Page 24 of The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland

When in doubt, look to the sky. There’s more up there than we can ever know. Besides, it’s pretty, isn’t it? What do you see in this cloud?

—Evie Oxby, Instagram

Beatrice’s heart creaked. “I understand—”

Minna threw the pen against Xenia’s headstone.

“You do not . You’re pissed at your father, but he’s alive.

Mine isn’t. Wanna know what the worst part is?

He wanted a boy. Did he get a boy? Yes. Was he the happiest man on the planet because he had a baby boy?

Yes, he was, and I know that because he told my mother a million times.

And because he died falling off that stupid ladder before I was old enough to remember him, my mother spent the first ten years of my life telling me how thrilled he was that he got what he wanted: a strong, smart boy.

” She plucked at her red capelet. “But he didn’t get that, did he?

He actually got a girl. And my mother stopped telling me he wanted me because she tries not to lie straight to my face.

I know she and Gran love me the way I am.

But my father? I want to talk to him . I want to tell him—I want to see if—”

Beatrice did get it, though. Even after Naya had come into their lives, the empty mother spot never truly filled.

Minna’s voice broke as she hung her head.

“Mom and Gran say they can’t talk to him because of stupid reasons, like they’re too close to the situation, and I can sometimes get images through my guide but never from him.

And then you just—you just tap into the actual words of people on the other side?

Just like that? But you don’t want to? You don’t want to even try to learn how to control it?

” With a strangled groan, she flopped backward on the grass. “It’s too much.”

The words came before Beatrice could stop them. “I’ll try.”

Minna’s head popped up. “Huh?”

“Tell me what to do, and I’ll try it.” It might be ridiculous, but Beatrice felt as if she’d try anything for this girl. “I don’t believe in magic, or in divine intention or in whatever word you want to dress it up in. But I believe in you . So tell me what to do.”

Minna waggled her arms and legs in the air like an upside-down water bug and then scrambled up. “Oh, my god. Thank you. Just one more try. Thank you.” She shoved the notebook back at Beatrice.

Beatrice took it and reached for the pen from where it had landed in the grass after bouncing off the headstone. “Should I read it again? Out loud?” She touched the nonsensical syllables she’d written out.

Minna nodded and looked up as the first cold raindrops hit the leaves overhead. “I’ll hold the umbrella over you.”

“What else?”

“Set the intention. His name was Taurus.” Her spine straightened. “He’s buried around the corner—should we go there? No, wait. This feels right. Here with our ancestors. Just think of me. Then reach for him and see what comes through.”

It felt cruel to get Minna’s hopes up, but somehow it felt crueler to deny her the attempt.

So Beatrice began to read the sounds out loud.

“Bent canth ilno trill—”

The image of the fountain pen clicking itself into the old padlock flashed back into her mind, and she wasn’t even halfway through speaking the first line when something rose in her chest—a need that was as strong as her need for oxygen—she needed to write right now .

Her brain folded itself out of the way, leaving her hand to move on its own. She had as much control over it as she did the rain, now coming down harder, smacking against the umbrella Minna held over them both.

A second—or an hour—later, she blinked, and she was back in control of her hand, her breath, her brain.

run to the tree house get them out don’t wait run and then run more go NOW

Minna met her eyes.

Then, together, they ran.

Minna was younger, with longer and stronger legs, but somehow Beatrice kept pace with her niece as they raced through the rain.

As she frantically wiped water from her eyes, fear blazed through Beatrice’s limbs, fueling her speed.

Out the gates of the cemetery, down the residential side streets until they hit the main drag—then they skidded around the corner and dashed across the street, dodging cars, ignoring their outraged honks.

Through the park, past the gazebo, and then they were there, at the base of the tree house where the busker had stopped on Beatrice’s first day in town.

Rain lashed down, and the wind howled through the limbs. Minna gasped for breath as she pushed back her dripping hair. “What do we do?”

Beatrice threw herself at the ladder nailed to the tree’s trunk.

On another day, she’d probably have taken some time to think about how to climb it without hurting herself, but now, she flew up as if she’d done it a hundred times.

She pushed her way past the hanging oilcloth to crouch inside the tiny space.

Inside, where it was still dry, three girls read comic books. None of them could have been more than ten years old. The noise of the pounding rain was a roar.

“Out,” yelped Beatrice. “You have to get out.”

“What?”

“Who are you?”

“Throw them down if you have to!” Minna shouted from the base.

“It’s not safe. Get out, now !”

Her roar was enough to terrify them into motion, and they leaped around her and out, tumbling down the ladder, Beatrice scrambling down after them.

run more go NOW —she could almost hear the words she’d written reverberating in her ears.

“Keep going! To the gazebo!” The five of them ran the fifty yards, Minna in front, Beatrice bringing up the rear.

Once in the gazebo, out of the rain, the tallest girl demanded answers Beatrice didn’t have. “What’s your problem? Now we’re soaked.” She held out a comic book. “And so are these!”

“I’ll buy you new ones,” mumbled Beatrice, feeling sick to her stomach.

The smallest girl’s lower lip was trembling.

What had Beatrice been thinking? Had she just kidnapped these kids?

No, that required keeping them, right? She’d merely forced them quickly to a new place, but that was probably some kind of crime, too—

CRASH.

The sky lit up—everything did, going white-bright, the noise so loud, it was almost soundless, registering only as pressure and a terrifying heat.

Just as quickly, the light and heat and pressure were gone.

And the tree that held the tree house just…

disintegrated. The lightning must have destroyed the trunk itself from the inside out, because instead of simply burning, as the tree house was doing—flames leaping from all sides—the trunk began to crumble, and then, with a thunderous whoomp , it collapsed into itself, the biggest limbs cracking as they hit the ground, the smaller limbs catching fire.

Two of the girls burst into tears. The tallest one walked to the edge of the gazebo’s platform and threw up neatly into a trash can.

The handkerchief Cordelia had given her was in Beatrice’s hand, but she didn’t remember taking it out of her pocket. She gripped it so tightly a French knot indented the tip of her finger.

Two women and three men hurtled out of Fritz’s café, throwing themselves at the girls, shouting in confusion, their voices merging with the siren that rose in the distance.

If Beatrice had arrived a few minutes later, the parents clutching their kids would have had no one to hold.

Fritz arrived, followed by Keelia. A girl Minna’s age detached herself from Keelia’s side and wrapped her arms around Minna.

Beatrice didn’t notice her legs were giving out until Reno, who had arrived along with the parents, guided her to sit crossed-legged on the gazebo’s wooden floor.

“It’s okay,” said Reno.

“But—” Beatrice clutched at Reno’s warm, strong hands. “What if I hadn’t—what if—”

“It’s a miracle ,” said the woman holding the tall girl.

It couldn’t be a miracle. She and Minna had simply done something, something that had given Beatrice information that she couldn’t have had any other way, information that had allowed her to save those kids.

Had that been… a really big coincidence?

No, of course not. Coincidences didn’t work that way, written on paper in some kind of bizarre fugue state.

That was—it had to be—magic.

But magic didn’t exist.