A School for Unusual Girls (26 page)

First, I cannot thank you enough for this ink. It will do more good than you could imagine. As you might've guessed, after London I go to Vienna. How long my sojourn there will be, I cannot know. Second, I must warn you, Georgie. Do not expect other gentlemen to behave with the restraint you witnessed in me. Exercise caution around other men while I am away. No kissing.

I shall be extremely unhappy if I hear of you breaking any other hearts.

Yrs, Sebastian

He was teasing, of course, about breaking hearts. I hadn't broken his. If I had, he might still be here. I wanted to smile at his words, but the warmth they generated vanished under a deadly chill.

Sebastian's secret message wasn't hidden at all.

Neither of us had applied the gall solution, and yet the faint writing was clearly legible, every word exposed. My invisible ink had darkened on its own. Sunlight streaming through the window may have developed it, or may have reacted with a chemical in the paper. It didn't matter. Sebastian was headed to London, and tonight he would distribute an invisible ink that would betray everyone who used it.

I whipped around to Tess. “We have to stop him.”

She rocked, pale, unmoved.

I ran and shook her shoulders. “Tess, listen to me. Lord Ravencross's horse—you must get him to lend it to you. I have to ride for London straightway. I can't explain why. It's a secret, but I need you to get me a horse.”

She stared blankly at me.

I shook her again. “Tess, I need a horse. Any horse. Now.”

That seemed to wake her up. “You can't.”

“I can. I must. I have to warn Lord Wyatt or terrible things will happen.”

“No. You can't leave yet. Think it through. We only have one hope.” She frowned. “You have to make an ink that works.”

After my colossal failures in the past few days?

“There isn't time.” I gave her shoulders another shake. “We have to stop him. Now! Before he gives it to his men. He'll get caught. They'll
all
get caught.”

“No!” She jerked out of my grasp and buried her face in her hands. “Listen to me. I've seen that path. If you don't make an ink that works, too many people die.” She looked up, eyes pleading. “Too many. Him, others, ambassadors, kings…” She tried to suppress a moan and started rocking again. “If they die, you can't begin to imagine what happens here in England,
and
on the continent.”

She rubbed her forehead, hard, as if that might scrub away the images she saw. “I warned you! Why didn't you listen? Everything was going so well. The dreams had stopped. If only I'd seen this. If I'd known Sebastian would leave I would've tied him down.” She gritted her teeth. “If only he would've waited. You would've figured it out today.
Today
.” She slapped her hand against the wooden bench. “That's how it was supposed to be. It was supposed to be
today
.”

“You can't know that.” Frustrated and angry, I shouted at her. “Formulating a new ink could take months.”

“You only have today.”

I clutched Sebastian's note in my fist, and glanced wildly about the workroom. “Even if I do find a solution today, how would I get it to him?” A few moments ago my course of action had seemed so clear, a simple matter of running him down on the road and warning him that I'd failed, that the ink didn't work. Now, everything seemed infinitely more difficult.

Impossible
.

Tess stood and stared down at her feet showing beneath the hem of her night rail. “I only know what happens if you don't. You have to do it, and then we must take it to him.”

“How? He's in London. There's a ball tonight, with diplomats, dignitaries and…” I shook my head and backed away. “No. It's impossible. We must get word to Miss Stranje. She'll know what to do. Madame Cho—”

“No!” She grabbed my shoulder and wrenched me close. “You can't. Miss Stranje won't get back in time, and I've seen what happens when Cho sends word to London. It makes things worse. Much worse.”

She drew me close to her face, so close I smelled her terror. Acidic. Suffocatingly sweet. Almost metallic.

“If Madame Cho stops him from delivering the ink, Sebastian dies in Vienna.” She stared at me, looked straight through me into another time, a place of horror. Her eyes opened wide. Whites showed all around. “Hundreds slaughtered in a single day.”

“What? How? Tell me what happens. Maybe we can—”

“It isn't like that.” She made a low keening noise. “It comes in snatches. Flies at me like a flock of mad birds, flapping in every direction, beating against my skull. If this happens, then that happens, and this. Never in a neat organized line. It crashes over my head in rolling waves. Bomb bursts of pain. Fragments.”

Her fingers dug into my shoulders, holding on, as if she might fall. “You don't understand. I live what happens. A blast shatters Sebastian's ribs. Rips through his side. I've gasped with him as he silently screams for air, holding his bloody entrails in his own hands.” Her voice dropped. She squeezed her eyes shut and lowered her face. “Dying isn't easy. All those wretched regrets as life oozes away.”

How did she keep from going mad? I tried to pull out of her grasp.

She blinked, color washed back into her cheeks, she drew a quick breath and let go. “Not just him, Georgie. Hundreds. The sound of their wailing tears at my soul. How can I make you see? Bloody battles. The destruction. Shall I tell you about the starvation? Orphaned children—”

My heart rabbited around my chest, thumping, lost. I didn't know which way to turn. Where to run. “What can I do? How do I stop it?” I pleaded, knowing if I failed again, I would never banish my guilt.

“Bring him an ink that works. It's the only path open to us. I've seen the others.” She voiced this fragile hope with quiet determination. “We'll leave as soon as you're done.”

“But how—”

“I'll get a horse. You”—she pointed at the table—“make the ink.”

Sera stood quietly inside the doorway, watching us, holding a familiar pair of shoes and my muslin morning dress in her hands. “I brought your clothes.” She held them out to me. When I didn't take them, she set the pile on the table. “We'll explain to Madame Cho that you have more experiments to do. Maya and I have knife-throwing lessons this afternoon. We'll keep her so busy she won't suspect anything. Jane will bring you something to eat and assist you.”

Maya followed Sera into the room and the three of them stood around me in a solemn circle, like mourners at a funeral.

“You all know about the ink?”

Sera worked the toe of her shoe against the floorboards. “Our training wouldn't be worth much if we hadn't figured it out.”

“You must never breathe a word of it to anyone else,” I warned. “Swear on your lives—not a word.”

“You have our promise,” Sera said, taking the blood oath for them all. “We'll help you as much as we can.”

I glanced at the worktable and ran my fingers through my hair. After a lifetime of failures, of jumping too soon, of foolish blunders, and wrong assumptions, too much depended on me getting it right for once. “What if I fail again?”

Maya reached for my hand. “You
will
find the answer, Georgiana.” Her voice vibrated through her fingertips up my arms, and flowed around me like a hypnotic flute, smoothing out my agitation. “You are a woman of much courage. I know this. You will go to London, and you will do what must be done.”

Sera nodded as if she believed it, too.

I bowed my head trying to escape Maya's trance. Could I really formulate an ink that worked in so short a time?

She kept hold of my hand, gazing steadily into my eyes. “I believe you will do this.” Her words were airy notes of hope that sailed straight into my heart.

“You will.” Sera stood beside Maya. Her face not as serene as Maya's. “You must.”

Tess slipped out of the room. The others followed, leaving me alone in the middle of a desperate nightmare. Yet, there was a chance, a mathematically improbable chance, but a chance nonetheless, that I could set my mistake right.

I bent over my notes with an urgency and determination I had never felt before. I studied the formula. An hour later, I realized exactly where my error lay. As usual, I'd overcomplicated things. The solution was so simple. Iron was bound to darken when exposed to any number of elements, sunlight. It was uncontrollable. Alum, alone, was the answer. I knew it with as much certainty as I knew I was still standing on the floor in my bare feet.

How had I missed it last night? I swallowed, remembering exactly why.
Sebastian
. The ache in my chest expanded. I remembered his arms holding me and his lips covering mine. But Tess had made me see his death, too, and that was unthinkable. I would concentrate as I'd never concentrated before.

I quickly pulled on my clothes. It only took a couple of hours more to create the new formula. By the time Jane brought food, I'd already mixed and heated a batch of clear soluble alum. “What did you tell Madame Cho?”

She set down the tray. “I explained that you insisted on working without interruption, and that I would bring you food and provide assistance if you needed it.”

Ah, yes, the truth can be highly effective.
“Did that satisfy her?” I snatched a muffin, took a bite, and tossed it back on the plate. It may as well have been wood shavings. My appetite was gone. I measured gall for the developer solution.

Jane rubbed her arm absently. “She got that quizzical look on her face. You know, the one that means she didn't believe me.”

“It was nothing less than the truth. I certainly don't want any interruptions and I do need your assistance.”

“How can I help?”

I pulled out several sheets of foolscap from my folio, tore them in half, and half again, so that we had a dozen test papers. “Write something on each one using India ink.”

Jane checked the nib of the pen. “She's bound to notice when you're gone this evening.”

“Not if we're careful.”

“We'll need more than caution on our side. Luck, I'd say. What do you want me to write?”

“Anything. A quick line or two on each of the papers.”

She thought for a moment and set to work. By the time she finished, the new invisible ink formula was ready to be tested.

Jane had jotted several farming instructions on each. “Leave the west field fallow. Plant beans in place of wheat in the east field,” and so on. I quickly perused the papers and glanced up. “Are these ways to improve crop yields?”

She nodded.

“Brilliant.” I had a new appreciation of our Jane. “We must discuss this when I return from London.”
Assuming I did return
.

She smiled. “I thought you might find it interesting.”

Between the lines of her list, I used the clear alum ink to pen a short invisible apology to Sebastian for putting him in danger. On successive pages, I apologized to the Prince Regent of England for making an error on my previous formula.

I waved one of the papers bearing my hidden confession over the burner, heating it. I laid another in the sunny window. All afternoon we repeated the process, using different types of paper. I sprinkled water on some notes, dirt on others, spilled wine on them, salt, vinegar, and candle wax. This time, I wasn't taking any chances. I intended to expose the ink to light, time, heat, and anything else that might cause it to inadvertently develop. With a grimace, Jane reluctantly spit on one of the notes—thus providing me with a saliva test.

All the while, I kept repeating over and over in my head.
Don't let anyone die because of my mistakes
.

I imagined the diplomats and their families who might suffer because of my failed ink, because I'd jumped to conclusions. Miss Stranje was right.
Impulsive
. Tess was right.
Hasty
.

One face, above all those nameless others, haunted me, one whose features I knew by heart. The thought of Sebastian locked away in a dungeon, or dying in the ghastly way Tess described, set me to pleading even harder for a reprieve.
Please, God, if you're there, spare them
.

“What are you thinking about?” Jane wiped out the pot so I could start a fresh batch of invisible ink.

“My mistakes.” I stirred the gall emulsion.

“Don't you wish there was a way to turn back time? There are so many things I wish I could go back and do differently.”

“You?” I turned down the heat on the burner. “But you always seem to know the exact right thing to do.”

She shook her head. “Not always, or I wouldn't be here, would I?”

“What could you possibly have ever done wrong?” I poured the solution into a cooling vessel.

“Everyone makes mistakes,” she said pensively.

I handed her the spoon. “But if you
could
go back in time, what would you wish to do differently?”

She shrugged. “Bragging cost me everything. If I could turn the clocks back, I would keep my successes to myself.”

I checked on the papers in the windowsill, holding each of the notes up to the light, inspecting them for any telltale signs of the invisible writing. I didn't understand Jane wanting to hide her successes. It was my failures I desperately wished to escape. “Whyever would you want to hide your accomplishments?”

She stirred the emulsion, cooling it down. “My parents were killed in a coaching accident,” she explained. “They left us with a nearly worthless estate. My older brothers, gamblers, the pair of them, had no use for our ancestral home apart from the meager allowance it provided. They abandoned me, left me with a handful of servants to get along as best I could.” She shrugged. “So, that's exactly what I did.”