A Great and Terrible Beauty
I understand fully now, as does Ann, I gather, by the way she nervously straightens her skirts with her hands, not meeting anyone's eyes. Pippa squints at Felicity as if she might read the meaning in her forehead, but slowly, a blush creeps up her neck into her cheeks and she's gasping. "Oh, my heavens, you can't honestly mean that that they like husband and wife ?"
"Yes, exactly."
Pippa is stunned into silence. The red does not fade from her face and neck. I'm embarrassed too, but I don't want them to know it. "May I please continue?"
"The Gypsies came back today to make camp. When we saw the smoke from their fire, Sarah and I hurried to see Mother Elena."
"Mother Elena!" Ann gasps.
"That lunatic with the ragged head scarf?" Pippa wrinkles her nose in distaste. "Shhh! Go on," Felicity says.
"She welcomed us warmly with herb tea and tales of her travels. We gave sweets to Carolina, who devoured them. To Mother we gave five pence. And then she promised to read the cards for us, as she has before. But no sooner had Mother placed Sarah's cards in the familiar cross pattern than she stopped and shuffled them into a pile again. 'The cards have a bad temper today,' she said with a little smile, but in truth she seemed taken by a sense of foreboding. She asked to see my palm, snaking her sharp fingernail along the pathways of my hand. 'You are on a dark journey,' she said, dropping my hand like a hot stone. 'I cannot see the outcome.' Then, most abruptly, she asked us to leave as she needed to make her way through the camp to be sure things were well settled."
Ann is peering over my arm, trying to read ahead. I pull the book away and end up dropping it, scattering the pages.
"Bravo, my lady Grace!" Felicity applauds.
Ann helps me cluster the papers together in my arms. She can't stand having anything out of order. A patch of wrist is exposed. I can see the red cross-hatching of welts there, fresh and angry. This is no accident. She's doing it to herself.
She sees me looking and pulls hard at her sleeves, covering her secret.
"Come now," Felicity chides. "What more will the diary of Mary Dowd reveal to us tonight?"
I grab a page. "Here we go," I say. It's not the same page, but that hardly matters to them.
"Sarah came to me in tears. 'Mary, Mary, I cannot find the door. The power is leaving me.'
"'You are overwrought, Sarah. That is all. Try again tomorrow.'
"'No, no,' she wailed. 'I have tried for hours now. 1 tell you it is gone.'
"My heart was gripped with an icy cold. 'Sarah, come. I'll help you find it' "She turned on me with such fury that I scarcely recognized her as my friend. 'Don't you understand? I must do it myself or it's not real I cannot ride along on your powers, Mary.' She began to cry then. 'Oh, Mary, Mary, I cannot bear to think that I will never again touch the runes or feel their magic flowing through me. I cannot bear to think that I will be only ordinary Sarah from now on.'
" For the rest of the evening I could not rest or eat at all. Eugenia saw my misery and bade me sit with her in her own room. She says it is often that way a girl's power flares, then fades. The power must be nurtured deep in the soul, else it's nothing more than grasping. Oh, diary, she confided that Sarah's power is such, fleeting and unanchored. She says that the realms make the decision about who shall rise in the Order and learn all the ancient mysteries and who must stay behind. Eugenia patted my hand and confessed that the power is great in me, hut I am lost to think of going forward without my dearest friend and sister.
"When Sarah came to me late this evening, I felt as if I would do anything to make things as they were before, with us close as sisters again and the magic of the realms within our reach. I told her so.
"'Oh, Mary,' she cried. 'You've cheered me considerably. You know there is a way that we can be together always.'
"'What do you mean?'
" 'I have a confession . I have visited the Winterlands. I have seen it .'
"I was shocked at this, it chilled me so. 'But, Sarah, that is a realm we are not to know yet. There are things we should not see without the guide of our elders here.'
"Sarah got such a hard look in her eyes. 'Don't you see? Our elders want us to know only what they can control. They fear us, Mary. That is why Eugenia is taking the power from me. I have spoken to a spirit that wanders there. She told me the truth!
"Her words seemed true, but I was afraid still. 'Sarah, I'm afraid. To call up a dark spirit is to go against everything we've been taught.'