The reeds hissed, and the insects chittered, in the slow autumn wind, in the cold autumn wind. Down into the creek the black soil sloped, carrying everything away to the sea. The ice-grey tombs lodged themselves deeper into the earth with every passing moment. Thrusting up into the silver sky alongside them, Castle Grimnalghast remained in the corner of Tzipporah's vision. In its hinterlands, where the dead outnumbered the living, she lay out on a checkered blanket, letting a small, black spider dance across her hand. The headmistress sipped her tea, and thought of what was to be said.
Saturday hung in the air like a spell. On the coast, ferries cruised across the dark water like planetoids in the depths of space. A trickle of students returned to the outside world. Had she anywhere in that world to go, Tzipporah might have followed them. She had thrown on a black dress and a cardigan from her dresser. A necklace hung about her collar; a hand wrought in heavy metal, with an eye in its palm. A memento that stayed otherwise under her shirt, just as in the reformatory, but one she wore today more freely. Perhaps it would protect her.
She set the spider down on her bag and sat up straight, stretching the muscles in the hand gripped tight around her wand. Her own mug of tea lay on the bumpy surface of the blanket, sods of earth pushing from underneath to knock it over. She clasped a hand around it, and tried to focus. Her gaze rose to the headmistress, lounging as demurely as a model in a painting. Tzipporah gazed intently – studied every tangent of her eyelashes, every angle of her nose cartilage, and even the uncannily pure blue of her eyes. A blue not like the sky or like dyed wool – not like the eyes of her supposed father – but a chemical blue. Tzipporah stared into those eyes, for if she looked anywhere else, she would see the things she did not want to see. The terrible-eyed things. The many-faced things and the no-faced things. Creeping about the graves, slinking through the creeks and the reeds, hiding even under the blanket against her bottom.
— How is the tea, Tzipporah? I thought you might like less sugar — the headmistress asked, breaking the silence. — I trust you like your tea and coffee black.
As if always there, a fat many-legged thing, nothing like a spider at all, crept about the bright fabric of her wimple. It drew in Tzipporah's gaze like the snap of an animal trap. Her fingers twitched around her mug in cosmological connection with every creak and jolt of its too many slender limbs.
She brought the mug to her lips to sip, afraid to move her eyes away from the spider-shaped hole in her vision. The tinge of bitterness screwed up Tzipporah's face. She tried to spit her own tongue out with the rancid bathwater of a drink. The headmistress frowned.
— Well — she said. Her bone-white wand clacked against the rim of the mug. — Try that…
Tzipporah tasted it again. The bitterness was washed away by a warm, smooth taste that came together with the scent of the dirt and the water.
— I always make tea with two sugars — Tzipporah said.
— Ah — the headmistress said, as if it were a profound truth. — There is always something new to learn about you, Tzipporah.
— I imagine the same is true of most people — she said.
— Hm … Are you still finding it lonely at Grimnalghast?
She had expected some question about her social life, but had neglected to prepare an answer. She needn't lie, but the thought of telling the truth was no more appealing.
Over the headmistress' shoulder, there was a face of something that eyes were not meant to see. It melted into the tree trunks behind it like an oil spill. A thing with too little being to have pupils or a mouth, but with a face nevertheless. Enough to be embarrassed by the gaze of it; enough to be afraid of its retribution; but merely the mockery of the presence of a person. Long arms, without definition or reality, leaked out from its underside. Tzipporah could tell the headmistress, in a very honest fashion, that she was feeling unwell, that she really needed to return to her dormitory.
Instead, Tzipporah said: — Some places are always lonely. Perhaps they're not meant to be filled with people.
— I find that, in the company of friends, a lonely place feels more intimate than any other … I wanted to discuss your house's half-term residential with you. I suspect your old school never held such things.
— No. My- I wouldn't have been allowed to go even if they had.
— At Grimnalghast, you will never need such permission, thankfully. It is not compulsory, but I thought it might interest you. — She reached into her robe. A great expanse must lay nestled between the folds of fabric. — The lodgings are owned by non-wizards, but I am told you will be visiting local wizards. — She stretched out her hand with a pamphlet.
Tzipporah used a flick of her wand to let it glide across the picnic blanket into her grasp. She turned up her nose at the tacky, plasticy paper it was printed on. It was probably carcinogenic. The photos inked onto it showed great homogeneous masses of quaint, spindly pines stretching into the distance, spiralling inwards towards a village with steep uneven roads and a people drunk on tourist money.
The headmistress spoke as she read to herself: — The school will handle the expenses, and the trouble of crossing the North Sea, so you needn't worry about anything.
“See a different side of Europe. See Brandenburg.” Tzipporah had never left Britain, though her mother had mentioned returning to France, or Algeria, once she was old enough. She herself had read more about continental Europe than she had dreamed of it. It was merely a place. “Brandenburg Manor gives a glimpse into a world forgotten by the speed of industry and modernity. A Europe where life was simple but honest … take ferry trips on the river, go hiking through the forest, see recreations of historical life, or even visit the flower fields of Berlin with our specially licensed tour pr-” Tzipporah let the pamphlet dither in her lap.
— It's dreadfully written, but the manor seems rather nice — the headmistress said with a sympathetic smile. — Would you like to go?
— It would depend on who else is going, I suppose. I might be burned at the stake if I were alone.
— Is there anyone you're eager to see? Fellow students?
— There is … someone in my form who I have been talking to.
The headmistress smiled, and said: — She will have received an invitation as well.
It was merely a matter then of whether Nausicaä enjoyed the thought of going to Germany any more than Tzipporah. The headmistress set her tea down and dug into a paper bag of liquorice. The wind picked up amongst the reeds, curving them into long arches like the arms of galaxies.
Over the bank of the creek whistling past them, Tzipporah watched more faceless things reveal themselves between tree trunks and tombstones. Up upon a hill, faceless schoolgirls watched from behind the station chainlink. No more than silhouettes against the grey sky. Tendrilous black limbs fell from them like kite streamers. Tzipporah could not be certain they were any more real than the things in the grass. They might even be both real and hallucination at once … Their hidden eyes were as pins through an insect's carapace, either way.
She turned her gaze away from the sea. Amongst the rivulets and the swathes of water around Grimnalghast, a jagged skerry rose up like the foundation of some ancient fortress. Dark evergreens veiled the space nestled in the centre of its stadium of rock. Tzipporah shivered as her mind walked down the river banks, across the bridges dotting the grounds, and into its midst. A sense overwhelmed her that on that inland islet, no matter the hour of day, no matter the clarity of the sky, no matter the radiance of the sun, there was nothing but darkness. Even as the light streamed through the tree tops and curved around the face of the rocks, the world outside had fallen away. Perhaps it was a quality of the air. A stillness, a coolness, altogether unnatural.
— Headmistress, what is that island? — Tzipporah asked.
Something grim fell over the headmistress' face as she looked to where Tzipporah pointed.
— No place for a student to be, Tzipporah. Your professors may overlook students snooping in their laboratories, but were you to trespass there … It is warded, in any case. Put it out of mind.
The chatter of insects in the grass swelled as Tzipporah looked to the islet. Pinpricks on the ear became a static that rumbled in her head. All the staring, watching things had vanished, abandoned their posts. Already, the world restructured itself. The spindly pines on the far-away islet grew long black hairs, bent into agonising limb-like shapes. The rain clouds on the horizon thickened and pooled in the air, creeping down to earth like predators to sate themselves. Everything sloped away over into the distance, even Tzipporah's breath. She held her hand to her chest as if she could somehow reach inside and fix whatever had broken.
— Tzipporah? Is it happening again?
Her eyelids shut away the last vestiges of sensation. The headmistress' voice was faint and as slow as amber as Tzipporah passed into the clammy nothingness of unconsciousness.
When Tzipporah came to, the ceiling above her was the wrong one. It was with difficulty that she pushed herself up, troubled by the gauzy blanket which grazed her palms instead of her duvet. The bed frame was metallic and cold like a cage. She hadn't put on her nightgown. Her necklace was heavy against her collarbone.
Whole minutes whispered away as she made sense of the room. Beds lined the walls that stretched away from her like in a railway tunnel. Curtain frames tarped with some scratchy white fabric sequestered them from one another. All lay empty but hers. She grasped around herself and hit upon a table, under a tall and white window. Her eyes focused. The sun had risen high in the midday.
A scrap of notebook paper lay on the bedside table, edge carefully creased. Tzipporah picked it up like the wing of some half-dead insect. The writing was blue and unsteady. “The headmistress told me what happened. I hope you're alright, Tzipporah. I'll come see you when I'm back from my nan's house.” Signed Nausicaä. Her wand had been placed gently beside it. The headmistress was nowhere to be found.
Tzipporah held the little note tight in her hand, and administered herself a brief neurological exam, reciting the alphabet and trying to recall trivia such as who the prime minister happened to be, and what the date was. She imagined that if something had happened to her brain, it would seize and ache as soon as the wrong thought crossed it. She might as well get it out of the way sooner rather than later.
Once she was happy that she was in full possession of her mental faculties, she got out of bed and took her wand to explore. Her feet hit against her school bag, draped over the edge of the bed.
Tzipporah wandered and peeked around the curtains that hid her. The room was nauseatingly long. The squeak and strain of her own boots made her flinch. She had not been touched at all after being placed here. It must have been the sickbay, but there were no nurses in sight.
A sink on the opposite wall, beside a queasily tall cabinet of medicine, caught her eye. All the tea and liquorice from before her spell of something-itis had left her throat tight and rough. She traipsed across the room as if crossing a busy street, ever worried that another student lay just out of sight. But all the beds proved empty. Tzipporah took a spare glass from the shelf and filled it. There was a peculiar familiarity to the sickbay. More than any part of Grimnalghast, it reminded Tzipporah of the reformatory, with its shale-black gas heaters and cabinets paned with dust-mucked glass. She expected at any moment for a floorboard to give way, just as in that 19th century shack of a school. Perhaps they had been built in the very same era.
— I wouldn't drink that water if I were you — came a voice like a knife. Far from elsewhere in the room, it descended from above. Tzipporah looked up to the high top of the medicine cabinet, where a black cat sat perched on its slender legs. It was not like the things that swam in her vision. Were she tall enough, she could reach up and grab it.
— Good afternoon to you as well, Wormwood — Tzipporah said calmly, as if greeting the postman at the door. — It's been weeks since you've visited. I was beginning to think you had moved on to other callings.
— Oh, Tzipporah… — the cat whined, lips moving as humans' did. — I am far from done in Grimnalghast. One must simply be … careful. There are eyes everywhere, you know. — Its voice purred like the engines of the airships over London.
Tzipporah took a sip of water to wet her throat; time to prepare her words carefully.
— You never did say why it is you are so shy. Do “we humans” have some prejudice against … whatever you are?
— Humans have all kinds of funny ideas. Far be it from me to deny them their fancies.
— And that means…? — she asked impatiently.
The cat rose up with its back arched, tail flitting like a serpent. It walked carefully along the sanded edge of the cabinet, saying: — A poverty of knowledge for one man can be a wealth of power for another.
— Is that what you want? Power? What would a cat want to rule? The warrens and nests under the castle?
— You know I am not a cat, Tzipporah — Wormwood said. In a smooth arc of black fur, the cat leapt from the cabinet and landed softly on the hospital bed beside her.
— You certainly aren't human. Let me guess … a demon? I can only wait to receive my witch's broomstick.
The two laughed two very different laughs together.
— I find our conversations so very stimulating, Tzipporah, but there is business to be attended to.
— I assumed our conversations were your business. You strike me as someone who collects conversations like trophies.
— What a charming sentiment. But even I cannot thrive on words alone, Tzipporah. No … I have a request of you. A simple thing.
— What could you possibly need from me? You are an evidently supernatural being, are you not? Or are you merely a trickster?
— You needn't understand in order to help a friend, now, do you?
— Are you testing me? Will I be cursed if I refuse?
— Why would I need test you? I know exactly what you will do.
— Why should I help you if you cannot give me a compelling reason? Even the threat of a curse would at least force me to comply.
— What if I were to tell you that very soon… — It evaporated into a cloud of black smoke that swam across the surface of the floor. A new cat rose up from the mist, on a chair beside Tzipporah. — You will need my help? — Its teeth shone white, like flashes of light around the edges of polished surgical instruments. — I want nothing more than to free you from everything that would impede you, but someone in so precarious an employ must be … strategic. I need to show you that you are ready to be free.
— What a compelling omen. Why would I believe a word of it? You sound like a cheap charlatan who will say whatever it takes to make me come inside for a reading.
— Because you know, dear Tzipporah, that I never tell a lie.
— You tell me that you never tell a lie. You say it so often that one begins to think you must be compensating — Tzipporah said. — Why would you, whatever you are, be bound to the truth?
— Because, Tzipporah… — it said, vanishing again in a fizz of shadow. Its voice echoed throughout the room. — I have a soft spot for young girls.
— I don't think there exist another set of eight words that inspire more trust in someone — Tzipporah said with mock sincerity. — I suppose there is no point asking anything other than: what is it? What do you want?
— Good. You're learning so very quickly... What I need of you is to take me somewhere. The islet you saw earlier… — It should not have surprised Tzipporah that the creature had been watching even then, but she felt cheated still. — In a time long since past, humans called it the Isle of the Dead. It would not be unreasonable to suspect that you too share an interest in it.
— It seems like a miserable, ghoul-haunted place — Tzipporah said, putting her glass down roughly.
— Well, those who named it certainly believed so. I know you are always so trusting of your forebears' wisdom, Tzipporah.
— Why not go to the island yourself? You constantly flaunt the ability to appear and disappear at will. This seems suspiciously like a trick.
— Is that so? Do you worry I mean to have you caught redhanded by your dear Hephzibah, or eaten by hungry ghosts?
— Precisely. I am glad we are on the same page.
— I have told you that I cannot lie, Tzipporah. But there is something else I should divulge about my nature… — the cat said, tucking its tail by its feet. — I always need permission.
— Like a vampire? — Tzipporah asked, incredulity adulterating her voice. — I find that even more difficult to believe.
— Perhaps Mr Stoker met me and could think of nothing better afterwards than to commit the experience to writing.
It was a well-known fact in the region that Bram Stoker had often stayed in nearby Whitby. It was there in a library that he had learnt of the peculiar nickname of one Vlad Tepes. Dracula. Tzipporah had long planned of travelling to the coast to see as Stoker saw. It dawned on her now that such things were finally in her power. The station ferries passed little old Whitby.
Tzipporah shook the thoughts from her mind, and said: — If you were telling the truth, you wouldn't say "perhaps." It's one of your tells.
— Or perhaps I may choose whether or not to say "perhaps" when telling the truth, Tzipporah. Truthful language needn't be as clean and frill-less as hospital beds and dressings.
— That's a very cute trick. You don't need to bother with being honest if you never say anything meaningful to begin with.
— You're so literalistic, Tzipporah. Don't you think conjecture can be just as informative as statement? Sometimes, a question means far more than its answer.
— You grace me with your wisdom, Wormwood. Why don't you be so kind as to give me an example? — she said in a peevish voice.
— When is a raven like a writing desk?
— The mad hatter asks that, not the cat.
— Unless I said it first. It is hardly likely that you are the only human I have ever visited.
— Perhaps.
— Perhaps indeed.
She pursed her lips at the creature. Their conversations often unravelled into circuitous labyrinths of verbiage and logic. Tzipporah denied Wormwood any more pleasure, declaiming: — Well, I give you permission to go to the "Isle of the Dead". — Her voice was disdainful and low. — There. You can go chase mice or whatever you do when I'm not present.
She hoped secretly that Wormwood might reveal exactly what that was, but instead, it said: — Oh, innocent Tzipporah... You do not have permission to go to the island – the headmistress said as much – so the authority to grant me passage is hardly invested in you.
— Is there a nightclub for magical creatures on this island that you need me to sneak you into? What is so important about it?
— Magical? Don't insult me... The island is no more exceptional than any island. Perhaps I am simply a curious cat.
— "Perhaps." There it is again.
— Of course. I am, after all, not a cat.
— Answer clearly: do you plan to do something nefarious on the island?
— Nefarious? What bold word choice, Tzipporah.
— That isn't an answer.
— Read my feline lips as I say this: I do not plan to do anything nefarious on the island. You know this to be true because I said it.
— Fine — she said flatly. Tzipporah marched across the room to throw her school bag over her shoulder. — So long as you're content to hide in here.
— Oh, it would be my pleasure, Tzipporah.
— Don't say that. It's creepy.
— "Creepy"? Now you disappoint me. They told me you were a wordy girl...
— “They”? Are there more of you stalking me?
— I can assure you that all of the black cats currently on the grounds are perfectly natural creatures, barring their magical modification by your wizardly kin.
— Always such careful qualification, Wormwood. "Currently on the grounds." I have no way of knowing they did not vanish temporarily while you spoke those words. There could be dozens of you.
— How would you prefer I qualify it? For all you know, your planet may be infested with sentient feline creatures from the planet Jupiter by the year 10,000.
— Who told you I was "wordy"?
— No one, Tzipporah. It's only a humorous turn of phrase.
— Then, you lied? It is hardly befitting an imp like you to show your hand so quickly. You haven't even had me wish upon a decrepit simian paw yet.
— Lied? Are comedians liars? Poets? All those dusty books you read are corrupting your young mind. It's as though you're becoming a robot.
The flicker of its teeth behind a smile unsettled Tzipporah, but not nearly as much as that word. Robot. She was not wont to believe Wormwood was as knowing as it claimed, but she was keen enough to trust for now that it would come to learn of anything she did upon the grounds. If the headmistress learned of how she had meddled with station technology...
— Either leave or get in my bag — she said, opening the zipper.
— As you command, my midnight mistress — it said terribly.
Wormwood leapt inside, nimble forelegs outstretched. A jolt travelled through Tzipporah's arms for a moment, but the weight she expected to feel had vanished. There was no knowing if the creature was only playing pretend, but she zipped the bag up again and relished the newfound silence.
In the hinterlands of her mind, the hinterlands of Grimnalghast stretched out wordlessly, colourlessly. Again her mind walked the banks and the paths and the stepping stones. The castle craned across the sky like the ancient goddess Nut, back as arched as Wormwood's angled black spine. She could not see the islet, but she felt it. Cold and wet and heavy in the mouth, with a taste like blood. Tzipporah played and stepped through the wrought iron that encircled it. Dread passed through her tired body like the icebreakers watching from the sea. Tzipporah's fingers drew greedily around her necklace, tracing out the cold edge of the little metal hand, like rosary beads.
A flesh hand, just as cold, touched her shoulder.
— Tzipporah? — The words came in the low, sing-song voice of the headmistress. Tzipporah opened her eyes, though she could not recall closing them. More words: — Are you alright? You should be resting…
— I'm fine, headmistress — Tzipporah said. — …I apologise for fainting. — She sat hastily on the hospital bed nearby, anxiously smoothing out the light depressions Wormwood had left in the bedding.
— Well … I'm glad you're awake — the headmistress said. There was more that she wished to say, but the words escaped her. — If you feel better, you should return to your dormitory and try to relax. You seem troubled.
— I'm not troubled. — The headmistress said nothing, but apprehension clung to her features. Tzipporah tightened her fingers around her wand and said: — Headmistress, may I ask for a favour?
— Of course, Tzipporah. You are my student. I should be honoured to help you grow into the greatest young woman you can be.
Tzipporah's eyes darted to her boots. — Would you take me to the Isle of the Dead? In the graveyard, I … saw something there. Related to my episode earlier.
— The Isle of the Dead? — the headmistress said quizically. — Where did you hear that name?
— I… — The question lingered on her tongue. — Read about it. I only now realised it was the same island.
The headmistress scrutinised her face like a woman who could not tell what she was looking at. At last, she spoke: — I see … I told you it is forbidden to students, but that is only a precaution. A brief visit in my company could not hurt… But, I hope you will understand, Tzipporah, that there are certain things even bright, precocious girls should not worry about.
— I merely want to know what happened to me, headmistress — Tzipporah said in a mutter. She had long had a habit of disguising her emotions in statements of utter truth.
— Hm. Come, then — the headmistress said, rising. — It is almost lunch.
Tzipporah held her bag strap tight as she walked in tow, out of the sickbay, out of the school, into Grimnalghast's graveyard. Whether Wormwood hid inside the bag concerned her less and less as they approached. It could do what it liked. The islet loomed against the sky again. The wrought iron fence came into sight. Tzipporah's footsteps became heavier. The no-things did not show their faces, but an unreality had fallen over the faces of rock and the evergreens, as though they were painted against the firmament of the sky. One worried what might happen if one strayed too far into that formlessness.
The headmistress reached into her robes for something, and said, voice devoid of her usual softness: — Look away, Tzipporah.
— Why? — Tzipporah asked. She waited for an answer that would not come. The headmistress acknowledged her with only a slight turn of the head. Everything of her humanity was hidden by robe and mitre. Tzipporah obeyed, looking out over the side of the bridge. Her nerves returned. In the mirror fluence that passed underfoot, things stood on the banks of the creek. The reeds swayed against them.
The gate creaked open. The headmistress bid her to come, and so Tzipporah walked with her. Even at the threshold of the islet, there was the sharp, chemical scent of spruce trees. The type she had watched her father – men her father had hired – carry inside from a truck for Christmastime. Touch. Smell. Taste. In those trees they were united in a singular itching, bitter sensation. Hidden in their trunks and canopies were formless, sightless animals.
Past the trees, into the hidden place within the rocks and canopies, lay a lake. Not much more than a pond. The water was as black as obsidian and unmarred by even a single ripple. It could have been a hole into a sky-coloured pit. Near its edge, the pale grass dithered away until only the grave field's dark soil remained. The headmistress drew close to that thin border, bunching the skirt of her robes up in her hands. Only now did Tzipporah notice her feet were bare, soles grey and dirty like the rain-expectant sky.
As the headmistress stared into the water, Tzipporah unzipped her bag, careful about the whispering click-clackle of the metal. Like a genie from a bottle, Wormwood slithered out without warning. It wound around her legs, clinging to her like sin. The headmistress was too fascinated by the pond to notice Tzipporah's inner battle – whether to pick Wormwood up and throw it into the tree line. She drew her legs together like a soldier, hiding the cat-creature as best she could in case the headmistress thought to do something insane like turn around. Wormwood did not say a word. Perhaps it could not, devolved to a feline form entirely.
— Do you feel anything, Tzipporah? — the headmistress asked. — You seem less affected.
She did. Faintly, in the back of her neck, where her brain met her spinal column. A jittering feeling that was all too easy to miss with Wormwood distracting her. She answered: — It feels somewhat like a migraine, but I am not light-headed. The island does not seem as … overwhelming.
The headmistress revealed her wand from her cloak. Through the blankets of air over the world, she stirred the water's flat, glassy surface into a radar field of ripples. She spoke: — Perhaps you are becoming accustomed to it. — Like an actress, her posture shifted, all through her body. The warmth returned to her, as if she had seen something in the water. She turned to Tzipporah with mollified features, and said in a voice like her own again: — Many find the island unnerving. It is not surprising you would be more sensitive to it.
Tzipporah panicked for a moment, staring down at her feet, but Wormwood had vanished. — I suppose — she said shakily, but the explanation neither soothed nor convinced her. — Headmistress, what is this island? Is it enchanted?
— An apt question — she said, revealing nothing to suggest she had seen Wormwood. — And one you must forgive me for not answering fully… Much magic has been performed on this island, but it was as it is long before wizards ever set foot upon it.
— Is it a trick, then? Is there a chemical released by the plants or something like that?
The headmistress laughed, and said: — No, but some would say it is a natural phenomenon, if that comforts you.
— Who would say?
— The men and women of the research station. This is what they study in their great concrete prison.
— Strange islands? I wasn't aware the government cared about those — Tzipporah said incredulously.
— They are scientists. Such things interest them — she said, but Tzipporah struggled to believe her. — I know the island's natural features are not what interest you, Tzipporah. If I may ask … What do you see?
— I see an island.
— I mean: what do you see that is not really there?
— …Is it common to hallucinate here?
— No. I have never seen anything but a normal island, like most who will pass through this school's doors. But, I have known many like you, Tzipporah. I am an old woman. Young people show things on their faces, in their eyes.
— I see … black figures. Sometimes, they're small like animals. Other times, they're tall and thin like people.
— Do these figures ever speak to you, Tzipporah?
— No, headmistress. They do not – do anything. They just look at me, like they're upset with me.
— I see. Well, forgive me for my curiosity.
— It's fine, headmistress, but … are they real?
A sad look softened the headmistress' features. A pitying look. The kind that Tzipporah knew meant that nothing more would be said – nothing meaningful. It was the look on her mother's face when she asked why all the other children had grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, and siblings, when Tzipporah did not.
— Hallucinations aren't real, Tzipporah — she said, pocketing her wand. — We should be returning to the castle. You wouldn't want to miss lunch.
— Yes, headmistress — Tzipporah forced herself to say.
As they left and the iron gate creaked itself closed to seal the island for another century, Tzipporah looked over her shoulder. Through the metalwork, she saw it: the realest of the shadow-things. Wormwood sat at the rim of the lake, its form indistinct and far too distant to form a face. Yet still it smiled at her, as clear as if it were in front of her. In a rough and thick brushstroke across a delicate canvas, it leapt into the air and down into the water. It did not make a sound.
🪬— So what does she talk to you about, anyway? — Nausicaä asked, sitting on the side of the bed. — Does she make you practice really hard spells? Oh, oh, or does she send you on secret missions to find ancient wizard artefacts!? Is that why you were really trying to get into the library the other week? Tzipporah, have you told her about me? Maybe I could join your top secret meetings sometime! — Her face sparkled, mind racing with even more ideas of what could possibly go on inside that office.
Tzipporah set down her book gently and said in an unremarkable voice: — We drink tea and discuss schoolwork.
— Oh… — Nausicaä said, deflating against the headboard.