“We’re in control here,” said Josiah, “or hadn’t you noticed?”
They’re not. It’s what they want you to think. Stop listening to them!
She had to get through to him. It was stupid that she had the answer and had got herself all trussed up like some dimwitted princess in a fairy tale. She had let Cuerva Lachance put handcuffs on her, for crying out loud. Why had she done that? What was wrong with her?
Never put handcuffs on an angry teenager.
It was a sentence from her past. It came out of nowhere and hit her right between the eyes. She blinked. She had said that … the crazy lady in the woods. She had said it right before she had given Freddy—
She stopped breathing, this time of her own accord. The crazy lady had given her a key.
Slowly, gently, Freddy began to move her bound hands towards her tunic pocket.
“We can stop you from leaving,” said Josiah. “We can trap you here forever if we like. This is our domain, not yours.”
“It’s just an ordinary house,” said Mel. “Roland, think of it as an ordinary house.”
“That won’t work,” said Josiah a shade too quickly. Freddy didn’t think it would work, or not entirely. It was obvious that the house on Grosvenor Street wasn’t an ordinary house any more. But Mel had the right idea. It was too bad she was still thinking about the situation backwards. Freddy’s right hand slid into her pocket. The angle was awkward, but she could just barely hook her fingers around her key ring. Careful not to let the keys jingle, she drew them gently upward.
“Make the choice,” said Cuerva Lachance. “It’s all perfectly natural. And I never say that, so you know it must be true.”
“The second you make it, everything goes back to normal,” said Josiah, signing simultaneously. “All three of you go home. School happens tomorrow as usual. Maybe I’ll finally manage to get suspended. You can play games with your friends and draw swords on your homework. Can’t you see there’s really nothing sinister about any of this?”
“Sure,” said Mel, “which is why you have my sister tied to a rock and keep threatening to choke her.”
Don’t draw attention to me, Mel. The keys were held firmly in her fist now. She sorted through them with her pinky finger. She could have found the key she wanted in her sleep.
“I hate you all,” said Roland.
Josiah shrugged. “Hate us all while making the choice.”
Freddy had located the key. She eased it down between her fingers, letting it poke out into the air. Still moving as slowly as she could, she brought it around towards where she hoped the keyhole on the left handcuff was. She couldn’t move her head to see.
“I’ve had dreams about you,” said Roland, his voice rough. “Over and over. I was all these different people.”
“He’s one of those. Interesting.” Cuerva Lachance sounded quite friendly about it.
“But I always felt the same in the dreams,” said Roland. “Trapped. Forced. The choice is more than you’re saying it is.”
“It’s not, honestly,” said Josiah. “It’s just one little choice.”
“I won’t make it.”
“Then Freddy will stop breathing again. And I’m sure we can find something to do with Mel as well.”
The sand around where Mel was sitting began to bubble in an ominous way. Freddy felt the key catch on something.
“Stop it,” said Roland. “Stop hurting them!”
“When you make the choice,” said Josiah. “We’re getting tired of waiting.”
Roland’s face was twisted into the sulky scowl Freddy had always hated, but now she looked past the expression and saw fear there, too. Something inside her felt very strange. She had gone running off without a thought to rescue him. He had gone running off without a thought to rescue her …
He was going to do it. He was going to have to, or he thought he was. Judging by his loathing of Josiah, Freddy thought he might choose Cuerva Lachance, and she really didn’t know what that would mean for her and Mel.
The key slid into the lock and turned. The left handcuff fell open. She wasn’t quite sure this was a good thing. It was Cuerva Lachance who had given her the key.
She had seconds, if that. She could try to tear off the gag, but frankly, she could have done that with the handcuffs on; she hadn’t bothered because the gag, like the neck rope, was as hard as stone. There was really only one thing she could usefully try: one thing that not a single person here would even suspect she could do.
If I do that, she thought, he’ll know …
The faint vestiges of the old anger stirred briefly. It felt like a reflex. Shut up with the stupid pride already, Freddy told herself. She shoved the keys back into her pocket.
Roland’s eyes had been wandering desperately from Cuerva Lachance to Josiah to Freddy and back again. She waited until they fell on her, then raised her hands.
Freddy signed, clumsily, Don’t make choice. You … GM. They … NPC. Everything backwards.
She had no idea if she’d got the signs right. She had no idea if he’d understood. She hadn’t been able to say what she’d wanted because she hadn’t known the sign for “storyteller,” but she thought maybe the gaming terms would work better with Roland anyway. She saw his face change, his eyes widening in astonishment as he realised what she was doing. She had never signed to him before or let on she understood what he was signing.
Josiah and Cuerva Lachance had seen, too. “Damn it,” said Josiah, “how did she…?”
The rope around her neck contracted. “Freddy!” said Mel, seeing her struggle to breathe. Freddy brought her hands up to tug at the neck rope, but once more, it was too solid to move.
“Backwards,” said Roland. “NPC?”
They’re non-player characters, Roland, Freddy thought. Everything was going red and black again. Will you please do something about that now?
The world was fuzzing down to nothing. People were yelling at each other, but very far away. Freddy thought her eyes might have closed at some point; she wasn’t quite sure where she was.
She was on the ground. She didn’t know how that had happened. Someone was thumping her on the chest. Freddy choked, then breathed.
“Get up,” said Mel. “Get up, get up. It’s not over.”
Freddy opened her eyes. “What…?” she croaked. The gag was gone. She sat up. Her throat felt bruised.
“He made Cuerva Lachance let you go,” said Mel. “With his brain. But they’re fighting back … both of them.”
Freddy glanced over at Roland. Around him, the desert boiled. Cuerva Lachance was standing on top of the rock, her coat blowing wildly about her. As Freddy watched, her hat was whipped away into the crackling sky. Roland said, “This isn’t happening. You’re not doing anything. Get down from there!”