Page 6 of A Spot of Tea and Sorcery: Vol. 6

“I know,” she answered coldly.

Mrs. Goddard spared them further awkwardness by clapping her hands suddenly. “Green Mother above, enough of this chatter! We’ve kept poor Luna up far too late, and she has work in the morning, don’t you, luv? Tobias, you scurry up to the shower right away, and none of your lip! Don’t you forget to wash behind your ears, or it’s the back of me hand you’ll be having. And Luna, duckie, you come this way. I’ll show you to meguest room. You can stay here tonight, no sense in you venturing out into this dark and cold on your own.”

Luna accepted the offer with gratitude and followed Mrs. Goddard up her poky staircase to a room as whimsical as one might wish for, almost suffocated in quilts and lace and embroidered doodads. Mrs. Goddard gave her a fresh toothbrush, towels, and a comb, pointed out the bathroom (from which the sounds of Tobias’s ablutions could even now be heard), and told her to sleep in as long as she wished in the morning. “When I takes his breakfast, I’ll just mention to Mr. Grimm that he ought to expect you late,” she added.

Luna didn’t have the energy to protest. Just before she closed her door, however, she did call out to the good woman’s retreating form, “Mrs. Goddard? Please. Don’t say anything to him. About Wednesday, I mean.”

Mrs. Goddard’s cherry-red face crinkled with distress beneath the lace of her old-fashioned cap. But she shrugged and said, “Your business is your business.” Then, biting her lip, she added, “I don’t know what’s got you so spooked, sweet duckie. But I hope you won’t let yourself be frightened out of a lifetime of goodness.” With that she turned and bustled back downstairs.

Luna quickly shut the door before turning and sagging back against it. She covered her face with both hands and pressed the heels of her palms hard into her eye sockets in an attempt to drive back tears. But they would come rolling down her cheeks. At last, with a gasp that was almost a sob, she moved to the bed and dropped her purse on the quilted comforter. It opened, and a broken shooting star earring spilled out, along with the edge of an envelope.

Luna’s gaze fixed on that envelope.

Moving slowly, as though afraid of being stung, she stretched out her hand, pulled it the rest of the way from her purse. She flipped it open and slid free the thaumagraph of her and heremployer, taken only a few short hours ago at the Moat House Café. Her own frozen face she passed over without interest, but her gaze fixed with some intensity on the likeness of Mr. Grimm. On the way he looked at her. With so much undisguised longing.

Luna worried her lower lip. She touched the picture, allowing the tip of her finger to linger over his mouth.

“He might help you, you know,” she whispered, her voice very soft in the overly-whimsified atmosphere. “If you go to him now, if you tell him the truth . . . he might be strong enough. To fight the Brotherhood. To change your fate.”

He would certainly try. If she asked him to. A man who looked at a woman likethatwould attempt to move heaven and earth. She knew it. Knew it with a conviction she should have recognized weeks ago. Had he not been showing her his heart for at least that long? As far back as her birthday, as far back as Green Yule, no . . . farther even than that. All the way back to the first day she met him, when he’d tried so hard to make her tea and offered her a job and literally fell over himself with the desire to please her.

If she asked him to fight, he would.

But Mr. Grimm was not in that vision she’d scried so long ago.

Which meant . . . which meant . . .

“He’ll die,” she whispered. “He’ll die, trying to save you.”

And she couldn’t bear that idea. She’d rather offer herself up to the Brotherhood right now, lay herself down on that dark slab of stone, docile as a sacrificial lamb. Anything rather than let him die for her.

“So, you’ll leave,” she whispered. “Wednesday morning. Four o’clock.” She pressed the thaumagraph to her chest, closing her eyes tight as two hot tears escaped and rolled off her chin. “You’ve just got to get through Tuesday first.”

Every so often, Nigel’s consciousness fought its way through layers of darkness, fog, pain, and poison to gasp an agonized breath of icy air.

Each time he surfaced, he would think,Oh. Still alive, I see.

Then the clinging fingers of severmist poison would grip his spirit and pull him back under, and any other thoughts halfway-formed in his head slipped away, replaced by pure agony. He’d surface again some while later, take another ragged breath, and sink once more. How many times this happened, he could not guess. Neither could he guess how much time passed between each strangled breath.

Part of him was still aware of the need to fight. Luna was in danger, after all. The Brotherhood was out there, and that meant he couldn’t just lay down and die. Not like this. It was one thing to give his life in glorious battle, defending her against all foes. It was quite another to make a stupid mistake and die before ever reaching the battlefield.

Nigel clung to the idea of Luna. Even in the absolute depths, in the darkness and the wallowing pit of pain, she was there.In his heart. A beacon, a light toward which he might turn and strive. This alone, he suspected, enabled him to fight for each ragged gasp of air in his lungs. But he never seemed to make any progress. Eventually, he knew, the severmist would win this struggle. How long would it take for his body to be discovered in this back alley behind the abandoned rec center? Would Luna mourn his loss, or would she be relieved? Would she—

Something pried his mouth open. The next instant, something else was stuffed inside. Nigel’s tongue was assaulted with a potent, floral flavor which he found singularly disgusting. Disgusting enough, in fact, that it jolted him back to a space of semi-lucidity, and his ears were able to discern an ungentle voice demanding,“Never mind!”furiously.

Though it required far more effort than he wished to expend on anything pertaining to this mortal existence, Nigel managed to make himself chew. Then swallow.

His body spasmed. The next moment, he heaved up his guts for the second time that night.

When the awful cramps in his stomach finally abated, he lay in the cold, muddy snow next to a puddle of his own sick. It was such a miserable state of being, he was more than willing to let himself pass out again, and his eyes rolled back in his head. But a sharp burst of fiery pain in his fingers jolted him back to consciousness. He forced his eyelids up, and his bleary vision took in the sight of a multi-headed stock of pink blossoms. Some of those heads worried at his fingertips quite viciously, while others shot tiny sparks of flame.

“Snapdragons,” Nigel muttered. He shut his eyes, shook his head. He was becoming aware of other sensations up and down his body. Toothless mouths worrying at his trouser legs, soft petals stroking his cheeks. When he made himself look, he found he was surrounded by flowers. Dahlias and tiger lilies, petunias and carnations.

“Wh-wha-what . . .” Words garbled in his throat, not wanting to emerge. But the sound brought all those little petaled faces turning to look at him with some expectation. “What are you lot doing here?” he managed at last, followed by an, “Ow! Steady on!” when, out of nowhere, a thorny cane smacked across his backside.

He pushed himself upright, away from the sickness and the snow. Flowers scattered, giving him room to maneuver, then crowded in close as he propped himself heavily on quivering arms. The double-delight undulated into his line of vision, much larger and more impressive than the rest. Many bi-colored blossoms shook their ruffled heads at him with clear disdain.

Nigel felt his mouth gaping open as he stared around at the dirty little alley, which had somehow, miraculously, transformed into an extraordinary garden. “Y-you shouldn’t be here. Out in the cold,” he said, teeth chattering. Now that the immediate threat of death had passed, he became more aware of the winter chill himself. “It’s not . . . it’s not good for you.”