He raised his hand again, though the amount the auctioneer had called made him nauseous. It was a steep price, even for his own life. He glanced back at his opponent. The eyes looking back at him were green, like freshly cut grass. The small man adjusted his tie and gave Jacob another smile, and then he lowered his ringed hand.
The auctioneer’s hammer dropped, and Jacob felt dizzy with relief as he picked his way through the row of chairs. A collector in the first row bid ten thousand dollars for the silver rattle. Treasure, on both sides of the mirror.
The cashier was sweating through her black jacket, and she’d put too much powder on her pasty skin.
Jacob gave her his most winning smile as he pushed the wad of money towards her. ‘I hope this will do for a deposit?’
He added three gold coins, which were usually a welcome currency even on this side of the mirror. Most dealers took him for a fool who didn’t know the value of antique coins, and he always had some preposterous story ready for those who quizzed him about the Empress’s head on them. The sweating cashier, however, just cast a suspicious look at the three coins and called over one of the auctioneers.
The bottle stood barely two steps away, together with the other sold items. Even from this close, the glass didn’t reveal anything about the creature hidden inside. Jacob felt a brief temptation to grab it, despite the guards by the door. But then a quiet cough interrupted this far-from-sensible train of thought.
‘Interesting coins, Mr . . . I’m sorry, your name is . . .?’
Green eyes. His competitor barely reached up to Jacob’s shoulder. His left earlobe was studded with a tiny ruby.
‘Reckless. Jacob Reckless.’
‘Ah, yes.’ The stranger reached inside his tailored jacket and gave the auctioneer a smile. ‘I will vouch for Mr Reckless,’ he said, offering Jacob a card. His voice sounded hoarse, and it had a slight accent Jacob couldn’t quite place.
The auctioneer bowed his head reverently.
‘As you wish, Mr Earlking.’ He looked at Jacob. ‘Where shall we send the bottle?’
‘I’ll take it now.’
‘Of course.’ Earlking smiled. ‘It’s been in the wrong place far too long, hasn’t it?’
Before Jacob could reply, the small man made a quick bow. ‘Please give my regards to your brother,’ he said. ‘I know him and your mother very well.’ With that he turned and disappeared into the well-dressed throng.
Jacob looked at the card in his hand. NOREBO JOHANN EARLKING. Nothing else.
The auctioneer handed him the bottle.
CHAPTER THREE
SPIRITS
The wrong world. The security man anged for a carriage ride through the sleepy streets of Schwanstein. The moon shone from the grimy puddles in front of the old apartment building. Staring down at him from the brick walls were the grotesque stone faces that used to frighten Will so much as a child that he ducked his head every time he stepped through the door. Since then the exhaust had eaten away at them, and they were now barely distinguishable from the stone vines that grew around them. Yet as he climbed the steps to the front door, Jacob felt their stony stares more intensely than ever before. His brother probably felt the same wayt the airport scrutinised the bottle so intensely that, had this been the other world, Jacob would have put a pistol to his uniformed chest. His flight was late arriving into New York, and his taxi got so held up in Manhattan’s evening traffic that he lo. The contorted faces contained a whole new kind of terror since Will himself had grown a skin of stone.
The doorman in the entrance hall was the same man who had always dragged him and Will out of the lift when they were children, riding it up and down too many times. Mr Tomkins. He’d grown old and fat. On the counter where he kept the mail was the same jar of lollipops he’d used to bribe them to run his errands. At some point, Jacob had managed to convince Will that Tomkins was a man-eating Ogre, and for days his brother had refused to go to preschool because he was afraid to walk past the doorman on the way.
The past. It lurked in every corner of the old building: behind the pillars in the entrance hall, where he and Will used to play hide-and-seek; in the dark catacombs of the cellar, where he’d gone on his first (and unsuccessful) treasure hunts; and in the lift, which would transform into a spaceship or the cage of a Witch, whatever their adventures required. Strange, how the prospect of death brought back the past. It was as though every moment he’d lived was suddenly back, whispering, Maybe this is all you get, Jacob.
The lift door still jammed a little when it was pushed open.
Seventh floor.
Will had left a note for him on the door. WE’RE OUT SHOPPING. FOOD IN THE FRIDGE. WELCOME HOME! W.
Jacob tucked the paper into his coat pocket and unlocked the door. He was paying with his life for this welcome, and he would have done it again, just for the feeling of having his brother back. They hadn’t been this close since the time when Will used to crawl into his bed every night – when he still believed that doormen sometimes liked to eat human flesh. Love was lost so terrifyingly easily.
The darkness that met Jacob behind the door was strange and yet familiar. Will had painted the hall, and the smell of fresh paint mingled with the scents of their childhood. Jacob’s fingers still found the light switch, but the lamp was new, as was the sideboard by the door. The old family photographs had disappeared, and the yellowed wallpaper – which, even years later, had shown the spot where his father’s portrait had once hung – had been covered by white paint.
Jacob dropped his bag on the well-worn parquet floor.
Welcome home.
Could it really be home again, after all those years during which all he’d wanted from this place was the mirror? A vase with yellow roses stood on the sideboard. Clara’s signature. Before coming through the mirror, he’d felt slightly nervous at the prospect of seeing her again. He couldn’t be sure whether the Larks’ Water was still affecting him or whether it was just the memories that set his heart racing. But all was well. It had been good to see her, with Will, in the world Jacob hadn’t belonged to for an eternity. She had obviously not told Will about the Larks’ Water, but Jacob felt how the shared memory bonded them, as though they’d been lost in the woods and had found their way out together.
Their mother’s room, like their father’s study, was still mostly unchanged. Jacob hesitated before he opened the door. A few boxes full of Will’s books were piled up next to the bed, and the family photographs that had hung in the hallway leant against the wall beneath the window.
The room still smelled of her. She had sewn the patchwork quilt on the bed herself. The pieces of fabric used to be all over the apartment. Flowers, animals, houses, ships, moons and stars. Whatever the quilt said about his mother, Jacob had never been able to decipher it. The three of them had lain on it together many times, when she’d read to them. Their grandfather told them the fairy tales he’d grown up with in Europe, full of the Witches and Fairies whose kin Jacob would meet later behind the mirror. Their mother’s stories, however, were American. The Headless Rider, Johnny Appleseed, the Wolf Brother, the Magic Lady, and the Stone Giant of Seneca. Jacob hadn’t come across any of them behind the mirror yet, but he was sure they existed there, just as his grandfather’s fairy-tale folk did.