Ring. Sister. Piano (Book 4 of The Powder Trail)

Chapter Sixty: Respite and Reunions

Unconsciousness was not the same as sleep. Jack wanted one, but not the other. He wanted oblivion to whisk him off all at once, without having to lie in silence waiting for it.

And he didn't want dreams. There were too many raw spots, too many broken edges that his subconscious was sure to catch on. It would show him his mother, or make him breathe the cold, clammy air of the red room. It would replay Sita's screams.

He had been left in the hall because he refused to go to bed while Sita was in the operating theatre. But he couldn't go down there and see how she was because he was still afraid to look at her. He prevailed on Sarah to sit and talk with him, when she wasn't running around on Sergei's errands, fetching blankets and brandy and hot tea.

He was so afraid of the silence that he even occasionally hovered by the piano, pressed a random key, and shuddered. Every note was a reproach now. He even thought he could see his mother and Henry and Baby Jane standing by the piano, resting their elbows on the top, glancing in his direction as if they'd just been talking about him.

After looking horrified and useless for half an hour, Danvers announced that he was going back to the Academy, where Elsie was spending the night. Apparently, she was dividing her time between the Faculty and the Academy to make sure nobody executed Anna in her absence.

Jack was relieved. He didn't want to endure her questions, or her whimsical explanations. But he still questioned Danvers minutely about her health, because it was the best indicator he had of Ellini's.

"She hasn't been suffering any pains?" he demanded. "Any physical symptoms you couldn't explain?"

Danvers looked half-alarmed and half-offended. "No! Why should she?"

Jack scrubbed a hand across his forehead and tried his hardest to be patient. "She's connected to Ellini, remember? You saved Ellini's life by giving Elsie a transfusion?"

Danvers took a step backwards, as if Jack had been brandishing those words like a clenched fist. He couldn't possibly have forgotten, could he? Jack would certainly never forget that Sergei and Danvers had clubbed together to save Ellini's life when he himself had been at his most useless. It had galled him to even mention it.

Maybe Danvers just hadn't let himself dwell on the implications – the idea that the woman he loved was now twice as vulnerable, twice as easy to kill. She essentially had two lives to lose.

"Good God!" Danvers exclaimed. "You mean if – heaven forbid – one or the other of them were to die...?"

"Best not to think about it, mate," said Jack, though he wasn't feeling particularly matey.

"But – but you're thinking about it!"

Jack sucked in a quick breath through his teeth. "Well, I think about everything. You don't have to suffer from the same affliction. It doesn't matter anyway, does it, because Elsie is fine, and you're going to tell me the instant she experiences anything strange."

"I..." Danvers gave him a pop-eyed, red-faced stare. "Come to think of it, she has been complaining of feeling hot..."

"Then Ellini's in the fire-mines," said Jack. He told himself this was to be expected. It would have been worrying if she wasn't in the fire-mines, after being away for three days. But he couldn't help feeling a prickle of unease at the thought of what she must be feeling, breathing that close, steamy air again. Sweltering away under the black rocks.

Part of him was glad she wasn't here, because he suspected his eggshell-thin calm would crack the moment he saw her. In many ways, he was still in the gauntlet. He had got through the rooms, but he couldn't leave them behind. Part of him knew that this strange, swirling calm was only temporary. At some point, if he didn't die, he would have to sort through all the horrible things that had been stirred up.