The Stolen Child (43 page)

“
Yeah, well, lucky for some.  I was an only child too.”
 

For a moment there was an uncomfortable stillness in the air.  She could hear the creaking timbers, and the hum of the propellers, as Rachael stared at the wall, biting her lip.  Gently, Arsha put her arms around the girl and pulled her close.  She felt Rachael's arms around her, squeezing tight, as she leaned in to whisper in the girl's ear.
 

“
Not any more.”
 

It was eerily quiet in the hold.  
Ensconced
above the large room, in the pool of light that a single ghostlamp cast over the loft,
the girls knelt on the
dark
oak
floor, facing each other in nervous silence.
 

Carefully, Arsha undid the bag she had brought, and produced the contents one by one.  Dried herbs and salt, a flask of water, a small wooden pot, bandages and safety pins, three small clay bowls, some matches, and a wooden handled kitchen knife.

Arsha crumbled the dry herbs into the three bowls and set a lit match to each one
in turn.  A powerful aroma filled the room, as the herbs began to smoulder, a dull red glow creeping through the papery leaves.  Then she picked up the bag of salt
and began tracing a swirling three point pattern on the floor between them
.  
She could feel her hands shaking as she tried to keep the lines even.  Several times she had to glance at the image she had copied out of the book, to make sure she was getting it just right.  
Finally, she placed the wooden bowl in the centre of the pattern and filled it with water from the flask.

“What happens now?” Rachael asked, quietly.

“Start by taking deep breaths,”
Arsha said.
  “Don't force yourself, just breath
e
, deep and even.  Focus on your breathing, on the sound of your heartbeat.  Let everything else fall away.”  

She
spoke evenly, trying to keep her voice
c
alm and reassuring,
the way Milima's had been.
  Her own eyes were half-closed, but she could see enough of Rachael to watch the girl's breathing slow.

“Concentrate on the sigil... The pattern in the circle.  
It's like a map, for your mind.  It shows you where you need to go
.”

Arsha noticed that a sheen of sweat had already appeared on Rachael's forehead, and realised that her own face was feeling flushed and damp.  
The air smelled bitter and sharp, as she breathed in the thick smoke.  She
swallowed.  
H
er throat fe
lt
dry.

“Hold the sigil in your mind.  Focus on it.  Let everything else fall away.”

Already,
Arsha
could
feel as if she was floating,
as if her body was made of clouds.
 

“Fall.  Fall inside of yourself.  As if your own mind was the whole world, and you were just a tiny dot, floating deep inside of it.”

Arsha could feel her blood pounding in her ears.  The walls of the room seemed to fall away, leaving a dark and empty space around them both.

“
Now I want you to picture a door.  Any door.  Imagine it however you like.  When you can see it clearly, you're going to reach out and open it.”
 

They sat in silence.  Then she heard Rachael's voice, a whisper so quiet that she could barely make out the words.
 

“
I can't.”
 

Rachael's eyes were still closed.  Her knuckles stood out white against her tightly clenched hands.
 

“
It's OK,” Arsha said, softly.  “This is just part of the ritual.  Opening the door is part of creating a connection.  You let me in.  I let you in.  We become a part of one whole.”
 

“
I know.  I know,” Rachael said, her voice tight.  “But I can't.  I can't open that door.  I know... I know what's behind there.  I can't go back to that.”
 

“
You're not going back Rachael.  I promise you, you're not.  You're moving forward.  That's why I want to do this with you.  I want this, for both us.”
 

She heard the girl take a deep breath.
 

“
It's OK,” Arsha said.  “When you're ready.”
 

“
OK,” Rachael whispered.
 

It took a moment, to centre herself again, trying to resume the calm even tones she had been using.
 

“
Close your eyes, open the door, and step through.  This is the space between us.  The connection we share.  This is real.  Do you see me there?”
 

“
I can see you.”
 

As she spoke, Arsha pictured her own door.  It was the door to her bedroom, battered old oak-wood chipped and scarred in a hundred tiny but familiar ways.  She could almost feel the brass handle turning in her hand.  It opened, and she stepped through into the darkness, where Rachael stood, facing her.  
She saw the tears on Rachael's cheeks
and the fear in her eyes.
 
She
wondered if it was real or
just
her imagination.

“
OK,
”
she said.  “Hold out your hand.”
 

The knife gleamed in the darkness, as Arsha drew it across the skin of Rachael's palm.  She watched the blood well up around the cut and begin to drip, slowly, from the edges of her palm.  
She heard the soft splash each drop made as it fell into the bowl of water.
 

Arsha then held out the knife, handle first, and offered her own hand,
wishing that it wouldn't shake so much
.

When the blade met her
palm
she gasped in pain
.  It was as if Rachael was drawing the tip of a red hot poker across her skin.  It took everything she had not to
pull her hand away
.  She bit her lip so hard that the taste of blood flooded her mouth.  Distantly, she heard the knife clatter to the floor, but all she could think of was the pain.  Tears flooded her eyes.

“It's OK,”
s
he heard Rachael say.  “I think I know what happens next.”

Carefully
the girl
pressed their bleeding palms together, clasping Arsha's hand tightly in hers.  Their mingled blood dripped down from their hands, falling softly into the bowl.  
Arsha
felt a warmth and a tingling throughout her whole body.  She seemed to be surrounded by endless light, and she was intensely aware of Rachael's breathing, her pulse, her heartbeat.  
As the sound of it thundered in her head, she felt the words coming back to her.
 

“Repeat…
Repeat
after me.  Forever
to this binding we submit
,” she said, hearing Rachael echo the words back to her.  “Bound in body, bound in mind, bound in spirit, bound in fate.  
In blood we forge our souls to share as one.
”
 

Blinking, Arsha opened her eyes
again
.  Rachael's hand was still clasped in hers.  The water in the bowl was a pale red.  The mounds of crushed herbs had burned out.  The smell of blood and smoke filled the air.  There were tears
glistening
on Rachael's cheeks.

Rachael's eyes flickered gently open, and they looked at each other as if they were both expecting something to happen.  It felt as if something should have changed, but the room was the same.  It seemed that they were the same too.

“Did it work?” Rachael said, ca
utiously
.

“I don't know,” Arsha said, before breaking into a nervous smile.  “I've never done this before.”

“Right,” Rachael laughed, softly.  “I guess, maybe... I guess I was expecting something more... Magical.”

“That wasn't enough for you?”  Arsha said, drying her eyes
with her free hand.
 

Rachael
blushed and looked away.

“
Yeah.  I guess it was,” she said.
 

Gently,
Arsha
lowered
their
clasped
hand
s
into the bowl of water, carefully washing away the blood.  She expected it to sting, but it didn't really hurt very much at all.  When they withdrew their hands from the water, her breath caught in her throat.  Where there should have been a gaping wound, there was barely a mark.  
O
nly a tiny scar, a single thin line across the palm, like it had healed years ago.  She examined Rachael's palm, and found the same.  
O
nly a slim trace of a scar.

“I guess it did work,” Arsha said, softly.

“Yeah.  It's weird... After all the other things I've seen, I shouldn't really be surprised by this.”

“Why not?” Arsha said.  “I am.”

Still staring at her hand in amazement, Rachael began to stand up.  She was halfway to her feet when her legs seemed to give way, and she fell backwards against the sofa.  Arsha covered her mouth, trying not to giggle.
 

“
Shut up.  I'm just dizzy,” Rachael growled, but there was a smile on the girl's face.  As she settled onto the couch, Arsha slowly cleared away the remains of the ritual.  Carefully she poured the bloodstained water back into the flask, and packed away everything into the bag.  Then they made their way back down, taking each step with care, slipped through the corridor with soft footsteps, and dumped the last of the evidence down the toilet bowl.
 

Eventually they arrived back at Rachael's room.  The girl fell down onto her bed, leaning back against the wall with a dazed expression.  Arsha stood, awkwardly twisting her hands together as the ghostlamp flickered.
 

“Alright…
Good night...” she said, half mumbling the words.
 

“
Hey, come here you,” Rachael said, holding up her arms in a beckoning gesture.  A little confused, Arsha sat down on the bed beside her, and immediately Rachael's arms slipped around her shoulders, pulling her close.  Her head fell against Arsha's chest, eyes closed.  It struck her that she had never seen the girl quite so defenceless.
 

“
Thank you,” Rachael whispered, her voice so soft that Arsha almost couldn't hear the words.  Arsha said nothing at all, as they lay together, arms tight around one another.  The ghostlamp settled and dimmed, as Rachael's breathing settled.  Slowly, Arsha pulled the blanket up over the both of them, and laid her head back.  She could feel her sister's heartbeat, soft and slow, as her shoulders rose and fell with every breath.  Outside the porthole the night darkened and the propellers droned on, their
gentle hum lulling her off to sleep.
 

Standing out on the deck, they watched the Citadel approaching, lit from behind by the rays of the morning sunlight which reached out across the rolling white dunes of the desert below.  At first all they saw of the Citadel itself was a smudge on the far horizon.  
Slowly it
grew
closer, larger and more menacing.  
As they watched the shape resolved itself into an island of rock hanging in the blue sky, completely unsupported.  The sunlight gleamed on the spires of crystal that dotted the dunes, far around it.
 

They stood at the prow, leaning against the railing.  Rachael was still wincing from her morning training with Ilona.  For three days now she had been spending every spare moment down in the hold, practising under Ilona's watchful eye.  With time to spare, Arsha had buried herself in her various projects.  The harmonic had finally come together, but when they'd turned it on they found only the Citadel wave, with blandly neutral music and coldly mechanical announcements.  They had promptly turned it off.
 

They watched in silence as the sun continued to rise.  Eventually the Citadel was
near enough that she could make out the shape of the
buildings
,
rising up in staggered waves towards the centre of the structure, where a single tower stood far above all the rest
.  
It was so slim and fine
that the whole thing seemed to be hanging from the sky on an invisible thread, connected to that needle point.  Concentric rings of walls, dotted with towers, rose up like a wedding cake
around the outer perimeter
.  
At first she
thought the tiered structure looked like a castle, but as it grew in size the sense of scale became clearer, and she began to see that it was closer to being a city.
 

Below where the island floated, shapes emerged from the desert, the tiered and misshapen skyline of a much larger city, tall spires that reached for the sun and crowded rows of buildings that lined narrow streets and broad avenues.  All of it had taken on a warped and misshapen appearance.  Sand had built up in great waves around the base of the buildings, and most of the structures had a twisted, half-melted look to them.

The city below gleamed in the dawn light, but the Citadel itself shone like the sun.  The dazzling rays of sunlight reflected off every wall, as if every surface was a mirror.  As the distance closed, Arsha finally saw that every
part of the cit
adel
, from the lowest edge of the outermost walls on upwards,
appeared to be
some kind of clear stone or crystal, tinted aqua
green
like jade.  
She drew a sharp breath as the realisation set in.  It was made of glass.  Every part of the Citadel, every brick and stone, was made of glass.
 

It was beautiful.  As soon as the thought entered her head, she hated herself for it, but she couldn't shake it.  The
C
it
adel
was elegant, radiant and utterly awe inspiring, and
she
hated it.  Still she watched as they approached, the ship sinking lower until they were below the level of the island.  Vast openings lined the lower reaches of the island on which the cit
adel
rested, lit by strings of lanterns along their
in
side
walls
, looking like tiny sparks of light in the darkness
of each cave mouth
.  As the ship approached one of the openings, it almost seemed as if it would be too small, but the cave continued to grow as they drew closer.  
Every time she thought she had judged the perspective correctly, the shape of the Citadel turned out to be even grander than she had imagined.  
The whole island was vast, and each of the caves could easily accommodate ships much larger than the Triskelion,
the vessel seeming tiny against that great dark opening
.  
As they entered the tunnel, Sir Reuben's sleek black ship followed them in.