The Blackwood Curse, page 14
I didn’t.
He jabbed a finger into Wax’s temple. ‘You are just a cog in the wheel that helps me get to my goal.’
His uncle was clearly completely unaware of us all swarming around him. I didn’t understand what the hell was going on. Wax flicked his eyes and shook his head very slightly for me to do nothing. ‘Why do you need black magic?’ Wax asked. I was sure it was to stop his uncle realising someone else was there with him.
His uncle renewed his grip on his shirt. ‘It’s too much for you to understand,’ he said, pushing off him and letting him go.
Wax straightened up and rearranged his clothes. ‘It’s a beacon, isn’t it? You’re trying to call someone.’ Then Wax frowned, as if he was thinking it all through and it was making an awful kind of sense to him. ‘Except instead of getting a particular person, you’re getting anyone and everyone in a radius around us.’
His uncle turned and smiled genuinely then, looking more than a little surprised. He slow-clapped his hands. It was the first time I really noticed how smartly dressed he was. He reminded me of a Victorian gentleman with his style of clothing. ‘Well done, Master Waxley Black. Bravo.’
‘But why? It’s creating havoc in the spirit world.’ Then he looked at me as if something saddened him. ‘They are people that aren’t meant to be here.’ I knew he was thinking of me directly.
Wax looked down at the pentagon in a circle, marked out on the floor. I followed his line of vision. He was taking in the objects. ‘What’s missing?’
His uncle came up to him and put his arm round his shoulders. Wax stiffened as he looked into his face. ‘Why, a Blackwood of course. And I think she’s already here. Isn’t she, Bret?’
He grinned and looked around the room. It was an eerie feeling having his eyes look right through you but not see you or any of the seven with you at all. I clung onto that; he couldn’t see us.
‘I dunno what you mean?’ Wax said, half-laughing as if he was ridiculous. He pointed at his own head. ‘I mean. There’re so many. How can I decipher between them?’
His uncle knew he was being smart and narrowed his eyes. ‘Maybe. But if she hasn’t already, she’ll make contact with you soon. She won’t be able to help herself. You can feel the curse at work already. The snow is keeping us all here. All the key players are in place.’
I felt my blood run to ice. He knew too much for it not to be true. Everything was making a horrible kind of sense.
Wax shrugged. ‘How do you know it’ll be a girl?’ He went to walk off as if it didn’t matter at all to him.
His uncle shot him a scathing look and shook his head. ‘Don’t act dumb, boy. It doesn’t suit you.’ He whirled him round by the arm and pointed in his face. ‘It’s always a Blackwood girl and a Waxley-Black male.’
We were all in shock, absorbing the information, but I didn’t want to let this opportunity to question his uncle to slip us by. I pulled Wax down to my mouth and whispered, ‘Ask him how long he’s been calling everyone.’ I had a hunch I needed confirming.
The uncle perked up as if he heard something. ‘What did you say?’
Wax quickly straightened and the rest of us huddled together. ‘How long have you been doing all this?’ Wax said, holding out his arm to encompass the whole room.
His uncle shrugged. ‘In part … study, research and such forth, pretty much my whole life. I learned of the curse as a small boy. But this—' He turned a circle to take in the markings on the floor and the altar. ‘The magic that you see here … a year maybe – a year and a half.’
My heart sped up. It was what I suspected. Wax looked down at me and I knew he got it too. It was because of his uncle that we hadn’t passed over. He was creating Shades.
Just for a moment, I saw a flicker of regret in Wax’s eyes. It was there and it was gone. It left me wondering if he felt as I did. Disappointment that we weren’t the main players in all this. Fate and the curse hadn’t seen to bring us together.
Wax looked back at his uncle and I could see the indecision. He wanted to ask more questions but didn’t want to give anything away that might reveal us. In the end, he just said, ‘What now? … You know, now I know.’
Wax’s uncle came over and put his arm around his shoulders. He began steering him out to the normal part of the cellar. ‘Go to bed, Bret. We will talk later this evening. It’s almost dawn.’
At the boundary, his uncle smacked his palm against the button, stepped back and the wall began to crank and close in front of him. I had wandered after the two of them, preoccupied with what I’d learned, when I was swept up in everyone shooting past me. No one wanted to be left behind. I soon joined them in a gallop to hop over the line. Ollie made a last-minute grab and literally yanked me over the last three feet of space before the wall closed.
I righted myself from almost falling flat on the floor, just in time to see Wax’s uncle, hands behind his back, eyelids lowered as his blank face disappeared behind the panel. My heart was still beating wildly at the close call, when Wax picked up my hand and looked into my eyes. They were calming and unsettling at the same time. In that brief look they said, ‘I got you’, but left me with an unease about what all this meant for us. All I could do was smile weakly. At least we’d escaped unscathed. However, as I let Wax lead me out of the cellar and away to safety, it was with a troubled heart.
Everyone talked at once as soon as we got to the kitchen. ‘Shut up!’ Wax hissed, shutting the pantry door. ‘He’ll hear you. Grab what you need and we’ll go up to my room.’
Wax pulled a pack of beers from the fridge while I picked up my crutch. I wondered then whether it was invisible as it was with me when I came. Otherwise, Wax’s uncle would have seen it leaning against the wall. We made our way back up the stairs, me slowly at the back with Wax helping. I wondered if it was deliberate. When we reached the top, he allowed the others to disappear into his room. ‘Wait,’ he whispered. ‘You OK?’
I nodded, not entirely sure which bit he was referring to, exactly. ‘I think so … he explained a lot,’ I said, looking up and searching his eyes for clues. ‘So, he made us.’ I shrugged as if that was it.
Wax frowned. ‘He didn’t make you. He brought you here, robbing you of your afterlife.’ He looked angry, but not in a way that made me scared. The kind that made you swallow at how handsome he looked when he was passionate about something.
I had mixed emotions. I didn’t want to talk about my disappointment at us not being the centre of the curse. It seemed over-presumptuous of me. I mean, I knew he fancied me, but I didn’t know how deeply his feelings ran yet. We’d only just met. The fact that he was alive and I was dead was weirdly beside the point. My mind was still sifting through it all. But one thing I was certain of hit me. ‘I’m not sorry, Wax. I’m glad I came here. Otherwise I wouldn’t have met everyone.’ I looked over my shoulder at the door to his room, left ajar. ‘I wouldn’t have met you.’ I turned and his mouth was right there. He kissed me. It was soft but lit a fire inside me. His hand went behind my neck to hold me to him and I totally lost myself in the taste and feel of him.
He pulled away, too quickly, and led me to his room. His arm was around my waist and his fingers gently rubbed my side, sending tingles through me in waves.
Everyone had flopped down on the bed, on the large black leather bean bag or on the floor. Wax gave a hard look at Josh and he moved his legs so I could sit on the bed. Then he sat on the floor, leaning against the wall opposite me. His eyes looked into mine, turning my insides to liquid. I wished I knew what he was thinking.
‘What the hell was all that?’ Ollie said.
I dragged my eyes from Wax and stared at him. He looked in shock. They all did.
Tallulah started crying. ‘So all this is – our lives here – is just because of him.’
Ollie pulled her into his lap, kissed her head and stroked her hair. ‘I don’t think we’re in the real world. Wax can see us,’ he said, nodding at his brother. ‘But it’s more like he has us trapped in some fake loop or dimension,’ he said to everyone over her head. ‘Think about it. Wax is the only real, live person we interact with.’
He was right.
Tallulah began to sob.
I felt sorry for her. Their existence had no higher meaning than his will for them to be there; it was pointless. I guess they’d all harboured some romanticised notion that they were here for some preordained reason for something. Yesterday they didn’t seem to care, now it felt like they’d lost something.
Wax knocked the top off one of his beers and passed one to me, then to his brother and anyone else who wanted one. He looked genuinely sorry. I thought how terribly he’d been used too. His uncle had obviously discovered his psychic gift and unashamedly used it to monitor if what he was doing was working. Then, at the same time, making everyone think he was mad, making him a social leper just to keep him where he wanted him. No wonder he got angry. ‘So let me get this straight,’ I said, somehow knowing that Wax wouldn’t bear me feeling sorry for him. ‘He’s done all this to get us here to start the curse … Why?’ I looked around at everyone for the answer and was met with silence. ‘Is he trying to break the curse or use it for something else?’
Wax had an expression on his face I’d never seen before. It was part smile, part amazement. ‘She’s right. We need to figure this out as, you can bet, he doesn’t give a shit about any of us.’ He finished by looking me deeply in the eyes. The look smouldered, making me wish I could take the cardigan off that covered my ridiculous dress. I looked down, suddenly remembering I had it on. It had been a long night.
Wax chuckled as if he’d read my mind, while the others looked at each other, puzzled. He got to his feet and went to one of his drawers. He pulled out some sweats and a plain white t-shirt, then passed them to me.
I took them hesitantly, wanting to put them to my nose, but realising how weird that would look. ‘Can you show me the bathroom up here?’ I said, suddenly hoarse.
Joe was nearest the door and went to get up. ‘Sit down,’ Wax ordered. He got up and helped me off the bed. He glared at Joe as we left and it didn’t bother me nearly as much as it should have. ‘Are you normally so rough on them?’ I said as soon as we got out in the hall.
Wax was holding my elbow while I made slow progress along the landing. ‘I have no interaction with them at all,’ he said with a shrug. ‘Except for my brother. He’s always with that annoying girl and I have to continually tell them to shut up.’ When I took a sideways glance at him, I caught the corners of his mouth twitch into a smile as he realised how moody he was sounding.
We got to a room right at the end and he pushed the door open. ‘I’ll wait here … unless you want me to come in?’ he said with a wicked grin.
I rolled my eyes and turned and went inside, but my butterflies somersaulted at how good-looking he was. The smile that was so rare made him even more so.
The bathroom was large and plain, but not dilapidated like at my aunt’s place. Then the reason hit me. Everyone in it was dead. It was frozen and empty, where this one still held the living. Wax’s uncle kept up the household staff, bought TVs and fridges and renewed the decor. That was why this room had a modern white bathroom suite, gleaming tiles, chrome taps and a shower. I wished I could use it, but Wax was outside and I didn’t want the uncle to wonder who was in here. I wriggled out of the dress and folded it with a smile. I guess it did make an impression.
I pulled the white t-shirt on over my head and the clean linen smell was edged with him. It totally surrounded me and I loved the feeling. I pulled on the grey sweatpants that went over my plaster cast easily and bunched at my ankles. He had to be almost a foot taller than me.
I came out eventually and his eyes glazed over for a second. Then he nodded. ‘That t-shirt looks better on you. It’s a shame the others are here because you could lose the sweats.’
Before I could register what he’d said and blast red, he’d picked up my hands. I thought it was to take me back to his room, but he used his weight to step me back into the bathroom. We were kissing again and it felt more urgent than before. He groaned, hands in my hair and pushing his fingers into the skin on my back.
I couldn’t believe how I responded to him. Before coming here I’d barely kissed anyone and here I was, in a strange boy’s bathroom, wanting to rip his clothes off.
He pushed me up against the basin and his hands gripped either side of it, trapping me against his body. Before I knew it, my legs were clamped around his waist and I was moving against the fabric separating us, running totally on instinct. Then, just as I was about to pull off my top, his incendiary kiss died against my lips.
He slowed until he stopped. I looked up at his face and his eyes were on something behind me. Except I knew all that was there was the basin and the mirror.
That last word in my head made me unlink my legs and slide them down to the floor. I turned, slowly, to look at what Wax could see.
The face that gazed back at us in the mirror.
Chapter 15
The face in the mirror was that of a woman. A young woman with blonde curls framing a pretty face, wearing a faded yellow bonnet. She was clearly scared, her hands pressed to the glass and her mouth moving rapidly. It was like she was trapped in a glass box.
I looked up at Wax behind me and he seemed frozen to the image in front of him. ‘Who is it? I said to shake him out of it, because I had a good idea who it was. The similarities to the portrait were undeniable.
Then she seemed to see him and stopped moving. Her lips began to move like the TV with the sound turned off. I looked up at him again to see what was going on. He appeared to be following what she was saying because he answered, ‘Don’t go to the doorway or he’ll have you.’ I was amazed they were communicating.
Another volley of animated conversation followed until she was suddenly pulled backwards by an unseen force. It happened with a scream so loud, I had to cover my ears with my hands. I could only gape in horror as she shrunk in size the further away she got, the image faded to grey and she disappeared completely.
After a moment of shock, I looked up at Wax who smacked his hands on the wall, rested his forehead against the glass and closed his eyes.
‘What just happened?’
He straightened, picked up my hands and searched my face. ‘It was Lila. She kept saying she’s stuck in the Inside Out. I have no idea what that is, but I guess it’s a plane that runs parallel to this one. She said the Waxley-Black brothers imprisoned her there and the only way out is a door into my uncle’s basement.’
‘You’re not suggesting we go back down there?’ I said, feeling acid in my stomach at the thought of facing his uncle again.
Wax started to move towards the door. ‘No, not yet. We should wait until he sleeps again. Then we need to get in there and find Ainsley’s journal.’
My eyebrows rose at that.
‘Lila said my uncle has it and it will explain everything.’ He opened the bathroom door and I followed, limping as quickly as I could behind him, back to his bedroom. All the while, I couldn’t help the pain I felt in my chest. I knew it was jealousy at the way he said Lila’s name, as if he knew her. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help feeling something wasn’t right; I just didn’t know what it was yet. Lila was beautiful and Wax was trying to help her, but something felt off.
We got back and Wax told the others what happened. They all became animated with excitement, offering theories of what we should do to help. It all went over my head as I studied Wax. Thankfully, his tolerance of anyone was short and he soon told them all to clear off to Ollie’s room to give him some peace.
I went to turn and walk out with them.
‘Not you,’ he said, bobbing his head in the direction of his bed to rest on.
I did as I was told, though I was still uneasy. I had to go over in my head again and again the evidence I’d found that Lila was murdered, so I felt sympathy for her. It made sense that she needed help, but I couldn’t shake off the feeling that Wax was walking into some kind of trap.
Tallulah gripped my arm as she walked past and widened her eyes. ‘We’re just next door if you need us,’ she said, flicking her eyes at Wax. She was still wary of him. Maybe I should be too.
We were now alone and Wax was pacing. ‘We’ll wait an hour after my uncle goes to sleep tonight and then we’ll go back into that room.’
I sat down heavily on the bed and watched him walking up and down in the space at the foot of it. ‘Won’t he rig something up now so he knows if you’ve been in there?’ Then I thought about the speed with which he caught us. ‘He may have done that already.’
He shrugged moodily. ‘Probably. We’ll have to be quick. You saw how scared she was. I can’t leave her to that prick. You don’t know what he’s like, Becks.’
His eyes looked desolate when he paused his pacing to look at me. My heart sank a little more as there was no stopping him. She was the original damsel in distress. I sagged in defeat. I had to stop thinking like a needy little girl.
Wax must have read the exhaustion on my face. ‘You should get some sleep while you can.’ I turned my head and looked at the inviting soft quilt. Then at the window. It was getting light. When I looked back at him, he was already shaking his head. ‘I don’t sleep … not without one of those,’ he said, nodding towards a small brown bottle on the nightstand.
I totally got why he didn’t want to take them. His uncle had probably got them for him and God only knew what was in them.
Then an idea came to me before I got too comfortable. ‘Maybe we would be better off searching your uncle’s bedroom while he’s occupied. He might have left something there.’
