Page 92 of Harvest of Sighs (Thornchapel 3)
“Because you don’t think it’s real,” Becket clarifies.
“Because even if it is real—which is a very big if—there’s no guarantee it will manifest again. And even if it does, it doesn’t have to be terrible. We get to assign the meanings we want to it and all that. Isn’t that right, Father Hess?”
“Some meanings are inherent to themselves, Mr. Martinez,” replies Becket.
“You mean the meanings of magic, invisible doors?”
“Well, if you’re going to be reductive about it, then—”
“Look, my father wouldn’t have told us about this if it weren’t true,” interrupts Rebecca. “He doesn’t deal in fantasy or delusion. I had to ask him to stop reading the Harry Potter books aloud to me when I was a girl because he kept pausing to explain that the magic at Hogwarts was logically impossible and also that Dumbledore was criminally negligent in the care of children. The man does not exaggerate and he doesn’t credit anything he hasn’t personally seen or experienced. If he says there is a door, then there is. And if he says it’s dangerous, then it is.”
“You don’t want to go out there either?” asks Delphine, tilting her head to look at her Mistress.
Rebecca sighs. “Delph—”
“Sometimes things are dangerous,” Becket says. “But that doesn’t mean they’re bad. Arguably the best things in life are dangerous, because they have the power to be.”
“Or—lone voice of dissent here—they’re not dangerous at all,” Saint says, “and we’re letting old ghost stories scare us away from something we enjoy doing.”
“Since when are you pro-chapel?” Auden asks. “You’ve always been reluctant to go out there before.”
“Probably since you fucked him there, Auden,” Rebecca says dryly.
Saint glowers at her from behind the sofa.
“Maybe it doesn’t matter,” I say. The others turn to look at me; outside, the rain surges against the window, turning the library into a colossal drum made of stone and books and glass.
“What do you mean?” Rebecca asks.
I glance over at Auden. Of all of us, he’s the only one who’s truly seen the door in waking life, and he’s the only one who might understand. “I think the door might appear whether we go there on Lammas or not. I don’t think it’s beholden to us or our actions.”
“That’s excellent news, then,” Saint says. “If it doesn’t give a shit about what we do, then no one has to be human-sacrificed to it anyway.”
Auden glares at him, his eyes dipping meaningfully to me. “Let’s not make light of this. People have died.”
“But I still don’t understand what harm a manky old door is,” Delphine protests. She’s held out her arm for Rebecca to caress now, and Rebecca obliges—a wry, amused smile at her lips as she does, like she’s too charmed to stop herself from doing it. “Can’t we just ignore the door, like Saint said?”
Auden’s hazel eyes meet mine in the storm-infused murk, and I know what he’s thinking. It’s all well and good to feel like the door doesn’t matter when you’re here, but when you’re there—when it’s in front of you . . .
“We can ignore it because we’re not going out there,” Auden finally says. “Not for Lammas. Not for any other ritual. As far as I’m concerned, we’re done with all of it.”
Delphine sits up and glares at him. “You don’t get to decide that for us!”
“Someone has to,” says Auden, his mouth set like a king’s.
“And that someone should be you?” Delphine pushes, her tone outraged.
“Yes, for fuck’s sake, yes!” Auden yells as lightning splits the sky outside. For a moment, the world is bright and sharp, and then it’s plunged back into gloom as the answering thunder roars overhead. “Don’t you see?” he asks. “It was my father who killed Poe’s mother, it is my family that owns this land and has been doing horrible things with it for centuries. This is my
responsibility, and I refuse—I mean, absolutely refuse, Delly—to let one other person get hurt. I’m not doing it. And if that makes me draconian, if that makes me unreasonable and a ruiner of fun, then so fucking be it. I’d rather have you all miserable and safe than hedonistic and dead. Am I very understood?”
For a few seconds, the only sound in the room is that of the rain against the glass and the low roll of thunder over the hills outside.
I think of our parents—all arguing viciously about what to do—and I wonder if we’re about to erupt in the same kind of a sour tumult. If the next person to speak is going to tell Auden to fuck off, that he’s not the boss of us, that he has no right to choose for us, and then we’ll be fighting for real.
I wonder if this is the end for our strange little group, our small, kinky kingdom out here in the moors, and dread curdles in my stomach.
But the moment passes.
