Page 62 of On Edge

His eyes narrow. “Are you lost?”

“I was just…er…looking for...”

“Looking for who?”

I’m tempted to say Severin, but who am I kidding? “Um, the journalist. Tobias?”

Mundel’s face darkens. “You just missed him.”

“Really? I didn’t see?—”

“He’s gone.”

“Right, I’ll head back then.” I take a few steps the way I came. But as I glance over my shoulder, Mundel, forgotten about me already, has gone off in the opposite direction, deeper into the woods.He’s not looking, so I have a split second to decide if I’m following him or not.

Ignoring the way my pulse surges, I hurry after him, slipping among the trees into which he vanished. But stalking someone through the woods in a dress isn’t easy; twigs snap under my feet, and my skirt catches in brambles all too often. Once or twice, he looks back, though I quickly have sense to dart behind a tree, breath held, blowing only the smallest puffs of icy air out.

But I quickly lose Mundel. I’m too far away to keep sight of him in his camouflage jacket, and I’m not wearing the rightclothes or outerwear. I did bring my cardigan this time, but it’s no use when the downpour suddenly buckets through the canopy. I’m drenched in seconds, shivering and miserable. I really need to go shopping. I should have at least grabbed a coat from the boot room.

As I trudge back to the house, there’s the sound of neighing. I look up past the helipad. A horse is prancing on a hill. I squint to see if there’s a rider, but the rain in my face makes it hard to see, and then it disappears.

Severin has horses?

Having missed my chance with Tobias, I hike around the helipad to where I can only assume the horse went, ignoring the damp grass leaking through my boots. I don’t really know why, except I’m not quite ready to go back to the house.

Over the crest, there’s a crop of outbuildings—stables to be exact. I enter the yard, and there’s an American barn. It looks to have been recently renovated, with its bottom ash black, and the rest stark white, as if it were burned down to a shell and then rebuilt. My eyes catch on an old brass plaque mounted on the central beam above the large barn door. Although it’s what’s written underneath on a shiny new one that stops me dead:

SWANLEY FARM STUD

Est. 1847

In memory of those we’ve lost.

My breath stutters. Why would Severin keep the Swanley plaque and add a memorial beneath it? Could it be he’s making a gesture? Or is he…mourning his own family. Shaking off the way the hairs at the back of my neck stand on end, I haul open the huge doors.

I shouldn’t think of Troy Severin as the lost Swanley heir. Not until I know for sure. And even if he is, it doesn’t matter. I’mhere for Nell; he took her from me, and that’s what I need to prove.

Nothing else.

Inside, several equine heads peer out over the stalls. A roan-colored horse in the nearest stall nickers at me, so I stop to stroke him first, even as the cold air from outside blows in the barn and right through me.

“Hey, horse.”

The big roan nuzzles my damp cardigan, looking for treats. Of course, I have none. But he doesn’t seem to mind nibbling my hands gently, blowing on my palms, warming me up inside and out. His coat steams from the recent ride, and the familiar scent of hay and leather brings an unexpected pang of longing. I used to ride before I got sick. Nell did too, but she was really good at it, while I never really got over my first fall from the saddle. I much preferred being on the ground, grooming or mucking out.

“My sister loved horses,” I tell the roan, and he snorts in response and wedges his head against mine as I hug him.It feels nice to talk to someone, anyone.

An ally on this ghastly island.

I end up telling the horse everything I know so far about Severin, every scrap of evidence I have—even my crazy suspicion about him being the heir of the Swanley family. Saying it out loud sounds ridiculous, so I whisper it into his coat, and I feel better for it.

The cold inside me thaws, just enough, so I’m less frozen and corpse-like. More human.

“I know he’s horrid, and I should stab him the first chance I get. But I pity him more than anything. I’ve no idea how I’m meant to do it anyway. Maybe I should just bake him a poison cake?” The horse seems to agree because he snorts.

But then, something primitive in my brain sounds an alarm, and the horses around me suddenly go quiet. Never a goodsign. Heart thudding in my ears, I slip into the stall and crouch down by the door, my nerves leaving me when I actually hear footsteps.

“Talking to yourself again, are we?”