Lily Read Online Free PDF

someone. Shhh, listen.’ The little dog settled her chin on her front paws with a gleeful expression. Clearly the occupants of the room below had moved closer to the open French windows. Lily sat down on the balcony, leaning against the railings, and hearing the words drift out into the summer evening.
    ‘Is she any better, ma’am?’
    ‘She’s talking to Marten, her lady’s maid,’ Lily whispered.
    ‘Hardly at all. I had such hopes…’ There was a rustle of stiff silk that made Lily shiver. Mama was pacing again, her skirt swishing around her.
    ‘Are they talking about your sister?’ Henrietta breathed.
    ‘I expect so.’
    There was silence for a moment from downstairs, then as Lily’s mother came past the window again, her voice floated upwards, unnaturally clear. ‘If only I could do it myself…’
    Lily shivered. Mama was speaking half-spells again, the words forming strange colours and lights in Lily’s mind, like swirls of scented smoke. She shook them away hastily, digging the hard iron of the balcony rail into her hands, until her mind was clear again.
    ‘But the prophecy was quite clear. It has to be a child that brings it all about. I was so certain that she was the one. That seer I brought over here after she was born swore to me that this was the child that had been foretold. She lied, perhaps… Well, I suppose we can always send this one the way of the others. But such a lot of time wasted!’ An expressive sigh. ‘And I am running out of time…’ She laughed bitterly. ‘And children.’
    Lily frowned at Henrietta, whose ears were twitching frantically. ‘What does that mean? Oh, there’s the bell, and I can hear her moving away. She’s going in to dinner.’
    ‘Look!’ the pug hissed, nodding towards the next-door balcony. ‘How long has she been there?’
    Lily twisted round, gripping the railings and looking across at Georgie’s balcony. It was wider than her own, and she hadn’t noticed the strange little heap in the corner when she was trying to look into Georgie’s room. But now she realised that it was Georgie herself, curled up against the wall, her whitish hair shining in the strange thundery evening light. Listening.
    ‘Georgie! Mama and Marten have gone. Georgie, I want to talk to you. Unlock your door, please! I’m sorry I was mean.’
    But her sister didn’t so much as move.
    ‘Oh!’ Lily muttered crossly. ‘Well, I shall just have to climb across and shake her! I’ll make her listen!’ She sprang up, and swung one leg over the low iron railings.
    ‘Be careful…’ Henrietta laid her ears back. ‘The whole house is crumbling, that doesn’t look at all safe – and where are you going to put that foot now? Not there, you can’t reach! Lily, no!’
    But Lily had jumped, flinging herself at the next balcony, the same way she clambered about in the apple trees in the orchard. Except there she fell onto long grass and several years’ worth of rotten apples, not a stone flagged terrace.
    With one elbow hooked around the top edge of Georgie’s balcony, Lily heaved to pull herself up, but she could feel her arm slipping already.
    ‘Georgie, help me!’ she gasped, her breath coming in frightened pants. But her sister seemed far away, her eyes blank and staring behind a white veil of hair.
    Henrietta had scrambled out of the window, and was now scurrying backwards and forwards on the balcony, whining in horror. Then all at once she barked, a sharp, angry noise, that caught the back of Lily’s neck like nails scratching down paint. She shuddered horribly, and managed to struggle another couple of inches of arm over the railings.
    Georgie stirred for the first time, flinging her hair back out of her face wearily, like someone waking from a strange dream.
    ‘Lily!’

‘W hat were you doing, you idiot?’ Georgie yelled, hauling her little sister over onto her balcony.
    Lily sat panting on the stone floor, rubbing her strained arms, and giggling