The School Between Winter and Fairyland by Heather Fawcett

Author:Heather Fawcett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Published: 2021-08-17T00:00:00+00:00

13

In Which Autumn Is Entangled

Everything was hazy after that. Autumn remembered Cai leaning over her, chanting something, and suddenly her head stopped spinning. Then they staggered over the mountain for a while, eyes streaming from the lash of the night wind.

Autumn woke slowly, covered in blankets and very muddled. Her stomach was inside out, and she ached all over. Had she been sick?

A familiar voice said, “Autumn?”

“What time is it, Winter?” she murmured. But Winter didn’t reply.

Then Autumn opened her eyes and found herself in a tower in Inglenook.

That shocked her awake, and the memories of last night rushed back. She knew right away she was in Inglenook, not her cozy attic bedroom. Sunlight poured through a circular column of windows that overlooked the Mythroor col and the green darkness of the Gentlewood. And it smelled like Inglenook—of well-banked fires; of old, damp limestone; of the mint and lavender sprigs the housekeepers rubbed into the tapestries to freshen them.

Autumn sat up. She was in a beautiful oak bed canopied in sky-blue velveteen. The bed was big enough to fit three girls and looked more like a cake than anything, with its layers of creamy silks and soft furs. She glanced across the room, and there was Cai, reposing with a book atop an equally ornate bed.

“You’re awake.” His expression was strange—had she been talking in her sleep? She couldn’t remember. “How do you feel?”

Autumn blinked. “What am I doing here?”

“I didn’t know where else to go,” Cai said. “I didn’t think it would be a good idea to take you home all cut up and dirty. Especially when your grandmother didn’t know you were out. I managed to sneak us into the castle through one of my shortcuts without anyone seeing.”

Autumn lifted her hands. Her palms were bandaged. Dimly, she remembered taking a tumble down a steep slope in the mountainside, a tumble halted by a prickly gorse bush.

“I sent a message to your grandmother.” Cai looked guilty. “I said you were helping me with another essay. She thinks you left before sunrise.”

“Good thinking.” Autumn rubbed her head and felt an acorn-size lump. “What time is it? Won’t you be late for your morning classes?”

“I have a few minutes.” Cai sounded so unconcerned about the prospect of lateness that Autumn’s mind boggled. “Are you hungry? I had the servants bring breakfast. I met them at the door so they wouldn’t see you.”

He gestured to the table by her bed, where a tray of toast and marmalade and soft-boiled eggs sat next to a pot of tea. The teapot was wrapped in a thick flannel cozy and the tea was still hot. Autumn was hungry, but she could only pick at the food. Alongside the cup was a square of fresh honeycomb, an extravagance beyond her imagining. She popped it into her tea and watched it dissolve, then slurped up the remnants before she could stop herself. The honeycomb crunched wetly when she bit down, oozing summer sweetness.

Autumn felt dizzy. She was in the students’ tower in Inglenook, eating honeycomb brought for her by servants.

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