Page 51 of Fragile Wicked Things

"Are you Jane?" the stranger asked me to which I nodded.

He had a round, pudgy face, short brown hair and a scar running along the underside of his jaw.

He then spun around, looking to the ground.

"My satchel. I must have dropped it in the bushes.

" He lifted the underbrush, kicking the dirt until he hit something and picked up a bag.

"Thomas is bait," he said over his shoulder.

"The kid knows what he's doing. Sort of.

We have an hour to sunrise. Unfortunately, I was caught earlier than planned. "

"I don't understand," I said.

The man removed two wooden stakes from his satchel and tossed them to Rochester and me. Rochester grasped it in one swift move while my clumsy fingers hit the stake and knocked it to the ground. I retrieved it.

"Thomas would kill me for bringing you into this, but we misjudged the number of Blanche's men and could use the help. Name's Colonel," he said before moving past us to the house.

Colonel shimmied open a window and we climbed in, stepping into the kitchen.

Voices carried from the drawing room, low at first, but grew louder above the music that played.

The Colonel headed out, peered around a doorjamb, and, after a few seconds, indicated that we should follow.

Down the hallway and along the staircase we tiptoed in the semi-dark with Colonel a few steps ahead of us.

Rochester walked in front of me. It was unclear to me what the plan was, but as the Colonel walked towards the closed door of the drawing room, I prepared myself.

I clenched the stake tighter, holding it in a striking position in front of me when Franklin stepped out from the darkness between us and the Colonel.

With his back to Franklin, Colonel had no warning as a claw slashed into his back and he let out a scream. The alarm had been sounded.

Rochester jumped Franklin, pushing him to the ground and threw himself on top.

They struggled, Rochester attempting to drive the stake into Franklin's chest, but Franklin was equal in strength and pushed back, gained the upper hand and threw Rochester off balance.

He slammed him into the hallway table and it splintered in large pieces.

With Rochester out of the way, Franklin came at me.

The stake shook violently in my hand, and when he grabbed for it, I stabbed his hand.

The pain was minimal compared to what he was capable of doing to me.

I had angered him and he charged at me again, mouth wide and teeth bared when an arrow thrust through his heart.

For a moment, he looked down at the arrow, pulled it out and crushed it.

Again, he charged for me, then stopped to look at his hands, turning them over.

His skin was turning, first grey, then charcoal, then black, until he was nothing more than ashes that withered away.

I looked up in time to see a man with a crossbow race down the stairs towards us.

"Colonel," he said, pressing his fingers against the Colonel's wrist. "He's alive."

Blanche's laughter carried into the hallway, muffled by the closed door to the drawing room.

Rochester stood, wiped the blood from his face, took determined steps to the drawing room and kicked the door off its hinges.

Blanche stood, guarded by her men on either side of her, her unholy hands clasped around Thomas's neck.

"No." The tiny syllable escaped me.

From behind me, an arrow whizzed past and I could feel its vibration.

It was followed by another and another in quick succession, hitting several of Blanche's men in the heart.

Rochester charged into hand-to-hand combat with two others.

He tore at them, ripping them to shreds and when he was done with those two, moved on to the others.

Blood splattered on the walls, all over me, some even got into my mouth.

An animal cry came from Rochester; there was an ease in his movement and his destruction.

He was no longer Rochester, but the beast that did his bidding.

He snapped necks and thrust the stake into empty hearts and shattered bones. Ashes consumed us.

Finally, Blanche's laughter subsided. She looked around at her imminent defeat, the ashes of her nest clung to her hair. "Oh my," she whispered.

Blanched then sunk her teeth into Thomas’s neck.

This she did for me to watch, for me to suffer and as I stood before her, my hand poised to strike, my anguished cries spreading all around, I saw what she couldn't—a glint in Thomas’s eyes.

As she buried her teeth deeper, Thomas’s hands trembled downwards then snatched a stake tucked into his pant leg.

He took a deep breath and thrust the stake upwards, stabbing Blanche in the neck.

The demon let out a horrific scream and struck Thomas, sending him across the room.

She clutched at her neck to stop the blood from flowing, and wobbled forward, weakened, but not yet defeated.

In moments, she was upon me, ripped the stake from my hands and when I turned to Rochester, I saw he was under attack by three more of Blanche's men.

He tried to fight them off to get to me, but there were too many of them.

In his eyes was the one thing he most likely didn't want me to see, and his face crumpled in defeat. He could not save me.

Supposedly, your life flashes before your eyes when death comes, but that's not what happened to me.

Instead, everything that followed was in slow motion.

Blanche dragged me along the floor to the front door, pulling me by my clothes, my hair, my arms and tossed me outside like a rag doll.

Even wounded, she was by far stronger. I lay on the ground, hands splayed out, raking the gravel for a weapon of some sort and found nothing.

"Rochester! Edward!"

"He can't save you now."

She took a step toward me. Blood flowed from her wound, and she swayed. When she stopped to regain her balance, I scrambled to my feet and ran. Her laughter followed me into the maze.

"I love it when they run."

It was a decision under duress that could only lead to a terrible outcome: trapping myself in a maze with the Minotaur and being chased by a demon.

Each corner I rounded appeared no different from the last, and often, I found myself at a dead end.

My breath came in hard, my heart raced, and her laughter floated around me.

"I can hear your heart pounding." Her voice sounded as though she were next to me.

I dashed around another corner.

"I can smell you."

I stumbled onto the mossy ground, got back up, and sprinted.

"I can taste you."

Rounding another corner, I crashed into someone and screamed, but when I heard her laughter far away, I realized it was the Minotaur statue I had bumped into. What did Rochester tell me that night I first got lost there? From the Minotaur in the center, one left, followed by all rights.

I carried on, made a left, then a right.

Sunlight was hitting the top of the hedge, and specks streamed through the brush.

The sun was rising. It was darker in the maze and more dangerous the longer I remained, and when I saw the exit, I ran for it.

Finally, I was free and stepped into the opening when hands were on me, holding me tight, drawing me in.

I struggled against Blanche, pulling away from her blue eyes and jagged teeth.

I could not release myself from her grasp.

I could not run. The image of her horrid face would be my last on this earth.

Suddenly, Blanche was thrown to the ground, and Rochester stepped in between us. She screamed at the betrayal. Again, he picked her up and tossed her, so she landed on the driveway, away from me. Rochester moved towards her, a stake clasped in his hand and high in the air, ready to strike.

"You made me!" she said.

He stopped, affected by her words and lowered his hand. Humanity had returned, but I longed for the beast to strike her. Yes, he had made her and had paid the consequences for it. Above all things, it was redemption that he sought, yet he shouldn’t seek it from her.

"Edward," I said, stepping towards him. He turned away from me.

A ray of sunshine inched toward us, fanning out and brought light where once there was darkness.

Blanche sprung from the ground, her arms outstretched to take hold of me.

Her fingernail scratched my arm and drew blood, but then Rochester stepped in and pushed Blanche against the Great Oak tree that had been struck by lightning.

With hesitation, he held the stake against her heart.

Even then, her maniacal laugh escaped her and swallowed up the air around us.

"Do it!" she told him. "Put me out of my misery."

"Forgive me," said Rochester and he thrust the stake into her, but she struggled, shifted and he missed her heart, stabbing her in her shoulder instead.

She gasped and, looking down at the stake, knotted her eyebrows in absolute surprise, and her lips formed an 'o.

' Blood dripped from her wound. The blue of her eyes lost their intensity, her teeth rounded and the features of her face softened, but the wounds to her shoulder and neck were not enough to kill her.

Rochester thrust the stake deeper. Certainly, it caused pain, but nothing more.

She looked at him, reached out to touch his face and stared as a mist rose from her hands.

The sun was coming out. Her face stiffened, cracked and blackened.

Rochester stared in horror at what he had done.

Then I saw it. A mist was rising from him, too.

He looked first at his hands and then at me. The sun was killing him.

"Inside," I yelled to him. "Get inside now." I pulled at his arm, but he stood steadfast.

"Did you see? I'm releasing her from the darkness. Free me."

"No! Edward, not like this." Again, I tugged at him, like a small child trying to drag a parent somewhere.

His skin continued to burn and sizzle. All the while, Blanche laughed at us.

I threw my arms around him, pled with him, and kissed his cheeks, his nose, and his lips, but he was dying before my eyes.

A curtain panel came down on Rochester, pushing him to the ground. When I looked up, I found Thomas standing near us, blood still dripping from his neck.

"Help me get him inside," he said.

We pushed a weakened Rochester toward the house and into the front foyer, where he fell to the tiled floor.

Thomas closed the door behind us, out of the sun's reach.

There, we knelt by a motionless Rochester under the damask cloth, its side edged in gold tassels.

I fingered one of them and rubbed my thumb against the smooth, round ball, too afraid to peek underneath.

"The Vampyres are dead," Thomas said.

Rochester's blackened fingers stuck out from under the curtain, charred and motionless. The foyer reeked of burning flesh.

"Edward," I whispered and lay on the floor next to him.

There was no response. When I reached out to touch his fingers, they did not flick up in reaction to my touch. I stroked them until tears sprang to my eyes, sucked in a breath and lifted the curtain, peering into the darkness.

Rochester's cold, black eyes stared back at me.