ES Chapter 11

'Even so—murdering the neighbouring family by arson isn't what actually happened. Is it.'

'Look here, Ayesha." The editor's voice had the quality of someone correcting a fundamental misunderstanding, and not for the first time. "People don't want that kind of dull, pitiful truth. What people want to know is whether the arsonist really did set the fire and kill five neighbors—and when they're going to get to watch him hang.'

'But—'

'But nothing. A journalist has to seize attention with a single line. Set aside every long-winded circumstance and write it as sensationally as you can. That's what makes money. We don't dig the salary out of the ground. If you want to be paid, be worth paying.'

The editor's principle was clear. Just money.

It had been exactly the same when she had raised her concerns before leaving for Worsley.

'What if House Etheldore doesn't stay quiet after we publish this?'

'The current lord has only just come into his inheritance—he'll be stretched thin enough without making time to read a peripheral magazine like ours.'

'The lord himself might not, but someone around him might happen to read it and report back.'

'Simple enough—don't write 'Etheldore' outright. Don't make it explicit who you're pointing at. Hint at it, obliquely, just enough. And if they push back, we deny it flat. What are they going to do? We say it wasn't us. If anything, pretending they don't know is more likely. It's a family shame, after all. If they come after us, they're publicly confirming the story is about them—they'll never do that.'

If she came back empty-handed after the editor himself had gone to the trouble of hunting down a story and sending her all the way out here, she would be comprehensively, thoroughly berated—and might even be let go.

Even so—how many families in this entire country had mental illness running hereditarily across generations? And the specific episodes she had picked up along the way were too concrete, too particular. Anyone who knew would have no difficulty identifying which house the events belonged to.

Was it really safe to write this as an article?

...As long as it can't be traced back to who wrote it.

She put the anxiety down as best she could.

'Miss—let what we've said here go in one ear and out the other. People in this part of the world either know very little or nothing at all. And for people like us, there's nothing to be gained from knowing too much about the affairs of those above.'

A corner of her conscience snagged. She bit her lip shut, sharply, and sealed it off.

Once a secret left the mouth, it was no longer a secret. Whether quickly or slowly, it would reach the world. Those women on the carriage couldn't have not known this. They knew—and they lost to the desire to show off what they had.

The events belonged to a previous generation. The servants who had witnessed them had left long ago. Cyrix would have no easy way of tracing which mouth the rumour had moved through.

After all, words have no legs, yet nothing travels faster.

Most importantly—by the time this article reached the world, she too would have left Langfield Manor.

Then write it.

Somehow, write it.

She tilted the quill, nib dipped thick with ink.

The tip—cut slantwise with a knife—pressed down into the paper. The strokes smeared. Black ink oozed out and spread across her fingers.

"Oh, not this again."

The nib had already gone soft.

Quill pens had short lives; a few days of use and they wore out, routinely. People who wrote as much as Ayesha always had to carry spares.

The editor had more than once asked how long she intended to keep using those outdated things, urged her to buy a fountain pen. She had refused every time. No particular reason—she had simply never warmed to them. The attachment would not arrive. Especially when she looked at the sharp pointed nib: her breathing would shorten, and cold sweat would break out.

She stood up to wash the ink-darkened hand. Shook the bell pull. A servant arrived promptly with water warmed to lukewarm.

Everyone who worked in this manor came prepared before being asked. They read the room quickly—attended in silence to only what was needed, then vanished without trace, as if they had never been there. Like shadows that appeared from nowhere and were gone.

"Bring it to the bathroom, please. I'm tired—I'd like to wash my face as well."

She had planned only to rinse her hands. Changed her mind. She had been sitting in one spot working over the article draft, and her eyes ached.

The servant filled the basin. Left. Ayesha went through and sank both hands under the warm water.

The ink began dissolving. Spreading. The water's surface turned, gradually, to the colour of blood diluted with water.

She was staring down into the basin.

She blinked.

The world closed briefly under her eyelids and brightened again.

What did she just see.

Reason snapped back.

The water, looked at again, was not red like blood but a murky grey-black. Of course it was.

She shook her head.

Presumably the combination of having been exposed to this family's tragedies before she had even arrived at the manor—and then hearing Cyrix speak directly of evil spirits and stranger things besides—had temporarily bewitched her into an optical illusion.

She scrubbed carefully between her fingers with soap. Rinsed. Lifted her head and met her own eyes in the mirror.

Beyond the deep violet-blue of her irises, she could see the small reflected figure in her own pupils.

"Look at you. What, are we scared now?"

She teased herself lightly.

She had no doubt it was all delusion. And yet the concept itself—an evil spirit endeavouring to steal a human body—was, admittedly, the kind of thing that made the skin crawl. Like a horror novel.

"Pull yourself together."

It was likely the sheer exhaustion of playing a medium—a role never written in her stars.

Even so. An optical illusion. Really too stupid.

While she was at it, she splashed the remaining water over her face and washed up properly. She was dabbing herself dry with the towel the servant had left out when she glanced, without particularly meaning to, back into the mirror.

Stopped.

The silhouette of the reflected figure inside her pupils was somehow unfamiliar. Too small to be certain—but there appeared to be a shape with hair hanging long and loose.

Hair hanging long and loose...

A water drop she had not fully dried fell from the tip of her chin.

Drip.

Since taking the journalist's position, she had always tied her hair neatly into one. The work required mobility; hair hanging loose would only get in the way. So today, too, she had tied it up the moment she woke. A habit settled across every single day without exception.

...That can't be right. Look again. Look carefully.

She leaned toward the mirror. Her upper body went deeper. The tip of her nose approached the glass until she was almost touching it.

Her reflection clearly showed dark golden hair tied neatly below the ears, the nape exposed.

The figure inside her pupils in that mirror: where a face's outline should have been, the hair was undone—undulating in slow, loose waves.

She raised her hand. Felt at the back of her neck. Found the rolled knot of her tied hair. Loosened the hairband's knot. Her hair, coiled tight, unspooled and fell in dark waves.

The silhouette.

"...What."

Another optical illusion?

Staring straight ahead into the mirror, she slowly sounded out her own name.

"Ayesha."

The her in the mirror moved her lips identically.

Ayesha.

"That's me, isn't it. That's me."

That's me, isn't it. That's me.

This time too her lips traced the same shape without a single deviation.

Her throat closed.

She stared at her own shape, held on the other side of the glass.

'If I am looking at you through this mirror, then you should be looking at me.'

'But who is that woman reflected in your eyes?'

'Through me—who are you looking at?'

The more she asked, the more clearly the vague dissonance she had been half-aware of became distinct.

Cold settled at her back.

Her heart began to beat hard. Rough.

Dizzy. Her stomach turned over.

She had surely seen it wrong. Doesn't everyone have this kind of experience once or twice—walking down the road and catching a glimpse of discarded rubbish, taking it for an animal; startling at your own shadow. It was just the 'little image' in her eye—no larger than the nail of her smallest finger. Everyone knew the eyes played such tricks. There had to be a reasonable explanation—

She told herself this wasn't worth dwelling on.

The thought would not settle.