at least once a week.

Lottie found this interest unsettling since she could not, in fact, call any Barghest with a special howl and since she had no idea how to even find the particular Barghest who had helped her escape the Southerly Court. Since she'd returned to Limn, there had been no sign of the Barghest—or of the Northerly spy Dorian Ingle.

“Maybe,” said Eliot, “Trouble just found the key lying in the dirt somewhere and thought it looked pretty?”

The others exchanged glances.

Fife said, “Doubtful.”

“There wasn't anything else in your pocket?” Adelaide asked. “No note, nothing to explain the meaning of the key?”

“Nothing,” said Lottie. “What I can't make out is if Trouble just found the key, or if . . .”

“If what?” asked Eliot.

Lottie let out a shuddery sigh. “If someone
else
summoned Trouble? Is that possible?”

“Of course not,” said Adelaide. “No one can summon a genga other than the genga's owner. They respond only to the exact timbre of your voice.”

“That's not entirely true,” said Oliver. “There are some keens—”

“Ugh!” Fife tossed the key from his hand, as though he had been burned. “Stop talking like that, Ollie. Splinters are the worst.”

Eliot frowned. “Splinters?”

“Sprites who use their keens for
illegal purposes
.” Fife lowered his voice dramatically. He wiggled his fingers and made an eerie whistling sound.

“Like what?” Lottie asked, rubbing at her goose-fleshed arms.

“Impersonating other sprites,” said Oliver. “It's against Southerly and Northerly law, but there are some keens that can do it. Mainly taste and touch. They say some splinters can alter their appearances. Others can imitate another sprite's voice. Even summon their genga. It's possible.”

Lottie's eyes widened. “You mean someone else out there could be impersonating me?”

Lottie had the sudden, uncomfortable sensation of being naked, though she was very well bundled up in three layers of clothes.

“It's possible,” Oliver said again, “though I don't know why a splinter would use their keen just to send you a Northerly key to nowhere.”

“It's not a key to nowhere,” Eliot said. “We just don't know where the
where
is yet.”

“Well, it's nowhere I'd like to go,” said Adelaide. “You should throw it away. Or bury it.”

“Have you asked Trouble about it?” said Oliver.

Lottie nodded glumly. “He won't listen to me. Every time I've tried to ask him where he's been, or where he found the key, he just flies off.”

“So we don't know where it's from,” said Fife, “and we don't know what it's for. Talking about it won't change anything. I guess we just wait and see if anything else weird happens.”

Fife looked a little too excited about the prospect of something weird occurring again.

Lottie felt protectively at her coat pocket, where Trouble was currently sleeping. She tucked away the Northerly key in her other pocket. She did not intend to follow Adelaide's advice and bury it. She didn't trust the key, and Lottie thought it better to keep things she didn't trust close by, where she could keep an eye on them.

Lottie's first day of “rest” wasn't restful. She slept, but her dreams were nightmares—as they often had been since her return to Albion Isle. Fife had explained that bad dreams were common in Wisp Territory. It was something in the air, something unseen, that crept into the ears and wound around the brain and turned even the cheeriest dreams to bleak, black mist.

Lottie once asked Mr. Wilfer if there was a remedy to the nightmares.

“There are remedies,” he replied, “but they can be extremely addictive. Dreams are a delicate, dangerous business. Other healers might disagree with me, but I don't dabble in anything that so strongly alters the workings of the mind.”

This had sounded very noble and impressive at the time, but after nearly a month's worth of bad dreams full of choking Northerly vines and unfriendly Barghest with bared teeth, Lottie was weary of sleep. She no longer looked forward to sinking her head into the pillow, even after a full and tiring night. She dreaded that moment just before unconsciousness, when her thoughts turned nonsensical with disconnected words and impossible images.

This time, her nightmare was worse than usual. In it, she was back in the throne room of the Southerly Palace,
surrounded by dark tapestries and shelves full of strange-looking bottles. Her feet were dragging her toward the throne, where King Starkling sat smiling lazily at her. As Lottie came closer, the king's deceptively young skin began to bubble and split, revealing a thick, tar-like substance beneath. He smiled wider, revealing blood-coated teeth.

“Tsk, tsk,” said Starkling. “Not sharpening, I see. This is hardly the time for a vacation when there are
only two, maybe three weeks left to live
.”

Lottie emerged from the dream with a shriek, waking Adelaide. Her skin was damp, her shoulders trembling. She apologized, sure that Adelaide would be angry at the disturbance. But then Adelaide did something entirely unexpected. She found Lottie's hand in the dark, and she wrapped her cold fingers around Lottie's wrist.

In a soft voice, she said, “It's okay. I have them, too.”

“What are they about?” Lottie asked.

There was a long silence. Finally, Adelaide said, “My mother.”

Lottie remained quiet, unsure of what to say.

“I wasn't even two years old when she passed,” Adelaide said, “so it's quite impossible that I could remember her. But—it's silly, I know, it's not as if it's really possible—but I dream I remember her
voice
. I remember a song she would hum as I fell asleep.”

“It's not silly,” said Lottie. “Sometimes I think I can remember my parents' faces, even though the image is just from the picture I have of them.”

“No, but it's not like that,” Adelaide said impatiently. “I hear her voice like a real,
true
memory. I hear the melody.”

Then Adelaide hummed. It was a gentle sound, one that took Lottie off guard; she wasn't used to hearing gentle things from Adelaide. The song was sad, though there were no words to make it so. Its drooping melody made Lottie feel as though she had lost something, something she could never reclaim and never replace. And though it was sadness that carried her to sleep, Lottie had no more nightmares that evening.

That week, the forest turned golden. In a single day, the yew needles fell from their branches to the earth, transformed by death to a glittering yellow. The grass, too, faded from pure white to the color of cream. Late autumn had settled on Wisp Territory, thick with cold and the scent of smoke. Lottie was glad she and Eliot had packed sweaters, mittens, and warm boots. Now more than ever, she made use of her periwinkle coat and green scarf.

Resting was difficult work, Lottie discovered. She spent nearly every hour of the next two days with Eliot, and though
Mr. Wilfer had told her that her presence alone improved Eliot's health, she still noticed when he coughed extra loud or overlong, and each time her heart spasmed with guilt. How was she going to make Eliot better if she wasn't even trying to improve her keen? What if he got worse again, and this time she couldn't heal him?

Trouble, at least, was better behaved than usual. He kept close by Lottie and did not squawk obnoxiously or nip at her fingers or peck about her belongings—all of which he'd been wont to do before. It was as though Trouble sensed Lottie's anxiousness and, out of sympathy, had become less of a nuisance. This evening, the eve of Autumntide, Trouble flew serenely overhead as Lottie, Eliot, and Oliver walked down a path to the Clearing.

They had just paid a visit to the red apple tree, where Eliot had sent his weekly letter to Mr. Walsch, all under the watchful eye of the wisp guard. In just two days, Lottie and Eliot would use the tree to return to Kemble Isle for Thanksgiving. Still, Eliot insisted on sending his letter.