Page 84 of The Whispering Night
“Because,Winona. Remember what I said about having a plan?”
“Hard to forget, given that I’m currently being dragged through it like tin cans on ajust-marriedcar. But you know what would help, E? If youtoldme the plan. And then explained why you have one in the first place.”
“Patience, please.” Erica’s voice sounds different now. More solid, like the walls have changed shape around her.
Which they have, because now Winnie has also reached the ladder’s end and the pump room spans before her, lit only by Erica’s swinging flashlight. Pipes stretch and loop, connecting vats and heaters in a complex embroidery of copper and steel.
“This way,” Erica murmurs, hefting the duffel onto her shoulder. “Andyes,Winona. Before you nag me again: once upon a time, I became a Diana, and the first thing they taught me was to make sure I hid my stuff in weird places.”
Once upon a time, I became a Diana, and the first thing they taught me was to make sure I hid my stuff in weird places. Places that have absolutelynothingto do with me, so if anyone ever finds my mask or—god forbid—my source, they won’t have any way of tracking it back to me.
My mask was easy to hide because it’s flimsy and foldable. I put it in a Ziploc, put that Ziploc in another, and finally hid it inside a toilet tank on the second floor of the history library.
No, Winnie, that isn’t gross. The water in a toilet tank is clean, okay?
As for my source, that was riskier to hide. Because unfortunately, whenhiding a source, you need it to be contained by running water—yes,I know. I thought of the toilet tank trick again, but when you put a source in its dampener, it’s too big for a tank.
And the sourcehasto be in the dampener if you’re going to do magic with it. It not only prevents Luminaries from finding the source, but it also preserves the magic within. Which, I mean… I was definitely trying to do magic, even if I wasn’t really succeeding.
Yeah, that means I was burying my source in the forest regularly to absorb spirit magic.
How long does it take to absorb? Only a week to charge it fully, though if you’re a really experienced Diana, you can charge it faster than that, by finding the most powerful spots in the forest to go to. But I never got good at sensing those areas. And I needed to be able to access my source in the forest easily, so I buried it not far from the southeasternmost tip. It was walking distance from the Thursday estate.
Anyway, when it’s not buried, a source needs to be somewhere easy to get to with lots of running water. And I was actually in the hot room during Coach Rosa’s class when I suddenly realized there must be pumps that feed into the underground maze. All that steam would need running water, right? And once I figured out where the plumbing was—by following Rosa one day after class—it wasn’t hard to actually steal Rosa’s key and slip inside.
I spent almost a full two hours exploring this space that day. Because I mean, look at this! It’shugein here. Not only does it feed the hot room, but also the training lake and the pool. And then the entire school too, and the Sunday library. There’s one spot, though, that no one knows about. Like, it’s so forgotten there are three water heaters blocking it, and the only way someone would know about it is if they study old blueprints.
So how did I find it?
Because Jenna found it first.
CHAPTER
35
Dampener: A metal tin filled with moss used to hide a Diana’s source from Luminary detection and to slow the drain of collected spirit power over time. Often a fish hook is added to the moss to act as a “vent,” since power sometimes drains in explosive spurts instead of steady drips.
There are some places that are so profoundly private, other people are never meant to find them. Secret corners where children play unwatched by adult eyes. Forgotten tombs meant only for spirits of the dead. The bathypelagic depths of the ocean.
And hidden rooms built for witchcraft.
Which is what greets Winnie after she wedges herself into a liminal space the original plumbers had no use for, so they blocked it off with three massive water heaters that radiate warmth like a dracon puffing fire.
“I never would have looked here,” Erica explains, “if not for one line in Jenna’s diary aboutmy secret place behind the three.I didn’t know what that meant at all until I was down here, saw three tanks, and that line came back to me. I poked around, and…”
“And,” Winnie agrees becauseandis all there is to describe this spot, away from prying eyes. A place to do magic no one can sense. A place for an artist soul who needs to get away from it all.
It’s not that Winnie feels safe here—she doesn’t. The only things separating this random ten-foot-by-ten-foot area are three brutally hot waterheaters, so while Erica is right that it’s almost impossible to get here without prior knowledge…
It’s still not anactualroom with anactualdoor that they can lock against approaching scorpions. Plus, it wouldn’t surprise Winnie if Jeremiah does dig up blueprints once Winnie and Erica aren’t found on the Sunday grounds.
Still, despite that inherent weakness, there is a sense that this place is separate from the outside world. Like time has stopped and history is moving on without her. Only subterranean silence will ever exist here.
It even smells like Jenna, like the summer rain perfume she used to wear.
Much like the old cabin on the Thursday estate, there is a shelf and folding chair in one corner. A fan too, which is probably necessary if the heat off the water tanks gets too intense. A simple pink-and-white quilt has been laid over the floor like a rug, and there’s a second blanket that hangs behind the heaters in a crude semblance of a curtain.
Erica lowers that blanket now, making sure there are no gaps around the edges to let out light or sound. Then she moves to the shelf where a lamp awaits. She flips it on. A warm glow unfolds, rendering the phone’s sharp light unnecessary.
