Page 12 of Darkest at Dusk (Revenant Roses)

Chapter Six

M onday dawned dreary, the low hanging sky a smear of charcoal and soot. It wasn’t quite wet enough to be called rain or cold enough to be called snow, but it was miserable all the same.

Isabella refused to look back as the hired hackney carried her away from the narrow house she and Papa had called home all her life.

The windows had been shuttered, the hearth gone cold.

She had sold or given away everything she could not carry, her life whittled to two trunks.

One contained Papa’s secret books locked up tight.

The other was stuffed with her clothing and accessories, her mother’s silver brush and comb set, a kit wrapped in oilcloth containing the tools of her trade, and Papa’s coat, folded flat at the trunk’s bottom.

She had been unable to leave it, just as she had been unable to stay.

Now, as the hack creaked to a halt, the station loomed before her, its iron-and-glass roof rising like the ribcage of a monstrous beast. It struck her that this place, all steel and steam and shrieking metal, could not be more unlike her father’s book-lined study.

He had hated trains, called them unnatural, noisy contraptions built to scar the countryside.

He would have hated this journey, and the destination even more.

Harrowgate Manor, home of Rhys Caradoc, a man her father had warned her about in the most strident terms. She could pretend that she had accepted his offer solely because there had been no other and because she had been desperate and afraid.

But while those things were true, they were not the only truths.

Beneath the grief and guilt and the echo of Papa’s disapproval, there was a well of curiosity, vast and deep.

Something about Mr. Caradoc’s visit had opened a wound in Papa that morning, one that had festered deep beneath the surface and gnawed at his spirit, igniting a darkness in him and sending him spiralling in a coil of despair and dismay. Ever since that visit, Papa had been afraid.

And now Rhys Caradoc wanted her under his roof. She intended to find out why.

Fog curled around her as she stepped down from the hack onto the damp stone. She paid the driver, and he dropped her trunks beside her, the smaller with a thud, the larger with a loud scrape and groan that made her ribs tighten.

A porter in a frayed waistcoat with a pencil behind his ear materialized with a handcart.

“Destination?” he asked.

“Maidenhead,” she said.

He tied on a pasteboard label written in a neat, black hand and whistled up a second man.

“Guard’s van for this beast, miss,” he said with a gesture at Papa’s trunk. “You’ll not want it crowding your compartment.”

She watched with unease as the second man trundled the trunks away, wheels rattling over iron seams.

“Don’t worry, miss. They’ll be safe and you’ll see them again when you reach Maidenhead,” the porter said.

She palmed him a shilling and tucked the luggage claim in her glove, then followed the crowd into the station. Steam hissed from engines, mingling with the din of clanging luggage carts, shouting porters, and the screech of metal wheels.

Weaving through the press of travellers, Isabella strode forward.

The air around her grew cold as cellar stones.

Two wraiths glided at the corners of her vision, vague, spectral forms that drifted along the edges of the platform, untouched by the chaos around them.

One turned its face toward her, mouth open in a soundless plea.

The other lifted a beckoning hand, fingers tipped in curled talons.

Isabella walked on, refusing to acknowledge them. Not here. Not now.

Heart tripping, she approached the Bristol train, its engine exhaling thick clouds of steam that curled around the wheels and drifted across the platform.

Mr. Caradoc had spared no expense; her ticket was for the first-class carriage.

A porter opened the door for her, and she stepped into a compartment with walls of polished wood and green velvet seats that were deep and cushioned.

A brass lamp swayed overhead. She took a seat by the window and watched the crowd surge past: a mother clutching the hands of two small children; a woman carrying a hatbox; an elderly man leaning heavily on his cane; a group of young men, talking and laughing.

But the compartment itself was empty, save herself. She was alone. And though the seat was soft and comfortable, the emptiness pressed in on her, unsettling.

A sharp rap sounded at the carriage door. Startled, Isabella turned as Mr. Christopher swung it open, breathless from running the length of the platform. His hat was askew, his cravat loose, his face flushed with exertion.

“Mr. Christopher!”

“Miss Barrett,” he said, his tone urgent. “I was afraid I would be too late.” He stepped inside, shutting the door against the rush of steam and shouts outside. “I could not let you go without warning you.” The gravity of his expression made her wary.

“I made inquiries,” he continued, catching his breath.

“I hired a man, discreet but thorough. We have not the time for me to provide details but suffice it to say that while Mr. Caradoc is what he seems, a gentleman of means, there is also a blight on his history. My man traced him to St. Jude’s Asylum. He was a patient there many years ago.”

The name struck Isabella in her heart, making it twist in fear and remembered horror.

Her palms went clammy inside her gloves, her breath coming in short rasps.

Memories of St. Jude’s clawed their way free.

The reek of carbolic acid and damp stone.

The muffled cries that haunted the corridors.

Bars on the windows. Wired panes in the doors.

And now she was to picture Rhys Caradoc there, trapped in a windowless room, gray eyes dulled by the shadows that haunted that place. If he had been a patient there many years ago, he would have been a very young man at the time.

Why had he been confined? What had driven him into that place? And most of all, was it only happenstance that he had sought out Papa…and her?

Papa’s warning came back to her with sudden force. He had wanted her as far from Rhys Caradoc as possible. And yet, here she was, about to deliver herself into his hands.

Mr. Christopher’s eyes softened. “Your father was more to me than a client, Miss Barrett. He was my friend. I believe he would want me to watch over you.” He studied her carefully. “I must ask…Are you certain this is what you want? To go to Harrowgate Manor?”

Certain? No, not at all.

Fear churned through her like quicklime. She opened her mouth to demand more—why Mr. Caradoc had been there; what affliction had chained him to those barred rooms—but the shrill of the guard’s whistle cut her off.

The train shuddered beneath her feet, ready to pull away.

Mr. Christopher offered his hand. “Come now. Quickly, before it is too late.”

Isabella rose, her body taut with indecision. For an instant, she nearly followed him, nearly let herself be guided back to the platform. Her pulse pounded in her ears.

But for all his concern and kindness, Mr. Christopher had offered her no other path, no other refuge.

Where else could she go? What else could she do?

And beneath those concerns sat a deeper truth.

She needed answers. Needed to understand what had driven Papa to such despair, what had brought Rhys Caradoc to their door.

“No,” she said, firm. “I must go.”

Worry flickered across Mr. Christopher’s face, but he only nodded once and said, “Then may God keep you.”

His hand slipped from hers and he stepped down. Steam roiled up to swallow him.

Isabella lowered herself to her seat once more, her hands pressed tight together in her lap, the echo of Mr. Christopher’s words and Papa’s warnings tangling like thorns in her chest. Whatever waited at Harrowgate, she was bound for it now.

The train gave a lurch that rocked through the floor beneath her feet, and she braced herself as it began to move. Pulse racing, she watched the platform slide away, the glass-and-steel vault of the station vanishing into the fog.

The soot-streaked buildings of London gave way to countryside painted in shades of gray and green.

The world grew quieter, the sky larger, the view unimpeded by buildings.

In the distance, fields stretched beneath a pewter sky, their hedgerows frosted white.

Smoke curled from the chimneys of distant cottages.

Isabella rested her gloved hand against the windowpane, the cold of the glass biting through.

As the minutes gathered into miles, the cadence of iron on iron worked its slow spell. Her head sank back against the plush seat. The carriage lamp hummed. The train swayed. Her lashes lowered. Sleep slipped in on the next curve.

A wraith touched her nape.

The whispers grew harsh.

The rain fell, dripping off the edges of her umbrella.

Shivering, she looked down at her father’s open grave then up again.

She looked to the hedge where Mr. Christopher waited just out of sight.

Mr. Caradoc was in the distance now, the fog swirling at his back. She lifted her skirt and hurried after him, instinct guiding her feet.

But no matter how she quickened her pace, she could not catch him.

She called out, but he did not turn or slow.

She hurried past endless rows of gravestones, moss-covered and damp.

The rows grew narrower, the stones taller, until she was forced to turn sideways to maneuver between them.

Her heart pounded and her mouth grew dry, unease gnawing at her like vermin at a carcass.