Lasher (Lives of the Mayfair Witches 2)

At last we entered my room on the third floor of the house.

"Get the girl some food," I said. "She looks as if she has never had a square meal." I sent Stella off with Richard. I collapsed on the side of my bed, too exhausted to think for a moment.

Then I looked up and my soul was filled with despair. This beautiful fresh creature on the brink of life, and I so old, very soon to end it. I was so tired I might have said yes to death now, if this girl, if her case had not demanded my presence here.

"Can you understand me?" I asked. "Do you know who I am?"

"Yes, Julien," she said in plain English effortlessly enough. "I know all about you. This is your attic, is it not?" she said in her little treble voice, and as she looked around at the beams, at the books, at the fireplace and the chair, at all my precious things, my Victrola and my piles of songs, she gave a soft trusting smile to me.

"Dear God," I whispered. "What shall I do with you?"

Twenty-one

THE PEOPLE WHO lived in this bright little house were brown people. They had black hair and black eyes; their skin gleamed in the light above the table. They were small with highly visible bones, and they wore clothes in very bright red and blue and white, clothes that were tight around their plump arms. The woman, when she saw Emaleth, got up and came to the transparent door.

"Good heavens, child! Come inside here," she said, looking up into Emaleth's eyes. "Jerome, look at this. This child's stark naked. Look at this girl. Oh, my Lord in heaven."

"I've washed in the water," said Emaleth. "Mother is sick under the tree. Mother can't talk anymore." Emaleth held out her hands. They were wet. Her hair hung wet on her breasts. She was slightly cold, but the air of the room was warm and still.

"Well, come in here," said the woman, tugging her hand. She reached for a piece of cloth on a hook and began to wipe Emaleth's long dripping hair. The water made a pool on the shiny floor. How clean things were here. How unnatural. How unlike the fragrant beating night outside, full of wings and racing shadows. This was a shelter against the night, against the insects that stung, and the things that had cut Emaleth's naked feet, and scratched her naked arms.

The man stood still, staring up at Emaleth.

"Get her a towel, Jerome, don't stand there. Get this girl a towel. Get her some clothes. Child, what happened to your clothes? Where are your clothes? Did something bad happen to you?"

Emaleth had never heard voices quite like these, of the brown people. They had a musical note in them that the other people's voices didn't have. They rose and fell in a distinctly different pattern. The whites of their eyes were not purely white, these people. They had a faint yellowish cast to them that went better with their beautiful brown skin. Even Father did not have this kind of soft ringing quality to his words. Father had said, "You will be born knowing all you need to know. Do not let anything frighten you."

"Be kind to me," said Emaleth.

"Jerome, get the clothes!" The woman had taken a big wad of paper off a roll and was blotting Emaleth's shoulders and arms with them. Emaleth took the wad of paper and wiped her face. Hmmmm. This paper felt rough, but it wasn't hurtfully rough, and it smelled good. Paper towels. Everything in the little kitchen smelled good. Bread, milk, cheese. Emaleth smelt the milk and cheese. That was the cheese, wasn't it? Bright orange cheese in a block lying on the table. Emaleth wanted this. But she had not been offered it.

"We are by nature a gentle and polite people," Father had said. "This is why they have been so hateful to us in times past."

"What clothes?" said the man named Jerome, who was taking off his shirt. "There's nothing in this house that's going to fit her." He held out the shirt. Emaleth wanted to take it but she also wanted to look at it. It was blue-and-white-colored. In little squares like the red and white squares on the table.

"Bubby's pants will do it," said the woman. "Get a pair of Bubby's pants and give me that shirt."

The little house was shining. The red and white squares on the table were shining. If she grabbed the edge of the red and white squares she could have pulled them off. It was one sheet, that thing. Shiny white refrigerator with an engine on the back of it. She knew the handle would bend just so, just by looking at it. And inside would be cold milk.

Emaleth was hungry. She had drunk all of Mother's milk as Mother lay staring under the tree. She had cried and cried, and then she had gone to bathe in the water. The water was greenish and not fresh-smelling. But there had been a fountain on the edge of the grass, a fountain with a handle. Emaleth had washed better in that.

The man came rushing back into the room with long pants such as Father wore and he wore. Emaleth put these on, pulling them up over her long thin legs, almost losing her balance. The zipper felt cold against her belly. The button felt cold. But they were all right. Newborn, she was still a little too soft all over.

Father said, "You will walk but it will be hard." These pants made a warm heavy covering. "But remember, you can do everything that you need to do."

She slipped her arms into the shirt as the woman held it for her. Now, this cloth was nicer. More like the towel with which the woman kept patting her hair. Emaleth's hair was golden yellow. It looked so bright on the woman's fingers, and the inside of the woman's hand was pink, not brown.

Emaleth looked down at the shirt buttons. The woman reached out with nimble fingers and buttoned one button. Very quick. Like that. Emaleth knew this. She buttoned the other buttons very fast. She laughed.

Father said, "You will be born knowing, as birds know how to build their nests, as giraffes know how to walk, as turtles know to crawl from the land and swim in the open sea, though no one has ever shown them. Remember human beings are not born with this instinctive knowledge. Human beings are born half-formed and helpless, but you will be able to run and talk. You will recognize everything."

Well, not everything, Emaleth thought, but she did know that was a clock on the wall, and that was a radio on the windowsill. If you turned it on, voices came out of it. Or music.

"Where's your mother, child?" asked the woman. "Where did you say she was sick?"

"How old is this girl?" asked the man of his wife. He stood rigid, hands forming into fists. He had put on his cap, and he glowered at her. "Where is this woman?"

"How should I know how old she is? She looks like a big tall little girl. Honey, how old are you? Where is your mother?"

"I'm newborn," said Emaleth. "That's why my mother is so sick. It wasn't her fault. She doesn't have any more milk. She is sick unto death and she smells like death. But there was enough milk. I am not one of the little people. That is something I no longer need to fear." She turned and pointed. "Walk a long way, cross the bridge and under the tree, she's there where the branches touch the ground, but I don't think she'll ever talk anymore. She will dream until she dies."

Out the door he went, letting it bang loudly after him. With a very determined air he walked across the grass and then he started to run.

The woman was staring at her.

Emaleth put her hands to her ears, but it was too late, the transparent door had banged so loud it made a ringing inside her ears and nothing now would stop it. The ringing had to wear away. Transparent door. Not glass. She knew about glass. The bottle on the table was glass. She remembered glass windows, and glass beads, lots of things of glass. Plastic. The transparent door was screen and plastic.

"It's all encoded inside," said Father.

She looked at the woman. She wanted to ask the woman for food, but it was more important now to leave here--to find Father or Donnelaith or Michael in New Orleans, whichever proved to be the easier thing to do. She had looked at the stars but they hadn't told her. Father had said you will know from the stars. Now, of that part she wasn't so sure.

She turned and opened the door and stepped outside, careful not to let it bang, holding it for the woman. All the tree frogs sang. All the crickets sang. Things sang of which no one knew the name, not even Father

. They rustled and rattled in the dark. All the night was alive. Look at the tiny insects swimming beneath the light bulb! She waved her hand at them. How they scattered, only to come back in a tight little cloud.

She looked at the stars. She would always remember this pattern of the stars, surely enough, the way the stars dipped down to the far trees, and how black the sky seemed at one point and how deep blue at another. Yes, and the moon. Behold the moon. The beautiful radiant moon. Father, at last I see it. Yes, but to get to Donnelaith, she had to know how the stars would look when she reached her destination.

The woman took Emaleth's hand. Then the woman looked at her hand and let her go.

"You're so soft!" she said. "You're as soft and pink as a little baby."

"Don't tell them you are newborn," Father had told her. "Don't tell them that they will soon die. Feel sorry for them. It is their final hour."

"Thank you," said Emaleth. "I'm going now. I'm going to Scotland or New Orleans. Do you know the way?"

"Well, New Orleans is no big problem," said the woman. "I don't know about Scotland. But you can't just walk off like this in your bare feet. Let me get Bubby's shoes for you. Lord, yes, Bubby's shoes are the only ones that are going to fit."