own sister sneaking back in legless! (Fiona never could hold her cider.) Mistress Pitch was steaming—standing on the Lawn in her dressing gown and nine months up the duff.
Ebb lost her wand—her staff—for a week because she was the one who snuck us out. Then the next night, Ebb spelled the bridge down with my wand. (We could always use each other’s pieces.) Gutty as fuck, she was.
Course we got caught again.
Getting away with it wasn’t the point.
The point was that we were young and free and full of magic. What was Mistress Pitch going to do? Toss out her own sister and the two strongest magicians at Watford?
They weren’t going to toss out Ebeneza; they were too worried she’d go rogue on them. Too worried she’d realize she could do more with all that magic than stick the desks to the ceilings—or call every shaggy dog in the county to Watford, like she was the Pied Piper.
I realized. What Ebb could do. What I could do.
* * *
I get to our street and cut down the alley, then let myself into the back garden. The gate creaks. I’m a few minutes early—Ebb’ll be inside still. I make my way over to the willow tree and sit down on Mum’s bench.
Wish I could have a fag.
Gave ’em up when I crossed over—almost twenty years ago. But that Pitch brat blew smoke in my face, and now I’ve got a taste for it again.
Fi and I used to roll our own, on menthol papers.
Ebeneza wouldn’t have any of it. Said tobacco gunked up her magic.
“Your sister’s trynta stay pure,” Fiona would tease. “Like an athlete. Like Princess Di.”
We used to give Ebb hell over being a virgin. Hell, she’s probably still a virgin. (Does feeling up other girls even count?)
The back door opens, and I look up. But it ain’t Ebb. Just somebody—no one I recognize—stepping out for a smoke. I close my eyes and inhale. This vampire nose is good for something.
Ebb’ll come out soon, and she’ll walk out into the garden and lean against the gate. And she won’t talk to me. That’s the agreement. That’s the rule.
She’ll just talk.
She’ll tell the wind how she’s doing. She’ll catch the Christmas moon up on all the family goings-on. Sometimes she might do magic—not for me. Just for the sake of it. Anything alive comes out to say hello to Ebb, even in the dead of winter. Last year, a deer pranced up the alley, caszh as anything, and rested its head in Ebeneza’s hands. I knifed and drained it as soon as Ebb went back in. I think she knew that I would—maybe it was a gift. Maybe she was trying to keep me pure for a day.
Anyway, I had to haul the deer’s body a mile before I found a bin big enough for it.
Ebb’ll come out soon. And she’ll talk. And I’ll listen. I don’t talk at all—don’t think Ebb would want that. It would be too much like a conversation. Too close to breaking the rules.
Plus, what would I say? I’ve got nothing to report that she wants to hear. No news that won’t turn her stomach. All Ebeneza really wants to know is that I’m still here. Such as I am.
Mostly my sister talks about the school. The grounds. The goats. The kids. That dryad she’s been mooning over since sixth year. She doesn’t talk about the Mage. Ebb’s never been one for politics. I expect she stays out of his way—though she told me once that they got into a royal dust-up when one of his merwolves ate one of her goats.
I’ve never seen the merwolves, only heard about them from Ebb. It’s the only animal I’ve ever known her not to like. She says they try to throw themselves up on the drawbridge. That the bridge shakes while the children and goats are crossing it. One of the wolves actually made it out once—dragged itself around the Lawn, snarling, until Ebb came and cast it back into the water. “I spell them to sleep now when the bridge is down,” she told me. “They sink to the bottom of the moat.”
Whoever it was who came out for a fag finishes it and goes back in, slamming the screen door shut.
* * *
I was early. But now Ebeneza’s late. Real late.
The noise has stopped inside the house. The kids’ll be in bed. Ebb says all our brothers and our little sister have kittens these days.