“1914.”
Brightonshire shakes his head. “Remarkable. Over a hundred years separate us, and yet here I am, speaking with her.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Shh, you’ll scare her.”
He squeezes her hand. “I apologize, Sophie. Can you tell us where you live?”
“Boston,” she says. “I’m supposed to be getting ready for my sister’s engagement ball.”
“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “We’ll get you there. Just follow us, okay?”
She hesitates. “The shadows told me not to move. They said they’d come back for me.”
“They can’t hurt you, Sophie. Not if you come with us.”
But I’ve already lost her. She stares through me, her eyes fuzzy.
I open my mouth, but before I can say anything, Brightonshire scoots in front of Sophie, forcing her to look at him. “Have you ever played hide-and-seek?”
Her lips pull at the corners. “It’s my favorite game.”
“Marvelous!” He claps his hands together. “My friend and I play it all the time in this wood. Your home is hiding between the trees, you see, and we must seek it out. The first person to find it wins the game.”
She tilts her head. “Really?”
He arches a brow. “Do I look like I would lie to you?”
Her cheeks turn pink as she shakes her head.
Brightonshire takes her hand. “Come. Let us go find your home.”
She smiles up at him, unconcerned with the thin trails of blood running down her arms. “All right.”
They start down the path. I let Brightonshire lead the way, tapping him on the right or left shoulder depending on where we need to turn. I know the Boston threshold well. It’s situated in a park, and it opens frequently. I tend to get at least two children or nannies from there a month. I even got a rider on a horse once who didn’t even realize he was no longer in the park. I told him he’d just wandered off the main path and if he went back the way he came, he’d find himself in familiar territory. It didn’t hit me until after he’d returned home how true a statement it was.
When we get to her threshold, I pull back on Brightonshire’s shoulder, making him stop.
“Ah, here we are,” he says.
Sophie frowns. “I don’t see my house.”
He puts his hands on his knees, dropping down to her level. “It’s right through the trees there. You only need take a step forward and you’ll see it.”
She takes a small step, then stops. “I only see more trees.”
“One more step should do it.”
She sighs and walks forward, disappearing through the threshold.
He straightens and looks back at me. “I hope she will be all right.”
“She’s home now,” I say. “She’ll have some explaining to do, but her parents will just be happy to have her back.”
He nods. “Where to now?”
“This way.”
Our footsteps are muffled by the wind shaking the leaves overhead. They’re almost all painted now. Sunlight glitters across them like Dorothy’s ruby slippers, if she also had purple and orange and yellow slippers. Dad laughed the first time I said that, but he wouldn’t be laughing now. Not with the black leaves speckled in between, spreading like disease.
I clear my throat. “Thanks for helping me with her,” I say. “You’re really good with children.”
He shrugs. “I only wanted to see her home safely. She looked so broken.”
“The wood will do that to you.” Even without some unknown power turning the leaves black.
“It is odd.”
“What’s that?”
“The shadows Sophie described. Have you ever encountered aught like them before?”
“No,” I say, though that’s not entirely true. But last night, when shadows that shouldn’t have been there without light to cast them darted through the trees, it was after the sun had already set. Not in the middle of the afternoon. “There are stories about the shadow monsters who live in the wood after dark, but there’s no way Sophie was in the wood that long before we found her.”
“How do you know?”
“I would have felt her presence earlier,” I explain.
“Can you feel everyone’s presence in the wood?”
“Yes,” I say, ignoring the doubt tugging at my heart.
“Do you think these shadows have something to do with what’s happening here?”
“I don’t know.”
We walk on, down the twisting, curving pathways. I watch Brightonshire, his steady footing, the crystal-clear focus in his eyes, all from an elixir that defies the very reason the guardians were selected in the first place: to protect the wood from the travelers who would use it for their own personal gains. Augustus and Celia must have known how dangerous this elixir would be if it fell into the wrong hands. Were they really willing to take such a risk simply so their adopted son could … what? Partake in their legacy? Or was there a different motive behind the elixir? Maybe they didn’t disappear because something bad happened to them, but because they were doing something bad.
And if that’s the case, can Brightonshire even be trusted?
XIV
Twenty minutes to sundown. I hold up my hand, and Brightonshire comes to a stop next to my threshold. “Wait here.”
My first steps out of the wood are wobbly, and my head feels like it weighs a thousand pounds, but I can’t do my decompression exercises, not until I know the coast is clear. Taking deep, steadying breaths, I cross the backyard and check the driveway. No car, no Mom.
I grab my backpack from the car, then stick my head through the threshold and say, “All right. Follow me.”
He steps through the threshold and immediately lists to the side. I grab him and stand him upright.
“What’s wrong with me?” he asks, his face turning a sickly shade of green.
The fabric of his shirt is soft and delicate in my palms. Homespun. Nothing at all like the clothes we wear today. I clear my throat and let go of him. “It’s just an aftereffect of the wood. Sit down for a second.”
We sit next to the rock. I check my watch. I don’t know how long I have until Mom gets here. For a moment, I think maybe I shouldn’t hide him. Maybe I should tell her I’m bringing a two-hundred-fifty-year-old boy home from the wood, not because I think he’s cute or anything, but because he’s going through the same thing we are, and maybe we can help one another. Maybe if we find out what happened to his parents, we’ll find out what happened to Dad, too. But we need to keep it a secret, because if the council finds out I’ve broken the most sacred rule of the wood, I don’t know what they’ll do.
Yeah … I don’t see that going over so well. Besides, I don’t plan on keeping him here long. I’m just going to hear him out, then send him right back where he belongs. He’ll be here one night, tops.
I show him how to stretch and touch his toes, and then how to circle his head to loosen the knots in his neck. “Better?”
He nods.