CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN #2
‘No,’ hissed Theodora, flying at Opal. They collided mid-air and fell against the slanted roof. Lio hurtled to their side, holding Opal down by the shoulders.
‘Oh, what raucous fun,’ cackled Opal, her back now pinned to the rooftop by Lio and Theodora. ‘Is this not a dream for both of you? Lio? T? How much have you missed me?’
‘Are you drunk?’ cried Lio.
‘This is Opal now,’ said Theodora, bitter. ‘Just an addled girl, slipping into madness.’
Opal snorted. Her iridescent eyes gleamed with hatred. ‘You always were a liar. Trust you to paint me with so convenient a brush.’
She lunged with the knife and caught Lio in the arm.
He cried out. Opal kicked him away. Down the steep edge of the tiles he slid.
Theodora, momentarily distracted, did not see Belchamber looming.
The spirit seized her, and he sent a shock of lightning up Theodora’s arms. She yelped and grabbed at him and tumbled down the roof, crashing into Lio – all of them cascaded over the edge.
That left Dot alone with Opal.
Dot scrambled backward. She seized her chalk from her trouser pocket, scribbling runes against the rooftiles. She trembled as her magic failed. The scent of woodsmoke, incense, gunpowder and blackberry wafted over as Opal drew near.
‘I was going to bring you straight to Salamander,’ said Opal. ‘But as soon as little Rupert brought out my bread knife, I came up with a better idea. I’ll spare your life, Dottie, even though I do not need to. You see, I’m not the monster your Theodora makes me out to be.’
And then, several things happened at once.
Theodora reappeared, slinging a burst of magic at Opal.
Lio stepped out of a portal, firing his own spell; Belchamber was in his arms, limp.
Dot scrambled backward across the tiles and, as she did, Opal deftly dodged the magic cast at her. She flew forward and seized Dot’s unafflicted hand and she whispered, lovingly, in Dot’s ear, ‘Just a pinch.’
And with the bread knife, she cut Dot’s middle finger clean off.
Dot screamed, the animal sound ripping from her chest.
She fell against the roof.
Receding into the cold wind was the sound of Lio bellowing at Opal, of Theodora shouting at Opal, of Opal justifying, laughing, faltering, roving around the rooftop, dodging magic again, but Dot paid her no mind because she felt, simply, the bizarre and faraway breath of loss.
Wetness. Cold wind pinching the space where bone and flesh should have been.
A gentle villainous ache, duller and more deliberate than any pain she had ever felt before.
Dot held up her right hand and gawked at it as oil-thick blood rushed down her wrist.
Her finger was gone.
Dot stared at her unafflicted skin. She fought the perverse and sudden inclination to giggle. How odd, to look at her right hand, her human fingers and bitten nails, and see absence.
Then, arms were around her. Three tiny golden daggers were swinging before her eyes. No, Dot thought. Don’t let the blood stain Theodora’s blouse.
Opal leaped up to the chimney, the bread knife in one hand, Dot’s nail-bitten finger in the other.
She raised the severed finger up to the sky and yelled an incantation.
Dot felt the immediate lurch of icy magic within her – it was yanked out of her body.
It coursed toward the deranged woman on the chimney.
Opal was casting a spell with Dot’s magic.
Cold oceanic light shot up into the storm clouds and in one violent torrent, thick rain attacked the city and Dot began to scream.
Thunderous magic was torn from her. Pain seared at her arm. Her scales were growing, already rising over her elbow. Each one cut in, scalpel sharp, and it was all she could do not to faint from the sudden horror of it all. Her finger gone. Her humanity, scale by scale, ripped away.
‘Balance it, Dorothy!’ shouted Theodora. ‘The human magic, reach for it!’
Dimly, she heard the witch’s voice.
The scales were halfway up her bicep now.
She tremored. She was the ocean. She was desolation.
‘No,’ groaned Dot, as she reached deep for her own fury. Willard, screaming at her. Lio, screaming at her. Opal, on top of her. Just a pinch. Her finger was gone. Her writing hand – why did it have to be her writing hand?
‘Good!’ came Theodora’s voice over the rain. There was a crashing sound. Faraway yelling and the beeping of motor car horns. Was that the ocean she could smell? Could she hear the waves? ‘Anger, Dorothy! Come on. Balance it.’
The streets were filling with water, collecting first in the gutters and drains and then rising over the footpaths as the rain gushed over the city.
Theodora was beside Dot now. She squeezed Dot’s afflicted hand.
The witch forced some sharp liquid down her throat.
Then, Dot’s right hand began to burn as fire ripped over the stump to stop the haemorrhage.
Dot screamed again. She concentrated on the smell of burning flesh and the sound of crashing waves and the flood that was collecting around them below and the sharpness of the rain.
Back and forth, the magic spun within her, leaning between the icy cold and vicious heat, in and out, until quite suddenly the magic stopped and so did the rain and Dot collapsed against the roof.
Theodora steadied her. Down in the street, enchanted waves slapped at living room windows. In the absence of the rain, Dot heard the shouting now. Archie and Rupert were down there in the water, and she dimly watched Lio as he stepped into a portal.
Above, Opal tremored like a paper doll, caught in the wind. She reached again and again for Dot’s magic, but Dot fought off each attempt until, at last, Opal noticed her own skin.
‘What’s happening?’ shrieked Opal, gawking, horrified, at her hands. From the tips of her fingers to her angular wrists, Opal was covered in milk-white scales.
Opal stared between Dot and Theodora for a moment – manic, confused – and then keeled violently over and vomited whey-coloured liquid all over the rain-soaked roof and down her black gown.
She coughed; she wiped her mouth on her forearm.
The raven, Eliot, noticing Opal’s distress, fluttered over to her.
‘What is wrong with my hands?’ shrieked Opal.
Lio appeared beside Theodora, coughing violently as he stepped out of his portal and tugged Archie and Rupert alongside him. Archie dropped to his knees before his granddaughter. ‘What did she do to you, Dottie?’
Opal clenched her shaking, scaled hands and called down at them from the chimney, ‘Soon, Dottie won’t mind one stitch about that finger. Soon Salamander will have his tubes in her, and it’ll be far the worse, so don’t you worry, Archibald—’
Theodora shot flame, thick and vicious, at Opal.
The ball of fire smacked into her, and Opal screamed and doused herself in water and dropped the bread knife, which clattered down the rooftiles and landed in the gutter.
Opal cursed. Eliot the raven, having dodged the flame, now nuzzled his head on her arm.
Opal raised her fingers at Belchamber, but whatever magic controlled the spirit was now utterly spent, and he did not move.
Opal’s dress was singed. Her legs were burned. Perhaps in spite, she raised Dot’s finger and, with it, dragged out another shot of magic which spewed up and into the storm clouds.
Dot’s magic was torn out of her again and channelled into Opal. Dot cried. The scales again grew.
Theodora’s hand was on her shoulder. ‘Balance it, Dorothy.’
Dot drew as deep as she could. Her brother’s cruelty.
Lio’s cruelty. Her severed finger. It wasn’t enough anymore – the finite fuel of her anger was depleting.
But nevertheless, Opal’s spell began to weaken.
Dot sobbed at the effort until, at last, the spell was over and she collapsed in Archie’s arms.
A hiss of pain escaped Opal. She doubled over, her own white scales cutting up her arms.
Then they all heard a deep rumble that rose from the end of Ethel Avenue. Opal smiled down at them.
‘You never had the stomach for true witchcraft,’ said Opal. She stood tall and wiggled Dot’s finger.
‘Opal,’ said Theodora, slowly climbing the roof. In the street, the enchanted sea water was surging, swirling, rushing down Ethel Avenue in one vicious wave. ‘Give the finger back.’
‘Do you know what Salamander has planned for your tea shop?’ asked Opal, her wet, matted hair whipping in the wind.
‘Those valuable little wards – they can hide just about anything, can’t they?
Saints, that’s probably where Sal will keep Dorothy, in a tiny metal cage, her blood leeched every day, doomed to look out at the ugly jacaranda tree until she dies or goes insane or both. ’
‘I gave you a home,’ said Theodora. ‘I gave you everything you wanted.’
‘You were scared of me,’ said Opal. ‘And more scared, yet, of being alone. Of being the sad little girl from the valley of the willows whose parents couldn’t be bothered to respond to her letters. You simply loved my attention, until you didn’t.’
Theodora shook her head. ‘Why did you do it?’ she asked, edging forward. ‘Why not just take Dorothy to Salamander?’
‘I wanted to spare you, if only a little,’ said Opal, and behind those gaunt features, Theodora saw that some small part of her meant it.
‘My mother weakened the wards outside the tea shop. Lio weakened the ones within. That just left the keystone ward. Between you and Belchamber, wasn’t it?
’ Opal shook her head and laughed. ‘I’ve known for years that I would have to weaken your wards in preparation for Salamander.
I never wanted to. I was still loyal to you, T, for far longer than you deserved, and although I am not now, although I despise and resent who you’ve become, I still have love for that girl I met in the forest.’
Opal nodded down at Wren Court, and Theodora turned. She squinted. That low, heavy wave was rushing down the street toward them.