Page 21 of Ashwood (Wallflowers and Demons #1)

WRETCHED THINGS

DORIAN

W e descend into the hollow trail without a word. The trees here are packed tight and the resting air is moist and heavy. Gabriel strides at our left with a pistol drawn.

He doesn’t trust me.

I don’t trust him, either.

“What are we even walking toward?” he mutters. “You can’t follow prints on moss.”

“I’m not following prints,” I say. “I’m following the way the wind moves through the trees.”

He glares at me as though I’ve lost my mind, but I ignore him. Every branch that breaks echoes twice. Once through the air—and again from behind us, slower.

We don’t speak. Not even when we hear a voice call out ahead.

“Is somebody there?”

“Don’t,” I say. “Whatever you see is not there.”

Gabriel hesitates. He wants to believe. That hesitation is all it takes. I peer at him and see that he is trying to unknot the string around his waist.

“Lord Gabriel, what are you doing?”

The young lord doesn’t answer.

He stares ahead, wide-eyed and slack-jawed. Then, he smiles.

“Katherine…” he whispers.

I lunge forward with a hand already outstretched. “Gabriel stop —”

But it’s too late. He steps forward.

The earth gives way beneath his feet.

His foot hits a hollow patch masked by moss and the ground caves in like wet paper.

“Katherine!” Gabriel screams before he disappears into the blackness.

There is no time to think. I’m on my knees, arm plunged elbow-deep into dirt, grabbing his wrist just before he’s gone.

“Blasted fool!”

His weight drags me down and the string goes taut. I carry the weight, lest all our men be dragged away with him.

His head goes under and I stymie the panic and yank hard. Dirt collapses around me.

“Ahhh!” With a bellowed scream, Gabriel is ripped upward.

“Your Grace,” he splutters as his head finds air, choking for a life he almost lost. “You saved my life.”

WILLIAM

William wipes sweat from his brow as he follows the Butler in silence, eyes affixed on the rope between us. Nine yards of tension, gently sway between trees we’d marked at least an hour ago. Silence comes now, from all sides. Both left and right.

“Sir?” William whispers.

But the Butler doesn’t answer. He’s frozen mid-stride, eyes vacant in the darkness. He speaks too quietly.

“There is something… there …”

Suddenly, the rope goes tight around my waist. My heart pounds as I turn, just enough to witness a shadow darting across the path. A row of teeth, glint. Something snatches me by the shoulders and rips backward.

“Whore’s breath!” I scream.

“WILLIAM!”

My stomach lurches and nausea rises as my feet lift off the ground. Dirt flings sideways as I am pulled.

“CHRIST! ”

I try to hold onto something, but it’s to no avail. With a thud, I am splattered against a tree, before being ripped away. Mud fills my mouth as I am swung violently across the forest floor. The creature tries to yank me into the underbrush. The wire goes taut.

“William! Stay there, I am coming!” Everly bellows.

The cord jerks taut.

My teeth vibrate as the world rotates without rhyme or reason. “Where else would I be g-g-going, you b-b-b-lackkk-guard!”

Everly reacts instantaneously. He drops his lantern and clutches the line; his heels in, as he throws his weight back.

“HOLD ON!”

Panic comes hard and fast as a sharp talon pierces through my trousers. I thrash my legs hard against the Earth and kick.

I turn, a terrible decision.

Oh no…

Black eyes see me. Wet, eyeless skin caked in red velvet skin.

Flailing, I panic. Leaves fill my hands as I try to hold onto the very ground itself.

“Everly! Blasted cretin, pull harder!”

The rope digs into my ribs, slicing through my coat. I yell loudly.

“Cows piss!”

It bruises, but it doesn’t snap.

“Bollocks!”

There’s a crack of a pistol shot in the distance, and the monster lets go with a shriek. It vanishes into the shadow. The rope twinges before my spine collides into a nearby tree. I thud to the ground, bruised and a shell of myself. I gasp as Everly approaches my sprawled form.

The Butler holds a smoking pistol as he drags me up. I check the cord as I do so, shaking madly. My voice cracks as I stammer, “I thought—I thought I was gone—Christ…”

The Butler tightens the knot on my waist. “You would’ve been. If not for that damned string. That smug bastard.”

I peer down at my drenched trousers. “Mr. Everly, I think I’ve pissed myself.”

PETER THE VALET

The air is fetid with mould and decay. Each breath stifles the inside of my throat as I walk four paces behind Isaac, the driver.

“She passed through here,” I murmur.

“You’re certain?”

“I can smell the linen soap she uses. Lemon balm and tallow. Much of it.”

We descend into a hollow. The fog parts like and trees bend as the wind moves.

“Sir—” I stop short with my nose twitching. “There’s something else.”

We enter a glade, and there she is. She kneels in a soiled muslin gown, arms curled around herself.

“Miss Nora?” he calls out.

She does not raise her head.

“She should have looked up by now.”

Issac takes a step forward, but I stop him with a touch on his shoulder.

“Sir—don’t.”

“What are you talking about man. It is only Nora.”

I shake my head and do not move.

“It is putrid.”

But Issac doesn’t slow. He shrugs me off.

“You are being foolish, man.”

It is then she turns, and wearing a semblance of Nora’s face, stands with long limbs, a slanted gate and a mouth that is slit from end to end.

What in God’s name..

I do not scream as it lunges.

Issac acts quickly. He throws his body in front of me, intercepting the creature. A squelch sounds as claws slash him across his chest. Blood sprays onto my face as it rips him open. Flesh and blood spill as his ribs are exposed.

Isaac’s mouth opens but no sound comes. He collapses to the ground at the same time as the creature. I peer down, trembling only to witness a giant blade jutting out from the monster’s chest. I gulp.

He saved my life…

Isaac falls, then, sinew weaves itself back together. It is hideous to look upon.

Tendons pulses rapidly, beneath the skin like crawling worms. His face contorts, his spine arches and eyes cloud.

“Sir,” I hiss.

My man does not respond, he writhes on the ground, until all at once, he begins to laugh maniacally.

“Christ’s crooked cock, and devil take his Grace and the whole cursed house! Drive for the Duke, they said—coin and comfort! Piss and shit, more like! Yah, you flea-bitten whores!”

With my knife hovering over the cord, I step away, prepared to sever it. “Balls, old man, if you lose all faculties, I shall be forced to abandon you. Don’t make me the villain!”

Issac shudders, and for one suspended second, he doesn’t look like a man. And then, just like that, he returns to his usual self.

“Better?” I enquire from a safe distance.

The driver groans as he locates his senses and his feet. “Worse.”

Isaac rubs at his chest, where the mortal wound used to be, and exhales deeply. “I despise this forest.”

It is through the wind that a voice carries.

“The maid,” I whisper in horror. “I hear her…in two places.”

Issac grips his knife, returned to his usual self. “Which is the real one?”

The air, it is reeks of the unfamiliar. I swallow hard. “Neither. We follow the footprints.”

DORIAN

Gabriel gasps, drenched to his shoulders. His boots make sick squelching sounds as he heaves himself free of the bath I’d dragged him from. It is then I hear a panicked cry not far from here.

“HELLO? Is someone there?”

My ears pick up the distinct voice.

“Nora?”

“Your Grace!” she yells. “Is that you? Oh, thank heavens!”

Through the trees, I spot her. Barely afloat and nearly drowned, a pale hand and fingers stick out from above the earth, scraping at moss as she sinks to her doom.

Her face is streaked with dirt and tears, hair plastered to her cheeks.

Rain falls upon her, almost obscuring her entirely.

Hurrying closer, I spot the bog now at her waist. The more she fights, the more it drags her down.

“Hold on!” I shout.

Dropping to my knees, I crawl through mud. The ground sinks underneath my weight. On my stomach, with arm outstretched, I call out to her. “Nora, I am here. If you can, reach me.”

Her fingers slip against mine and mud sloshes as it pulls her down again.

Gabriel arrives beside me without a word.

“Quickly,” he states, “both of us at once.”

He plants his heels, grabs my coat, and anchors me as I stretch out one more time.

Almost…

Our fingers catch.

I latch onto her wrist and yank hard. Her screams muffle through the storm as she breaks free, and slides over muddy grass.

“Oh Gods!”

She collapses half-a-meter away, coughing, shaking and drenched in black filth. Still, when she glances over and her teeth chatter, the coolness in her eyes tells me all I need.

I saved her, but I am still a demon.

She does not trust me.

Rain wipes grey sludge off his face as Gabriel stands, both hands over his hips as he tries to even his breath. “There are miracles tonight, it seems.”

I guide Nora to her feet.

“But—Katherine.” Her lips tremble as she peers around. “She… she’s not with you.”

Lightning forks across the sky.

“Your Grace,” Williams calls out, behind me, breathless.

He and the Butler stagger into view, soaked through, carrying the limp form of Mrs. Grange between them. Blood lines her skirts. A rough bandage is tied around her leg.

“She fell down the ridge,” Everly says. “Half-conscious, but breathing.”

I look through the trees, and every muscle in my body shakes.

There she is, perched at the edge of a cliff.

She stands without a stitch of clothing, her back facing me.

Her skin glistens with rain, and her long black hair wild inside the flowing gusts that bend trees. The downpour clings to her like silk.

Katherine.

She turns her head slowly, revealing one pale, hollow cheek. Her eyes are open, but glazed. As though she still sleeps.

She smiles.

Not at me.

Through me.

Lighting distorts my voice as I yell.

“Katherine!”