Page 83

She read the label dislodged from one of the bottles, confirming her suspicions.

“To Combat: Dark Magick”.

Then, she noticed burgundy dried blood on some of the shards. Amelie frowned. The Dark One did not bleed.

Davron wouldn’t have destroyed these potions, would he?

She backed away from the cabinet, remembering his cold resignation when he sent her away. He’d made up his mind about something.

Head spinning, she was forced to face the awful and most logical answer. Davron destroyed them, because he no longer needed them. And he would only no longer need them if he’d surrendered himself to Levissina.

Amelie had been surprised the sorceress allowed her to simply leave the castle with her brothers. Perhaps it was not so surprising after all. Amelie had been unconscious for days after the raider attack. That was plenty of time for Davron to make an agreement with the Dark One.

Had he exchanged his life for hers? Only for Amelie to scold him for rejecting her? She felt ill and selfish for not considering this possibility before. And for thinking so little of him—that he wouldn’t give his life for hers. He had shown himself to be exactly the kind of man who would do anything to save her.

And she repaid him by riding away, ignorant of everything, including her very own feelings for him.

Where was he now? What happened to him? Her mind reeled with the possibilities, all of them horrible to conceive.

She would go to the village at once. The villagers would surely tell her more than the dusty, empty castle could. If not the villagers, then her brothers.

Instead of doubling back to the keep, she saved time by exiting through the storerooms where Oskar unloaded his crates.

The grounds were unsettling. The formerly lush, blooming flowerbeds now lay wilted and barren. The grass was dead, and thick black veins ran through the bark of the trees, as if they were being strangled. A lone crow circled over the rose garden. The whole of Castle Grange seemed to have met a gloomy demise. Amelie gripped her satchel tighter and hurried down the driveway.

At the perimeter, right before stepping over the estate boundary, she paused and looked back. The crow still circled above the rose garden, its black wings stark against the colorless sky. A sense of sick premonition engulfed her, so sudden and strong it made her sway on the spot.

Part of her wanted to flee—ignore her intuition and run to her brothers and leave the province with every living villager. The pervading misery of Davron’s estate told her everything she needed to know, even if she was loathe to admit it. The Dark One had already been here, and gone.

But she intuited that if she wanted closure, she must go to the crow.

The cold air snatching at her cheeks and bare hands, she stumbled to the rose garden, feeling like she was in a horrible dream. Except this was very much real. Whatever awaited her within those garden walls would change her forever.

As she reached for the iron handle on the garden door, she closed her eyes briefly, envisioning Davron. His warm gaze. His smile. His deep voice and rumbling laugh and rousing touch and his thoughtfulness. She wanted to remember how incredible and unique and perfect he was when they first met. Her biggest regret was taking so long to realize it. Losing Davron would haunt her forever, but she would keep this lovely picture of him in her heart.

Holding her breath, she creaked the door open. The sight before her buckled her knees. Her grip on the iron ring was all that kept her from collapsing onto the putrid ground.

CHAPTER 35

The rose garden had been transmogrified into a dead, rotted version of itself.

Gone were the vibrant red and pink blooms. Black ropes crawled through the decaying petals and leaves, crisscrossing the garden many times. The thorny, bent remains of the rose bushes protruded from the foul morass like skeleton hands.

The smell was sickly sweet, like perfume tinged with rotting flesh. Amelie suppressed a dry heave and forced herself to stand straighter so that she could search the writhing mess. A mound of the dark matter throbbed distinctly near the middle, like it was the heartbeat of this vileness.

Shivering with dread but unable to look away, Amelie crept toward the mound. Her feet disturbed the black tendrils as she walked over them, and they snagged on her boots and the hem of her cloak. She shook them off, progressing slowly on the slippery, uneven surface. From above, the crow let out a single mournful cry.

When she drew closer to the mound, a hand became visible through the twisted mass. A pale, large, six-fingered hand. Amelie’s stomach lurched.

“Davron!”

She tried to hurry to him, but slipped and fell on the thrashing surface. The tendrils snaked around her wrists and her satchel strap, pulling her downward. Gritting her teeth, she tore free and scrambled to where Davron’s hand lay among the foul black ropes.

“Davron, can you hear me?”

Her voice sounded small and thin, swallowed by the malignancy of the garden.

His hand was ice-cold and lifeless when she grasped it. The tattoos were the provenance of the black tendrils. They grew from his skin and wound around his body, extending beyond him to invade the entire garden.