The Blackwood Curse: A Night Shades Novel, page 10
Then I put my password in and hit return. Of course the spinning wheel whirred for a good minute before it told me my password was incorrect. It made me feel better though; that my anger was somewhere out there in the cyber ether.
I bent down, pushed my laptop under my bed and got up. I went to close my curtains before I went downstairs.
I froze.
There was a subtle warm glow coming from the round house. At first I thought it had to be a reflection, but it was too far away from the house. Was it Burt?
Someone was definitely out there.
I grabbed my crutches and rushed downstairs as fast as they would carry me. I was definitely getting faster negotiating the staircase. I went through the kitchen while Gerty was at the sink. ‘Is Burt here today?’ I demanded a little harshly, out of breath.
‘What’s the rush? No, I haven’t seen him.’
I didn’t wait to answer. I flung open the back door and hopped out as fast as I could. The snow was heavy and slowed me down. All my muscles screamed in protest as I cut a path through, almost falling over a couple of times.
At last I reached the line of trees that sheltered the orangery. I slowed my pace and went through, then stopped a few feet away. The cosy orange glow spilled out of all the small panes of glass and glittered gold on the snow around it.
I edged forward, still unable to see any movements inside. I got to the door, placed my crutches down gently on the floor and reached for the doorknob. I turned it and pulled the door open as slowly and quietly as I could.
The snow made a ridge and it wouldn’t move more than a couple of inches. In the end I could do nothing else but yank it open.
Before I could see a thing, the wind rushed past me and took away my breath.
Burning pain seared me. A sandstorm blast hit my face and neck and flayed my bare arms. All I could do was scream as a million needle-like shards of glass pierced my skin.
Chapter 10
It seemed like the world fell silent for ages, until voices eventually stirred me from my stupor. I felt strong arms and then a sensation of floating. The next thing I knew I was in my bed and the sun was streaming into my room in a bright head-splitting light.
A vaguely familiar woman was bending over me, smiling. ‘Ah, there we are. She’s awake.’
I remembered her then. She was my aunt’s nurse. Then the memories hit me like a sledgehammer, and I struggled to sit up.
‘Sshh!’ the nurse said, holding my shoulders and pushing me back down. ‘You’ve had quite an accident, young lady. You need to stay in bed today, at least.’
I blinked at her in confusion. I remembered the round house, going to open the door and then nothing but pain. I couldn’t remember anything after that. ‘What happened?’ I said.
‘You don’t remember?’
Before I could answer, there was a knock at my door.
‘Come in,’ the nurse said.
Gerty came straight in, thanked the nurse and looked at me with a rueful smile. ‘I think you should stay away from the orangery for a while – at least until Burt has had time to fix it up. Your aunt is very upset. You need to go and see her when you’re up and about.’
She was shaking her head before I could even say, ‘But…’ My memories were fuzzy, but I didn’t remember doing anything actually dangerous.
‘Burt found you. Said you must have pulled the door too hard and loose panes fell out and hit you.’
I put my hands up to my face that felt irritated and tight and hissed at the pain in my arms. They were both bandaged and throbbing.
‘Be careful!’ Gerty said, quickly. ‘You have a lot of cuts. All superficial, but they’ll be sore for a while. The doctor said you were a lucky girl and they should heal pretty quickly. The top road is completely blocked by snow if you’d needed the hospital.’
I pointed at my dressing table. ‘Can you pass me the mirror, please?’
She passed the small hand mirror immediately. ‘It looks worse than it is.’
I stared at the face looking back at me. It was very shiny with some kind of ointment and covered in hundreds of tiny red angry pits and scratches. It went down my neck and looked horrendous.
Gerty smiled weakly. ‘It will heal in a couple of weeks. The deeper ones will take a little longer, but you’ll hardly notice it in a month or two.’
My heart sank and, strangely, my first thought was Wax. Why I should care if he saw me like this, I had no idea. I passed the mirror back to Gerty and lay back down in the bed.
She placed the mirror on the dressing table and picked up an empty cup and glass off the nightstand. Then, after whispering something, she left with the nurse.
I thought about what she said. I had been very lucky. My memories were patchy, but I didn’t think it had been loose panes that had given me these injuries. They were simply too small and too many.
I must have dozed.
Gerty brought me up a cup of tea and some toast some time later and said Tallulah was coming over at some point. Then, after plumping up my pillows, she left me alone.
My face stung and I felt miserable. Actually, it was the most unhappy I’d felt since I’d left home. My thoughts inevitably took a darker turn into memories of Pete. A place I seldom went for fear I’d spiral down and not come out. I wasn’t sure how long it was, or when the tears came, but there was a knock at the door.
‘It’s me!’ the familiar voice said.
Tallulah. I quickly dabbed my eyes on my sheet. ‘Come in,’ I said, more grateful for the interruption than she’d know.
‘Yuk!’ she said as soon as she saw me.
I smiled. ‘I know, right.’
‘What happened? Mum said the orangery collapsed on you, or something.’
I frowned while my mind went back to the moments before it happened, and I shook my head. ‘No, that’s not what happened.’ The pieces seemed to come together in my mind. ‘I saw a light in there.’ I looked over at my window and remembered looking out and seeing it. I looked back at Tallulah, who was hanging on my every word. ‘So I went out to see who it was.’ I frowned, when the memories became as clear as day. ‘I pulled open the door and the glass …’ I stopped, knowing how weird it was going to all sound.
Tallulah waited expectantly for me to finish. ‘What?’
I swallowed and took a breath. There was no other explanation for what had happened. ‘The glass just flew at me in the wind.’
Tallulah frowned and half laughed. ‘The wind did it,’ she repeated flatly.
I knew it sounded stupid. ‘Well, not a wind exactly.’ I took another breath. ‘I think it was the ghost out to get me.’ My eyes dropped guiltily away from Tallulah’s, but I’d said it. I looked at her again when she hadn’t said a word.
‘Shit!’ was all she said after a full minute. It was very difficult for me to gauge her reaction. I wasn’t sure if she thought I’d lost my mind or was expressing the gravity of the situation. Her eyes went wide and she sat on the edge of the bed.
I felt a little braver. ‘Think about it. It’s like a warning.’ When she still hadn’t said anything, ‘My face looks like it’s been sand blasted. Surely if the place had collapsed on me, I’d have some deeper cuts?’
Her eyes widened at that as if she was just falling in with what I was saying. ‘What are you going to do?’ she said, eventually.
It was a good question. One I hadn’t thought about yet. I had no idea what I was going to do. I was scared now. What had started off as an adventure to pass the time had quickly evolved into something a lot more serious and very dangerous.
‘You still have to come on Saturday,’ Tallulah said, as if it was now the most obvious thing in the world.
I looked at her as if she’d gone mad. The thought of meeting new people looking like this horrified me.
‘We can help you. You won’t get any answers here. You owe it to yourself now to get to the bottom of all this, Becks.’
I continued to stare at her way after she’d finished speaking. Not only was she right, but I was surprised by how strong and sensible she sounded. Somewhere along the line she’d become my friend. A real one. I had to swallow down a lump in my throat.
‘Of course I’ll get Mum to patch you up good, put you on some intensive healing regime, or something. I’ll stress that it’s urgent and that you need to go because you’ll go mad if you stay cooped up in here much longer.’
By the end I was grinning. Her enthusiasm was infectious. There was no way I couldn’t go. ‘OK, but if I still look like this by Saturday, you’ll have to get me a Freddy Krueger mask or something.’
She laughed. ‘Becks, if you still look like that you won’t need one.’
I laughed in spite of myself. She was right though. I would go mad if I stayed here much longer. I needed answers: what happened to me and what the hell was going on.
* * *
Despite the lively conversation that followed, when Tallulah left, doubts crowded in and my confidence ebbed away. The enormity of what had happened slowly sank into my bones. Someone or something had given me one hell of a warning to stay away and it had scared me. Real fear set in, and because of it the furthest I ventured was to the bathroom. Even then I hurried past the secret door and washed as quickly as I could to hurry back. In the bathroom, memories echoed of the very real occurrences there like ghosts.
Back in my room, I wedged a chair against the door and peered out of my window. It was dusk again and the snow glittered from the reflected light from the windows of the house.
The orangery looked dark now. Who had been in there? If it was a ghost, then who? Was it Lila walking around because she’d been murdered, Jed having lost his great love, or Ainsley, having had the two closest people to him in the world betray him? The jumbling thoughts made my head ache. Whoever it was, they hated me getting close to finding out, and that didn’t tally with the whole idea of being a ghost; they stayed around so their injustices were solved.
I hopped over and got back into bed. I was feeling tired again. Everything swirled around in my head till I dropped off. All I seemed to do was sleep these days.
My routine of recuperation continued: sleep and bathroom breaks with Gerty bringing me my meals in bed. ‘You sure you won’t come downstairs today?’ she said, when I had lost all idea of what day it was.
‘Not yet,’ I said, pulling a pained face. ‘I’m so tired … Maybe tomorrow.’ I didn’t want to admit that I wasn’t ready to leave my cocoon just yet.
Tallulah Facetimed me while playing a games console at the same time. It was pretty typical for her only to give me half of her attention, so I settled back against my pillows and accepted it as normal. ‘So, Mum says you won’t get out of bed.’ She flicked her eyes away from the screen at me for a second, pulling faces and twisting as if she was turning a corner in the game. ‘You’re coming to Ollie’s on Saturday, Becks.’
Before I could whine an excuse, she said, ‘I’ll come for you at 6.30. Bye then!’ And she clicked off before I could open my mouth.
I let out an exhausted breath. It was going to be harder to get out of this than I thought. Still, tomorrow was Friday then I had all day Saturday; I was bound to think of a way out by then.
I slid down into the bed feeling sad and empty. I rolled over and reached for my laptop on the floor. Whenever I sunk low, I missed Pete the most. I needed to play some music to connect me to him, even though I knew it would be painful.
I flipped open the lid and pushed down the power button. The curser flashed for a full minute making me shout, ‘Come on!’ Then the words crawled across the page and took my breath away.
* * *
Ollie said you got hurt. Are you OK? Look, I’m sorry I lost my temper and was hard on you, but you need to go. You need to leave this place while you still can. The snow is already trying to trap you. If you don’t go soon, you’ll never get away.
* * *
My heart thumped in my chest making me out of breath. It was fear, excitement and disbelief that he was actually talking to me again, all rolled into one. I needed to talk to him so badly, it didn’t make sense. I tapped back: I’m OK, I’m healing. Do you know what’s going on here? I hit Send. It was a huge risk asking him a question like that. He could disappear, never to be heard of again. But I was getting desperate and needed some help. I waited, holding my breath and chewing my nails, praying for an answer.
* * *
Yes – please go. I can’t stand it. I can’t look after everyone. Shades. What is it with you? You all think you’re invincible.
* * *
I couldn’t believe what I was reading. What? I never asked you to look after me. Just a civil word would be nice. And anyway, I can’t go home. You don’t understand.
* * *
There was a long gap before he answered as if he was thinking about what I said. Is it to do with your leg?
* * *
Kind of.
* * *
Another long space. Is it true you’re coming here on Saturday?
* * *
I thought carefully before I answered. It was strange as I’d been looking for a way out up until then. Now it seemed that wild horses couldn’t keep me away from that house on Saturday night. Yes! I replied.
* * *
Well, I’ll be out!
* * *
It didn’t take long for the bad mood to come back. Good then. Sounds perfect! He was making me more and more furious with every exchange.
* * *
Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
* * *
It was obvious that he was going and I couldn’t bear it. Wait! Can you at least tell me what a Shade is?
* * *
I thought he’d gone for sure when he sent: You don’t know?
* * *
No … how would I?
* * *
The cursor flashed a long time again, so long I almost gave up. Then it came just like the killer blow: Dead person walking.
* * *
I stared at the screen, then I clicked frantically, Wait … what? But the password prompt came up signalling, as usual, that the conversation was over.
My mind went into freefall. He’d talked to me, apologised for his previous behaviour, warned me off and then insulted me again. How dare he try and scare me like that? He was saying I was as good as dead. That was an awful thing to say.
I was so unsettled after that that my heart kept on speeding up every five minutes as I kept getting upset and angry all over again. I put my earphones in and eventually fell asleep listening to Pete’s favourite music.
He entered my dreams and I was so pleased to see him. I was ecstatic, but he wasn’t. He was worried and upset. He kept warning me over and over to go back, that I was in a no man’s land, but he of all people should know how it was with Mum and Dad. He was crying, telling me that death would be at the end of it. ‘Go back … go back,’ he said. ‘I love you, Beccah. Please, it wasn’t your fault, I don’t blame you. There’s more that you don’t know.’
In the end I was crying so hard in my sleep that it woke me up.
It was a dream born out of anxiety and wishful thinking. There was no doubt about it. I was driving that day and I killed my brother. My parents were right to hate me. I killed their little boy.
* * *
I dressed the next day. After Wax’s message and the dreams of my brother, there seemed little point hiding away. I even ventured out in the snow and found myself at the round house – the source of my anxiety and worries. However Burt had boarded it all up so no one could get in. I stood outside and looked at it, soaking up the feelings of gloom it radiated.
Now I wasn’t even sure I wanted Burt to fix it up. Maybe everyone would be better off if it was demolished.
* * *
At last Saturday evening came. Nerves meant I could scarcely eat a thing. I stood in front of my mirror and wondered what the hell I was doing in going. Here I was, standing in my tarty maid’s outfit with my boobs pushed up, my face like it’d been scrubbed with barbed wire, my arms like I’d self-harmed for a year with a razorblade, and my leg in plaster past the knee. Good grief, what did I look like? Well, it did look Halloween, I guess. I could be a tarty zombie. At least I had one good shoe on. If I stood sideways, I looked kind of cute.
I heard Tallulah’s loud voice downstairs in the hall. I smoothed down the short skirt of my dress and put on my coat to cover myself a bit. Then I picked up my crutches and headed towards the stairs to join her.
When I saw her standing in the middle of the hall, she grinned her approval. She’d had the same idea as me and had a long coat covering what she was wearing. I guessed Gerty wouldn’t be impressed, so I paused and did my coat up properly too.
‘Come on, you look great. I knew you would.’ Then she linked her arm through mine and we walked out of the front door into the snowy night for the maddest night of my life. One thing I knew for sure, good or bad, nothing was ever going to be the same again.
Chapter 11
It was the first time I’d noticed that the path had been lit up between the two houses, through the woods. Another thing that pointed to a connection. A lantern had been hung in the trees every ten feet or so, making seeing either side of the path impossible and scary. Despite feeling like bait in a horror film, I felt exhilarated to be out at night. I’d been cooped up for so long, grieving.
The snow glittered on the path in front of us as we chatted animatedly. Tallulah was walking so fast, I had to tell her to slow down a couple of times because of my leg. ‘Who will be there?’ I asked. The nearer we got, the more nervous I became. I hadn’t mixed with people for ages.
