Catherine Fisher: Darkwater

catherine fisher

Dial Books

an imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

DIAL BOOKS

An imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Published by The Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014, U.S.A.

Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3 (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

First published in the United States 2012 by Dial Books

Published in Great Britain in 2000 by Hodder Children’s Books

Copyright © 2000 by Catherine Fisher

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fisher, Catherine, date.

Darkwater / Catherine Fisher.

p. cm.

Summary: Sixteen-year-old Sarah sells her soul to reclaim her family’s estate and is given 100 years to atone for their sins, but as the bargain nears its end, modern-day Tom, yearning to attend the private

school that Darkwater Hall has become, gets caught up in the bargain.

ISBN 978-1-101-59110-9

[1. Supernatural—Fiction. 2. Private schools—Fiction. 3. Schools—Fiction. 4. Soul—Fiction.

5. Twins—Fiction. 6. Brothers—Fiction. 7. England—Fiction. 8. Great Britain—History—Edward VII, 1901–1910—Fiction.] I. Title.

PZ7.F4995Dav 2012 [Fic]—dc23 2011048063

“The angel of the Covenant you are longing for, yes he is coming, says the Lord.

Who will be able to resist the day of his coming?

Who will be able to stand before him?

For he is like the refiner’s fire and the fuller’s alkali.

He will purify the sons of Levi and refine them like gold . . .”

BOOK OF MALACHI

Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Epigraph

the prince of darkness

one

two

three

four

five

six

seven

eight

nine

ten

eleven

twelve

thirteen

the great work

fourteen

fifteen

sixteen

seventeen

eighteen

nineteen

twenty

twenty-one

twenty-two

twenty-three

twenty-four

twenty-five

twenty-six

About the Author

one

In the dream, she hurried down an endless corridor lined with books. Shelf on shelf they towered over her head, leaning out, frowning down, disapproving. She knew they wanted to fall on her and crush her.

Nervous, she walked faster, wishing she had a ladder so she could climb up to them, the thousands of heavy volumes, the folios, encyclopedias, vast flat atlases, thin slivers of poetry. There were books bound in vellum and calfskin, unicorn and dragon skin, some still with wings and sleepy eyes that blinked at her; fastened and locked with clasps and huge keys and chains that encircled them like prisoners. Fat Bibles, expensively crusted with gold, filled a whole shelf, their cameos of dead emperors high and dim and sneering. All out of reach.

Uneasy, she tiptoed now. Even a breath would make them topple, a whisper set off an avalanche of pages, crashing spines.

Then she stopped.

She had come to a thin mirror, squeezed between shelves, and it showed her own sudden reflection. In the grimy glass she was wearing a rich girl’s clothes. A blue dress, ruched and glinting with pearls. Her hair was clean and brushed; on her feet, wonderfully frail ivory slippers. Astonished, she stared at herself. A cat came out of the shadows and sat there, eyes bright.

“What do you think of this?” she said to it. “I’m a lady.”

She turned, gathering handfuls of the skirt. It was silk, fine and delicate, but as she touched it, it withered and shriveled until she held only cobwebs, fistfuls of sticky, filthy dust.

Something crashed past her shoulder.

She jerked back, heart pounding.

A book had fallen.

It lay there in the dust. She crouched and opened it, her knees breaking through the disintegrating dress. It was clasped with great hinges like a gate; creaking it wide, she read one enormous word.

ALCHEMIE

Then, in curly letters underneath:

Being the Arte of Transmuting Base and Useless Metal into Gold

The page was dusted with gold. It came off on her fingers, and her hands were shining with it, but before she could turn it over, another book crashed, and then more, a whole stack wobbling and thundering behind her, sending echoes and dust flying into her eyes. The corridor rang with vibrations, all the precarious heaps above her quivering.

And in the mirror, quite suddenly, she saw a boy watching her. He was faint and strange through the grime, and he separated into a double image, so that there were two of him. Then he put his hand out through the glass and caught hold of hers.

She screeched.

“Sarah!”

Martha was shaking her hard. “For mercy’s sake! It’s seven o’clock!”

Sarah sat up quickly. Sweat was cold on her. Through the rag nailed over the window a gray light gleamed. “What?” she mumbled.

“You’re late! You know what she said! This morning of all mornings!” Martha hurried out. “You won’t have time to eat a morsel.”

Shivering, the dream dissolved in seconds, Sarah scrambled out of the trundle bed. Her clothes were flung over a chair; she dragged them on: the harsh gray skirt, the jacket that used to be Martha’s son’s, the patched shawl. Forcing her feet into icy boots, she laced them desperately, dragged the curtain wide, and ran into the dark kitchen, where Martha pushed a crust and a comb into her hands, holding the baby expertly on her hip. “You’ll lose this situation, my girl.”

“I wish I could.” Sarah dragged the comb through her hair. “I could earn more in the workhouse,” she said, pin between teeth.

“Aye. And learn less.”

“I don’t get to learn much. And I hate that woman.”