It doesn’t matter, she told herself. She blinked fiercely, tears stinging her eyes. It’s all just nonsense. It doesn’t matter.
The crowd didn’t seem to be dispersing. In fact, so many people were gathering on the street that the carriage came to a complete stop. A stream of people hurried past, heading toward Town Hall and gazing up at something in the sky.
“Lowry,” barked Corvus, knocking on the roof to alert the driver. “What’s the holdup? Get those people out of the way.”
“I’m trying, Chancellor, but—”
“It’s here!” somebody shouted. “It’s coming!” The crowd cheered in response. Morrigan craned her neck, trying to see what was happening. People embraced in the streets—not just the Bid Day children, but everyone, whistling and whooping and throwing their hats in the air.
“Why are they…” began Morrigan, then stopped, listening. “What are those bells ringing for?”
Corvus looked at her strangely. His papers slipped from his hand and scattered across the carriage floor as he pushed open the door and leapt out onto the street. Morrigan followed and, looking up, saw what everyone had been running toward.
The clock tower.
The Skyfaced Clock was changing. Morrigan watched as the dusky twilight blue deepened to sapphire, to navy, and finally to a profound, unfathomable black. Like an inkpot in the sky. Like a black hole, come to swallow up the world.
The bells were ringing for Eventide.
That night Morrigan lay awake in the dark.
The bells had rung until midnight, when they were abruptly replaced by an oppressive silence. They’d been a warning, a signal to everyone that Eventide was coming… but after midnight, they didn’t need to ring anymore. Eventide was here. The last day of the Age had begun.
Morrigan knew she should feel frightened, and sad, and worried—and she did, she felt all of those things. But mostly, she felt angry.
She’d been cheated. It was supposed to be a twelve-year Age. Everyone said so—Corvus, Grandmother, all Morrigan’s caseworkers, chronologists on the news. Twelve years of life was already too short, but eleven?
Now that the Skyfaced Clock had turned black, the experts were all scrambling to say they’d long suspected, they’d read the signs, they’d been on the cusp of publicly announcing that in their opinion this year, this winter, was the last of the Age.
Never mind, they all said. We guess this one’s an eleven-year Age. Everyone makes mistakes, and one year doesn’t make much difference.
Except, of course, it made all the difference in the world.
Happy birthday to me, Morrigan thought miserably. She tucked her stuffed rabbit, Emmett, into the crook of her arm, where he’d slept every night for as long as she could remember, and she squeezed him tight and tried to fall asleep.
But there was a noise. A very small noise that was barely a noise—like a tiny whisper or rush of air. She flicked on her lamp and the room flooded with light.
It was empty. Morrigan’s heartbeat quickened. She jumped up and looked around, under the bed, threw open the wardrobe—nothing.
No. Not nothing.
Something.
A small white rectangle stood out against the dark wooden floorboards. Someone had slipped an envelope under her door. She picked it up and creaked the door open to peek into the hallway outside. There was nobody there.
On the envelope, someone had written untidily in thick black ink:
Jupiter North of the Wundrous Society wishes to present his bid for Miss Morrigan Crow. Again.
“The Wundrous Society,” Morrigan whispered.
She ripped open the envelope and pulled out two pieces of paper. One was a letter, the other a contract—typed and official-looking, with two signatures at the bottom. Above the word PATRON was the large, messy signature of Jupiter North. The second, above PARENT OR GUARDIAN, she couldn’t read and didn’t recognize at all. It certainly wasn’t her father’s handwriting.
The third space—CANDIDATE—was blank. Waiting.
Morrigan read the letter, feeling utterly bewildered.
Dear Miss Crow,
Congratulations! You have been selected by one of our members as a candidate for entry to the Wundrous Society.
Please be advised that your entry is not assured. Membership in the Society is extremely limited, and each year hundreds of hopeful candidates compete for a place among our scholars.
If you wish to join the Society, please sign the enclosed contract and return it to your patron no later than the last day of Winter of Eleven. Entrance trials will begin in spring.
We wish you the very best of luck.
Regards,
Elder G. Quinn
Proudfoot House
Nevermoor, FS
At the bottom of the page, in a hurried black scrawl, was a brief but thrilling message:
Be ready.
—J.N.
CHAPTER THREE
DEATH COMES TO DINNER
On Eventide night, even the streets of dull, conservative Jackalfax came alive.
The cobbled stretch of Empire Road had swelled from a merry hum of good spirits in the morning to raucous, uncontainable revelry in the final hours before midnight. Street bands played for coins on every corner, competing for the attention of passersby. Colored lanterns jostled with streamers and strings of tiny lights, and the air smelled of beer, burnt sugar, and meat grilling on the spit.
The blackened Skyfaced Clock loomed above the celebrations. At midnight it would fade to the color of Morningtide—a pale, promising pink—and Spring of One would bring a fresh beginning for everyone. The night was uncommon and crowded with possibility.
For everyone, that is, except Morrigan Crow. Morrigan’s night held only one possibility. Like every other child born precisely eleven years ago on the last Eventide, when the clock struck midnight she would die—the eleven short years of her doomed life complete; her curse finally fulfilled.
The Crows were celebrating. Sort of.
It was a somber affair in the house on the hill. Lights dimmed, curtains drawn. Dinner was Morrigan’s favorite—lamb chops, roast parsnips, and minted peas. Corvus hated parsnips and would usually not allow them to be served when he was home for dinner, but he kept a grim silence as the maid spooned a huge mountain of them onto his plate. Morrigan felt this spoke volumes about the sensitivity of the occasion.
The room was quiet but for the soft scratching of silverware against china. Morrigan was conscious of every mouthful of food she swallowed, every cool sip of water. She heard each tick of the clock on the wall like a drumbeat in a marching band, marching her ever closer to the moment when she would cease to exist.
She hoped it would be painless. She’d read somewhere that when a cursed child died it was usually quick and peaceful—just like falling asleep. She wondered what would happen afterward. Would she really go to the Better Place, like Cook had once told her? Was the Divine Thing real, and would it accept her with open arms, as she’d been promised? Morrigan had to hope so. The alternative simply didn’t bear thinking about. After hearing Cook’s tales of the Wicked Thing that dwelled in the Worst Place, she’d slept with the light on for a week.
It was a strange thing, she thought, to be celebrating the night of your own death. It didn’t feel like a birthday. It didn’t feel like a celebration at all. It was more like having your funeral before you die.