The Blackwood Curse, page 25
She nodded. Then my heart stopped as she turned to look straight at us at the foot of the stairs. I still wasn’t sure if she saw us or just sensed. Either way, she knew we were there.
‘Our guests?’ Ainsley said, turning to look in the same direction.
‘Will the waters really give them life?’ Ainsley asked. ‘It will cause ripples in the community if they’re suddenly back from the dead.’
Lila shrugged and her look turned spiteful. ‘It doesn’t matter, because they won’t be getting any. The fountain must remain a secret if we’re to be rich.’
‘What about Bret? We can barely handle him and I walk a fine line with his parents as it is.’
She smiled sweetly at him and cupped the side of his face. ‘We have his little girlfriend captive and, don’t worry, he’ll learn his place if he wants to stay out of the asylum. We can deal with his parents.’
Ainsley nodded, not looking totally convinced. ‘It’s a shame we need him as the only one who can get the waters.’
Lila tutted, turning on him sharply. ‘I weary of all this, Ainsley. My Ainsley would have sorted it like this!’ she said, clicking her fingers next to his face. ‘I wouldn’t need to explain trivial things. He would know that your brother and his wife will simply go on their travels and never return.’ She roughly pulled out of his arms and flounced off down the corridor. ‘Pack! You useless buffoon! Must I do everything.’
While Ainsley stood, baffled at her outburst, wondering what on earth he’d done, I whispered, ‘Let’s go.’ We’d all heard enough to know I was right about Lila. All our lives were at stake.
Chapter 27
In a moment I was back in the grey of the Inside Out, staring back at my friends through Ollie’s bedroom mirror. The only plus side being that it felt less claustrophobic. ‘So you know exactly where to go.’
They all looked at Ollie. ‘Through the servants’ corridor under the stairs, to the door on the far side that leads to another corridor, that leads into the tunnel between our two houses. Move along it about a hundred yards to where there’s a slight bend and there’s a gap in the rock on the left,’ Ollie recited.
I let out a breath and nodded. ‘We can do this,’ I said, taking in each one of their faces. It was amazing how deeply I felt about them all and I didn’t even know them a few days ago.
‘We need to get going, sappy,’ Ollie said with a grin.
He was so damn likable, even when he was making fun of me. ‘OK, go!’ I said, swallowing the lump in my throat with pride. They’d all dressed in something black of Ollie’s and trooped out like a line of coalminers. All they needed was soot on their cheeks. How I wished I could go with them in the real sense.
My job was much lonelier and dangerous. I’d be traveling with the vengeful ghost of Jedediah Waxley-Black.
I left the mirror and navigated the house, bathed in the eerie grey light, in exactly the same path I’d sent the others. It was hard to believe we were occupying the same space in different dimensions.
Jedediah was a dark and foreboding figure waiting for me at the fissure in the tunnel. His head was down and the dark hood covered the scary lamps he had for eyes. I came to a stop as near to him as I dared. ‘I’m ready,’ I said.
Without looking up, he lifted an arm and pointed a bony finger at the gap in the wall. I guess that meant I was going first.
I squeezed through sideways, amazed at just how tight it was and how anyone bigger could possibly make it. However, Jed was already on the other side when I got there, proving he was even less corporeal than me and had very few boundaries. It brought me up sharp and I had to hold my chest to steady my heart. I still wasn’t used to the rules of all the various types of beings.
He didn’t speak, he just turned and glided along what was a narrow ledge lit by a strange light from candles set in the jagged wall. Great lumps of rock loomed and leaned on each other, forming a roof, and to our right fell off a sheer drop that I was too scared to look down in case I lost my balance. While Jed appeared to float, I climbed natural steps upward and shimmied slowly down slippery slopes on my butt. The grey from the candles became further apart, until I was sure the only light came from the projection of Jed’s eyes. I had no phone with me to use as a torch, so I was forced to stick closely behind him. Strangely, my fear of falling was greater than my fear of him. Although it did make me wonder just how powerful Jed was.
It felt like we’d been walking for hours. I hoped the others were making good progress. I thought about Tallulah’s mirror and began to look for shiny objects as I walked along. I hoped she remembered to take it out of her bag. She was so ditzy at times.
Jed pushed on, strong and determined, downwards, to what felt like the bowels of the earth until we came out into a large, circular, perfectly lit cave. It had to be about thirty feet across and a similar height, with great rock shards jutting over our heads.
I hoped it was safe. If not for me then for the others. Jed slowed and turned and I realised we must have reached our destination. I could hear a light tinkle of water and looked at Jed and frowned. There was no great pool or the waterfall that I was expecting.
He put out his bony hand to a collection of small rocks where the light grey was marbled with black. It was hard to tell colour in this place. I edged closer, not sure what I’d find. The tinkle got louder until I peered between the rocks to find a pool no bigger than a kitchen sink. It had a tiny trickle from a narrow channel running into it and another where it flowed away back between the rocks. It was perfectly hidden and contained. ‘That’s it?’ I said, standing up straight and facing Jed again. It was hard to believe that it was what all the fuss was about. So many people had died or had their lives ruined over generations for this.
Jed stood, unmoving, with his head lowered. It was how he always seemed to rest. In a state of waiting. However, today he seemed more sad than usual, as if even he saw the futility of it all. Perhaps he was remembering that his brother had betrayed him for it with little or no remorse. ‘We have to find the mirror,’ I said, cutting through the unbearable silence.
There was nothing in the cave, so they hadn’t made it that far on the other side. Jed understood and moved towards the way we came. We retraced our steps to an area where the path forked. It would have led them in the wrong direction or at least made them stop, not knowing what to do. If they had sense, it was here they would wait.
I was right. I loved Tallulah right then and vowed to tell her she wasn’t as silly as she looked. I reached up for the small circular light propped up on the tiny ledge. I put my face up against it, the mists cleared and there they were; arguing over which direction to go. ‘Guys! Guys!’ I said, a little louder.
‘Shh!’ Ollie hissed. ‘Listen.’
‘Over here,’ I said again, bringing all their heads around.
‘Beccah!’ Tallulah squealed.
Everyone gathered around and peered into the small circle of glass. I couldn’t see them all, but they seemed safe and well. ‘You made it,’ I said, relieved. ‘You must follow the right-hand fork. I could see the black outline of Jed looming behind them. They seemed to sense him and parted and he slowly shook his head. Then I got it. Things in the mirror were the other way around. ‘Sorry, go left.’ It was so confusing if you dwelt on it. ‘I’ll meet you there.’
In less than ten minutes, I was looking at them all again.
‘I can’t believe we’re here,’ Tallulah said, excitedly, as if they’d gone to the beach or something. ‘Have you tried some yet?’ she asked.
In all honesty, it hadn’t crossed my mind, I’d been so worried about everyone else.
‘God, I’d have my head in it like a horse in a trough,’ she said.
Joe and Josh sniggered and she scowled at them.
‘We don’t know what it will do. Let’s wait till Wax gets here safely first.’ With the mention of his name, a sudden panic took hold of my heart. His journey was far more dangerous than ours, and he was, of course, alive and had something to lose. He would have arrived by car with his father and be trying to get through collapsed tunnels and mine shafts. Ruins that had been the same way for a hundred or so years. The structure would have long gone. At that moment, he seemed so far away. He was in the real world, not in the Inside Out or even in the curse plain. I hoped they overlapped as they did in the house because I wasn’t sure whether even the Shades could manifest there.
I turned to look at Jed, who was already fading into the cave wall. ‘Where are you going?’ I said, alarmed. I was terrified of being trapped and alone.
He put up a hand, telling me to stay, then he blended into the wall. I was left with the only light coming from the compact. My hearing was on high alert for anything scurrying around my feet. I had to breathe to stop myself giving way to my fear.
‘What’s happening?’ Ollie asked, reading the panic on my face.
‘Jed’s gone.’ I knew I had to get a grip of my breathing so I didn’t freak them all out. My eyes were slowly getting accustomed to the light. ‘Sorry, it’s so dark in here.’
‘He’s probably gone to get Wax,’ Ollie said, kindly. ‘Spirits are much stronger on the Earth plane than we are.’
I breathed a little easier, knowing he was probably right. Jed hadn’t brought us all this way to leave us stranded. ‘Can you see?’
Ollie nodded and looked around. ‘There’re candles and we’ve got our phones. No reception though.’
I did the same, taking the compact with me and using its meagre light. I could hear the direction of the water. ‘The fountain is a bit of an anti-climax,’ I said, edging my way closer to it, careful not to fall. Dropping and smashing the mirror would be a catastrophe at this stage. ‘Guess we should try the waters for ourselves, you know, to see what it does?’
Ollie shrugged. ‘Tallulah just did.’ He shook his head wearily as if he should have known she couldn’t follow orders. ‘She said she doesn’t feel any different.’
‘Well, I don’t,’ came from a little way off.
I chuckled to myself. Trust Tallulah to rush headlong into something. ‘Tell her they are the ugly waters, the fountain of youth is over there,’ I said, not able to keep the laughter out of my voice, as I pointed in the other direction.
Ollie laughed.
Tallulah shouted, ‘Hey!’
I reached down to the fountain myself. The water felt ice cold, as you would imagine this far down. It was a natural spring, filtered through miles of rock. There didn’t appear to be anything magical about it. Just ordinary-looking water that could have come from a bottle or a tap.
For a moment, I wondered if we could all have been part of an elaborate con. Well, Lila and Ainsley had gone to an awful lot of trouble to get it if it was.
I cupped my hands and brought some to my mouth and drank. It tasted sweet with a slightly metallic undertone. Kind of how I expected it to taste. Then I stood back up and waited. Tallulah was right. Nothing happened. ‘Well, I’m still—’ I went to say alive and amended it at the last minute to, ‘here.’ I frowned at the ridiculous irony.
All the others did the same, stooping, taking a drink and standing around waiting for something miraculous to happen. It didn’t. Then we all looked at each other, wondering what was next.
A noise echoed on their side. They all turned to look. ‘Wax!’ Ollie said.
They all rushed over, but, in the excitement, they forgot to hold me up. I was blind and buffeted in the darkness. When they slowed, I was next to someone’s blue-jeaned legs. Tallulah eventually held me up and clipped me over the strap of her bag. I could see Wax gazing at all of them and his father looking around, a little way back. ‘I can’t believe it. You’re here. How did you get here?’ Wax asked, a little alarmed. Then he noticed the compact. ‘Becks?’ His eyes went to Ollie, angrily.
‘Don’t be upset. Beccah came up with this plan so we weren’t double-crossed. There’s another tunnel that’s also in the Inside Out. And how come Dad’s here? … I didn’t think anyone else could get in here apart from you,’ he finished in the same accusatory tone.
Wax checked his father over his shoulder and shrugged moodily, then shot a glance at me as if I’d crashed a party he was at. ‘We tested it and nothing happened. We guessed it was because the curse is broken and he’s with me.’
Wax was treating me like I wasn’t there. I told myself it was just because he was hurt that I hadn’t included him. I had to suck it up and accept that, for the time being, he was on the other side.
His father came over. ‘What is it? … Everything OK?’ he said, helping Wax take off the heavy rucksack from his back.
‘Nothing … usual voices,’ Wax said, delving into the bag and taking out a small glass flask with a stopper. ‘OK, take some while I fill this,’ he said, throwing us a look and walking over to the group of rocks that held the fountain.
‘Is it Ollie? He’s here?’ his dad said, whirling around in the vain hope of seeing something.
‘Yes, he’s here and he shouldn’t be,’ Wax said, crouching down and submerging the bottle.
‘We’ve already tried it,’ Tallulah said flippantly. ‘I don’t think it does anything. Not to us, anyway.
Wax paused and frowned.
His father came up to his shoulder. ‘What is it?’
Wax didn’t speak until the bottle was filled. He stood back up, corked it and slipped it in his bag. ‘And this is definitely the place,’ he said, talking to himself as if he was going over what he knew.
His father was following him expectantly. ‘It must be,’ he said with a shrug.
‘The rods drew me in this direction and then we saw the light.’
I didn’t say I knew it absolutely was the right place because Jed had guided us here himself. Wax was clearly feeling side-lined enough. The others were looking to him for the answers. His father was still searching around him. ‘If you have it, let’s go. I’m not sure how safe the roof is here.’
Wax swung the backpack over his shoulder. ‘Wait. Before we go, there’s something you should know. Ollie has already drunk the water and it hasn’t worked.’
Wax’s dad looked back at him, shocked. ‘I don’t get it. It has to. Ainsley said—’
Wax shook his head. ‘He either doesn’t know or he lied. Ollie’s here, Dad, and if you can’t see him then it hasn’t worked.’
I felt desperately sorry for Wax’s dad. He looked stricken. He’d done everything to help Ainsley in the hope of bringing back Ollie and it had all been for nothing. The dangers of the roof were forgotten and he went over to gaze down at the unimpressive waters of the fountain. It was clear he had no idea we were all there.
Wax reached over and pulled me off the strap of Tallulah’s bag and held the compact out to his father. ‘Except her. You might be able to see her through the glass.’
My heart thumped. I had no idea what on earth Wax was doing. I went closer to the glass and saw his father peering down at me. I knew the moment his eyes focused, as he jumped back in shock. I wasn’t sure what the scientific explanation for it was, but his father definitely saw me. Maybe the glass was a conductor, I wasn’t sure. I was somewhere else entirely to the others. Maybe the waters had helped in that. I didn’t know for sure.
‘It’s Beccah. Rebecca Whitely,’ Wax corrected. ‘She’s the Blackwood Lila trapped to get free.’
His dad looked from him to me, bewildered. ‘Hi, Mr Waxley-Black,’ I said, with a little wave as if Wax had just brought me home to do homework together or something. It felt weird.
Wax’s dad continued to look from me to Wax and back again. ‘But I don’t understand.’
‘This is what it’s all really been about, Dad,’ Wax said, tapping the mirror with his finger. Lila was trapped and Ainsley’s made some kind of pact with her. I don’t think they had any intention of bringing Ollie back.’
‘It’s true, sir. Lila has been dead well over a hundred years,’ I said, hoping he could hear me.
He looked down at me with an expression that said he didn’t know if he should be awake. ‘And you?’
I nodded. ‘Recently, though. Actually, about the same time as Ollie.’
‘You know Ollie?’ He put his hand to his mouth as he battled back tears. I felt desperately sorry for him. I guess grief made a person do mad things when they grasped at hope.
He walked away with his hand to his forehead, shaking his head and turned back again. ‘I didn’t know if it would work, if you want the truth of it. I suspected not, but—?’
I knew what it was to long to see someone that desperately. I felt it every day about Pete.
I was suddenly conscious that everyone had swung around to look at something.
Oh my God, Lila. Walking in and nudging Olivia along, with her hands tied behind her back and Ainsley holding a large shotgun behind her.
Wax went to take a step forward and Ainsley immediately held up his gun. ‘Tut-tut!’
‘How can you be here? Why did you need me?’ Wax demanded, thrown and anxious for his mother.
We were all confused.
Lila clicked her fingers and pointed at Wax’s rucksack. ‘Give it to me,’ she ordered.
Wax took it from his shoulder and slowly passed it to her outstretched hand.
‘Why didn’t you just come and get it yourselves?’
‘We would have if we’d known about the tunnel,’ Ainsley said. ‘But we still needed you to get it. So we just followed the peanut gallery here.’
Lila grinned at the others, proving I was right and she could see them all along. She took out the glass bottle and held it up to the light. Then she uncorked and sniffed it and threw the contents straight down her throat. She closed her eyes and we all waited. The trickle from the fountain seemed deafeningly loud. Just when I thought the whole thing was a fraud, a blue light seemed to travel down her whole body in a halo, until it reached the floor and disappeared.
