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The sound of footsteps—a woman’s, or perhaps a child’s—light and quick—made her twist around abruptly. A sharp reminder that she had a knife tucked into her pocket startled her upright, straight into the table’s edge.
“Ouch,” she complained, rubbing the top of her head and pulling aside her skirt to inspect the shallow cut she had accidentally given herself. It wasn’t concerning, only a slight nick that had put a hole into her pocket. More mending to do.
Evaine pushed to her feet. Her fingers curled around the knife’s handle. She froze. On the marble table was a small, battered book that hadn’t been there when she bent down a moment ago. She hesitated, her hand hovering over it, undecided. If she touched it, what kind of ghosts was she disturbing?
Chapter 12
Evaine
Evaine flipped open the small leather book. Inside the cover was inscribed in neat, girlish letters: Marina Corbett. Private. Do not read.
“If you didn’t want me to read it, you shouldn’t have left it here for me to find,” she muttered. The name felt familiar, but she couldn’t place it until she flipped to the first page and read, Gareth has gone off to university. I fear my life is about to become unbearable.
This was the diary of the young woman he’d been engaged to before the tragic fire. Lord Lucan’s dead bride. Curiosity blazed through her. Perhaps the answer to why the duke—Gareth—saw the world as an ugly place, full of liars and frauds, where dirty deeds go unpunished, could be found in here.
The footsteps she swore she’d heard a moment ago had been running away, almost as if someone—or something—had materialized long enough to place the book on the console table, and then dart away.
What if Marina Corbett was still here among these haunted walls?
“I don’t believe in ghosts,” she said, as if that would help any more than a kitchen knife would against a malevolent revenant. Nothing answered. A chill raced down her spine. Evaine repeated this mantra with each apprehensive step on her return to the kitchen. Marina’s diary was tucked into her pocket, and she clutched the knife and the lantern one in each hand. Her senses were alert to any sound.
Nothing.
Back in the safety of the kitchen, she exhaled fully for the first time since she had left it. This time, she closed the door firmly.
“Won’t stop a phantom,” she muttered, feeling ridiculous and frightened at the same time. She set the lamp on the stove and took the uncomfortable wooden chair that Gran had been sitting in earlier. Her grandmother slumbered fitfully on the pallet of old tablecloths and clothes, coughing occasionally, but not enough to fully awaken.
Evaine opened Marina’s diary and began to read.
Gareth
Gareth swam through the inky night sky. Stars, cold and twinkling, surrounded him. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he felt free. Unburdened. He floated high above the world.
In the distance, he spotted a female figure. Her back was turned to him, standing, which seemed like an odd posture when one could swim through the sky. She wore a plain white shift with a pale-blue ribbon tied around her waist. Long brown hair fell between her shoulder blades. No wind fluttered the hem of her garment, and that was how Gareth knew he was caught in a lucid dream. Nothing made any sense…but the wind, especially. There was no biting air swirling around him. Glancing down, he saw he wore his ordinary black trousers and no shirt. Exactly the way he had gone to bed.
He knew this, and yet he swam toward the woman in the distance as if it were the most normal thing to do.
Marina, he said, though his voice didn’t sound like his own. It sounded distant and hollow as if the life had been sucked out of him.
She turned slightly. Enough to let him know she was aware of his presence.
Marina, he said again.
Did you find it yet? she whispered.
Find what?
My inheritance. He took it.
Who did?
The duke. She turned to him fully then. Gareth recoiled. Her eyes were dark pits, her skin veined with blue. Dead. The front of her dress was singed and black. A chunk of her hair was burned off in the front. Suddenly, he was falling, sinking, drowning—
Find my treasure, she said impassively as she watched him tumble into darkness. Don’t let the duke win.
Somewhere in the distance, a woman screamed.
Evaine
