In a whisper very unlike her, she said, ‘But that could only mean . . .’
A familiar creak came from upstairs.
For a moment, Dot thought absolutely nothing of it. Half a year she had lived at the house and she had become so accustomed to its sounds that the creaking of the attic had altogether faded into the background. It was a homely noise, so ancillary it was almost inaudible – like the ocean. Dot had taken comfort in it. It was the sound of Theodora pacing or, if the witch was out, surely the sound of Belchamber. But then Dot realised in a horrible rush that both the witch and the spirit were here in the living room. Unmistakably, another creak came. Then, the croak of a raven.
Cate looked at Theodora.
‘Surely not,’ said the older witch.
Another creak. Theodora looked at Lio, then at Dot. She whispered, ‘Forgive me.’
And then the room burst into movement.
A bang exploded from Cate’s hand and Theodora, Dot and Lio were knocked backward. A strange, purple smoke enveloped the older witch, vaulting her from the living room. Theodora, who seemed to forget her magic entirely, shouted‘Cate, do not!’ and chased her into the hallway and up the stairs.
Lio groaned but did not rise. His head had collided with the wall.
‘Rupert, check he’s okay,’ Dot said, untangling herself and rushing after the two women. She stumbled, fatigue descending, but pulled herself up and pushed on to the staircase. A fierce ringing erupted in her ears and her brain began to fog over. She couldn’t understand how Cate had come to be in the house because surely Lio could not have harmed the wards. She pushed on up the stairs and found that Theodora’s trapdoor was already open.
‘Saints,’said Dot, and she climbed the ladder.
The effort made her arms and legs shake, but she pushed on ever upward, into Theodora’s bedroom. Dot cried out as shepulled herself up and into the space. She swivelled but could not see Theodora or Cate until, at last, she spotted the two of them standing inside the wardrobe.
Inside it?Then, foggily, Dot thought:What kind of a wardrobe has a window in it?
But it was not a wardrobe at all.
The doors were open, and Dot stumbled toward it, realising that within was a hidden room. A bedroom, directly over Dot’s own.
Dot’s hand clasped the edge of the doorway, and she stepped into the secret room.
Here, Theodora and Cate stood, the younger witch’s cuts reopened and bleeding through the bandages.
The walls of the hidden space were a deep purple. Rabbits’ feet dangled from the ceiling. There was a bookcase decorated with paintings and sketchbook pages. A cauldron in the corner. An icebox. A shelf of tinned goods, onions and bread. The north-facing window looked over the street just as Dot’s did.
Why had she not noticed, upon finally seeing Theodora’s bedroom from within, that the space lacked the northern window that she had seen from the street and in the photograph sold by the carpet seller?
Dot stepped out from behind Theodora and at last her eyes fell on the woman sitting in the middle of the bed.
‘Dottie!’ said the gaunt young woman. The lamplight was harsh on her skin, giving her hollowed face the shadowy quality of a corpse. Her olive skin was unhealthily pale and pockmarked. Still, the woman tipped back her head, assessing Dot with the superiority only a person who had once been uncommonly beautiful could possess. Her cracked lips split into a smile. Her fingers, with nails the colour of burnt oil, clasped an old bread knife.
‘I’m Opal.’
CHAPTERTHIRTY
Dot gawked at the spectral figure sat upon the bed. Opal’s angular jaw flexed as she grinned the smile of an addict, her fingers wound gently around the handle of the bread knife. That smell that clung to her – was that opium? Dot’s eyes darted around. No, it was woodsmoke, incense, gunpowder, blackberry and, beneath it all, that strange smell of something wet and rotting, of acrid chemicals and pond water.
Opal had eyes like her namesake, but their lustre was dull. Her hair was limp and dark. Her chest and arms were etched with tattoos just like Casimir’s. Her mouth quirked at Dot, and recognition sank in. This was the young woman who had warned Dot about the false monk before Saint Penelope’s Cathedral.
And Dot wanted to ask,You?
Where was the woman of radiance who had been described?
Opal crossed her arms and surveyed Dot, and Dot surveyed her back.
‘Opal,’ said Cate in a hush.
The window was open. The room was icy. Yet, Opal wore a dress of black satin that hung loosely on her emaciated body, revealing much of her chest, and of course those tattoos. Dot’s eyes trailed along them to the spot above Opal’s heart, where she found therune she was looking for. There, engraved in Opal’s chest, was the epicentre of Salamander’s conduence charm.
