Previously in the Vines Inquiry— Frank stumbled upon a strange gathering his parents hosted in the family manor. Meanwhile, the blizzard that has shut down travel off the island worsens, alerting Rosalind and Richard to something lurking by the front door.
A few more drops of blood landed on the freshly-waxed floor.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” said Rosalind, brushing off Richard’s help. “I got excited. Reached for the pieces without thinking.”
“Still sneaking cookies from the oven?” Nia’s voice came from the parlor.
The empty parlor, thought Frank.
Richard and Rosalind spared the room a glance, but nothing more.
“It’s here. An omen. It’s shattered. It’s here, Rick,” said Rosalind. “Nia. Feenuín’s Tears. It’s back.” She held the decimated remains of Dick’s childhood ornament. The frustrating rendering.
Frank’s parents looked at each other in silence. He could rarely think of a time they looked happier. Both of them held their breath as they exalted the pile of smashed glass in Rosalind’s hands, like it was runes that might reveal a deeper truth. Her smile returned and she strode towards the parlor, so focused she never even glanced towards the staircase. Richard followed her with the same conviction.
“When will it start?” said Richard.
“It already has!” she squealed like a child at, well, at Christmastime.
“We’ll need to be ready. To snatch it back from that townie whore,” said Nia. Everyone seemed to agree as sounds of shoving aside furniture and pulling old tomes from the surrounding shelves overtook the fireplace’s crackle.
“We’re going to make it work this time, Rick. I swear.” Rosalind’s voice was rushed. Desperate. “I demand it. I won’t be alone again.”
“I know, darling. I’m with you. We’re all with you.” A long pause, until—
“Yes,” said Nia. A beat. “Of course.”
Frank tried to listen but his heartbeat slammed in his ears. His ribs heaved like he’d just run a marathon while the organ punched against its cage. He couldn’t catch his breath and felt steaming hot even as the outside chill clung to his skin through the open front door. He gasped for air, pulling in what little he could. It wasn’t sticky like before. No two fleshes joining together, growing into one another and spasming apart. His throat was just closed. A steel hatch. Lungs full of water.
The corners of his vision started to go dark and Frank tried to stand, to walk down the stairs for help, but his legs were too weak. He felt frozen, numb. He knew he’d never be warm again.
The wall behind him became the same temperature and his hand slipped down the surface. The silk wallpaper disappeared in the shadows and gave way to something sharper and unforgiving. Frank looked down at his legs, trying to move them, and saw the staircase was gone; replaced by a sharp-edged slope made of oily black stone. He blinked it away, trying to slow his breathing. Violent green veins beat in the stone, matching pace with his ragged breath.
He thought of his apartment. No, his home. That was his home. Away from here.
Why did they have to keep bringing him up?
Him. How long had it been since Frank said his name? How long had it been since Frank thought this much about his dead brother?
He clawed at the wallpaper like he’d torn at the freezing water of the pond, scratching up and away from the shadow beneath. He listened to his heartbeat, the empty noise like a drum, a metronome keeping time to his demise.
The party had been everything that was promised by the name of its host. Dick Vines had a reputation in many varying crowds—exclusive circles and open organizations alike. Regardless, he was always known for being fun. The life of the party…but knowing when to leave.
That night’s festivities, all those years ago, had promised to be a crowded, but comfortable, rager. Easeful and opulent; a team effort where no one noticed that they’d done their share of the work. On that night, the eve of Dick and Frank’s sixteenth birthday, a bonfire roared deep in the Carlisle pines.
It had been Dick’s idea just that afternoon. Typically a planner, but with the charisma of someone who could throw something together last minute and have it come out as if scheduled months ago, Frank and co. almost didn’t have a choice but to follow his lead. Humbug to the fact that it was Christmas Eve. Balderdash to the wicked snow storm that had hammered Carlisle.
They were going to have a party, and everyone was invited.
Frank’s first instinct when he saw Dick fall through the frozen pond was to look around at the crowd. Surely, there was always a crowd whenever Dick pulled a stunt—an Evel Knievel-level gag. Gleeful and drunk on coconut rum, Frank turned back to the woods to revel with the chorus.
But they were alone. Even the bonfire, which he was sure had just been warming his cheeks, was a mere glint in the distance; obscured through the heavy snowfall that was already camouflaging the gash in the ice where Dick had fallen through.
Frank stared at the small gap, maybe a foot wide, waiting for his brother to burst back up and declare victory. As he was jumping in after him, running and sinking with the ice collapsing under his boots, Frank prayed that it was like seeing a fastball flying at your face. That time had slowed while he waited, a fool, for his brother to surface. He knew the seconds would matter.
He’d found Dick. Even in the cold dark, Frank had found him.
Encased in the frigid water, his brother’s body was limp, but still warm in the center. A cooling coal briquette. Frank yanked him towards the surface—or where he thought the surface might be. Twice he’d realized after a few strokes that he was going down, further into the hurtful depths. His head had gone from a searing pain to a numb, spiky tingle. Every inch of him was being pulled towards the bottom of the pond. A pond that was deeper than it had any right to be.
Frank touched a side of it—or god, the bottom?!—and tried to pause. To steady himself and get some bearings. His jailer allowed, as long as it got to keep prodding him with the frozen electric shock of the water. He let out some air, too much? Too late. And watched the bubbles to see which way they traveled. They paused in the air—frozen too?—until, at their leisure, a pair of them traveled to the left. No. Up! They were going up! Frank followed, tugging his brother along, the coal in him cooling with each weaker beat of their twin hearts.
The surface was brighter. Only just. Only in comparison. But certainly lit enough for Frank to see that the hole they’d fallen through was gone. The gash healed. An omen, he decided. A portent that they would heal too. That a swift and chilling recovery was around the corner.
Just as easily could be a eulogy, Pants.
No, can’t think like that. Can’t let that shadow in. Not for a second. Not for a blink. But he had. And he blinked. The darkness came in patches; quick snaps. Painful rests. Naps from smacking your head on slick pavement. Frank scratched at the ice and felt his fingernail catch. It snapped backwards, tearing the flesh. Would the blood help those above find them? Everyone was coming. Dozens of strong hands would pull them up any second. But the ice was still there.
The ice wouldn’t—
Frank had made it to shore, to a bank; the exposed, frozen roots of a tree with Dick pulled behind. His brother’s body was numb and still, soaked through and laying on the ground next to him. He tore off Dick’s soaked coat and wrapped him in the sweltering down of his own. He wrapped his scarf around Dick’s blue-grey neck, hoping the lingering warmth from the wool would seep into his brother’s clammy skin. He called for help, screaming at Dick and out into the pines.
Should I take off my socks? Frank wondered. Would dry socks help him?
“Help him!” Stella shouted. Harlow’s older sister.
I did. I am.
“Frank. Move!” she said.
Stella shoved him and Frank blinked from the impact. He took a few staggering steps, dry boots surefooted on the damp soil under him. Stella was at Dick’s side, rubbing his arms and smacking his face.
“What happened? Call someone! Call your mother!”
“He fell in,” said Frank, more of a question. “He fell through the ice. I pulled him out.”
Stella froze and gaped at him with pure confusion. She looked at Frank for a beat more, then at the pond as the snowfall rippled the waving, mirrored surface.