Voices in Stone - Emily Diamand Page 0,17

exercise. What are you doing?”

“Allow me to introduce Jess’s grandmother,” said Mandeville. “A lady named Marie. Jess used to call her Gran Marie.”

“Gran Marie?” said Isis, too surprised to be silent.

“What?” asked Jess.

Mandeville leaned in close to Isis. “She wants to pass on a message to your little friend.”

Isis could see the other ghost speaking, but she couldn’t hear what the woman was saying. There was a sense of enormous distance between her and Jess’s grandmother, very different from the ghosts Isis normally saw. As if the woman was speaking from somewhere else. As if she was thousands of miles away.

Jess glared at Isis. “Why did you say ‘Gran Marie’?”

Isis could feel herself blushing. “No reason… I mean, the words just popped into my head.”

“Gran… my grandmother died two years ago,” said Jess. “Don’t you dare talk about her!”

Mandeville poked Isis, delivering a frost-cold shot into her shoulder. “You should give Jess her grandmother’s message,” he whispered. “It might help Jessica remember the sweet child she was, instead of the bully she has become. You could steer her in a whole new direction. With just a few words, you could change her life.”

Isis looked into his eyes, gleaming only a few centimetres from her own. They were distant blue stars, and he was as cold as space.

“She was an artist,” Mandeville whispered.

Isis looked at Jess, and her lips formed the words. “She was an artist.”

Jess’s mouth opened.

Mandeville whispered in Isis’s ear. “Whenever Jessica visited, her grandmother would take her into her studio. Marie would work on her paintings, and young Jessica would play with bits of paint, and do her own childish drawings. They made one particular piece together. A collage of flowers.”

“You made a picture of flowers with her,” said Isis, following his lead. But this wasn’t like the Devourer; Mandeville wasn’t making her speak. She simply wanted to wipe away that look of scorn that Jess turned on her every day. “You both signed the picture, you and your grandmother. She had it framed and you were going to hang it on your bedroom wall, but your dad never got around to it. Now it’s under your bed.”

Jess’s pen fell flat on the paper.

“Your grandmother always thought you were very talented,” Isis went on. “She said you could be an artist yourself when you grew up.”

Jess was staring at her. “How do you know that?” she said, her voice not much more than a squeak. “Who told you?”

“She doesn’t want you to waste your talent,” said Isis. The words were kind, but there was no kindness to her voice.

“You see?” whispered Mandeville. “It’s not so hard, is it?”

Jess’s hand was over her mouth; her eyes were round and white-rimmed.

“You died!” she said through her fingers. “Something happened to you when you died, didn’t it?”

The blood drained from Isis’s face and her mind was suddenly clear again.

“Oh my God!” squeaked Jess. “You can speak to the dead, can’t you?”

Isis couldn’t talk. Shock tingled through her.

What had she done?

Behind Mandeville, the figure of the woman was fading, melting into the air. Her mouth opened and she said something.

“Thank you,” said Mandeville, repeating her words.

Jess stood up, her chair scraping back loudly. “I want to move!” she shouted. “I’m not sitting with her!”

Chapter Seven

Gray

Of course, Mum took me to the hospital.

“I don’t care what the paramedic said, I want you properly checked over.”

We had to drive to A & E, and since I didn’t even look ill we had to wait for everyone else to get seen first, which took hours.

“It’s probably an inner ear infection,” said the A & E doctor, after he’d finally checked me over. “Your ears contain your balance system as well as your hearing, so a viral infection can make everything go a bit haywire. It’s not very pleasant, but you’ll be fine in a few days.”

My mum folded her arms, and gave him one of her looks.

“Did his whole class have an inner ear infection?” she said.

“I’m sorry?”

“I told you already, my son was on a field trip when his whole class was affected by rocks or dust or something. All the children were throwing up afterwards. That’s why I brought him here, not for you to tell me he’s got a virus!”

“Well, I don’t have any information about that,” said the doctor, “and his symptoms are consistent…”

“Has he been poisoned by gas?” snapped Mum.

“It wasn’t gas,” I reminded her. “It was dust, I told you.”

Mum turned to the doctor. “Has he been poisoned by