An Early Morning Confession
Chapter Twenty-Two
AN EARLY MORNING CONFESSION
Alison
A lison awoke to the sound of Ceri’s voice as she shook Idris awake.
“Idris, wake up! I know you can hear me. I need help!”
Alison’s neck hurt from the night spent on the floor. It was still dark when she opened her eyes, but it was difficult to tell if that was because it wasn’t yet dawn or because the boarded-up windows let in so little light to make it seem like it was still nighttime.
From the sounds on the roof, it was still raining, but it seemed the worst of the lightning and thunder had passed.
“Idris. Please wake up. I lied. I did find something outside, only I was too embarrassed…it doesn’t matter. Leo is in trouble.”
“What do you mean, trouble? What did you find?” asked Idris groggily.
Alison heard the others stirring around them. She stood up (Gods, her back hurt; she was too old for this) and pulled the pair of them back to the corner they’d occupied earlier, where hopefully they wouldn’t disturb the others trying to sleep.
Ceri held something out to Idris. He lit a tiny flame on the end of his fingertip—it looked like he’d slept long enough to get at least some of his magic back—and looked at what she held.
Leo’s journal. She was certain Idris would recognize it as well; Leo was never without the thing.
“What does it say?” asked Alison.
“I don’t know,” said Ceri. “I warned him about what happened to you tonight, and he said something is after him too where he is.”
“Where is he?” asked Idris.
“Here. But not here. He said it’s like here but different. It’s daytime there.”
“You’re able to communicate with him?” asked Alison.
“Yes, through this. It seems to be the same in both places.”
Idris examined the journal. “There are pages missing.”
Alison could guess at the meaning behind Ceri’s guilty look without her explaining it.
She had removed the pages. Probably because they were about her, which is why she hadn’t come forward with the journal immediately.
If Idris also reached the same conclusion, he didn’t mention it. “I feel nothing unusual about it,” he said. “Nothing which suggests dark magic, at least. If he’s there with those objects and the items missing from my closet, he needs to separate them immediately. If he can put them back into their containers, all the better. We may be able to help him decurse some of them, but it will be harder with us here and the objects there.”
“I tried to tell him all of that,” said Ceri. “He stopped responding. I don’t know if he’s still there or if he even has the journal.” She sat down at the closest table and checked for a response, but there was nothing there.
Idris sat beside her and held the flame nearby so she could see.
“Do you have any idea how to get him back?” Alison asked him.
“Not yet,” said Idris. “I’ll need to read what he’s written about where he is. How was it that you escaped from that vine situation again?”
“Keir had to let me go over the falls. It was how he thought Charlotte had died.”
“Some sort of acceptance lesson?”
“Yes, we think so.”
Idris turned back to Ceri. “Are there any lessons you know of that he needs to learn? Other than not taking things that don’t belong to him or messing with dangerously cursed objects without permission?”
“Most of those objects belong to him. You are the one who took something that didn’t belong to you first.”
“I took them for safekeeping, and after tonight, perhaps you can see why I did.”
“Any response?” asked Alison.
“Nothing yet,” said Ceri. She yawned.
“Have you slept at all tonight?” asked Alison.
“No,” said Ceri. “How could I?”
“I’ll wait to see if Leo responds,” said Alison. Ceri looked like she was going to object. “Just for a couple of hours until you’ve had some rest. I’ll wake you if anything happens.”
“Promise you’ll wake me,” she said. “It would be nice to get a little rest. I imagine it’s going to be a long day in the library trying to figure this out.”
Oh Gods, the library. There was a disaster in there to be addressed before any research could be done at all.
“I promise I’ll wake you,” said Alison.
Ceri hobbled away, clearly inches from falling asleep where she stood.
“What do you think?” Alison asked Idris once Ceri was gone.
“I think he’s in a great deal of danger, wherever he is.” He read some of Leo’s description of his surroundings over Alison’s shoulder.
“The same place but with no people,” said Alison. “That does sound like the vine world. We were at the waterfalls near Weldan House. I had never been there before, but it was exactly the same when I visited after. The only people who were there were Keir and me and our neighbor who had gone in by mistake. But we were acting out a specific scene, a memory. It was almost impossible to break free from it. It doesn’t seem like that’s happening to Leo.”
“Maybe, maybe not,” said Idris. “He mentions some differences. The statue and the fence. We should ask the dean if he remembers when the statue was broken.”
“Or ask Groundskeeper Tomasar about the fence.”
“Good luck with that. He always seems to be in a rage whenever I see him.”
“Oh, I think he’s just grumpy. He has a very cute dog. Even Willow is a fan.”
They sat and watched the empty page after Ceri’s reply for a couple of minutes.
“You don’t have to wait up,” said Idris. “It’s my sister’s…whatever he is to her. I can keep an eye on it. If I had taken more time to teach him about the curses, we might not be in this mess.”
Alison had thought Idris had been a bit hard on Leo, but that didn’t make this his fault. “I don’t think Leo is the type who would have listened even if you’d warned him of the danger. Some lessons you have to learn for yourself. I’ll wait up. I’m awake now anyway, and I don’t think I can bring myself to get back on that floor.”
Idris stretched as he got up. “Tell me about it. I’ll admit that I’m curious about Leo’s research. My own magic can’t be maintained when I’m asleep, and I’ve spent years researching why that is when clearly many curses endure across lifetimes. I’d give anything for the ability to turn those awful sheets into a bed that would last the night.”
“I’d offer to help, but I’m afraid we’ll need my powers for the library tomorrow,” said Alison.
Idris groaned as he walked away.
Alison was glad she didn’t have a sibling.