The Night of the Solstice (18 page)

“Because she's
smart
,” said Janie. “She got all the information she wanted, everything Aric couldn't torture out of you three, and she didn't even need to use force. She found out that we were only kids, that nobody believed us, that we had no way to fight her. Why not let us come back? After all”—chillingly—“we'll still be here when she comes through on the solstice. She's smart,” said Janie again, sounding almost admiring.

“We have to figure out what we're going to do,” said Alys. “I have an idea,” she added, when no one spoke.

“Tell it.”

Alys told it.

Charles struck his forehead with his hand. “Oh, no. Oh, you've got to be kidding. Please say you're kidding.”

“It's the only chance we have left.”

“But you
met
her. She's bats, cuckoo, a total space cadet.”

“She's one of the Quislais. She has power.”

Charles laughed maniacally.

“Stop it. Listen, Charles. We'll lure her over here and trap her with a thornbranch. Remember, the vixen said you could trap a Quislai by tangling a thornbranch in her hair? Then we'll make her help us. Maybe she knows a way to get word to the Council. Or maybe she can help us free Morgana.”

“Wait a minute. How're we going to lure her?”

Everyone looked at him.

“Oh, no. No. I won't.”

“She liked you,” said Alys. “She kissed you good-bye when we left. She told you that if you wanted to see her again you just had to call for her.”

“No. I refuse. Absolutely not …”

By quarter to eleven Alys had begun to worry about Charles getting back.

She was tired of kneeling by the conservatory mirror with the thornbranch Claudia had stolen from a
neighbor's rosebush in her hand. And she was heartsick about the serpent and Arien Edgewater. Now that Thia Pendriel knew the part they had played, what might she do in revenge? And the moon would set at 10:59
A.M.
, and where on earth was Charles?

At 10:58 Charles came through the mirror at a dead run.

“Did you—”

“Yes!”

Elwyn came after him, on tiptoe, and Alys pounced. There was a flurry of action and two figures fell heavily to the floor.

“Got you!” cried Alys. The thornbranch was firmly wound in Elwyn's waterfall of silver hair.

Elwyn turned to peer at the thing that was holding her, met Alys's eyes, blinked in perplexity, then frowned. Her breast began to heave with agitation and her cheeks, half-veiled by tumbled hair, flushed pink.

“Why, you—you—” Alys braced herself. “You
naughty
!” cried Elwyn, clearly employing the strongest form of abuse she knew. “I am
vexed
with you!”

“Aw, Elwyn,” said Charles. “Give us a chance to explain.”

“No more explaining,” said Alys. The battle-madness was still singing in her veins. “Now we are going to
demand
.”

“Let me go, you naughty … you bad, naughty—”

“Be quiet!” said Alys, thumping her fist on the floor. Then she glanced sharply at the mirror. “Charles, can they—”

“See through? I don't know. I couldn't, but I wouldn't take any chances.”

“Right. We'll frog-march her to the nursery.”

The frog-marching proved unnecessary, as Elwyn had to follow whoever was holding the branch, so Alys was spared having to admit she didn't actually know what it was. It had just sounded good. She calmed down on the way up and resolved to treat Elwyn firmly but kindly.

Elwyn sank to the nursery floor with tears in her blue eyes. “You are a wicked boy,” she said to Charles, “and I am grievously sorry I let you kiss me.”

“Charles?”
said Janie.

“Oh, shut up and get on with it.”

“Elwyn, we're sorry for having tricked you. But you have to understand that this is an emergency.” Alys leaned forward and spoke slowly and distinctly, as if to a small child who was also deaf and mentally disabled. “Our … world … is … going … to … be … destroyed … tomorrow. If … you … help … us … save … it … we … will … let … you … go.”

“You … hurt … my … head,” replied Elwyn.

A muscle twitched in Alys's jaw.

“I told you,” said Charles.

“Please,” begged Alys, switching tactics abruptly. “Don't you care at all? Unless you help us we are going to
die
. Do you understand ‘die'?”

“No,” said Elwyn simply.

Alys, with a terrible chill, felt that without in the least intending to she had at last put her finger on the heart of Elwyn's problem. A whole universe of philosophic thoughts crashed through her mind at once. How could someone who could not die or be hurt understand fear or pain? No wonder Elwyn could be so heartless without being deliberately cruel.
She never had to fear the consequences of anything, because to her there were no consequences, perhaps that was why she remained a child… . Perhaps you need to face death in order to mature … to take on responsibility… .

A great part of her mind wanted to stay and wrestle with these questions before she forgot them. Another part snapped, “Get on with it.” Alys, being mortal, made the only decision she could.

“Whether you understand or not,” she said levelly, “you are going to help us. Because we're going to keep you here until you do. We won't ever let you go.”

Elwyn clapped her hands in exasperation. “I do not wish to stay here and you have hurt my head. If you are not careful I will become very angry.”

“And do what, call us names? We've got you.”

“Er—Alys—” said Janie.

“Not now, Janie. You see, Elwyn? You're trapped here.”

“Alys.”

“Hush, Janie. Look, Elwyn, just agree to help us, and afterward you can go home. Come on. Do it. Say yes.”

“Oh, I am angry now. I am incensed.”

“So spit. I am never going to let go of this branch—”

“Alys, I think there's something you're forgetting.”

“—until you give in. All right, Janie, what am I forgetting?”

“Sky-bolts,” said Janie, and there was an explosion of light against the far wall, and a crash like thunder.

Alys whirled. The wall now bore a smoldering black spot three feet in diameter. “Elwyn! What—”

Something whizzed by her head and struck the ceiling, shaking the house on its foundations.

“Stop it! Stop it!”

Whiz BANG! Whiz BANG! Whiz BANG!

Alys, appalled, realized that Elwyn was aiming to kill.

WHIZBANG! BANG-BANG-BANG!

Claudia shrieked, caught in a maelstrom of flying glass and wood as the window exploded. The room was thick with smoke and lit almost continuously by flashes like lightning. The air stank of ozone.

KA-WHOMP.

Alys felt as if the top of her head had been blown
off. She reeled backward, her hair snagging painfully on a nail in the wall, and slid to the ground. She was clutching a now light and unresisting thornbranch.

“She's getting away!” Charles darted out of the room. Tearing free of the nail, Alys ran after him. They skidded, steadied, and careered into the next room just in time to see an orange-red silhouette disappear in the mirror.

“After her!” cried Alys, but Charles held her back.

“You'll never catch up,” he said. “And besides, Cadal Forge is there. I saw him. He's got a whole crowd with him.”

Alys sagged. With glazed eyes she stared at the thornbranch in her hand. There was a goodly amount of silver hair hanging from it.

“How could she free herself like that?” asked Janie quietly, from behind them.

“I don't think she did it. I think I pulled the branch free when I fell.”

“Yes, I saw that. I believe this is yours.” Janie held out a strand of Alys's hair she had collected from the nail.

Claudia groped her way down the hall, which was now billowing with smoke. “There's a hole in the wall back there,” she said, coughing.

“Several holes,” said Janie.

Charles opened a window. “There's a lot of smoke coming out of the nursery, too,” he said. “Who do you like better,” he added, “Cadal Forge or the police?”

“Is that a hypothetical question?”

“No,” said Alys. “I hear sirens.”

The sirens swept up to the house.

Alys's hands balled into fists. “I don't care about Cadal Forge,” she said. “I don't care what he does to me. When they come in here I'm going to go through a mirror and show them.”

“You can't,” Janie pointed out, rather calmly. “The moon set twenty minutes ago.”

“But Elwyn—”

“She's a Quislai, remember? Like you said, powerful.”

Downstairs the front door burst open.

The last thing Alys said before the police came running up the stairs, followed by the firemen, followed by the paramedics, was, “Let me do the talking.”

For some time thereafter all was confusion, and none of them was quite sure whether they were being rescued or arrested. It seemed to be both, for after they were carried willy-nilly down the stairs, they were handcuffed, put in a police car, and driven to the police station of the city of Orange.

Hysteria reigned. Janie shrilled, Charles shouted, and Claudia, gentle Claudia, bit a police officer. Alys, although feeling dazed and desperate, managed to keep her head. She knew perfectly well that without proof it was hopeless to tell their story about the
Wildworld again. At the same time it was essential—it was more important than saving themselves—to convince the police that something terribly dangerous was going on at the old house. If the police believed that, and watched over the house on the night of the solstice, they might have some chance against Cadal Forge.

So she told a story that was as close to the truth as she could get without mentioning sorcery. She said that last week a person had lured them into the old house. As for what had happened inside—well, it certainly
sounded
like a drug-induced hallucination, the way she described it. The person had then threatened them to make sure they kept quiet, and made them promise to come back. There were other people in the house, too, she said, all more or less crazy, like the pyromaniac who had set fire to the nursery tonight.

“Sounds like a cult,” muttered one of the officers.

The only problem was that the police wanted names and descriptions of these crazed, drug-dealing cultists. And when Alys couldn't give these, the entire story was seriously weakened.

“I don't believe this cock-and-bull about a mysterious white-haired stranger setting fire to that house today,” said the detective in charge of them. “I think you know perfectly well who did it and you're lying to protect them. I think you're probably part of this gang you described. In fact, I'm not sure you didn't set the fire yourselves.”

But there was the evidence of the thornbranch—none of the children had hair that color. And the police, despite a search of the house, the grounds, and the children, could not find so much as a burnt-out match to explain how the fire had started. So they were forced to release them. However, it was made excruciatingly clear that if they ever went near Morgana's house again, or were ever caught playing with fire, or made any kind of trouble for the rest of their lives, they would be busted.

Worst of all, it was obvious that although the police had searched the house, they did not intend to keep it under surveillance round-the-clock. They certainly weren't going to stake it out at midnight tomorrow.

There was more hysteria in the car as their parents drove them home. Alys, her eyes swollen almost shut with crying, finally put her hands over her ears to block out her mother's pleas to “just tell us the names of the cultists.”

When the moon next rose, it would be the solstice moon.

They all cried themselves to sleep.

They were kept home from school the next day, and spent it in Claudia's playroom—the one with the bars on the window. Their parents stayed home from work to watch them. It was nearly unbearable to huddle near the window with those pale, haggard faces on the other side of the room.

“What do we do now?” whispered Charles.

“Do?” said Janie.

“We … we have to do something. Can't we—can't we—”

“What?”

Charles shrugged, defeated.

Feeling stupefied, they stared out the window.

At last Claudia said, “Maybe the police will come tonight after all.”

“Not unless they have a reason,” said Charles. “And they won't … Wait a minute.” A light had come into his eyes. “What if—what if we made an anonymous phone call tonight? Told them that—oh, the house was burning down or something. That would get them over there, all right.”

All this time Alys had not said a word, but she was not despairing or panicking; she was thinking. Now she slowly closed one hand until the nails bit into her palm, and struck the table a blow that shook the lamp.

“Alys? Is that what we're going to do?”

“No,” said Alys. One word, like the beat of a drum.

“Then, what?”

“We are going to burn the house down ourselves.”

Claudia shrank back against Charles.

“Alys … ?”

“I am not crazy, Charles. I'm serious.”

Charles and Janie exchanged an involuntary glance,
and then both of them looked quickly toward their parents, who were fortunately still out of earshot.

“Listen to me,” said Alys. “It's the only thing we can do that will be of any use. If we set that house on fire just at moonrise, the place will be crawling with police and firefighters by the time the moon enters its quarter and Cadal Forge comes through. Maybe they
can
do something against the Society. And if not—well, I wonder if even sorcerei can step into the middle of a fire and live.”