‘Help me, Baaaaaaab,’ I ask it anyway, pronouncing it the strange way Mamó does. ‘I need help.’
It flaps and caws and stares. The air slicing my lungs, I keep on running.
And suddenly I’m there. I swallow. My eyes are filling up. My hands are shaking. I can do this. I can do this. A place inside the woods where two roads meet. The bright hot body of the little fox. Will Button’s life be warm? I wonder. Will it have value to this old, dark thing? I need this plan to work. It’s all I have now. Instinct fighting loss.
I dump my bag on the ground and it wriggles. I lay the knives out on the forest floor. The more I hurt, the louder he will hear me. I breathe in deep and choose the smallest one.
Oh, Button, I think. And then, Oh, Catlin.
Unzip the bag and pull him softly out. He hiss-complains at me. I stroke him and I settle him in the soft crook of my left arm. I grasp him tight and then I lift the knife. His eyes are wide. He doesn’t even know what I am doing. Everyone he’s ever met’s a friend.
Oh.
This is the worst thing I have ever done.
His little face.
I narrow my eyes. The blade plop-curling in. I gouge it to the bottom of the socket. I keep my hand so tight around his neck. I never thought a cat could scream so plaintive sharp like that, like Catlin must have done. I haven’t got the stomach to continue. I’ll make it quick. I close my eyes.
For Catlin.
Someone grabs me tightly from behind. I scream and drop the kitten. Off he runs. I still have my knife.
‘What are you at?’ Mamó moves away, but just a little. She folds her arms, squinting. She looks embarrassed for me.
‘Put down the knife,’ she says.
‘I can’t,’ I gasp. ‘I have to try.’
‘It won’t work. What you’re doing,’ she says. ‘She will be dead by the time it gets here. And what it brings back might not be your sister.’
I look at her. ‘How do you know? What happened?’
Her voice is low. ‘Brian found me. I am sorry, Madeline. There isn’t … Stop that.’
My eyes are scanning the ground for Button, a rabbit, a fox, for anything that I could catch and kill.
I look Mamó directly in the eye. ‘Can you help her?’
She inclines her head. It’s not a nod.
‘What do I have to do?’ I ask, knowing that I’ll do it.
‘I’ll need a soul. I’ll take yours. And there’ll be no more school. You’ll come and work for me. For seven years. Even if she’s dead when we get back to the castle. I want to train you. Do we have a deal?’
There isn’t any going back from this. A beat, where I consider saying no. Walking away. Finding the kitten again, stabbing it to death. Trying my best to placate whatever comes through. She’s right, I know; it wouldn’t work. And Catlin would be dead and I’d be here alone.
What can I do? I swallow and I nod.
‘I have your word,’ she says. It’s not a question, but she wants an answer.
‘You have my word,’ I say.
We start to walk. My mouth is dry, the sweat beads on my back are very cold. The moon is fat and yellow. The mountains dark again. They’ve all gone home, the people who were searching. Do they know?
‘Where is she?’ Mamó asks.
‘In the castle,’ I tell her. ‘There’s this big cave –’
‘An old place. I know it.’ Her voice is low. We get into the car, she starts the engine and we drive in silence. My sister bleeding out. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to do.
I look at my hands, stained with three bloods mixed together.
She does something with her head, a twist, a shaping, and suddenly my stomach feels like we are on a rollercoaster, going up, and up, and up. Waiting for the drop, that falling feeling.
It only takes a flash to get us home.
41
Betony
We stride through the castle, up the stairs and in through Brian’s wall – the cave, when we reach it, is leached of life, all freezing dim and dust motes, grey and beige. The black sheets hide the blood. Mam’s holding Catlin on the speckled bed. I think of snow, of ash. Of fairy tales and princesses and endings. She’s telling her that it will be all right. That Mammy’s here. That help is on the way. That she’ll be fine. Such gentle, loving lies.
Catlin’s eyes are open, dull and dim. She’s staring beyond Mam, gaze out to nothing. She isn’t making noise. The light around her is faded next-day ash. The barest little ember clings. If I couldn’t see it, I would think that she were fully dead. She’s stretched out cold. Mam strokes her hair. Brian isn’t back. We don’t know where he is.
Nobody has come to help my family.
‘Get her undressed,’ Mamó says to me. I start to move. ‘Sheila, have you called an ambulance?’
My mother nods. ‘They said that … forty minutes … maybe longer …’
Mamó’s glare is strong as strong can be. ‘Call them back. You need to cancel. Tell them it was someone playing pranks. That everything is fine.’ My mother shakes her head. Mamó blinks at her. ‘You need to do this Sheila. NOW,’ she barks, and Mam takes out her phone, walks towards the cave mouth. ‘Come back when it is fixed,’ Mamó says. She looks at me. ‘We could be here all night. It will be hard.’
I’m unbuttoning my sister’s dress. She moans so weak. I think I’m hurting her. Mamó opens her big doctor’s bag. She takes a jar of something clear and dark. A thick, soft liquid. She takes a swig and hands it to me. I drink down some as well. And then try to give some to Catlin. Most of it just trickles on the bed. She’s not responding.
Mamó lights a candle. Says some words. I feel the click of something slowing down. And everything is bright. I see the shimmer on me and on her. I did not feel it furling out of me. It has always been here, I think, invisible. I just didn’t know. If I am bright, then Mamó is incandescent. It’s hard to even blink at her right now.
‘You started it yourself. You didn’t know.’ She looks at me, and nods. Then she reaches her hands towards me, grasps my light, begins to pull and tear. Pinching is the best way to describe it. She pinches fists of light and weaves them into threads towards my sister. Like a blood transfusion. Or a graft. I’m dimming as Catlin brightens, just a touch. But you can see it. I can see it. There! She pinches and she pinches and moves and moves and spins and winds and pulls. Her hands are busy, lifting, dropping, smoothing, taking, helping, giving. Hurting. This is the real stuff, I think. This is the kind of thing that kills or cures.
I stagger over, look at Catlin’s face. Her eyes half-open. And then, my vision pinching out of me, I’m dimming, dimming. It starts to hurt properly and I get cold. I get very cold. I lie beside my sister on the bed. My hand curls out to hers. Before I fade away I feel her take it. Just a little squeeze, but she is back. Her hand is cold. It isn’t stiff though. The wax of her is warm enough to mould. Pliable. And that’s a sign. I take that as a sign.
I close my eyes. When I open them again, the world is black but I can hear the movements of her hands, the little gaspy breaths that come from Catlin. Hearing’s next. It’s weird to moan and not to hear your voice. I know I’m making sounds but I can’t hear them coming from my throat. I murmur things. I keep on saying things in case she hears me.
I love you, you’re my sister. It’s OK. I love you, Catlin. It will be all right.
Then
smell.
I
hardly
notice,
except relief.
The tin of blood,
the dull stone-rot of cave I do not miss.