Page 112 of Feast of Sparks (Thornchapel 2)
It should be unnerving—the drums, the voices, the other-place—but for some reason, it’s not. Maybe I’m too tired to be unnerved. Or maybe you can only hear otherworldly drums so many times in your life and not get used to them.
I rub my face against Saint’s chest until I find the perfect spot for my cheek, give my sore and over-pleasured body one long, quivering stretch, and then to the feeling of Saint’s fingers sifting through my hair, I fall asleep.
I’m still tucked against Saint when I open my eyes.
Chirps come from everywhere, even though the sky has only just begun to lighten, and the drums are still going, but slower and fainter now, as if even in the other-place, the feast has ended and they are drumming the feasters back to their homes.
I yawn and sit up, wondering why I’m awake. Becket and Delphine and Rebecca are all cuddled together, with Becket’s head on Saint’s stomach, and I feel very snuggly and sleepy still. I’m about to lay back down and get some more snuggles when I turn and see the god sitting on the edge of the platform in linen drawstring pants and no shirt, his head in his hands.
Except it’s not the wild god, it’s Auden—just my spoiled, handsome Auden—and he lifts his head to give me a small, crooked smile.
“You’re awake,” he says, and I crawl over the blankets to sit next to him. I find a loose sheet to wrap around my naked body, and then once I’m covered, I rest my head against his shoulder.
“Sweet bride,” he murmurs, turning his face so he can kiss the top of my head.
“Wild god,” I say in response, and I can feel him smile again against my hair.
“Why are you awake?” I ask.
Auden sighs, turning his head so that he can rest his cheek against my hair as he looks out over the ashy scar where our Beltane fire was. “I didn’t go to sleep,” he admits. “I wanted to make sure the fire died down.”
“That’s what the water was for.” I yawn. “You should have slept.”
“You’re right.” He hesitates. “I also—I saw something.”
I look up at him, making him move his head. “You saw something?” I repeat.
He takes a deep breath and then nods to the altar. “Behind there. There was a door.”
He says it like he thinks I’m going to tell him he’s a lunatic, but instead I find his hand and lace my fingers with his. “I know,” I say.
“You know?”
“I mean, I’ve seen it before. In my dreams. An
d last night, I thought I caught a glimpse of it, although it was gone before I could be sure.”
He searches my face. “Poe, if you’ve seen it . . .” He doesn’t finish, but I think I know what he’s going to say, and I nod.
“Yeah. I think it’s real. Well, not real-real, maybe. But real here in the thorn chapel.”
“Like the drums,” he murmurs, turning back to stare at the altar.
“Like the drums.”
He keeps my hand held tight, but his voice is far away when he asks, “What do you think it means?”
To that, I have no answer. “I don’t know, Auden.”
“Do you think the others have seen it?”
I shake my head. “I don’t—I don’t think so. I think it might just be us. For now.” Except . . . “My dad said something about a door to me, weeks ago. He said something like he believed your dad would know how to close the door. Does that sound familiar at all?”
Auden shakes his head. “No.”
Sigh. More questions. More secrets.
For several long moments, we sit there, holding hands and looking at the altar. Auden still has that distant look on his face, and I’m thinking about how the door is not far from where my mother was buried, and wondering if it’s connected at all and then wondering if I’ll ever know. If the door is like the other-drums, then it feels like it will always be out of reach, like a mirage. Just another glimmer of magic that somehow lingers on here at Thornchapel.
