Page 53 of The Heart and the Hawthorn

She sighed. Once she got her breath back, she hauled herself up to her feet. A central walkway stretched towards a double-breasted stable door, the air thick with claustrophobic edges: the low ceiling, the restive pressure of the horses too accustomed to the dark. It made her uneasy, and she was someone used to enclosed spaces, who understood the press and tang of bodies, musk and heat. Someone brushed a whiskery huff against a stall door, of apple-tinged memories and sugar-dust. Another spoke with the echo of pounding hooves, thundering over an open field. She caught the outline of a window behind one of the stalls and walked over to peer through the glass, glimpsing the rough stone wall of an alley.

She saw a ladder then, propped in a corner, and hurried to drag it back to the cellar. When she lowered it down, Dian climbed out with far more poise than she had done, only to flinch when their feet touched the straw-covered floorboards, a flash of fear crossing their dappled cheeks.

‘It’s ok,’ Frida tried to smile reassuringly.

‘I know,’ they snarled, and the raw expression on their face evaporated. She may as well have been watching a door slamming shut.

She inched back, clearing her throat, just as a few yards away, a rust-red stallion hung his handsome head over his stall.

Frida watched as Dian spun.

‘Hello,’ the fairy murmured, their voice immediately melting into something soft, with no barbs in sight. What would it feel like, Frida wondered, if Dian spoke to her like that? She had about as much chance of that as turning into a fairy herself, she thought with a rueful grin as Dian walked over to stroke the horse’s velvety muzzle. He gave a neigh of pleasure when Dian leaned in to blow gently into his nostrils.

Frida’s guts twisted. Dian liked horses. Of course Dian liked horses.

Her eyes flicked towards where she could see the big stable doors, looming down the line of stalls. Darkness was already seeming to leak in through the cracks. How long had they been down in that cellar? Would someone come soon? It was a miracle no one had discovered them yet as it was.

‘Come on,’ she said, her heart sinking at having to break the tender moment between Dian and the stallion. ‘We have to hurry. We can’t stay here, we’re too exposed.’

Dian ignored her. ‘I have spoken one or two words with the horses in the groves, but this one does not speak the dialect I’ve learnt.’ They turned their head to Frida urgently. ‘Does he wish to be freed?’

Frida gaped at Dian. They could not free the horses. But before she could answer, the stallion blinked his liquid eyes at her, and Frida’s horse radio blazed on, vivid and whiskery. He sounded like hay and the stamp of hooves.

Dian continued stroking his nose. ‘What does he say?’ they asked quietly.

The stallion gazed at Frida. ‘Tell this creature of moss and rain I am content.’ Frida couldn’t help the relief that spiralled through her. If he’d said he was miserable, well, she’d have had difficulty explaining that to Dian. ‘Only,’ the stallion went on, ‘if you see the other two-leggers, tell them that I wish for more apples.’

Frida relayed the message with alacrity. But Dian was unsatisfied, insisting Frida ask more questions about his health and his comfort. They made Frida find the food store and give out a supply of fresh grain. Each second that passed made Frida more anxious. Even though she had no real plan, other than to find Forge House, and maybe Fireheart after that, she couldn’t shift the feeling of urgency. She had no idea how time travel worked. Even as they stood there, talking merrily to a horse, was Dian’s hawthorn forest continuing to twist its claws through the LEZ, cage by cage?

‘Ask the others if they are hungry,’ Dian said doggedly. Their face was set, mulish in a way Frida recognised. She could be similarly intractable.

Frantically, she glanced around the stable. ‘I can’t! We don’t have time to do this for all of them. There must be over thirty horses in here.’ Just dealing with the stallion had taken ten minutes, maybe more. And the others were getting significantly more vocal, neighing and snorting, kicking their stalls as if they sensed the coming of anarchy.

Dian’s nostrils flared, hammering their foot. ‘Do it!’

‘No. I can’t. Someone will hear! I’m sorry.’

Dian gave Frida a look of absolute disgust, which withered her soul to the core. ‘I won’t leave these people,’ they ground out through clenched teeth.

Frida wanted to cry. ‘Dian. We’ll come back if we can, we’ll come back afterwards and ask each one of them personally if they need anything. But right now, we have to get moving. We’ve wasted enough time—’

‘Wasted time–’ Dian’s loathing however froze on their face as their head jerked, and their pointed ears swivelled dramatically. ‘Sea and skies,’ they hissed, the colour draining from their face.

Frida felt no sense of righteous justification though as she heard the sound of human voices on the other side of the door. Dian grabbed Frida’s hand before she could do anything. They’d pulled her down the walkway so quickly she didn’t even know what was happening. The next second, the stable door opened, and two boys entered wearing woollen jerkins and caps, but Frida didn’t have time to gawp over the Pride-and-Prejudice-esque getup. She was stumbling behind Dian, who had slipped them out of the door behind the boys just before the heavy wood creaked shut behind them.

The world blinked – and when she looked again, she and Dian were drenched in shimmering water as if encased in the very skin of a raindrop. The curved wall blending with the outside world, like a veil of beaded silver. She looked about herself, her eyes very round.

‘Awful, isn’t it?’ Moth muttered dryly in her ear.

Frida let out a disbelieving laugh. ‘Awful?’ she whispered, shaking her head and lifting her free hand. The world was silver – silver like the glittery rushes of magic that had torn through the LEZ and ruined her life. But here . . . no, not awful. Beautiful. Tiny raindrops slipped and spun over her hand, refracting prisms of light, kaleidoscopic.

Since she’d left the LEZ and ridden through the skies with Lucky, her headache had slipped away. Now she felt as if her mind was bursting with fireworks, her brain igniting with infinite galaxies. Magic. This was magic, in its realest, truest sense. In the raindrops, Dian’s body seemed to dance. Droplets whirling around them in an aura of mist and stars. Their head tilted back, tiny diamonds studding their damp face. Their lips parted in unguarded pleasure. She caught her breath, caught the wild, damp scent of moss, along with the faint sweetness of almonds. This silver world was the loveliest thing she’d ever seen, but she didn’t have a chance to tell Dian this before their eyes flew open and they caught her watching.

A shadow crossed their face. With a growl, they started dragging her away from the stable. They were holding onto her so hard, she could feel the small bones in her wrist grinding together. It was the kind of grip where you really really want to let go but have to hold on tighter just to force yourself not to. She knew the ilk – it was the way she held onto a bucket of rotten meat, when it had been left uneaten for too long and turned into something greenish, a home for maggots.

They hated her, then. Truly. She stumbled behind them, her entire body flushed. It felt as if she was naked or something. Or Dian was. She could hear her own heartbeat, she could hear Moth’s, and she could also feel Dian’s, as if that’s what powered this watery place. Ba-dum, ba-dum. It was like they were swimming, their bodies inches apart in a rainstorm that was endless. Somewhere, the rest of the world was just on the other side of this raindrop, but they were veiled and melted into the worlds. Just the three of them.

Ba-dum, ba-dum.