The Hushing [#ONC2022]

Chapter Nine

Lady Ingrid straightened and dragged the knife from her neck. Black blood spilled onto the floor in thick splotches.

"In a history of bad decisions," she said. "That has to be your worst one, my pet."

As Lady Ingrid advanced, Marion scrambled backward. But she bumped against a wall of wraiths, unable to go any further.

"Did you really think you could kill me?" Lady Ingrid said. "I'm already dead, darling." She laughed and spread her arms wide. "There's nowhere for me to go. You're the one who has everything to lose."

She clamped a hand around Marion's ankle, her fingernails digging into Marion's skin like fish hooks. Marion struggled and kicked. She clawed at the ground, fighting to get away. But Lady Ingrid's grip was too strong, dragging Marion across the floor.

Then Lady Ingrid's fingers closed around Marion's throat and the cold began. Crackling through Marion's body, all the way to her fingertips. It burned like fire, sweeping from head to toe. She felt the ice crystals forming in her lungs as she gasped for air.

Lady Ingrid stretched her mouth wide, the wet black muscle of her tongue slicking her needle teeth. Heat scorched at the center of Marion's chest and then snapped free, like a plucked guitar string. A moment later, light sparkled across the crypt's ceiling and walls like the reflection of sunlight on a pond's surface – shimmering and bright.

Marion's soul hovered into view, suspended between her body and Lady Ingrid's mouth. It looked so small, barely the size of a soap bubble, glistening like a dew drop.

She wasn't going to make it home.

Just as Marion was about to close her eyes and let the cold wash over her, a rustle of movement drew her attention. Beyond Lady Ingrid's shoulder, a small, black spider scuttled along the wall. It could have fit on the head of a dime and she would have missed it if the spider had been a shade or two closer to the gray stone's color.

It paused, then tiptoed another inch or two and vanished behind...what? Slowly, Marion blinked, willing herself to focus. Every movement felt as if she was wading through a vat of molasses – sluggish and thick.

There.

A fold of cloth, black as night. And the curve of something behind it. Something big, taking up nearly half of the wall.

The mirror, Marion realized with a jolt. It was here. And it had been here all this time, right under her nose.

With the gleam of her soul within an inch of Lady Ingrid's mouth, Marion's window of opportunity was closing fast. She reached out, her cold, stiff fingers searching along the ground for something to fight back with. When her hand bumped against a loose chunk of rock, she grabbed it and swung.

She struck Lady Ingrid in the face, smearing black blood from her eye to her chin. Her lower jaw hung crooked.

Lady Ingrid growled and shook her head, snapping her jaw back into alignment. But the brief split of concentration was just enough time for Marion's soul to drop into her chest again like a pebble into the stillness of a lake.

Marion scrambled on hands and knees toward the wall, still clutching the rock out of fear and instinct. She grabbed a fistful of the velvety cloth that slipped like water between her fingers and she yanked.

The fabric fell away, revealing the mirror in all its glory. It stood twice as tall as Marion's full height, glossy black with a silver sheen from the mushrooms' glow. She couldn't believe that the way home had been waiting for her within reach.

Marion flung out her hand and took a step, ready to plunge into the mirror. She couldn't wait to find herself in her grandmother's musty old attic, surrounded by nothing but dust and old antiques, with the promise of pizza for dinner downstairs and the comfort of her own bed.

But her palm struck the mirror's surface. Unyielding. Solid.

No matter how hard she pressed against the glass, it wouldn't budge. Her reflection stared back at her, eyes wide with the dawning realization that she couldn't get through. Why wouldn't the mirror take her home?

Behind her, Lady Ingrid laughed – a low, gravelly sound. Her face still hadn't fully recovered from Marion's attack with the rock. Her eye socket was shedding ashes, sloughing off like the scales of a snake's skin. Beneath her skin was a thick, smooth blackness. Her teeth were mangled, jutting out at odd angles from her jawline. The knife to her neck hadn't slowed her down. But it seemed the more Marion fought to stay alive, the less power Lady Ingrid held over her.

"The mirror belongs to me," Lady Ingrid said. "And while you remain on Hushing soil, it answers to my command alone. I opened the mirror for you last time. I let The Hushing call to you and draw you in. But now...you're not going anywhere unless I say so."

Marion gazed out at the sea of wraiths before her, desperation and rage boiling in her chest. She had come this far, fought so hard to stay alive, to find the mirror again so she could return home.

Lady Ingrid took a threatening step forward. And Marion lifted her hand still holding the rock she'd hit Lady Ingrid with before. This time, she didn't raise it toward Lady Ingrid. Instead, she held it up in front of the mirror.

Lady Ingrid ground to a stop, standing stock still. The sureness in her expression faltered and her face darkened.

"Give the command to release me," Marion said. "Open the mirror. Let me go home. Or I'll break it into a thousand pieces."

"No, you won't, pet," Lady Ingrid replied. "You don't have the courage."

Marion pressed the rock against the glass with a tinkling crack-crack sound. Lady Ingrid's fingers flexed at her sides but she didn't move any closer.

"If you won't let me go home," Marion said. "Then I won't let you feed on anymore living girls like me."

Lady Ingrid's gaze flicked from Marion's face to the mirror. Tiny white hairline fractures radiated like a spider web from the rock's pressure against the glass.

"That's how you get your power, isn't it?" Marion said. "You might eat the souls of the wraiths who won't swear their allegiance to you, but the living souls are the ones you really want. That's why you've kept all these girls in the caskets, just for yourself. Slowly bleeding them dry."

Lady Ingrid's gaze snapped back to Marion's face. "You're nothing but a little girl in a world too big for you to comprehend."

Marion twisted the rock against the glass, sending cracks rippling across the surface. Lady Ingrid let out a wordless scream of frustration.

"I think I understand exactly how things work around here," Marion said.

Lady Ingrid vibrated with fury. The wraiths around her retreated, as if she was a ticking time bomb, ready to explode at any moment.

"Open the mirror," Marion said. "Let me go home."

Lady Ingrid balled her hands into fists at her sides. For several seconds, she didn't answer. Marion swallowed hard. What would she do if Lady Ingrid refused? If she broke the mirror, there would be no way to cross back into her world and leave The Hushing behind.

Then Lady Ingrid straightened her shoulders with a smug look.

"No," she said. "As soon as you pass through, you'll break the mirror and shut me off from your world anyway. So go ahead, pet. Break it."

Marion hesitated. This was it. She'd hoped to make Lady Ingrid give in and send her back. Instead, Marion was the one who had more at stake – and more to lose. She tightened her grip on the rock, her heart aching as she made her final decision.

And she slammed the stone into the mirror.

Lady Ingrid howled. Glass shards rained down around Marion's head and shoulders, splintering across the stone floor. They glinted in the silvery darkness of the crypt. She definitely wasn't going home anymore.

As soon as the mirror shattered, the glass caskets cracked and split apart. A moment later, movement rustled inside. Then the girls rose, kicking at tree roots until they could break free and climb out.

They were alive. And they looked furious.