Текст книги "Lux"

Автор книги: Courtney Cole

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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 16 страниц)

Chapter Twenty-Two

“We live a little ways from Hastings. It’s close to Sussex,” Dare tells me, after we land at Heathrow and drive through the country. He speaks of England as though I know anything at all about it. I nod like I do, because so much of what we say is a pretense now. We go through the motions.

Thirty minutes later, our car is still gliding over the winding ribbons of road, but I finally see a rooftop in the distance, spires and towers poking through trees.

Dare stirs, opening his eyes, and I know we’re almost there. Finn is still sleeping, so I nudge him awake, and he rubs at his eyes.

I crane my neck to see. When I do, I’m stunned beyond words, enough that the breath hitches on my lips.

This can’t be my family’s home.

It’s huge, it’s lavish, it’s creepy.

It’s ancient, it’s stone, it’s beautiful.

A tall stone wall stretches in either direction as far as I can see, encircling the property like an ominous security blanket. It’s so tall, so heavy, and for one brief moment, I wonder if it’s meant to keep people out… or to keep them in.

It’s a foolish notion, I know.

As we pull off the road, large wrought iron gates open in front of our car as if by magic, as if they were pushed by unseen hands. Puffs of mist and fog swirl from the ground and through the tree branches, half concealing whatever lies behind the gate.

Even though the grounds are lush and green, there’s something heavy here, something dark. It’s more than the near constant rain, more than the clouds.

Something that I can’t quite put my finger on.

I’m filled with a strange dread as the car rolls through the gates, as we continue toward the hidden thing. And while the ‘hidden thing’ is just a house, it feels like so much more, like something ominous and almost threatening.

I catch glimpses of it through the branches as we drive, and each glimpse gives me pause.

A steep, gabled roof.

Columns and spires and moss.

Rain drips from the trees, onto the car, onto the driveway, and everything gleams with a muted light.

It’s wet here, and gray, and the word I keep thinking in my head is gothic.

Gothic.

Despite all the beauty and the extravagance here, it still looks a bit terrifying.

I count the beats as we make our way to the house, and I’ve counted to fifteen before the limousine finally comes to a stop on top of a giant circular driveway made of cobblestone.

The house in front of us is made from stone, and it sprawls out as far as I can see. The windows are dark, in all sizes, in all shapes.

Rolling, manicured lawns, an enormous mansion, lush gardens. Stormy clouds roll behind the massive setting of the house, and one thing is clear. Ominous or not, this estate is lavish, to say the least.

“Is our family rich?” I ask dumbly.

Dare glances at me. “Not in the ways that matter.”

He pauses, and there is a rope between us, pulling us together, but at the same time, coiling around us, holding us apart.

“Calla, don’t let your guard down,” he tells me quickly. “This place… it isn’t what it seems. You have to…”

Jones opens the door, and Dare stops speaking abruptly.

I have to what?

“Welcome to Whitley,” Jones tells me with a slight bow. We climb out and suddenly, I’m nervous.

I’m in a foreign country, getting ready to meet a family consisting of strangers, and I know nothing about them.

It’s daunting.

Dare squeezes my hand briefly, and I let him. Because here, I’m alone.

Here, Dare and Finn are the only familiar things.

Here, they’re the only ones who know me.

Of course, maybe they always were.

Jones leads the way with our bags, and before we even reach the front doors, they open, and a small wrinkled woman stands in the doorway. She’s slightly bent, barely a wisp of a woman, with an olive complexion and her hair completely wrapped in a bright scarf twisted at the top. She looks like she might be a hundred years old.

“Sabine!” Dare greets the elderly woman. The little woman’s arm close around him, and her head barely reaches his chest.

“Welcome home, boy,” she says in a deep gravely voice. “I’ve missed you.”

Dare pulls away and glances at me, and I can see on his face that Sabine is important. At least to him. “This is Sabine. Sabine, this is Calla Price.”

Sabine stares at me, curiously, sadly.

“You’re the spitting image of your mother,” she tells me.

“I know,” I tell her, and my heart twinges because my mother is gone. “It’s nice to meet you.”

I offer her my hand, but she grasps it instead of shaking it. Stooping over, she examines it, her face mere inches from my palm. She grips me tight, unwilling to let me go, and I feel my pulse bounding wildly against her fingers.

Startled, I wait.

I don’t know what else to do.

The little woman is surprisingly strong, her grip holding me steady as she searches for something in my hand. She traces the veins and the ridges, her breath hot on my skin. Her face is so close to my palm that I can feel each time she exhales.

Finn coughs, and abruptly, Sabine drops my hand and straightens.

Her eyes meet mine and I see a thousand lifetimes in hers. They’re dark as obsidian, and unlike most elderly people, hers aren’t cloudy with age. She stares into me, and I feel like she’s literally sifting through my thoughts and looking into my soul.

It’s unsettling, and a chill runs up my spine, putting me on edge.

She glances at Dare, and nods ever so slightly.

If I didn’t know better, I would almost think he cringed.

What the hell?

But I don’t have time to ponder, because Sabine starts walking, leading us into the house.

“Come. Eleanor is waiting for you,” Sabine tells us solemnly over her shoulder as she uses much of her strength to open the heavy front doors.

Dare sighs. “I think we’d better freshen up first. It’s been a long flight, Sabby.”

The nanny looks sympathetic, but is unrelenting. “I’m sorry, Dare. She insists on seeing all three of you.”

Dare sighs again, but we obediently follow Sabine through lavish hallways. Over marble floors and lush rugs, through mahogany paneled halls and extravagant window dressings, beneath sparkling crystal chandeliers. My eyes are wide as we take it all in. I’ve never seen such a house in all my life, not even on TV.

But even as it is opulent, it’s silent.

It’s still.

It’s like living in a mausoleum.

We come to a stop in front of massive wooden doors, ornately carved. Sabine knocks on them twice, and a woman’s voice calls out from within.

“Enter.”

How eerily formal.

Sabine opens the doors, and we are immediately enveloped by an overwhelmingly large study, painted in rich colors and patinas, encircled with wooden shelves filled by hundreds and hundreds of leather-bound books.

A woman sits at the heavy cherry desk, facing us with her back to the windows.

Her face is stern, her hair is faded, but I can see that it used to be red. It’s pulled into a severe chignon, not one strand out of place. Her cashmere sweater is buttoned all the way to the top, decorated by one single strand of pearls. Her unadorned hands are folded in front of her and she’s waiting.

Waiting for us.

How long has she been waiting? Months? Years?

For a reason that I can’t explain, I feel suffocated. The room seems to close in on me, and I’m frozen. Dare has to literally pull me, then pull me harder, just to make me move.

I feel like I can’t breathe, like if I approach her, something bad will happen.

Something terrible.

It’s a ridiculous thought, and Dare glances at me out of the corner of his eye.

We come to a stop in front of the desk.

“Eleanor,” he says tightly.

There is no love lost here. I can see it. I can sense it. I feel it in the air, in the formality, in the cold.

“Adair,” the woman nods. There are no hugs, no smiles. Even though it’s been at least a year since she’s seen him, this woman doesn’t even stand up.

“This is your grandmother, Eleanor Savage,” Dare tells me, and his words are so carefully calm. Eleanor stares at me, her gaze examining me from head to toe. My cheeks flush from it.

“You must be Calla.”

I nod.

“You may call me Eleanor.” She glances at the door. “Wait outside, Sabine.”

Without a word, Sabine backs out, closing the door. Eleanor returns her attention to us.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” she tells me stiffly, but her voice lacks any sign of emotion, of sympathy or sadness, even though it was her daughter who was lost.

She looks at me again. “While you are here, Whitley will be your home. You will not intrude in rooms that don’t concern you. You may have the run of the grounds, you may use the stables. You won’t mingle with unsavory characters, you may have use of the car. Jones will drive you wherever you need to go. You may settle in, get accustomed to life in the country, and soon, we’ll speak about your inheritance. Since you’ve turned eighteen, you have responsibilities to this family.”

She pauses, then looks at me and then at Finn.

“You’ve suffered a loss, but life goes on. You will learn to go on, as well.”

She looks away from us, directing her attention to a paper on her desk. “Sabine!” she calls, without looking up.

Apparently, we’ve been dismissed.

Sabine re-enters and we quickly follow her, jumping at the chance to leave this distasteful woman.

“Well, she’s pleasant,” I mutter.

Dare’s lip tilts.

“She’s not my favorite.”

Understatement.

We share a moment, a warm moment, but I shove it away.

I can’t.

I can’t.

Sabine stops in front of double wooden doors.

“This was your mother’s suite,” Sabine tells me. “It’s yours now. Finn’s is across the hall. Dare’s room is across the house.” After she says that, she waits, as if she’s expecting a reaction from me. When she doesn’t get one, she continues. “Dinner will be at seven in the dining room. Be prompt. You should rest now.”

She turns and walks away, shuffling down the hall on tiny feet. Finn ducks into his room, and Dare stares at me, tall and slender.

“Do you want me to stay with you?”

“No.” My answer is immediate and harsh.

He’s startled and he pulls away a bit, staring down at me.

“I just… I need to be alone,” I add.

I’m not strong enough to resist you yet.

Disappointment gleams in his eyes, but to his credit, he doesn’t press me. He swallows his hurt and nods.

“Ok. I’m wiped out, so I’m going to take a nap before dinner. I suggest you do the same. You must be tired.”

I nod because he’s right, I’m utterly exhausted. He’s gone, and I’m left alone in the long quiet hallway.

I take a step toward my bedroom, then another, but for the life of me, I can’t seem to turn the doorknob. Something settles around me, dread, I think, and I just can’t do it.

The look on Eleanor’s face emerges in my head, the way she was examining me, and I can’t breathe. Something crushes me, that dark thing that I felt in the driveway. It feels like it’s here, pushing on me, lapping at me.

I know it doesn’t make any sense.

Something pulls me.

It pulls me right into my mother’s old rooms.

And there, I sit, surrounded by her memories.

Chapter Twenty-Three

My mother’s rooms are as lavish as the rest of the house. There are no childhood posters taped to the walls here, no teenage heart-throbs, no pink phones or plush pillows.

The suite is carefully decorated, with heavy off-white furniture and sage green walls. The bed is massive, covered in thick blankets, all sage green, all soothing.

But it’s not the room of a child, or a teenager, or even a young woman.

It lacks youthful energy.

But I still feel her here.

Somehow.

Sinking onto the bed, I find that I’m surrounded by windows.

All along one wall, they stretch from floor to ceiling. They let in the dying evening light, and I feel exposed. Getting to my feet, I pull the drapes closed.

I feel a little safer now, but not much.

My suitcases are stacked inside the door, and so I set about unpacking. I put my sweaters away, my toiletries in the fancy bathroom, and while I’m standing on the marble tiles, I envision my mother here.

She loved a good bath, and this bathtub is fit for a queen.

I imagine her soaking here, reading a good book, and my eyes well up.

She’s gone.

I know that.

I pull open the closet doors, and for a moment, a very brief moment, I swear I catch a whiff of her perfume.

She’s worn the same scent for as long as I’ve known her.

There are shelves in this walk-in closet, and on one, I see a bottle of Chanel.

Her scent.

I clutch it to me, and inhale it, and it brings a firestorm of memories down on my head. Of my mother laughing, of her baking cookies, of her grinning at me over the top of her book.

With burning eyes, I put the bottle back.

This isn’t helping anything.

I hang my shirts and my sweaters.

There’s a knock on the door, and Sabine comes in with a tray. A teapot and a cup.

“I brought you some tea,” she tells me quietly, setting it on a table. “It’ll perk you up. Traveling is hard on a person.”

Losing their entire life is hard on a person.

But of course I don’t say that.

I just smile and say thank you.

She pours me a cup and hands it to me.

“This will help you rest. It’s calming.”

I sip at it, and Sabine turns around, surveying my empty bags.

“I see you’ve already unpacked. These rooms haven’t been changed since your mother left.”

I hold my cup in my lap, warming my fingers because the chill from the English evening has left them cold.

“Why did my mother leave?” I ask, because she’s never said. She’s never said anything about her childhood home.

Sabine pauses, and when she looks at me, she’s looking into my soul again, rooting around with wrinkled fingers.

“She left because she had to,” Sabine says simply. “Whitley couldn’t hold her.”

It’s an answer that’s not an answer.

I should’ve expected no less.

Sabine sits next to me, patting my leg.

“I’ll fatten you up a bit here,” she tells me. “You’re too skinny, like your mama. You’ll rest and you’ll… see things for what they are.”

“And how is that?” I ask tiredly, and suddenly I’m so very exhausted.

Sabine looks at my face and clucks.

“Child, you need to rest. You’re fading away in front of my eyes. Come now. Lie down.”

She settles me onto the bed, pulling a blanket up to my chin.

“Dinner is at seven,” she reminds me before she leaves. “Sleep until then.”

I try.

I really do.

I close my eyes.

I relax my arms and my legs and my muscles.

But sleep won’t come.

Eventually, I give up, and I open the drapes and look outside.

The evening is quiet, the sky is dark. It gets dark so early here.

The trees rustle in the breeze, and the wind is wet. It’s cold. It’s chilling. I can feel it even through the windows and I rub at my arms.

That’s when I get goose-bumps.

They lift the hair on my neck,

And the stars seem to mock me.

Turning my back on them, I cross the room and pull a book from a shelf.

Jane Eyre.

Fitting, given Whitley and the moors and the rain.

I open the cover and find a penned inscription.

To Calla. May you always have the courage to live free, and the strength to do what is right.

The ink is fading, and I run my fingertips across it.

A message to me? It’s almost like my mother knew I would be here, and she left this very book for me on these very shelves in this very room.

I slip into a seat with it, pulling open the pages, my eyes trying to devour the words my mother once read.

But I’ve only gotten to the part where Jane proclaims that she hates long walks on cold afternoons when I hear something.

I feel something.

I feel a growl in my bones.

It’s low and threatening, and it vibrates my ribs.

I startle upright, looking around, but of course, I’m still alone.

But the growl happens again, low and long.

My breath hitches and the book hits the floor, the pages fluttering on the rug.

A sudden panic overtakes me, rapid and hot.

I have to get out.

I don’t know why.

It’s a feeling I have in my heart, something that drives me from my mother’s rooms out into the hall, because something is chasing me.

I feel it on my heels.

I feel it breathing down my neck.

Without looking back, I rush back down the corridor, through the house and out the front doors.

I’ve got to breathe.

I’ve got to breathe.

I’ve got to breathe.

Sucking in air, I walk aimlessly around the house, over the cobblestone and down a pathway. I draw in long even breaths, trying to still my shaking hands, trying to gather myself together, trying to assure myself that I’m being silly.

There’s no reason to be afraid.

I’m being ridiculous.

This house might be strange and foreign, but it’s still a home. It just isn’t my home. It’s fine. I’ll get used to it.

I look behind me, and there’s nothing there.

There is no growl, there is no vibration in my ribs, there is nothing but for the dim twilight and the stars aching to burst from behind the clouds.

The house looms over me and I circle back, only to find myself in front of a large garage with gabled edges.

There are at least seven garage doors, all closed but one.

To my surprise, someone walks out of that door.

A boy.

A man.

His pants are dark gray and he’s wearing a hoodie, and he moves with grace. He slides among the shadows with ease, as though he belongs here, as though Whitley is his home too, even though I don’t know him, even though I feel like I do. I feel it I feel it I feel it.

“Hello,” I call out to him.

He stops moving, freezing in his tracks, but he doesn’t turn his head.

Something about that puts me on edge and I tense, because what if he’s not supposed to be here?

“Hello?” I repeat uneasily, and chills run up my spine, goose-bumps forming on my arms once again.

I back away, first one step, then another.

I blink,

And he’s gone.

I stare at the empty space, and shake my head, blinking hard.

He’s still gone.

He must’ve slipped between the buildings, but why?

I’m too nervous to find out, and so I turn to walk back to the house. As I do, two enormous shadows bound out of the trees and race toward me, panting and skidding to a halt in front of me.

I’m frozen as I stare at two of the biggest dogs I’ve ever seen.

“It’s okay,” I tell them, as they examine me with dark eyes. “I’m supposed to be here. I’m not an intruder.”

They stare at me.

I stare back.

Then one steps forward and nudges my hand, sliding his massive head beneath my palm like he knows me, like he’s not going to attack me.

“Castor!” Sabine yells from behind me. “Pollux!”

The dogs stand at attention, and when she yells Come, they do.

She looks at me. “I’m sorry if they got you muddy,” she tells me. “They’re the estate dogs. And as you can see, they aren’t always graceful.”

I follow her gaze and she’s staring at muddy paw-prints on my legs, and when did that happen?

“They’re fine,” I tell her, because they didn’t hurt me. In fact, even though they’re enormous, they have such sweet faces. Sabine acts like she knows what I’m thinking.

“They wouldn’t hurt anybody,” she tells me. “It’s their size that is intimidating.” She pauses. “They’d protect you with their lives, though.”

Me?

Before I can ask, she returns to the house and the dogs go with her. Down the path a ways, one of them pauses and turns to look at me, but then he continues on his way and I try to put my uneasiness to rest.

Why am I uneasy?

They’re just dogs.

And the guy I saw was just a gardener or something.

Nothing to be unnerved about.

Yet I’m still unsettled as I wash my face, so when I’m finished, I poke my head out into the hall. There’s nothing there.

With a sigh, I lock my bedroom door and I’m chilled from the wet English air. Glancing at the clock, I find it’s only six thirty. I can rest for a few minutes more, and I’m thankful for that.

Because clearly, jet lag has made me its bitch.

Chapter Twenty-Four

As I step into the grand foyer of Whitley, my feet have barely hit the floor when I feel the overwhelming sense of being stifled, of the coldness that permeates a person’s bones here. To put the feeling in perspective, my home in Oregon is a funeral home. Whitley is far, far worse.

Finn picks my hand, aware of my faltering steps. “You ok?” he whispers, his blue eyes searching mine. I nod.

Of course I’m lying. I’m not ok. Why would I be?

I stand in the foyer windows, staring across the moors. England has such haunting moors, such rolling, wet fields, such places that are conducive to melancholy. It makes me think of sadness, of Charlotte Bronte, of Jane Eyre.

I don’t know why I identify so much with Jane. She’s plain, and I know that I’m not. I have hair like fire, eyes like bright emeralds. I’m not being conceited in admitting that, because after all, physical attributes are things that we cannot help. I am pretty, but I didn’t earn it. I was simply born this way, a product of a beautiful mother. Internal traits though, they’re important and praiseworthy. Jane Eyre is fierce in spirit, and I like to believe that I am, too. Fierceness is much more commendable than my pretty face.

To be honest, I almost wish that I weren’t pretty. It makes me self-conscious. People tend to stare, and when they do, I always feel like they’re staring at me because they think I’m crazy.

Crazy

Crazy

Crazy.

Just like my brother.

It’s like a whisper, echoing through the rooms of Whitley, across the grounds, through the air. Everyone watches us, my brother and me, to see which one of us will crack.

“I’m going for a walk,” I tell Finn. His head snaps up.

“Alone? You’ll get lost.”

“No, I won’t. I’m just going to explore.”

“I’ll come too.”

“No. Go get something to eat. I just need a few minutes to breathe, Finn.”

He nods now because he understands that.

I slip outside, out the door, away from the doom of the house.

The breeze is slightly chilly as I make my way deep into the grounds. I’ve come to believe that it never truly warms up here. The rain makes the lawns lush, though. Green and full and colorful. It’s viridem. And green means life.

The cobbled path turns to pebbles as I get further away from the house, and after a minute, I come to a literal fork in the road. The path splits into two. One leads toward a wooded area, and the other leads to a beautiful stone building on the edge of the horizon, shrouded in mist and weeping trees.

It’s small and mysterious, beautiful and ancient. And of course I have to get a closer look. Without a second thought, I head down that path.

The closer I get, the more my curiosity grows.

I can smell the moss as I approach, that musty, dank smell that comes with a closed room or a wet space. And with that dark scent comes a very oppressive feeling. I feel it weighing on my shoulders as I open the heavy door, as I stare at the word SAVAGE inscribed in the wood, as I take my first tentative step into a room that hasn’t seen human life in what looks like years.

But it has seen death.

I’m standing in a mausoleum.

Growing up in a funeral home, I’m well versed in death. I know what it looks like, what it smells like, even what it tastes like in the air.

I’m surrounded by it here.

The floor is stone, but since it is deprived of light, soft green moss grows in places, and is soft under my feet. The walls are thick blocks of stone, and have various alcoves, filled with the remains of Savage family members. They go back for generations, and it makes me wonder how long the Savages have lived at Whitley.

Nearest me, are Richard Savage I, my grandfather, and Richard Savage II, my uncle. When did he die? And next to him is Olivia.

Olivia.

I run my fingers along her name, tracing the letters cut in the stone, absorbing the coolness, the hardness.

What do I know about her, other than she must have been Dare’s mother?

Why is she significant in my memory?

Did Dare have her eyes, or her hair? Was she the only spot of brightness in his world? Does he miss her more than life itself?

I don’t know.

Trailing my fingers along the wall, I circle the room, eyeing my ancestors, marveling at the silence here.

It’s so loud that my ears ring with it.

The open door creates a sliver of light on the dark floor, and it’s while I’m focusing on the brightness that I first hear the whisper.

Calla.

I whip my head around, only to find nothing behind me.

Chills run down my spine, and goose-bumps form on my arms as I eye the empty room. The only people here are dead.

But… the whisper was crystal clear in the silence.

I’m hearing voices.

That fact terrifies me, but not as much as the familiarity in that whisper.

“Hello?” I call out, desperate for someone to be here, for someone real to have spoken. But no one answers.

Of course not.

I’m alone.

I lay my hand on the wall and try to draw in a deep breath. I can’t be crazy. It’s one of my worst fears, second only to losing my brother.

A movement catches my eye and I focus on it.

Carnation petals and stargazers, white and red, blow across the floor. Funeral flowers.

Startled, I turn toward them, bending to touch them. I run one between my fingers, its texture velvety smooth. It hadn’t been here a moment ago. None of them had, yet here they are, strewn across the floor.

They lead to a crypt in the wall.

Adair Phillip DuBray.

My heart pounds and pounds as I race to the plaque, as I trace the fresh letters with my fingertips. His middle name is the same as my father’s.

And this wasn’t here before.

What the hell?

I gulp, drawing in air, observing the fresh flowers in the vase beside his name.

There is no moss here, because this had been freshly carved, recently opened, and very recently sealed. But there’s no way Dare can be here, because I just saw him last night. He’s fine, he’s fine, he’s fine.

As my hands palm his name, as I reassure myself, pictures fill my head, images and smells.

The sea, a cliff, a car.

Blood, shrieking metal, the water.

Dare.

He’s bloody,

He’s bloody,

He’s bloody.

Everything is on fire,

The flames lick at the stone walls,

Trying to find any possible way out.

The smoke chokes me and I cough,

gasping for air.

I blink and everything is gone.

My hands are on a blank wall, and Dare’s name is gone.

The flowers are gone.

I’m alone.

The floor is bare.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t breathe.

I can’t breathe.

I’m crazy.

It’s the only explanation.

I scramble for the door and burst out into the sunlight, away from the mausoleum, away from the death. I fly toward the house, tripping on the stones.

“Calla?”

My name is called and I’m afraid to look, afraid no one will be there, afraid that I’m still imagining things. Is this what Finn felt like every day? Am I starting down that slippery path? It’s a rabbit hole and I’m the rabbit and I’m crazy.

But it’s Dare, standing tall and strong on the path, and I fly into his arms, without worrying about pushing him away.

His arms close around me and he smells so good, so familiar, and I close my eyes.

“You’re fine,” I tell him, I tell myself. “You’re ok.”

“Yes, I’m fine,” he says in confusion, his hands stroking my back, holding me close. “Did you think something happened to me?”

I see his name, carved in the mausoleum stone, and I shudder, pushing the vision away, far out of my mind.

“No. I…no.”

He holds me for several minutes more, then looks down at me, tucking an errant strand of my hair behind my ear.

“Are you ok? You’ve been gone for hours.”

Hours? How can that be? The sky swirls, and I steady myself against his chest.

I hear his heart and it’s beating fast, because he’s afraid.

He’s afraid for me because he recognizes the signs, he’s seen them before, he’s seen them in my brother.

“It’s ok, Cal,” he murmurs, but I can hear the concern in his voice. “It’s ok.”

But I can tell from his voice that it’s not.

Craziness is genetic.

I’m the rabbit.

And I’m crazy.

“Is your father’s name Phillip?” I ask him tentatively, and he glances down at me.

“Yes.”

“Mine is too.”

“I know,” he says. “But things aren’t always what they seem, Cal. Remember?”

That seems so silly. My father’s name is Phillip and his father’s name is Phillip and it is what it is. Dare’s arm is around my shoulders as we walk back to the house, and I can feel him glance at me from time to time.

“Stop,” I tell him finally as we walk through the gardens. “I’m fine.”

“Ok,” he agrees. “Of course you are.”

But he knows better, and he knows that I’m not.

Sabine is kneeling by the library doors, digging through the rich English soil, and she looks at us over her shoulder. When she sees my face, her eyes narrow and she climbs to her feet.

“Are you all right, Miss Price?” she asks in her gravelly voice. I want to lie, I want to tell her that I’m fine, but I know she can tell the difference. In fact, as she stares at me with those dark eyes, I feel like she can see into my soul.

I don’t bother to lie.

I just shake my head.

She nods.

“Come with me.”

She leads us both to the back of the house, to her room. It’s small and dark, draped in colorful fabrics, in mystic symbols and pieces of gaudy jewelry, shrouded in mirrors and dream-catchers and stars.

I’m stunned and I pause, gazing at all of the pageantry.

She glimpses my expression and shrugs. “I’m Roma,” she says, by way of explanation. At my blank expression, she sighs. “Romani. Gypsy. I’m not ashamed of it.”

She holds her head up high, her chin out, and I can see that she’s far from ashamed. She’s proud.

“You shouldn’t be,” I assure her weakly. “It’s your heritage. It’s fascinating.”

She’s satisfied by that, by the idea that I’m not looking down at her for who she is.

Her dark eyes tell a story, and to me, they tell me that she knows more than I do. That she might even know more about me than I do.

It’s crazy, I know.

But apparently, I’m crazy now.

Sabine guides me to a velvet chair and pushes me gently into it. She glances at Dare.

“Leave us,” she tells him softly. “I’ve got her now. She’ll be fine.”

He’s hesitant and he looks at me, and I nod.

I’ll be fine.

I think.

He slips away, and I don’t want him to go, but he has to. Because he’s part of this, I can feel it, and I can’t trust him. My heart says so.

Sabine rustles about and as she does, I look around. On the table next to me, tarot cards are splayed out, formed in an odd formation, as though I’d interrupted a fortune telling.

I gulp because something hangs in the air here.

Something mystical.

After a minute, Sabine shoves a cup into my hands.

“Drink. It’s lemon balm and chamomile. It’ll settle your stomach and calm you down.”

I don’t bother to ask how she knew I was upset. It must’ve been written all over my face.