Look!” I waved my hand and filled the attic with a thick covering of snow. The dusty shelves glittered with sparkling icicles. Sarah replaced the snow with a carpet of primroses. Then Helen made a breeze rustle through the icicles and made them chime like silver bells. We laughed and returned the room to its original state, then looked at one another, suddenly sobering up.

“I wish it could all be for fun like that.” Sarah sighed.

“I know, but we’re ready now for more than fun. Don’t you feel that?” I said. “Aren’t we ready to try the Talisman again, before it’s too late?”

“I think we are,” replied Helen slowly. “What about you, Sarah?”

Sarah hesitated for a moment, then nodded. “Yes, we’re ready.”

Sunday, our only day of freedom, arrived again at last. I sent a message to Josh that I had a cold and didn’t feel up to my riding lesson, then met Sarah at the school gates with the ponies so that we could set off to Uppercliffe.

“Won’t Josh wonder how you’re well enough to ride out, but not well enough for his class?”

“He probably won’t notice that we’ve gone out,” I said. “I’m sure he couldn’t care less what I do.” But it wasn’t true. I knew that his brown eyes followed me whenever I happened to be down in the stables, and I knew that I was avoiding him for that very reason. “Anyway, Sarah, I can’t afford to spend time messing around having a riding lesson when we’ve got so much to do today. Helen will be at Uppercliffe by now. That’s the only thing that matters.”

Sarah looked kind of troubled, but I turned away and urged Bonny on as fast as I dared. Perhaps my love for Sebastian was making me selfish, brushing Josh and Harriet and everything else to one side as unimportant. I didn’t want that to happen; I didn’t want to hurt anyone, but I couldn’t let down Sebastian. He had to come first. I would sort everything else out later, I promised myself, if only I could find Sebastian.

Helen was already waiting for us when we reached Uppercliffe. She had dug up the Talisman and was examining it closely. I couldn’t help wondering whether, if the Talisman had been left to Helen, she would have already discovered how to use it. Again I had a faint, troubling feeling of jealousy as I took it from her.

“Is everything okay?” she asked. “Shall we start?”

There’s no need to dwell on the failure of our efforts. The frustration, the rising anger, the terrible powerlessness. It is enough to say that nothing worked. The Talisman hung proud and cold and useless on its silver chain.

“What are we going to do?” I stormed, tempted to fling it from me in rage. I was furiously angry, but not with the Talisman or Agnes or the others. I was angry with myself. Why couldn’t I awaken Agnes’s powers? What was wrong with me? Everything I had tried and learned seemed feeble and less than nothing. But I had worked so hard. Follow my path…. I had tried, hadn’t I? And then it dawned on me. The answer was stunningly, glaringly obvious. I didn’t know whether to laugh or scream.

“We’ve been doing it all wrong,” I said blankly.

“What do you mean, Evie?” asked Sarah.

“We’re calling to the Talisman through our own powers. But Agnes’s element was fire, not water or earth or air. If we want to unlock Agnes’s power in the Talisman, we have to do it through her element, not our own.” I looked up at the others, convinced that I was right. “We need to channel the power of fire. She said I had to follow her path—I thought she just meant the Mystic Way, but she must have been talking about her own special powers. The fire is the only way to the Talisman.”

“But can you do anything with fire?” asked Sarah quickly.

“I don’t know; I’ve never tried.”

“Then try now,” said Helen.

Sarah found some scraps of rotten wood and made a campfire in the ruins of the old house. The wood spat and smoked, but a thin orange flame began to flicker and glow. I felt keyed up with excitement. This time I really would do it; everything would make sense at last. Agnes would help me this time; I was sure of it.

“See if you can control the flame with the power of your thought,” Helen said. “That’s one of the things Agnes learned to do first.”

“All right. I’ll try.”

We formed a circle and held hands and the chanting began. As I let my mind drift with the lulling incantations, the voices of the distant sea and the underground streams and the rain clouds high over the hills began to call to me, but I had to try to block them out.

Fire. That was what I needed now. I had to think of warmth and color and life. I clasped the Talisman in my hands and focused on the dancing flames that licked around the little shards of wood. Fire. Heat. Life. The fire of our desires… I closed my eyes and tried to concentrate.

In my mind I saw the flames flare up like blazing rockets. There was a flash of heat and I seemed to see a girl with auburn hair standing in a shabby room. It was Agnes. She was surrounded by dancing, fiery lights. She flicked her wrist to control them and they made brilliant shapes that swooped around her, stars and dragonflies and birds of paradise. She gazed into my eyes and held her hands out to me. You can do it, Evie. My face and hands grew hot; I was panting for breath; I opened my eyes and reached toward the fire that glowed on the earthen floor of the cottage. With all the force of my mind I willed the flames to change, commanding them to obey me.

Nothing happened.

“I—I can’t do it.” I stepped back, feeling weak and shaky. “I can’t. Sorry.”

Sarah and Helen glanced at each other. There was an awkward silence.

“Perhaps you could learn to do it, eventually,” Helen said slowly. “But how long would that take? And it’s not just about controlling a simple flame. Agnes’s powers were much deeper than that.”

“I know,” I groaned. “I know, I know, I know.” I stumbled outside, desperate for some fresh air. Leaning against the rough walls of the cottage, I let the wind blow through my hair, as though it could also blow away the weight of my despair. I looked across the valley to where the village lay tucked in the folds of land. I could see the towers of the Abbey behind a screen of leafless trees. Down there, girls were enjoying the Sunday relaxation that even Wyldcliffe allowed. They were writing letters home, or reading, or chatting, or having music lessons, or learning to ride…. For one second I saw myself walking away from the Talisman and everything it represented. I could hide it again up here and no one would ever know it had existed. Wouldn’t Helen and Sarah say I had tried hard enough to help Sebastian? Wouldn’t they understand if I gave up now? For those fleeting moments, I saw another Evie, walking hand in hand with a boy with straw-colored hair and quiet brown eyes, laughing in the sunshine….

No.

I wrenched my thoughts away. Sebastian had chosen to dwell in the shadows, but I would follow him there and bring him back to the light, however impossible it seemed. I would not give up. I would not grow weary.

I would not betray him.