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A chill ran through her. “What do you mean?” She tried to make the question sound demanding, but even she couldn’t ignore the note of uncertainty and fear in her voice.
“Oh.” He sailed through the distance in quick, twitchlike motions until she became aware of him standing just behind her. His remaining arm wrapped around the front of her, across her chest, “I mean that you might not like what it is you find in there, that’s all.”
Stiffening, Isobel tolerated his closeness. At her side, her hands balled into ready fists. “You can touch me, but you can’t hurt me,” she guessed.
“Which works out,” he said admittedly. “Because, remember, I don’t want to hurt you. But you have to understand, Isobel, there is always that fine line.” As he spoke, his hand trailed up her collar, his touch featherlight. “Between doing what we want . . . and doing what we’re told.” Cold, his fingers wrapped around her throat.
Isobel gasped and grabbed for his hand. It dissipated at her touch, and her fingers clutched at her own skin. He swept around her, coils of violet and black mixed with the churning ash.
He reassembled to block the door, his form shimmering into solidity.
“Open this door, and no matter what, you’ll never close it,” he warned.
“Kind of like you and your mouth,” she snapped, and went to push past him. Fear flashed in his eyes and he loosened again, slithering aside. She grasped the handle, and at this, the Nocs in the trees renewed their frenzy. She could hear them flitting and rustling.
“You’re going to need a lot more in there than backflips and cute tricks, cheerleader,” Pinfeathers called. He slid away with a fearful whisper that sounded like “Tekeli-li!”
The cry was taken up immediately by the other Nocs. In hoarse, rasping croaks, they echoed the call. “Tekeli-li!” they shouted with their parched voices. She had heard it before, that first time she had found herself in the woodlands. But what did it mean? They took flight from the black branches and fought the turbulent air with their wings, carrying off the strange word with them until they vanished into spells of violet.
Left alone, Isobel turned her attention back to the door. She took in a quick breath, then twisted the knob. The door creaked as it opened inward. As she crossed the threshold, it felt as though she was moving through a screen of static. The electric sensation lingered over her skin like pins and needles as she passed into the small space of an enclosed staircase landing.
Immediately the wind at her back silenced. She glanced behind her to watch the world of ash and charcoal whip and toss. Traces of static blipped the scene, and it was like watching the whole thing on a muted television.
The air inside the stairwell was musty, like an old closet. Cold slats of gray-white light streamed down from the square window above the narrow wooden stairs. Dust particles filtered in and out of the stark light like tiny lost beings. The staircase itself, sandwiched between two wood-paneled walls, led up into what Isobel knew to be an attic.
Ash slipped from the sleeves and cuffs of Varen’s jacket as she moved forward to take the first step.
Isobel placed a hand on either wall. She took the second step, and it creaked low underfoot. In her chest her heart began to pound, rushing blood to her ears and adrenaline through her system. She could feel the presence in the room upstairs. It was like a tight vibration humming in the air or a tuning fork set off deep inside her. She glanced over her shoulder to see that the storm outside had intensified. The tangled boughs of the twig-trees scrambled back and forth, clawing wildly at one another. The ash swirled in wild cyclones and blustered in sandstorm clouds. Still, no sound of the chaos reached her.
When Isobel came to the final step, it was to find herself alone in the attic. The table and chairs that she had once sat at with Varen now hovered in the air. Several books, too, and the threadbare rug drifted about in lazy suspension.
She looked out the window at the top of the stairs, which she now stood in front of. It should have shown her the brick side and the windows of the next building over. Instead there were only the tempest-tossed woodlands below. It was the same story with the other window, the oval one above the table that in the real world would have overlooked the street. This was the place where she had first read Poe, and standing there, staring at it all, the distance of time felt like years.
Isobel’s gaze traveled to a slim, familiar book floating near the table. She recognized it at once as Varen’s black sketchbook and went to snatch it out of the air. She held it between her hands and let her fingertips trail over the book’s surface, then hook beneath its cover. She opened the book, flipping through the pages crammed tight with his beautiful handwriting. She stopped at a spread of drawings, suddenly realizing that she’d seen them before. Roughly sketched faces stared up at her, faces with whole pieces missing. In the middle, she saw Pinfeathers’s familiar countenance, though he was not labeled by name. She remembered these pages from the day in the library, the first time they’d met to study. Isobel turned the book sideways, noticing a poem that stretched vertically down, crammed in between the artwork and the page’s edge.