Free Worlds of Ink and Shadow by Lena Coakley

arm gently.
    â€œIt wasn’t an accident that Papa found that paper, was it?” Charlotte asked quietly. “You left it for him to find.”
    Emily continued to stare fixedly at the water, knowing that if she met her sister’s gaze she might start to cry, and then all her anger would dissipate. She wanted to keep her anger a while longer.
    â€œYes. I did.” She had wanted to see her sister scolded but had gotten no satisfaction from it. “I did, and I’m not sorry.”
    â€œI suppose you felt I deserved it.”
    Emily bit her lip. Guilt was such an inconvenientemotion. “Oh, why won’t you at least do me the courtesy of losing your temper?” Tears did come to her eyes now, just as she’d known they would. “It was a wicked thing to do. I know it was.”
    â€œIt was for the best,” Charlotte said. She was being maddeningly calm. “It did me good to see my writing through Papa’s eyes.”
    â€œHow can you say that? He thinks your stories are childish, and they are anything but. Now they are coming to an end, all your beautiful words, and it’s my fault!”
    â€œIt’s not,” Charlotte assured her. “I think I would have stopped writing at any rate.”
    Emily pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and noticed that it was one of the ones Charlotte had given her for Christmas with little roses embroidered on it. “Oh! I’m a terrible person, I know I am.” She used the handkerchief to blot the corners of her eyes. “It’s only . . .” She considered telling her sister about Gondal, about how she longed for it, but she was afraid words could never do her world justice.
    Charlotte gazed at her in silence for a while. She wore the same puzzled expression that she did when trying to translate a particularly complicated passage from the French. “Would it help if you were allowed to say good-bye to Verdopolis?” she asked finally.
    Emily froze. “What do you mean?” Hope fluttered in her stomach, but she couldn’t allow herself to believe that her sister was talking about letting her cross over.
    â€œThe truth is that Branwell wants me to write one more story. An ending. A final farewell. I think perhaps I should accommodate him. And . . . it occurs to me that since you and Anne were there at the beginning of that place, you should be there at the end.”
    Emily felt her heart lurch. “Do you mean . . . Are you saying that you will let us go with you again?”
I’m going to see Rogue
, she thought, and for one moment her whole body seemed to float.
    â€œDon’t excite yourself, now, for heaven’s sake! It’s only the one time.”
    Emily tried to make her face as serene as her sister’s, terrified lest she change her mind. “Don’t excite myself,” she repeated. “How can I not?”
    Charlotte took her hand and squeezed it, and Emily felt the warmth of her through their thin summer gloves. “Listen to me, Emily. This is important. If the four of us cross over again, I need you to promise that you will be content with the ending I create. I need you to promise that you will not beg for more.”
    â€œAnything,” Emily said, a giddy laugh escaping her. “Anything, anything!”
    â€œAnd most of all, I need you to promise you will not try to discover how Branwell and I are able to cross over. That is a secret that must be left alone.”
    â€œOf course,” Emily said quickly. “I promise.”

CHARLOTTE
    A
FTER MONTHS AT SEA, TWELVE ADVENTURERS were shipwrecked on the coast of Africa. The land was beautiful and fertile, and so they planted flags and claimed it for England. With the help of the four Genii, they built the city of Glasstown on the very spot where their ship had come to rest.
    I hope I’m doing the right thing
, Charlotte thought.
    She was sitting on a chair in the bedroom she