Sadie Madison and the Boy in the Crimson Scarf

37 | The Journey Home

"It's not that simple, Sadie. I told you everything you needed to know," Rhiannon explained. "You had to want to leave. You needed a reason—one far bigger than Danver—to leave your family behind. You needed to see your family for who they really are. You needed to see them differently. Doktor Merrick and I couldn't make you. We couldn't bundle you in a blanket and whisk you off against your will. That's not how it works."

Sadie sat back against the worn leather and gazed out of the window.

"What happened at the house?" the doktor asked, turning his attention to the wireless.

"An almighty fight. The agents of the Gathering Order and the Wretched. Ryndai saw it all. The witches' magic was dark, unknowable. As we feared, their allegiance lies with the Lord of the Nyx."

"Malmortem," the doktor hissed under his breath. "The Unknown walks among us?"

"I didn't see him," Rhiannon said. "But I fear he is close." The wireless crackled for a moment, then Rhiannon added: "There was a timeshift, Robey."

"A timeshift?" the doktor replied. "I didn't feel anything."

"Fifteen minutes or so. Back to a moment before the confrontation began."

The doktor nodded to himself.

"There's...something else."

"Yes," Doctor Merrick said tentatively.

"There's another child here."

"Do you mean Eli? Or the adopted girl?"

"No," Rhiannon said. "I do not know who or what she is but—"

"It's Sofia," Sadie said, jumping forward in the seat again, her mouth close to the doctor's ear. "My twin. The one Rhiannon was supposed to kill."

The wireless buzzed.

"And...she's there?" Doktor Merrick asked. "In the house with the family?"

"Yes," Rhiannon said. "But I cannot read her. I cannot see what she sees or feel what she sees."

"Why ever not?"

"She is not of the Living, Robey," the woman in black told him. "I fear she may not be of the Dead either. She is...something else."

Doktor Merrick took a moment. "I understand. Remain where you are," he sighed. "Remain at the house. See that Michael and his family—and Sofia—are watched closely."

"As you wish," Rhiannon replied. "Godspeed, Robey. Godspeed to you all."

The wireless crackled, died.

"Turn the automobile around," Sadie ordered. "We have to go back!"

"Back? Whatever for?"

"My family are in danger! Sofia is in the house—pretending to be me. There's no telling what she'll do to them. Doctor Merrik, please. Turn the vehicle around."

He lifted his hands off the wheels and swivelled in his chair.

"I'm sorry, Sadie," he Sadie, the automobile negotiating the curves in the road of its own accord. "I'm not actually in control. There's nothing I can do. We're bound for Hurtmore House, and nothing can change that now."

Sadie collapsed back in her seat, watching the steering wheel ease from side to side. A tiredness billowed through her, an exhaustion beyond anything she had known.

She closed her eyes and instantly returned home.

She returned to her family—Michael, Larissa, Natalia, and Eli, the three wise cats, and the soft, loveable Atticus. Her heart ached for them passionately. Each one of them. Not because she wasn't with them, but because she couldn't be with them. She wondered if they would remember her. She wondered if the Narrowers would eradicate her from their memories, the same way they'd done with Danver. Sadie wondered where Rhiannon watched her family from. She hoped the Living would keep them all safe until she returned.

And what did she mean by a timeshift?

"You cannot save them all," Oliver said, his fingers resting on her knee.

"I can," she said. "And I will."

The boy in the crimson scarf looked anxious.

"Father, Mother, Natalia, and Eli. I'll save them. Even Sofia, whoever or whatever she is. I will save them all."

"How?"

Sadie looked deep into his aching blue-grey eyes. "One by one."

The doktor opened a small, nickel-plated tin and tipped out a handful of mints. He offered them to Sadie, but she shook her head. Doktor Merrick stretched his legs onto the dashboard, one hand cradling the back of his head, the other resting on the steering wheel. The automobile trundled down the brightening road. Towering mountains fizzing by on one side, the endless Sapphire Seas on the other.

"Ah, here it is," the doktor said suddenly.

The wheel pulled to the right, taking the automobile off the coast road. They dived down a small, unmarked carriageway between the Carcassus Mountains, the opening of which shone with bright, shifting colour. The road seemed to turn through hundreds of ninety-degree corners, making the distance far longer than it ought to be.

Eventually, the road expanded onto an enormous plain surrounded by a vast ring of mountains. There were no hills, no high ground, no distinguishing features of any kind. This place was barren and flat and wholly unpleasant.

Sadie turned and looked out the back window. To her dismay, the carriageway between the Carcassus Mountains had gone. Vanished, as if it had never existed.

A huge building materialised through the mist on the horizon, a mighty galleon of stone upon a sea of grass and thickets.

The doktor rolled his shoulders as the automobile passed between two nonchalant stone pillars and fizzed along the gravel approach road.

The long, black, important-looking automobile eased into a parking space.

Doktor Robey Merrick's name emblazoned on the wall.

He sighed deeply and swivelled in his chair.

"Welcome home."