I wish I knew what I’d been thinking. I’m nearly sure I meant only to frighten Stepmother, remind her I’m a witch, make her pay attention to me, not Rose. If I were a praying person, I’d pray it was just power run amok, helped along by the Brownie. Brownies are mad for practical jokes. I’d pray that I’d only meant Mucky Face to stand on his tail, to stretch his boiling strength over the Parsonage, over the garden. That I’d never imagined he’d smash himself upon Stepmother.
I remember it, all of it. I remember the gray water surging from the river, smashing itself to spray, washing over a blue dress. I remember my throat filling with acid, wanting to run to Stepmother, not wanting to run to Stepmother.
I had to save Stepmother. I couldn’t endure life without her. I couldn’t endure life with the guilt of having killed her. I’d barely left the house in a year, since Stepmother had told me I was a witch. Dr. Rannigan. I had to fetch Dr. Rannigan.
I had so many memories. My words couldn’t begin to do them justice. “I called you to crush my stepmother.”
“No, mistress,” said Mucky Face. “’Twere an Old One what called me, an Old One what were born o’ water. Tha’ doesn’t be born o’ water, mistress. I needs must speak direct. Tha’ doesn’t be near strong enough to call me. Tha’ doesn’t be near strong enough to draw me five miles upriver to tha’ dwelling.”
I wished I could believe him, but I am an Old One, I have that power. I called him and he came.
“Forgive me, mistress.”
“Don’t say that anymore!”
I remember running, running from Stepmother’s body to the Alehouse, where I found Dr. Rannigan. My memory now speeding into a jumble of people and voices, into the flooding of the Parsonage. My memory lingering on Stepmother, whom Dr. Rannigan and the Hangman lifted ever so carefully onto a stretcher—
“What do you want of me?” I said.
“I been wanting to come back into the story,” said Mucky Face.
The story, the story, always the story! “All the stories are burnt.”
“Can tha’ not scribe ’em again?” said Mucky Face.
“It’s too late for that.”
“But tha’ needs must scribe ’em, mistress! Scribing, it don’t never die, but a story what be on a person’s tongue—well, there don’t be no person what lives forever an’ aye. Scribe o’ my power that it don’t be forgot. Scribe o’ how I surges into the fringes o’ the sea. Scribe o’ how I dive—”
It was then that the pumping station blew up. Mucky Face tipped backward, exploding into foam. I tipped forward, exploding into a run.
You can run and run. You can run and grow fitter and faster. You can run so much and so fast, you turn back into wolfgirl, running endlessly, effortlessly, through the swamp.
I knew I’d called Mucky Face. I knew Mucky Face had injured Stepmother. But I was running, running like wolfgirl, outrunning my memories.
You can outrun your memories, but sometime, you will have to stop. And when you do, there will always be Stepmother, waiting to be remembered.
12
Wolf and Lion
Look at me, Briony, walking and talking with a boy-man. Tonight is the first meeting of the Fraternitus Bad-Boyificus. Eldric and I walk along the towpath. The sun sits on the river like a great orange yolk. Eldric and I admire it.
It feels as though it’s been months since Eldric arrived, but it’s been only five weeks. If you want to stretch out your life, here’s my advice: Look about for new experiences, lots of them. It slows down time. Here are the experiences I recommend: Sit down to breakfast with a person, actually sit and eat and talk. Plan the details of a secret club while your father reads the paper, and even if your father realizes what you’re doing, it’s all right, because you’ve kept the important thing secret.
No one knows about the fraternitus.
Pardon me: Fraternitus. It’s the sort of word that simply begs for a Capital beginning.
The Shire horses have marked the path with their great dinner-plate hooves. We put our feet inside their footprints, we laugh.
Briony feminina regularitatis est.
She is a feminina regularitatis who deserves a holiday, just for this one evening. Listen to what she did. Hark unto the extreme cleverness of Briony Larkin.
This is Briony Larkin.
This is Briony Larkin; who burnt down the pumping station.
This is Briony Larkin; who burnt down the pumping station; which made the Boggy Mun happy.
This is Briony Larkin; who burnt down the pumping station; which made the Boggy Mun happy; which prompted him to cure the villagers of the swamp cough.
This is Briony Larkin; who burnt down the pumping station; which made the Boggy Mun happy; which prompted him to cure the villagers of the swamp cough; which cured Rose Larkin.
This is Briony Larkin; who burnt down the pumping station; which made the Boggy Mun happy; which prompted him to cure the villagers of the swamp cough; which cured Rose Larkin; which meant that Briony Larkin deserved a holiday, and she wasn’t even obliged to sneak out at night and worry about being caught, nor was she obliged to worry about Rose waking and bolting into the swamp in a panic, because Father and Mr. Clayborne are looking after Rose, will wonders never cease?
This is Briony Larkin.
I deserved a holiday, and I deserved to dispense with the laces and trusses expected of a clergyman’s daughter. I wore my oldest frock, which looked remarkably like a potato sack, and I wore very little beneath. I should never have imagined how lovely that feels. It’s most freeing, and it gives you the delicious sense you’re on your way to moral degeneracy. I shall soon be painting my lips and drinking gin.
The first meeting of the Fraternitus Bad-Boyificus was also to be my first fighting lesson. I made a fist and showed it to Eldric.
“Fistibus Briony.” I shook my fist. “Eldric terrorificorum est?”
“Terrific? I’m terrific!”
“Not terrific!” I said. “Quite the opposite. Listen carefully: terrorificorum.”
“Hmm,” said Eldric.
“Grant me patience, O Jupiter Magnificum!”
“Not terrified!” shouted Eldric at last. “Never terrified of Briony’s fistibus!”
We laughed and laughed. I was aware that I didn’t hate myself, which left me in a philosophical dilemma. Should I hate myself for not hating myself?
Briony destere Briony.
It doesn’t quite have the same ring.
I initiated conversation, like this:
“Do you think you’ll return to London?”
I found myself truly interested in what the answer was to be.
“Not for some time,” said Eldric. “Father intends to find another tutor willing to spend at least a year in the Swampsea. I feel it my obligation as a bad boy, and a founding member of the Fraternitus, to complain whenever he speaks of staying on. So please don’t mention how very glad I am to stay.”
“Mumibus wordium,” I said, although I knew that Mr. Clayborne knew Eldric was fond of the Swampsea, and that among the three of us—Mr. Clayborne, Eldric, and me—each of us knew the others knew. There’s an example of the Clayborne family language. It’s a silent language, but dead opposite to Father’s. And I, Briony Larkin, was beginning to pick it up. I learn languages quickly. Have I perhaps mentioned that?
“Speaking of tutors,” said Eldric, “I wonder that your father let you go without lessons since that Genius Fitz of yours left. I hope I’m not being a nosy parkerium.”
“You can’t blame Father,” I said. “Or, rather, you can blame him, and I certainly invite you to do so, but it will have to be for something else. Father intended to send me to school. It was all arranged, and my trunks were packed, but Stepmother fell ill and I stayed to care for her.”