Sisters' Fate
Page 69

He called me sweetheart. I try to smile up at him, but it comes out more a grimace.
“I’m taking Sachi to Mei, too,” Rory says, marching up to us and practically dragging her sister behind her. “She can’t see.”
“It’s all the smoke,” Sachi insists, but the whites of her eyes are flushed red, and she can’t seem to focus on Rory’s face.
“Prue?” I ask.
“Already at the infirmary. She got a dreadful burn on her back earlier,” Sachi explains.
I twist my head back to Finn. “Father?”
“Took some of the orphans to the Green Dragon. Tess is going to meet him there. I’ll take you when you’re healed,” Finn promises, striding down the street. I look over his shoulder and gasp. The orphanage is engulfed in flame already.
I relax into him, trying not to wince against the jostling of his steps, comforted by the rumble of his voice through his chest as he and Rory talk. When we reach the park, he stops and sets me down on a patch of grass. The park is crowded with people—the injured, with their burns and cuts and broken limbs; witches from the Sisterhood with some healing magic; and working-class women with some nursing skill. Finn slides his cloak beneath my head as a makeshift pillow.
He sprawls down on the grass next to me, stretching out his long legs. “Three of the four fires are out,” he announces. “And the firemen are making another stand on the far side of the orphanage. I think they’ll get that one soon. It could have been much worse.”
He’s right, I know. Things could always be worse. Still, my eyes fill with tears.
“What is it?” He leans over me. “Where does it hurt?”
“Maura.” I close my eyes, but tears trickle out from beneath my lashes. “She’s dead.”
“Good Lord. How?” Finn takes my hand.
I tell him everything. “There was nothing I could do besides sit with her,” I say. Finn wipes away tears that are rolling toward my ear. “I know she—she was awful to you, and you must hate her, but—”
I break off as the truth of it hits me. If Finn can’t grieve with me—if he’s glad of her death—I don’t see how we can survive this.
“No.” Finn runs a hand through his wild hair, sending bits of ash flying. “What she did to me—to us—was awful. But she was still your sister, Cate.”
“I love you,” I whisper. “But I loved her, too.”
“Of course you did.” He brushes another tear from my face with the pad of his thumb.
I thought I was all cried out, but it turns out I’m not. Finn picks me up again and—heedless of the impropriety of it—holds me against him, stroking my hair while I sob.
“Things are going to change,” he says. “The Brothers can’t continue to outlaw witchery, not after what’s happened tonight. The people won’t stand for it. Witches and common people and Brothers have been working together all over the city. Look. It’s happening right here, in this park. Things are going to be different after tonight.”
Chapter 22
TEN DAYS LATER, WE GATHER IN CHATHAM FOR Maura’s funeral.
It is strange to be home when, two weeks ago, I thought returning was impossible. It’s even stranger without Maura. I expect to hear her voice calling me in for dinner, to see her running down the stairs to share some madcap scene from her book or popping into my bedroom to ask me to tie a troublesome sash. Last night, I sat at her dressing table, surrounded by old hair ribbons and the ghost of her laughter. In her jewelry box, I found a rhinestone bracelet she wore everywhere when she was little—she loved the way it sparkled when it caught the sun—and I burst into tears.
Now I stand in the family cemetery, surrounded by Cahill graves and sobbing mourners, and my eyes are dry. To our right is Mother’s tomb—Anna Elizabeth Cahill, beloved wife and devoted mother—and the five small stones marking the babies she lost. Next to them is a gaping grave and a mound of dirt and a mahogany casket from which I avert my eyes.
Elena stands beside me in her finest black brocade. Father was surprised when I asked that she be treated as family, but when I told him it was what Maura would have wanted, he agreed readily enough. Tess stands on my other side, her small face pale, next to Father; our housekeeper, Mrs. O’Hare; and our coachman, John. Mrs. O’Hare is dabbing at her eyes with a frilly white handkerchief, her gray curls bobbing as she cries. We only arrived yesterday; she has not had much time to get over the shock of Maura’s death.
Not that we are very used to it yet ourselves.
Brother Winfield refused to allow the funeral of a known witch to be held in the church proper, but Father prevailed upon Brother Ralston to perform the service. Father was furious that we’ve been banned from church, but I wasn’t bothered by it. Maura would have liked this better; she hated every moment she spent in that stuffy clapboard room, listening to sermons about our wickedness. It’s a pity we can’t have her funeral in a bookstore. She’d like that best of all.
Brother Ralston strokes his brown whiskers, then clears his throat. “Blessed are those who mourn,” he begins, “for they will be comforted. We have come here today to remember before the Lord our sister Maura, to give thanks for her life . . .”
I bite my lip. Truth be told, I do not feel very much like giving thanks at the moment. I shift and my footsteps crunch on the grass beneath me. It snowed yesterday as we were driving into Chatham. The ground is covered in four inches of sugary white that glistens whenever the sun hits it right—just like the rhinestone bracelet tucked into my cloak pocket.
I prick the tip of my thumb on the white rose I’m holding. Soon, we’ll drop our roses on the casket and the gravediggers Father hired will lower Maura into the ground. It seems impossible. It feels as though any minute she’ll come banging out of the house and dash up the hill, yelling, “Wait for me!”
A mound of white hothouse roses already rests on the coffin, along with an enormous bouquet of imported white tulips. Merriweather sent them; they must have cost a fortune. He didn’t come, but he sent Prue with Sachi and Rory.
I glance across the gravesite, where my friends stand. Neither Mei nor I have been able to heal the stubborn infection in Sachi’s eyes. She’s meant to rest them completely—no reading, no needlework, nothing taxing at all. She oughtn’t even be out in this bright sunlight. She can see blurry shapes now, but nothing more, and the specialist isn’t sure if she’ll ever fully regain her sight. Mei was able to heal Prue’s burns, though, and Rory escaped the fire unscathed. She sees me looking at her and tilts her head. She’s wearing a white feather in her hair, and beneath her black cloak, a white hem peeks out. Mei told her about the Indo-Chinese custom of wearing white for mourning, and Rory’s decided to adopt it for her own. She says she’s spent too much of her life wearing black already.
Rilla and Vi are here, too. Rilla stands with a motherly arm around Vi, whose eyes are as bloodshot and swollen as Sachi’s—though hers are from crying. Two days ago, we attended Vi’s father’s funeral. Robert was trying to save a little boy trapped in a house when the roof collapsed on them both. He was the only family Vi had; now she’s an orphan.