“I think… the library,” Florence said. She brushed an errant wisp of white hair away from her face. “There’s a one-way escape passage—people can leave, but there’s no way through into the house from it due to a fault of some kind with the door when it was built.”
“I marked the way out with a ball of string when I was using the tunnels as a hideout,” Rowan added. “It leads straight to the graveyard.”
“Perfect,” said Tino. “Crooks, I want you to organize a lockup. By that I mean a secure room to hold enemies in, if any are captured. Killing is only to be in self-defense or as a last resort—we don’t need any more repercussions. Anyone held can later be taken to the courts.”
“Or, at the very least, interrogated,” Merchant put in darkly.
“Agreed,” said Tino. “And again, we’ll need the most suitable room.”
A strange look crossed Florence’s face. “I…” She stopped and caught Warwick’s eye. “There is something. Not quite a room, but a… place, in the house, that we found once—accidentally—years ago.”
Warwick nodded. “More of a space than a room—about the size of a cupboard.”
“Do you mean a priest hole?” Fabian asked suspiciously. “I asked you once if this house ever had one, and you said no.”
“It’s not a priest hole, exactly,” said Warwick. “The house isn’t old enough for that. But it’s something similar—whether it was intended to be a hiding place or something like a self-styled prison cell, we’re not sure. Elvesden’s wealth meant he was a man who feared for his safety, and it seems the idea of something like a priest hole appealed to him.”
“We never told anyone about it because it’s dangerous,” said Florence. “Once you’re in it, you can’t get out without somebody else opening it from the other side. We always feared somebody getting stuck in it.” She looked at Fabian and Tanya. “Playing hide-and-seek, perhaps. That’s why we kept it a secret.”
“Well, where is it?” Fabian demanded.
“It’s in the old music room,” Warwick said.
“The one you always keep locked?”
“Yes. And the fewer people who know exactly where it is, the better. If Crooks is to be in charge of it, then we’ll show it to him, but no one else.”
Fabian pursed his lips.
“What about me?” asked Suki.
“You stay in here with Morag,” said Tino. “She’s your only hope of lifting the hex on your abilities.”
“Can you remember the symbols you found?” Morag asked her.
“Yes, I think so,” said Suki, closing her eyes. “I’ll try to draw it for you.”
“Good,” said Tino. “The rest of us—Warwick, Merchant, and myself, will discuss the next steps. Is everyone clear on what they need to do?”
There was a unified murmur of assent.
“Good,” said Tino again. “Let’s get to work.”
Since Amos’s death, none of the rooms on the second floor of the house were occupied, though the old man’s belongings still remained as though he might return any moment. They sat waiting for the day that Warwick would be ready to face them. Upon emptying the cupboard of junk, Rowan found four red cushion covers, stained with age. She added them to her bag and piled everything else back in the cupboard, not quite as neatly as she had found it, and moved on.
The other rooms, or at least those that were unlocked, were devoid of much furniture. She made a mental note of one room with tattered curtains of crimson velvet and then went to the alcove in which a wall tapestry concealed the hidden door to the servants’ staircase. Again, her search of the rooms it led to proved fruitless, and so Rowan went in the other direction, up to the attic. Gaps in the roof allowed some light in to guide her. She emerged from the alcove thirty minutes later covered in dust and with little to show for it.
Through a small window overlooking the back of the house she caught sight of flashes of light bouncing off shards of silver below. Victor was throwing knives, one by one, at the horse chestnut tree. To the rear of the garden Merchant and Samson were parrying, each with a sword that must have belonged to Victor. Beyond the walls, Tino was locked in conversation with Warwick, who stood sharpening the blade of his iron dagger.
A slight scrabble sounded from the roof above the window, and she wondered if birds, or even rats, were nesting in the roof.
She shuddered and hauled her cargo of fabric to the top of the stairs, ready for distribution, and then descended the staircase. Down on the first floor she saw that Fabian was having better luck. His bag brimmed, and he had even started a new pile. She left him to it and continued downstairs. On the landing, Florence was speaking earnestly to the grandfather clock.
“… and if you see anything, or hear anything suspicious, you’re to make the clock chime loudly, very loudly. Is that clear?”
Rowan fought an insane urge to laugh as she imagined the scene from an outsider’s point of view. Florence’s solemn words to the clock would appear to be utter madness.
She squeezed past and jumped the last few stairs to the bottom. In the dining room, Morag and Suki were poring over some circular drawings.
“There was a picture of me here,” Suki was saying, a pencil in her mouth. “And then the symbols were something like this….”
Rowan carried on past Tanya, who was carefully arranging salt on windowsills, until she glimpsed Sparrow in the library. She stopped in the doorway, her heart quickening.
“Looking for the secret passageway?” she asked.
He turned and shrugged, grinning. “I give up. Where is it?”
“Hang on,” she said. “Back in a minute.” She darted into the kitchen to collect another trash bag from the cupboard under the sink. Already the room was starting to resemble an armory. The huge oak table was clear of kitchenware and instead had begun to fill with other objects. Ironware, knives, and a skein of gossamer-like thread stood in the company of two large cages. On the other side of the cages, a vat of an ugly green liquid had been placed next to some smaller, empty bottles, and beyond that was Warwick’s air rifle.
Rowan ripped a bag from the roll and left, heading back to the library. Sparrow was prodding in various nooks of the bookcases’ intricate woodwork tracery.
“Here,” said Rowan. “I’ll show you.” She placed her fingers into three tiny indents and turned the circular panel until it clicked. Slowly, the partition opened and stale air wafted over them.
Sparrow peered into the stone passageway. “I don’t fancy the look of that.”
“It’s creepy,” Rowan agreed. “If you go in, don’t stay in there for more than a minute—the mechanism springs back and there’s no way in from the other side.”
“Think I’ll stay put,” Sparrow said. “How’s the clothes hunt going?”
“Not as well as I’d hoped.” She spied a bulky knapsack on the floor by the desk, next to a sleeping bag. “Is that yours?”
“Yeah. Don’t think I’ve got anything red, but feel free to dig through it.” He went over to the bag and unzipped the top, then upended it. A jumble of clothes fell out onto the floor. Sparrow stepped over the pile to return to the bookcase, craning his neck to view the musty stone staircase once more.
Rowan knelt and picked at the garments gingerly. Suddenly she felt uncomfortable about going through Sparrow’s clothing. It was limp and stale-smelling. Some pieces were worse than others. She wished that he would come away from the secret passage to save her from the embarrassment of looking through his personal things.
She coughed lightly. “Sparrow, I don’t think there’s anything red in here, but I wondered if you’d like me to…” She hesitated, wary of offending him. “I mean, while you’re here, I could wash some of it for you. Florence wouldn’t mind.” She began stuffing it back in the bag. “We could get it dry in no time.”
“Did you say something?” Sparrow’s voice was muffled from the tunnel. She turned and saw that curiosity had gotten the better of him. He’d gone right into it afte
r all.
“I said, we could wash your clothes.” She picked up another garment, sighing as her hand went straight through a scraggy hole in the back of it. “On second thought, half of it needs to be thrown away,” she mumbled, dropping it to the floor when, as predicted, the partition clicked back into place, sealing Sparrow into the tunnel.
“What did I just tell you?” she called as Sparrow banged on the wall from the other side. “You’re lucky I’m here to let you out.”
Her hand froze as she reached for the indents. An image had flashed in her mind, coming from somewhere deep, somewhere unexpected. Slowly, she turned away from the bookcase to face the knapsack again. Her legs trembled as she crossed the floor to the last thing she had touched. She bent down. Picked it up.
The black hooded top was bobbled and worn, and it smelled of Sparrow and the streets. With one hand she held it as the other felt down the back and found the waistband. Her fingers went straight through the jagged tear in the material that was about the size of her hand.
Sparrow thumped the wall again. “Don’t tell me it’s stuck!”
She took a step back, staring at the tear. She suddenly felt hot and queasy, trying to blink away the image swimming in her mind, but it wouldn’t leave her.
All she could see was the scrap of dark material Oberon had torn from the clothing of whomever he had chased in the woods. She had committed it to memory.
It was a perfect, horrible fit.
Another thud came from behind the bookcase.
“Red, are you still there? This isn’t funny—I’m getting claustrophobic in here!”
Rowan continued to stand, clutching at the hooded top. It couldn’t be, she reasoned. There had to be some kind of explanation. Sparrow couldn’t be the one Oberon had chased, couldn’t be the one who had tried to strangle Morag.
But the torn fabric in her hand suggested otherwise. Her fingers reached for the mechanism again, then withdrew once more. If Sparrow was guilty, and she released him from the tunnel, he could run. Yet if he stayed in the tunnel, he could still get away—she had spoken of the ball of string leading the way out in front of everyone. And not for the first time. She remembered how pleased she had been upon finding the way into the tunnels, how she had bragged to the other Coven members even then. Now she wished she had kept her mouth shut.
Behind the wall, Sparrow started to thump at it repeatedly. He clearly thought she’d gone. Without another thought, Rowan left the library, holding the top.
Warwick and Tino were outside. They looked up as she hurried over to them, still talking as she interrupted.
“Warwick, can you come inside? I found this.” She held out the ripped top.
Warwick’s eyes widened. He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out the scrap of material. It flapped in the breeze like a desperate bird trying to get away.
“It’s a match.” His mouth was set in a grim line. “Whose is it?”
Her lips didn’t seem to want to form the right shapes. They were saved from doing so as Tino grabbed the top from her and held it to his nose.
“Sparrow,” he whispered. “Where is he?”
“The library,” she choked out. “But there must be an explanation.”
Tino was already striding into the house. She ran after him, with Warwick following. In the kitchen they rushed past Crooks.
“What’s happened?” he called.
None of them answered. Warwick overtook Tino, leading the way to the library.
“He’s gone.”
“No, he hasn’t.” Rowan pointed to the bookcase. “He’s behind there, in the tunnel. He doesn’t know I’ve found it.”
Tino clapped his hand on her shoulder approvingly. “Well done.”
“No, I didn’t—”
“Is someone there?” Sparrow shouted from the other side. “I’m trapped in the tunnel! Get Red, she knows how to open it!”
Warwick stood in the doorway and nodded to Rowan. “Get him out of there. Let’s see what he’s got to say for himself.”
As the partition opened, Sparrow stumbled out, blinking and gasping. His eyes focused on Rowan, hurt. “That your idea of a practical joke?”
She bit her lip. Tino moved to stand in the way of the partition, blocking the only other exit from the room.
“Want to tell us about this?” he asked coolly. He held up the top.
Sparrow eyed it blankly. “It’s a top. Er, it’s black….” He shrugged. “And it’s mine. What you getting at?”
“It’s also got a rip in the back,” said Warwick. “And this is the missing part—the part Oberon came back with.”
“After chasing the person who tried to strangle the gypsy woman,” Rowan said.
“You can’t be serious!” Sparrow’s voice rose in disbelief. “I never tried to kill the old woman! I’ve never even been near her until today!”
“Then how do you explain it?” Tino growled.
“I don’t know,” Sparrow hissed. He held his hands up. “It’s been so warm that I haven’t even worn the thing in weeks—it’s been festering in the bottom of my bag. Anyone could have taken it and used it, but I’m telling you, I haven’t been near those woods! Why? Why would I do it?”
“Why would anyone want the gypsy woman dead?” Warwick said. “To cover their tracks. They would have known she was helping us and tried to silence her.”
“Then it was someone else,” Sparrow said angrily. “Someone must have gone through my stuff and taken it.”
“Why would anyone want to put that on?” Tino sneered. “It reeks.”
“Exactly.” Sparrow’s face flushed with humiliation but he held his ground. “If someone wanted to frame me, then using my clothes is an easy way to do it.”
“Oberon went berserk when you entered the house,” Rowan remembered.
“If I’d been the one to do it, do you really think I’d have brought that top anywhere near this house? That I’d even still have it? Whoever was wearing it knew the dog had taken a chunk out of it—they’d have got rid of it first chance they had!”
“He’s right,” said Rowan. Relief washed over her. “He knew I was about to look through his things and he didn’t even react—he was more interested in investigating the tunnel. That’s how he ended up shut in there.”
Sparrow stared back at her. “And how convenient for you that I did,” he said. “Made it all the easier, didn’t it?”
His quiet defeat hurt Rowan more than anything.
“Sparrow,” she said weakly. “What would you have done?”
“Spoken to you. At least asked you, before running off and telling tales.”
“If it had been anyone else, I would have. But with you, I couldn’t think straight….”
“Maybe he’s just being clever,” Tino continued, shifting as the partition finally swung back into place. “After all, he’s been taught by the best.”
Sparrow shook his head. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“If you were the one who attacked Morag, you knew the dog would have gone for you even if the top had been destroyed,” Tino answered. “It was your scent he was reacting to. That alone could have raised suspicion. But keeping the top and claiming someone else used it is altogether more plausible.” His mismatched eyes swept over Sparrow from head to toe. “That’s what I’d do. And that’s why I don’t believe you.”
“Tino…” Sparrow began. “You can’t think that of me. How long have you known me…?”
“Are you sure about this?” Warwick asked, evidently uncomfortable. “I mean, you know him better than anyone—it’s your decision, but—”
“I’m not sure of anything at the moment. And until I am, I’m taking no chances.” Tino grabbed Sparrow roughly. “We’ll need to put him somewhere secure—he’s been taught the tricks of the trade in escaping….”
Sparrow tried to bat Tino away. “Get your hands off me!”
“You mean the holding cell?” Warwick asked. “It’s small—if we put him in it,
there won’t be room for anyone else who’s captured later.”
“Good point.”
“Don’t do this.” Sparrow stopped struggling. “I’ll prove to you that it wasn’t me—I’ll find whoever framed me!”
“Let him try,” Rowan whispered, wide-eyed. Sparrow would not look at her. “Let him at least try….”
Tino shook his head. “I can’t take that chance.” He spun Sparrow round, pinning his arms behind his back, and jerked his head toward the bookcase. “The tunnels—you said it was a labyrinth down there. How dark is it?”
“Pitch black,” Rowan answered, confused. “Why?”
“Open it again.”
“But—”
“Do it! Now!”
Hating herself, Rowan quickly released the secret doorway.
“Help me search him,” Tino commanded, holding Sparrow bodily to the wall. Warwick frisked his pockets.
“What am I looking for?”
“Matches, or a flashlight. He can’t have any light. In fact, just remove everything he’s got.”
Sparrow began to fight again, crying out as Tino twisted his arm into a painful lock. “Don’t! Please don’t shut me in there!”
Warwick threw a slim book of matches on the floor. It was followed by some coins, string, and a penknife before he moved on to the next pocket.
Rowan watched, frozen. She helplessly watched as the surreal scene unfolded before her eyes.
“That’s everything,” Warwick said at last.
Tino bundled Sparrow into the stairwell, jostling to keep him under control.
“Stop struggling. I don’t want to do this.”
“Then don’t!” Sparrow yelled. “I’m telling you, you’ve got the wrong person! I’d never hurt no one—least of all an old woman! What about Crooks? This is more his handiwork than mine—he was the one who used to rob the old folks’ homes when you found him, wasn’t he? If I remember right, I was the only one bothered by that, but you, all you saw was how you could use him….”
Tino didn’t react. “How long before the door closes, Red?”
“I don’t know, maybe thirty seconds.”