Clouds swirl in a grayish mass, dimming the light. A thin film of fog clings to the plants and to my face like ethereal cobwebs. The sun has always restored me when I’m tired, sad, or unsettled. I could’ve used some of that positivity today.
Due to the ominous sky, I earlier clipped an LED book light—the one Mom bought for us to use on the ten-hour flight here—onto my sweater lapel. After I pull up weeds and break up clods with the fork from the cafeteria, I’ll have to remove any roots left in the loosened soil. A little extra illumination will help me find them. Some weeds, like elder, bindweed, and couch grass, will regrow if any chopped roots remain. They’re regenerative, like salamander tails, earthworms . . .
And phantoms.
I veer my gaze to the roses far to my right, those left for dead at the touch of a man’s hand last Sunday. The way they sway on their stems, heavy and black, proves I didn’t imagine it at all. My chest tightens and my footsteps falter as I notice a piece of gray cloth, strung across a cluster of golden flowers right beneath the thorny bush. I move closer. Partly because the fabric looks familiar, but more because it’s so out of place in this untouched wilderness.
Swallowing the knot in my throat, I crouch to tug the cloth free, recognizing it as one of the stockings Mom and I bought—part of my missing uniforms. The side seam gapes open, frayed but systematic, as if someone sliced it with scissors.
A sense of violation rattles through me, jarring. I stand on weak legs, catching movement everywhere now—other articles fluttering like flags on various flowers and plants, all along the path.
All this time, I’d assumed Kat and Roxie stole them, despite what they said to Tomlin. But when would they have had a chance to lay out a trail like this?
My windpipe narrows until the damp air seems to burn. I venture into the overgrowth, because no matter who’s responsible, I’m not going to give them the benefit of chasing me away.
Gathering up the damaged vests, stockings, and skirts, I place them in the tub I’d intended to use for gutted weeds and dead flowers.
The trail of damaged articles is like a macabre Easter egg hunt. Around every winding turn of the path, I find another ragged or frayed piece, all of them torn but possibly salvageable for someone who knows how to use a needle and thread.
Finally, I see the last article—a white ruffled shirt cuff hanging over an oddly shaped statue I can’t quite make out—on the other side of the footbridge where the garden ends and the cemetery begins.
I make my way over the water, trying not to look down into the depths, careful not to slide off the curved, cobblestone surface. Several yards away, the chapel casts muted shadows across the graves. The jeweled glint of the broken stained-glass windows frames the darkness within—a disorienting contrast that spurs the feeling of being watched again.
I step off the footbridge. Unlike the garden, the cemetery is easy to navigate. Ankle-high yellowing grass fringes a spongy, green carpet of moss between headstones. Stray, fallen leaves scatter across the ground on the wind. I stop at the tomb where my shirt cuff flaps, fighting the uneasy crimp in my stomach.
It’s an antique statue of a baby’s cradle with a canopy—the stone molded and etched to look like wicker. This must be the unnamed infant’s grave Madame Fabre mentioned. There’s only a year carved into the surface: 1883. Not even a month or a day.
Inside the stony cradle, my shirt covers the opening where a baby would be. The cloth puffs out, and red spots, resembling spatters of blood, tinge the white color. Ice-cold dread clenches my neck, makes my breath tight and whistling. After all the time I spent in Dad’s hospital room, observing him being poked and prodded with needles, watching his veins drained for test after test, blood is the one thing I’m squeamish about . . .
I shake my head, willing myself not to lose it. This is fake blood. At an academy like this, everyone has access to theatrical makeup. Gusts of wind tug at the shirt’s ruffles, creating the illusion of something moving underneath.
Goose bumps prickle my skin. I fist my free hand at my side, long enough to remind myself it’s all a prank. A cruel joke meant to scare me and send me running back to the states. Opening my fingers, I gingerly lift away the shirt. A bouquet of white roses waits underneath in place of the zombie baby my wild imagination had conjured.
I choke out a laugh, but it’s short-lived once I realize how the red stains got onto my shirt. From within the spirals of petals seeps a running, dripping, liquid trail—as if the roses are bleeding from their hearts.
Thunder growls in the sky and a stray droplet of rain hits my face. I shiver, though it’s not the impending storm that chills me to the bone; it’s how the flow of blood creeps into the stone’s cracks and crevices beside the thorny stems, forming letters, as if Death himself is penning the scraggy, cursive words before my very eyes:
B-e-l-o-v-e-d R-u-n-e.
10
ALONG CAME A SPIDER
“A spider spins its web strand by strand.”
Author Unknown