A Great and Terrible Beauty (Gemma Doyle #1)(20)

Right. Get this over quickly, then. The light from the open door brightens up the vestibule, but the far end, where the altar and wine are, is in complete darkness. I start toward it and hear the door creaking closed, the light vanishing with the girls, the heavy thud of the wooden bolt being thrown on the outside of the door. They’re locking me in. Without thinking, I throw myself shoulder first into the door, hoping for enough time to push it open. It doesn’t give. And actually, it hurts quite badly.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, Gem. What did I expect? How could I have been taken in by that story about wanting me to be part of their private club? Ann’s voice swims in my head—what’s the point? There’s no winning against them. I don’t have time to feel sorry for myself. I’ve got to think.

There must be another way out of here. I only have to find it. All around me, the church seems to breathe with shadows. Mice scurry under pews, their claws scratching against the marble floor. My skin crawls at the thought. But the moon is strong. It falls through the stained-glass windows, bringing an angel to life, then the gorgon’s head, its eyes burning yellow in the dark.

I’m up and feeling my way from pew to pew, hoping I don’t run into furry rodents or worse. Every sound is magnified. The clicking of night crawlers. Creaking and groaning of wood in the wind. Silently, I berate myself for falling prey to such a nasty prank. It’s just a little initiation we have here at Spence—we like to torture each other. Beauty, grace, and charm my foot. It’s a school for sadists with good tea-serving skills.

Click-click. Creak.

Felicity’s probably no more related to Admiral Worthington than I am.

Click-click. Creak.

I don’t even want to go to Paris.

Click, creak. Cough.

A cough. I didn’t cough. And if I didn’t, then who did?

It takes just a second for this to sink down into my legs and now I’m stumble-running up the middle aisle as fast as I can manage. My foot finds the first step to the altar. I trip and land sprawled on the hard marble, the sharp edge biting into my leg. But I can hear footsteps running up behind me, so I’m on hands and knees, scrambling for what I see just behind the organ—a door, open just a crack. Feel the last step and I’m up on wobbly legs, running hard for the promise of what’s on the other side of that door. Reach out a hand and . . .

There’s something overhead. Dear God, I must be imagining things because something, someone, is flying over my head, landing with a thump in the space between the door and me. A hand clamps over my mouth, trapping my scream there. The other arm pulls me in, pins me tight.

It’s instinct that makes me bite the hand on my mouth. I’m unceremoniously dumped to the floor. And then I’m up on my feet again, leaping for the door. A hand snakes around my ankle, bringing me down hard till I see pinpricks of light behind closed eyes. I try to crawl away but my knee and head hurt too badly.

“Stop. Please.” The voice is young, male, and vaguely familiar.

A match flares in the darkness. My eyes follow the light as it fills the chamber of a lantern. The light spills out, catches the outline of broad shoulders, a black cloak, before rising to frame a face with large dark eyes fringed in a halo of lashes. I’m not imagining things. He’s really here. I jump up but he’s faster, blocking off all access to the door.

“I’ll scream. I swear I will.” My voice is no more than a scratching sound in the dark.

He’s tensed and ready, for what I don’t know, but it makes my heart hammer against my ribs. “No, you won’t. How will you explain what you’re doing here with me in the middle of the night without proper clothes, Miss Doyle?”

Instinctively, I put my arms around my body, trying to hide the shape of me beneath my thin white gown. He knows me, knows my name. My pulse throbs in my ears. How long would it take for my scream to reach someone? Is there anyone out there to hear me?

I step behind the altar, putting it between us. “Who are you?”

“You don’t need to know who I am.”

“You know my name. Why can’t I know yours?”

He ponders this before answering with a curt reply. “Kartik.”

“Kartik. Is that your real name?”

“I’ve given you a name. That’s enough.”

“What do you want?”

“Just to talk to you.”

Keep thinking, Gemma. Keep him talking. “You’ve been following me. At the train station today. And earlier at vespers.”

He nods. “I stowed away on the Mary Elizabeth in Bombay. Rough passage. I know the English are terribly sentimental about the sea, but I can live without it.” The lantern casts his shadow up and across the wall like a winged thing, hovering. He’s still guarding the door. Neither of us moves.

“Why? Why come all this way?”

“As I told you, I need to talk to you.” He takes a step forward. I shrink back and he stops. “It’s about that day and your mother.”

“What do you know about my mother?” My voice startles a bird hiding in the rafters. Panicked, it flaps to another beam in a flurry of frantic wings.

“I know that she didn’t die of cholera, for one thing.”

I force a deep breath. “If you’re hoping to blackmail my family . . .”

“Nothing of the sort.” Another step forward.