Once

Forty Three

Elle stared at the door for a second, waiting for the inevitable to happen: for the witch to come bursting out, presumably on fire, presumably tearing straight through the soft biscuit of the door itself. But nothing happened. Not even a wisp of smoke came out from under the door.

It just looked like an ordinary door. An ordinary little door made of biscuit and candy. Weird, sure. But there was no hint of the atrocity that had just taken place behind it.

A second later Elle scrambled forward, throwing the door open again.

"Elle, no!" Jax cried.

But there was nothing to be worried about. On the other side of the door were four wooden steps leading down to a long, low room under the stage, crammed with broken furniture and chests of old costumes. No fire. No mountain of melting gingerbread. And, crucially, no witch.

"It's - it's all gone," Russell said.

He was staring at the door, which itself had turned back into a thing of wood and metal. Elle pushed it shut again, saying, "Of course it has. The witch was burnt alive in her oven. That's the end of the story."

They should have all been elated. But Elle's voice was vicious and hard, and it caused them all to go suddenly quiet, the smiles of relieved joy fading from their faces.

Elle was on her feet by now. They were all standing in a circle on the little square of grass, all of them looking bedraggled and exhausted. Maggie and Sellan's wrists were red and sore where they'd been tied up. Russell and David were covered in splattered cake, their hair slicked down to their faces by thick gobbets of icing.

Elle knew she must look the worst of them all. She was covered head to toe in hot, melting confectionery. Her left ankle throbbed with vicious biting pain, and she felt the blood pouring down her foot into her shoe. She was completely drained, chest heaving, and she could feel herself shaking. Every muscle and nerve of her body still shook with the adrenaline pounding through her veins.

She suddenly grabbed Maggie by the arm and wheeled her round. It was sharper than she'd meant it to be. Maggie's face registered a momentary spasm of shock, then indignation.

"Jeez, Elle -"

"What the hell were you doing down there?"

Elle's voice was explosive, dripping with venom. Maggie and Sellan both gawped at her; she could see the indignation rising to anger in Maggie's eyes.

"We heard something," she said, her tone mimicking the sudden seething rage in Elle's. "We were heading toward the dining hall and we thought we heard someone down there. Someone crying."

"We both heard it, Elle," Sellan agreed. He didn't sound as angry as Maggie did, but he did sound hurt and confused.

"You shouldn't have gone down there. You should have waited -"

"Waited for what? For the Amazing Elle to turn up and tell us what magic premonition she's had today?"

Everyone knew Maggie could be pretty quick to jump into a temper when she was provoked. Maybe that was why Elle was provoking her. Maybe the throbbing feeling pulsing through her body was actually a screaming desperation for an argument. She wanted to shout, to pound her fists against something, to bawl hysterically in someone's face. And the first person she'd found had been Maggie.

Jax took a very slight step forward.

"Guys, don't do this," she said.

"Don't do what, Jax? Don't point out how Sellan and Maggie almost got themselves killed because they couldn't just wait five minutes?"

"Come on, Elle, that's not fair." Jax looked hurt, too. That same confused pain that Sellan had written all over his face. "Maggie and Sellan were just trying to help."

"Leave it, Jax," Maggie spat out. "Clearly Elle thinks she's made a mistake. She thinks if me and Sellan are stupid enough to try and help someone who might be in danger, we deserve to get ourselves cooked and eaten alive by a witch."

Sellan said gently:

"Elle didn't say that, Maggie."

"Look, guys, let's just - let's just stop, yeah?" Russell said. "We're all tired. It's been a hell of a week for all of us."

"Oh, has it?" Elle's anger ricocheted straight from Maggie to Russell. "Have you had a hard week? Have you even thought for one second how hard this week has actually been for me?"

The thing is, Elle knew she shouldn't be doing this. In fact, she knew this was exactly the last thing she ought to be doing. The problem was she couldn't stop herself. It was complete self-sabotage. As if after all the other awful things that had happened to her this week her brain was just pushing the self-destruct button on her whole life.

"We all know, Elle," Jax said. "We're here for you."

"Are you? You weren't here for me on Saturday, when I told you about Marigold Loxley. You all thought I'd lost my mind."

"That's not fair," said Russell, through gritted teeth.

"Isn't it? You came to my house on Sunday and told me I was the one who ought to be sorry - sorry for betraying our friendship by lying to you. Did you tell everyone about that? No, of course you didn't. Because you're here for me, aren't you?"

Russell's face was firm, but there were tears in his eyes.

"Wow," he said quietly. "I... I thought you knew how sorry I was about that, Elle. I thought we'd gotten past it."

"Maybe I haven't. Maybe you'd know that if you ever bothered to ask me."

The tears were edging down Russell's cheeks now.

"I thought - Elle I'm sorry, I really thought -"

"Russell, it's OK," said Jax, putting a hand on Russell's back. "Elle's upset right now."

"Oh, of course, here she comes," Elle hissed. "Here comes Jax, always everyone's friend, always knows just what to say! Do you ever get tired of being so goddamn perfect?"

"Elle, I'd stop now before you say something you really regret."

She whirled round. This had come from David, in that calm measured voice he'd used just a minute ago. The calmness of his voice angered her more than anything else had so far.

She glowered at him, throwing all of her seething fury into her voice as she spoke.

"How the hell do you think you have the first idea what I'm going to regret? I don't even know you. I don't know anything about you!"

"That's not my fault, Elle -"

"No, of course not. Nothing's your fault, is it? You're just a perfectly nice, perfectly innocent, perfectly perfect guy who's got himself mixed up in all this. Well you know what I think? I think you're a bit too fucking perfect for your own good."

David took a half step toward her, and spoke in a low, steady voice.

"Elle. This isn't you, and you know it isn't. We know it isn't. You're upset, and you have every right to be. But if you push us all away now you're going to lose the few people who can actually help you. You - you can't do this on your own."

He looked at her appealingly. She looked round at the others: the circle of faces all registering outrage, bewilderment, distress. She was on a precipice. She could take it all back, beg for their forgiveness, say she didn't mean a word of it. Or she could double down.

But the self-destruct button had already been pushed. It was obvious she only had one choice, one course of action she could possibly take now.

"None of you have the first idea what I can and cannot do. None of you have helped at all in stopping the first six. I've done every single one of them on my own. And now I guess I'll be finishing this on my own, too."

None of them replied. She didn't give them a chance to. She just set off across the grass and marched toward the school gates. There were tears in her eyes now, and she simply didn't care.