“That’s different,” Magda said. “A person is born with that potential.”
“A person is born with the potential to change, to learn, to grow. It’s not always an easy step to take. You were changed by being taught to read and write. Reading and writing aren’t natural abilities. They were instilled in you. Aren’t you happy that people cared enough to change you so that you would be better than you were born and thus have a better life? Aren’t you better for it? Didn’t the struggle make you stronger?”
Magda swiped back her short hair. “But Isidore, he took your sight. How could you stand to lose—”
“No,” Isidore said, holding up a finger to cut Magda off. “It’s not that way at all. Yes, I lost something, but I gained something truly remarkable. I gained far more than I lost. Do you know that I’ve never again bothered to hold those scarves with the knots?”
“Why not?”
“Because I don’t need them. That memory is the past. I can see so much more now.”
Magda frowned. “What do you mean? See what?”
Isidore lifted an arm, slowly sweeping it around the room. “Well, I can see . . .”
The cat hissed as she suddenly jumped to her feet and rose up onto her toes.
Isidore’s arm halted in place.
The cat arched her back high. Her black hair stood on end as her mouth opened wide. Her muzzle drew back, exposing her teeth as she hissed.
Magda blinked at the cat. “Shadow . . . what’s the matter with you?”
“You should run,” Isidore whispered.
Magda looked up. “What?”
“Run.”
Chapter 37
Magda sprang to her feet, following Isidore up. Shadow’s black fur stood out straight, making her look bigger than she really was. Her tail puffed out to twice as fat as normal. Hissing with her fangs bared, she looked ferocious.
Isidore swept her arm out, pushing Magda behind her. “It’s too late to run. It’s in the hallway.”
Magda thought that her own hair might stand on end along with the cat’s.
“What’s in the hall?”
A gust of wind swept in low along the floor and then up through the room, swirling around the wall, extinguishing all the candles. The air turned icy, as if someone had opened the door into the dead of winter.
The cat growled in a way that Magda had never before heard a cat growl. It was a ferocious, feral sound.
The frigid, whirling breeze died away, leaving the room to settle into murky stillness. Fortunately, the shield door on Magda’s lantern had been closed. The flame hadn’t been blown out by the strange gust of wind, so it was still providing some light. But sitting off to the side as it was, and with the shield door closed, it wasn’t much help at lighting the uncomfortably dark room.
Magda squinted, trying her best to see in the dim light, looking for any sign of movement, something out of place, something that didn’t belong. She didn’t see anything that would have Isidore and the cat in such a state of alarm, but it was so difficult to see in the near darkness that she couldn’t be sure there wasn’t something she might be missing.
Using an outstretched arm, Isidore began backing Magda through the room, following the curve of the circular wall. The blind woman was obviously able to tell quite well where she was in the darkness. Now it was Magda who was at the disadvantage.
Magda pulled her knife. With her other hand she clutched Isidore’s arm so if she had to she could pull the spiritist back out of harm’s way. Even though Magda knew how to use the weapon to defend herself, with the unseen nature of the threat the knife offered less comfort than she would have hoped.
Not seeing anything, Magda leaned close and whispered, “Maybe we should go into the back room.”
Isidore had both arms out, crouched a bit, as if she, too, was readying herself to fight the invisible opponent.
“No,” Isidore said. “If we go back there we’ll be even farther from the way out. We would be trapped.”
“Trapped by what?” Magda asked, holding her knife out as she scanned the room to both sides. “I don’t see anything.”
Isidore came to a slow, fluid stop as she crossed her lips with a finger, urging silence.
Slowly, quietly, each step taken with care, Isidore began ushering Magda closer to the side of the room, all the while facing the entrance.
For the first time, Magda heard something coming from the entry hall. The strange sound sent goose bumps tingling up her arms. It sounded like fingernails dragging along stone.
The cat, facing the black maw of the entrance hall, hissed and growled even louder. Magda didn’t know if Shadow intended on making an escape or attacking whatever it was that she and Isidore had first sensed in the entry.
With a sudden roar that made Magda gasp, a dark shape burst out of the blackness of the hall and into the room. In the dim light, Magda could see that it was a man. As Magda brought her knife up, Isidore ignited a bolt of power between her palms that lit the room in blinding flash of light.
In that flash, Magda saw that the man didn’t look the way she had expected. The folds of skin on his face seemed dry and stretched. It was difficult to see clearly in the crackling flashes of light, so she couldn’t be sure exactly what she had seen. His scraps of clothes were dark and clung tightly, as if stuck to him.
Isidore flicked her hands, casting the sizzling point of light toward the intruder. The cat screeched and sprang for his face.
A dark arm caught the cat in midair and flung it aside. At the same time the bolt of power that Isidore sent flying at the man seemed to glance uselessly off the dark figure as he advanced through the room. Stone shattered where the flickering light of Isidore’s power hit the wall, sending shards flying and dust boiling up.
Isidore didn’t waste any time. Another bolt of powerful light ignited. This time, Magda had to turn her face away from the searing heat that slammed into the advancing figure. The shimmering heat turned to white vapor as h
e pushed through it without slowing.
“Try to get around him and run,” Isidore said.
“I’m not leaving without you,” Magda told her as she tried to think of a way they could get past the hulking man.
“Forget about me—I am already lost!” Isidore yelled as she pushed Magda back.
“You’re not lost!” Magda regained her footing and seized Isidore’s arm. “We both have to get out of here!”
“We can’t both get away.”
“Yes we can. Hold my arm. When I cut him that will give us an opening. Stay with me.”
“You will only have one chance,” Isidore said, ignoring Magda’s command and shaking her arm free. “When that chance comes, take it! Don’t lose your life in here, Magda. You have to get away! You are more important than I am.”
Magda had no intention of leaving a blind woman to her fate with whoever, or whatever, was in the room with them. She grabbed Isidore’s arm again and yanked her back just in time from what the woman couldn’t see. A powerful arm swept past them both.
Magda used the opening to duck under Isidore’s outstretched arm and to slam her knife up into the ribs just under the man’s extended arm as it swung past them. It was a solid strike. She pulled back in time to miss the elbow that cocked back, trying to get her. The arm swept around again, inches from her face. She tried to slash the arm but missed. Magda saw that the fingers were like shriveled, blackened claws.
Isidore pushed both hands out, using all her strength to send a concentrated, focused fist of air at the center of the figure. It bent him only a little. He staggered back a half step but then kept coming forward again as Magda and Isidore kept circling away from him.
The cat leaped out of nowhere up onto the man’s back. He twisted and threw it off. The cat hit the wall hard.
With an angry roar and sudden, ferocious speed, the man lunged toward them. Magda snatched for the blind woman’s arm to yank her back out of the way, but she caught only air as Isidore leaned in and again tried to force a focused wall of air at the attacker.