Sisterhood - Temptation Ch. 51

Katharina's breath left her lungs slowly and she buckled at the knees, slouching against the wall beside the door and sinking. There would surely be another exit from the chamber, but she would have to backtrack and search for it. Then before her haunches reached the floor, she stopped and cocked her head. It occurred to her to wonder why the door had no handles at all nor a lock, not even on the other side. She found she even smiled to herself when she recalled where else she had seen a similar door.

Beneath the Great Hall. She would not be beneath the Great Hall now, and this could not be that same crypt, but it was surely another like it. Having retained a sense of general orientation starting from the northern focus the amphitheater, Katharina placed herself now somewhere along the eastern side of the house, having walked some distance southward underground along the eastern wing, beside it or perhaps beneath it.

She heaved herself back to her feet, and her burden with her. The girl had fallen limp again, and Katharina took a moment to check that the girl was still breathing, felt the girl's torso inflating and then relaxing in long, rasping breaths. Then she turned to peer through the grated iron door into the low light beyond.

The space was indeed a crypt. And very much like that beneath the Great Hall. Katharina could not see much. The space was not lit directly, but there was a steady orange-electric glow from one end out of sight, which cast just enough light that Katharina could make out the shadows of the low arches that crossed the ceiling, and the blocks of tombstones beside the far wall.

Searching the floor, she saw finally a flicker of movement, the silent flip of something slim and glossy twisting idly from side to side. The tail of a cat. Focusing through the darkness, she made out the cat's body and then its eyes. The expression in the cat's eyes was impassive, looking at Katharina and examining her casually, but unfazed by her presence.

Katharina's breath wavered as she pursed her lips. She recalled the hissing sound that Aria had made, and set her tongue to her teeth to do the same. To her surprise, the cat lifted itself immediately to its feet and trotted slowly forward towards her. There was a pause, just long enough for Katharina to despair for a splitsecond that nothing had happened, and then the door swung slowly inward, juddering as it moved.

She felt herself again on the edge of sobbing, at the pathos of this tiny triumph overwhelmed by her recent failures, one last thing that she had still got right. She walked through into the chamber. After the uneven dust floor of the long chamber she had just traversed, the flagstones of the crypt were smooth and cool against the soles of her feet.

The cat slunk to Katharina's side and arched itself to rub at her leg. She looked down and saw its dark fur, mottled lighter in patches. It was not one that she had seen elsewhere in the house, as far as she could recall. Its expression was still blank.

Katharina looked around, turning to the wall behind her, and found the second gated doorway. She saw the upward-leading staircase beyond. Upward, back into the Summer House. But now that she knew where she was, she knew suddenly and finally also where she was going. It was the only choice left to her, the only one that she felt she could still face, that left her perhaps a slender avenue to redemption, but without forcing her to confront it right now, in her state of shame.

She ascended the stairs quickly, powered by fresh resolution. They spiraled up and round, and in what felt like several heaving strides she achieved the top and a door. She reached out and put her palm to the wood, forcing herself to act and push it open before she could waver.

Beyond, the light was suddenly dazzling, to the point of pain. It was sunlight. The airy clean sunlight of the house at daybreak. Katharina noticed then how much her eyes had filmed with moisture. She saw only a glistening blur before her, the impression of a long corridor with tall pointed arch windows and green beyond. She blinked and felt the first tear break and roll down over the blushed hot skin of her cheek. Sensing that more tears would be on the way if she hesitated and gave herself any time to reflect, she pivoted and searched quickly for the huge wooden double doorway that she guessed must be nearby.

When she found it she dashed, the girl on her shoulder jolting and bumping as Katharina's quick strides jogged her up and down. The girl groaned and Katharina heaved her forward to set her gently down on the floor, slumped seated against the wizened wood of the doors.

There was a splitsecond in which Katharina hesitated. But she found nothing in her hesitation, only a strange peace at the prospect of escape, and of rest. She smacked the heel of her hand against the door and thumped hard several times. The sound echoed away through the space of the house's tall corridors. There were several seconds more of agony, time enough to waver after all, to regret, then resolve, then regret again, and then finally a wooden slat at head height slid away to reveal a rectangular grilled peephole in the door. The eyes just visible behind the black gauze of a veil looked at Katharina, questioned without speaking.

Katharina replied, "Refuge."