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“Of course,” she said softly. “She was a sweet kid. She would talk to the little girl figment. Play with it sometimes. I think it misses her. That’s why it started looking like her. But it would be a mistake to think that it’s actually her.”
“That’s what people mean, then. If you know there aren’t ghosts at Harrow, you won’t think you’re talking to someone you love. You’ll know that they’re... they’re...” I gestured broadly, helplessly.
“The figments all look different, but they’re all just pieces of the same thing. Like masks it puts on.”
“What isit?” I asked.
Bryony paused. “I call it the dark soul,” she said quietly, and it had the tone of a confession. Her cheeks flushed. The dark soul. The Other. The thing the cage was built for. “I don’t know if there is a name for what it is,” Bryony went on. “An entity. A spirit. A power.”
“Is it dangerous?” I asked.
“Of course,” she said. A chill went through me. “That’s why your family has worked so hard to contain it.”
“Then why do you hate us?” I asked.
“Maybe I don’t think that just because something isdangerousit should be locked away,” she answered. “It has as much right to be as we do.” Everything about her was a challenge: the harsh tone of her voice, the tilt of her chin, the intense gaze she fixed on me. The anger in her face made it shine with the beauty of a keen blade, and I wondered how I could have ever thought she wasn’t pretty. “And that is why we aren’t friends, Helen Vaughan, and we aren’t allies, and I shouldn’t be helping you.”
“And yet here you are. Helping me,” I said.
She stared at me. And then she turned abruptly and walked to a shelf against the wall on which rested a wooden box that looked much newer than the rest of the furnishings. She opened it andpulled something out, and then strode back over. She pushed the object into my hands. “Here. You might be able to make more sense of this than me. Maybe it has some of the answers you’re looking for.”
The thing she had handed me was a small black book, bound in leather and tied shut with a thin leather cord. “What’s this?” I asked.
She didn’t answer—not directly. “It’s not fair, them throwing you in the deep end like this,” she said, almost to herself. Then, “You should go. You don’t want to get caught in a witch’s house. People would talk.” There was a spark of humor in her eye.
She turned away, as if done with me, and I stood for an awkward moment before stumping my way out the door.
I kept the black book clasped against my side until I got back to my room, though I ached to open it and find out what lay within its pages. I waited until I could be certain I was alone, the door closed and locked behind me. Then at last I picked apart the knotted cord and eased open the cover.
On the first page, in looping, old-fashioned script, I read:The Journal of Nicholas Vaughan.
9
THE PAGES OFthe journal were thin and brittle. Curled up on my bed, the remnants of the migraine pulsing behind my eye, I turned them carefully. The next page was filled with dense text in a strange alphabet. I flipped through the next few pages, but they were all the same. Only the dates were legible. The entries started in 1848. This book was older than Harrow.
Scattered throughout were quick sketches like diagrams—a triangle with squiggly symbols at the points, a drawing of a plant with three leaves and a star-shaped flower. One drawing took up an entire spread of pages. With only black ink, it should have been difficult to depict, but the crawling lines and blots of darkness were unmistakable. A vast and chaoticthing, rampant on a field of black stars. There was a caption, and this alone in the whole of the book was written in plain English.The God of the Vast Dark, it said.
A sudden gust of wind sent rain lashing against the window, and I jumped, nearly dropping the book. I swore and collected myself, then shot a glare at the fox skull sitting out on the desk.“You can’t blame me for being jumpy,” I told it. It grinned its endless, toothy smile at me.
The alphabet didn’t look like any I’d seen—it didn’t even look real. It reminded me of Desmond’s notebook, all those little symbols he’d jotted down.
I hesitated. Desmond had given me his number before he’d left and told me to text him if I wanted to chat. I’d smiled and told him I would, knowing that I wouldn’t. It was only a matter of time before he realized what everyone did eventually—that there was something wrong with me. Better I not get too friendly.
But I needed to read this journal.
I braced myself, sent Desmond a quick text asking if he was available, and then waited, flipping through the notebook. There were other illustrations—a city skyline, a diagram of the solar system, and, midway through, a rather intense-looking portrait of a young woman. She had a serious face and dark eyes. This must be Annalise Vaughan.
My phone buzzed.I’ve got a free period right now. What’s up?Desmond had written.
Do you know what this means?I wrote, and sent a photo of a page of text.I thought it looked like your notebook.
His response came quickly.My notebook’s in a simple substitution cipher. Symbols for letters. Celia used to be kind of a snoop, so I started using it when we were younger. This looks similar, but I’d have to take a longer look at it. What’s this from?
Nicholas Vaughan’s journal, I replied.
I watched the screen, waiting for a response. Instead, the phonestarted to buzz, Desmond’s name filling up the screen. I answered the call quickly.
“You seriously have Nicholas Vaughan’s journal?” Desmond asked. He sounded giddy.
