The goddess took a step backward. “You gave your life to me, Diana Bishop. It is now time to make use of it.”
A cry overhead alerted me to the presence of the firedrake. I looked up, trying to make her out against the moon. When I blinked, her outline was perfectly visible against Goody Alsop’s ceiling. I was back in the witch’s house, no longer on a barren hilltop with the goddess. The tree was gone, reduced to a heap of ash. I blinked again.
The firedrake blinked back at me. Her eyes were sad and familiar— black, with silver irises rather than white. With another harsh cry, she released her talons. The branch of the tree fell into my arms. It felt like the arrow’s shaft, heavier and more substantial than its size would suggest. The firedrake bobbed her head, smoke coming in wisps from her nostrils. I was tempted to reach up and touch her, wondering if her skin would be warm and soft like a snake, but something told me she wouldn’t welcome it. And I didn’t want to startle her. She might rear back and poke her head through the roof. I was already worried about the condition of Goody Alsop’s house after the tree and the fire.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
The firedrake replied with a quiet moan of fire and song. Her silver-andblack eyes were ancient and wise as she studied me, her tail flicking back and forth pensively. She stretched her wings to their full extent before tightening them around her body and dematerializing.
All that was left of the firedrake was a tingling sensation in my ribs that told me somehow she was inside me, waiting until I needed her. With the weight of this beast heavily inside me, I fell to my knees, and the branch clattered to the floor. The witches rushed forward.
Goody Alsop reached me first, her thin arms reaching around to gather me close. “You did well, child, you did well,” she whispered. Elizabeth cupped her hand and with a few words transformed it into a shallow silver dipper full of water. I drank from it, and when the cup was empty, it went back to being nothing more than a hand.
“This is a great day, Goody Alsop,” Catherine said, her face wreathed in smiles.
“Aye, and a hard one for such a young witch,” Goody Alsop said. “You do nothing by halves, Diana Roydon. First you are no ordinary witch but a weaver. And then you weave a forspell that called forth a rowan tree simply to tame a firedrake. Had I foreseen this, I would not have believed it.”
“I saw the goddess,” I explained as they helped me to my feet, “and a dragon.”
“That was no dragon,” Elizabeth said.
“It had but two legs,” Marjorie explained. “That makes her not only a creature of fire but one of water, too, capable of moving between the elements. The firedrake is a union of opposites.”
“What is true of the firedrake is true of the rowan tree as well,” Goody Alsop said with a proud smile. “It is not every day that a rowan tree pushes its branches into one world while leaving its roots in another.”
In spite of the happy chatter of the women who surrounded me, I felt lost and alone. Matthew was waiting at the Golden Gosling for news. My third eye opened, seeking out a twisted thread of black and red that led from my heart, across the room, through the keyhole, and into the darkness beyond. I gave it a tug, and the chain inside me responded with a sympathetic chime.
“If I’m not very much mistaken, Master Roydon will be around shortly to collect his wife,” Goody Alsop said drily. “Let’s get you on your feet, or he’ll think we cannot be trusted with you.”
“Matthew can be protective,” I said apologetically. “Even more so since . . .”
“I’ve never known a wearh who wasn’t. It’s their nature,” Goody Alsop said, helping me up. The air had gone particulate again, brushing softly against my skin as I moved.
“Master Roydon need not fear in this case,” Elizabeth said. “We will make sure you can find your way back from the darkness, just like your firedrake.”
“What darkness?”
The witches went silent.
“What darkness?” I repeated, pushing my fatigue aside.
Goody Alsop sighed. “There are witches—a very few witches—who can move between this world and the next.”
“Time spinners,” I said with a nod. “Yes, I know. I’m one of them.”
“Not between this time and the next, Diana, but between this world and the next.” Marjorie gestured at the branch by my feet. “Life—and death. You can be in both worlds. That is why the rowan chose you, not the alder or the birch.”