‘Why seek out Opal first?’ asked Lio. ‘Why not go straight after Thistlethwaite?’
‘We cannot take the risk of running headlong into Acanthi at Hemmington’s,’ said Theodora. ‘Both Cate and Salamander will want Opal. We can use her to bargain with them, or, if not that, then at the very least we could create a distraction.’
Dot and Lio exchanged glances. Then, they both gave a grim nod.
Theodora closed her eyes. Up kicked a warm wind. The scent of woodsmoke, incense, gunpowder and lilac enveloped them. She raised the bread knife and out burst a shot of light and then, before much fanfare at all, the magic halted and failed.
‘What?’ said the witch, staring at the knife.
‘The link mustn’t be strong enough,’ said Lio, puzzled.
‘It should have been,’ said Theodora. Her eyes darted and landed upon one of the strange scuttling creatures. ‘Oh.’
‘What?’ asked Dot.
‘Those things,’ said Theodora, nodding at them. ‘What did Belchamber call them?’
‘Acolytes,’ said Dot. ‘Looking for the South Sea Spirit.’
Lio stepped out of the way as one large acolyte scuttled grotesquely past him.
‘Did the Sympathetic link not connect with Opal . . .’ said Dot, watching the near creature, ‘because she’s no longer Opal?’
Lio recoiled. ‘Surely not?’
‘It’s possible,’ said Theodora. ‘If the affliction has taken her heart and turned her blood. There’s so much about this magic we cannot understand. It hardly matters right now, but, if we’ve no way to find Opal . . .’ Theodora paced about. ‘Wecouldlay a trap for Acanthi and try to sell them to Salamander but, oh, that would be a cruelty beyond any of us, surely . . .’
Theodora went on riddling, winding circles around the sea-swept courtyard until at last the answer hit Dot so obviously and profoundly that she started to laugh.
‘What?’ asked Theodora and Lio at the same time.
‘Ofcoursewe have a Sympathetic link,’ said Dot, and she held up her hand, and spread her remaining fingers wide, and showed them the place where her finger should have been.
CHAPTERFORTY-ONE
They stepped into and out of portals, the three of them together, flying through the darkness and into opulent sitting rooms, libraries, tea house entryways, cloakrooms, billiards rooms, all of them cast in dank, oceanic light. They chased the direction of Dot’s magic. Theodora had charmed the Sympathetic link, the rune drawn onto Dot’s hand with Lio’s chalk, connecting Dot’s living skin to the missing finger. Blood to blood. Lio cast the portals, over and over, his own body racketed by the last of his pneumonia. With each portal closer, those strange pulses of desolate magic grew sharper in Dot. Each time, she balanced them away, leading the group onward, writhing with the pain of each portal tearing at her healing wounds, rocking back and forth with the rhythm of the magic like the waves, always searching for equilibrium.
‘One hundred and fifty metres north-east,’ said Dot, hastening across to the eastern wall of a parlour room that must have belonged to a duchess or minister. The seawater outside the window lapped at the glass. They spotted schools of fish and rising bubbles, and Dot remembered the men and women she had seen camping under the bridge across the Lourdes.Oh, Saints.Had allof them drowned?
Lio cast the final portal, finding with the deftness of his talent the only available space to exit it. He almost collapsed with thiseffort, but he pulled them through and they stepped out from the portal and onto the palace roof of King Ellarde Custre IV.
‘Oh,’ said Theodora, surprised. The top of Saint Penelope’s Cathedral and the Tower of Étienne peeked through the skin of the water just beyond.
‘Opal must be directly beneath us,’ said Dot. Her head swelled, and she concentrated firmly on the cold slap of the seawater against her ankles.
‘She must be in the study of the Grand Magician Valiente,’ said Theodora. ‘She knows this is my office – perhaps she is looking for information here on the Ancient Spirit’s magic. The distance is not too great. Dorothy, will you be able to swim?’
Dot nodded.
‘And you, Liutprand?’
‘If I couldn’t, I’d have died in the South Sea every time I slipped off a trawler.’
Theodora crossed to the edge of the roof, the sea water spilling over her pointed boots.
‘Lucky that the palace was built on a hill,’ said the witch, counting the metres below. ‘Deep breath, chums. Dorothy, take a hold of my leg. Lio, hold onto Dorothy’s. Aren’t we glad you borrowed my mother’s trousers in the end, Dorothy, not that skirt you wanted?’
‘This is hardly the time to be a comedienne,’ said Dot, but then Theodora gave her a sad smile, and Dot knew that this could be the witch’sfinaltime to be a comedienne. They each took a long, deep breath and plunged into the enchanted sea water. Theodora sent out a summoning charm at the grand doors of the palace and the three of them propelled toward it.
