Page 59 of The Curse of Indy Moore (The Cursed Duology #1)

He set off. Wind hit the cottage, threatening to tear the structure apart. I lurched after him, shocked to find nothing, save a handful of black feathers on the doorstep. Rooke vanished, and I didn’t know if I could save him.

I wasn’t sure how long I stood there, expecting this mirage to fade. It never did because this was truly reality, and that… It wasn’t Rooke.

He wouldn’t have left us stranded in the cold.

He wouldn’t have walked by a grieving woman or frightened a girl clinging to a blanket.

He wouldn’t have let me drag my bare, aching feet through cold, wet muck to get my clothes.

Rooke wouldn’t have done any of this. Whoever that was, it wasn’t him, and I would do anything to find him once I got myself and Carline out of here.

Carline knelt in the mud, head down and fingers deep in the soil. I approached, hesitant, clutching my clothes to my chest. The mud gurgled when my feet sank. Carline raised her head, revealing warm brown eyes, human even, and lacking all recognition.

“You, girl!” She smiled so sweetly, she didn’t look like herself. “Have you seen her?”

“Who?” I asked, surprised when she took my hands to hold.

“My girl. My little girl. She’s five, you see, and I…and now she’s, she’s…” Her brows furrowed, and her eyes dimmed, then she smiled, confused. “Hello dear, do I know you?”

Whatever Rooke had done left Carline an utter mess. I didn’t know if she would regain her mind, but I couldn’t leave her there alone. Rooke took her power, somehow, and I wasn’t sure if she could get that back either.

“Yes, we’re dear friends,” I lied. When I took her arm, she leaned into me. “Let us get inside. It’s far too dangerous out here.”

“Yes, woods are dangerous after dark. Demons love to prowl in the night, you know.” She followed to the cottage without fuss, where I moved the couch back into place .

Carline sat in front of the fire, muttering to herself while I got dressed upstairs. A whimper broke past my defenses, urging on tears that I wiped away. I couldn’t cry yet, not when our lives remained on the line.

Using bedsheets and tacks, I covered the broken windows on the first floor. That was the worst of the damage. We could stay in the cottage until daybreak. It wouldn’t be safe to travel the woods so late when it was cold, and I didn’t know how far we were from any town or the main road.

Checking the kitchen, there were stocks of food, and the water worked.

We would be alright for a few days even.

I could make us packs for our traveling, so I took to doing that.

Carline sang from the couch. I didn’t recognize the lullaby, but it eased the eerie sense of the cottage.

She had a lovely voice that didn’t suit the demon that had cursed me.

“Did you write that lullaby yourself?” I asked after finishing our packs. They sat on the kitchen counter while I joined Carline on the couch.

“Yes, for my Antonia. She won’t sleep without a lullaby.” Carline abruptly stood, ringing her hands together. “Where is she? Antonia!”

My girl, she had said. For her Antonia. Did she name a wolf that? Or was Antonia a person?

“Antonia isn’t here right now.” I took her hand to ease her onto the couch. She looked at me for answers that I gave in lies. “She’s at a friend’s house. We’re setting out to find her tomorrow.”

“Oh, good, good. Having friends is important.”

A frantic voice sounded from outside. “Indy! Indy, are you there?”

My heart leapt into my throat. I ran for the door, throwing it open.

Otis and Professor Kumir stood on the porch, their expressions panicked then relieved.

Otis dragged me into his arms, where he hugged me so fiercely I thought I’d break.

I didn’t want him to stop, though. He smelled nice, like the chamomile tea he loved to make, and it brought a comfort I sorely needed.

“Thank the stars, you’re alright.” He grabbed me by the shoulders to look over. “You are alright, aren’t you? ”

“Yes, the curse is broken, and I’m as well as I can be,” I answered with a nervous glance at Professor Kumir. She had a stern look about her, like she was about to deliver bad news. Or knew I was. “But Rooke…”

“Has vanished.” Professor Kumir shoved her way into the cottage, a hand waving wildly above her head.

“The child appeared at Ivory House like a storm, snatched up his damned cat, then disappeared. I wouldn’t have known he had returned at all if Beamy hadn’t been on my lap when it happ—” Professor Kumir fell silent upon seeing who sat on the couch.

Smiling with all her teeth that were still oddly pointed, Carline waved. “Good evening. Are we having a party?”

“Tell me that isn’t who I think it is,” Professor Kumir whispered.

“This is Carline. Carline, this is Otis Thatcher and Professor Nysha Kumir,” I said, earning confused looks from Otis and Professor Kumir.

Carline’s eyes lingered momentarily on Otis, then she gave a dainty bow of her head. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Professor Kumir and Otis simultaneously yanked me into the dining room. It was a miracle they didn’t pop my arms out of their sockets.

Professor Kumir double checked that Carline hadn’t followed before hissing, “What in the blazes is going on?”

I explained the fiasco as much as I could.

Professor Kumir, with her wisdom on demons, asked for specifics concerning Slate and Rooke, the look of them, the feelings I had during the attack, and the words used afterward.

I gave every detail I could recall. After what we went through, I understood that the details mattered most. Saving Rooke would be in those details, and I couldn’t risk faltering, but it wasn’t my information that had the cottage falling silent.

Some time later, as I was questioned, Carline walked to the window. She pressed her fingers against the glass, her eyes half-mast and voice low. “I was hiding. I was hiding, and he found me. He consumed the others. He wanted to consume me, too, so I ran. I ran, and he found me. ”

“Rooke did?” Otis took a careful step toward her. “Do you mean Rooke had been searching for you?”

“I didn’t know who he was, just that he was taking us one by one, and soon, he will be taken too.” Carline met my eyes. Her expression softened with pity. “You should fear what he does next.”

She wandered to the couch with a palm pressed to her temple.

Groaning, she shook her head and laughed.

“What a lovely little cottage, reminds me of home!” She sang her lullaby, utterly oblivious to what she shared.

Otis tried asking about Rooke again, to which she responded, “Oh, I do love chess, especially against such a handsome man. Shall we play a game?”

Otis choked on his own breath, and Carline laughed.

“We shouldn’t push her. Her memories may return in time.

Hopefully.” Professor Kumir had hunger in her eyes.

“Can you imagine what she could share with us? The stories she could tell, if her memories recover. We may yet understand how demons come into being. Oh, I could write for the remainder of my life and have more to tell.”

“Let’s focus on Rooke for the time being,” I said.

“Right, yes, of course, that stupid boy.” The professor fell into a chair in the dining room.

Otis and I joined her. A sense of melancholy hung over all of us.

“By the sounds of it, we don’t have time. This, whatever Rooke is doing, has been going on for a while.” Otis tapped his fingers on the table. “We were up north just last month. Rooke and I received passes to Arestat to conduct botany research on plants in their mountains where…”

“Where Carline used to preside,” Professor Kumir finished for him. Her hands rested on the head of her cane, clenched tight. “Then she ran.”

“And we abruptly turned south with Rooke complaining about the cold.” Laughing, Otis pressed a hand to his head. “But it was for her. He was chasing her this whole damn time. ”

“And other demons before that. I am now certain he is the reason the elder demons are missing. It is too much of a coincidence that Stelmane went missing during the time you visited her jungle, and Carline likely would have gotten herself killed in these woods if Indy weren’t here.

Tell me everywhere the two of you traveled in the last five years.

I fear that this plot may run back at least that far. ”

My blood ran cold while Otis went over their whereabouts that all coincided with the missing demons. Everywhere they visited, a demon of old presided, then went missing.

“It was Rooke this whole time,” I whispered, pressing a hand over my twisting stomach. “He did to those demons what he did to Carline, drained them, somehow, but why? Slate is a demon, too, he said so himself.”

“It isn’t entirely unheard of.” Professor Kumir got up to pace.

Her cane clicked against the floor in perfect intervals.

“There have been demons who attacked their own kind, either to protect their territory or the nearby souls when they shared similar afflictions. We believed some to be naturally violent, but if Rooke and his demon sought others—and you mentioned he did it to acquire power—then that may be their affliction. They wanted power, and the best way to get it was taking it from other demons.”

Professor Kumir came to an abrupt stop at the same moment Otis went rigid. They shared an understanding that made me short of breath. Whatever came to mind didn’t bode well.

“Your report,” he said, standing and nearly knocking his chair back.

“That was so long ago,” she countered, swaying like the shock made her lightheaded. “He was a teenager. He couldn’t have… This whole time… We would have realized it!”

“What?” I asked, that sickness growing thicker in my gut. “What is it?”

“You recall the report that I mentioned Rooke thieving?” Professor Kumir fell into her chair, the energy zapped from her.

“Her Majesty visited me with concerns years ago concerning demons and how we may put a stop to them entirely. She asked if it was possible, if there was anything we could do to ensure no one fell to them again and even stop our enemies from using them in battle. I looked into it, if only to assure her it wasn’t possible, but soon realized maybe we could.

I had a theory on how to stop or even prevent demons like Carline, a spell to steal their ancient power, which I soon destroyed out of fear of what it could do.

Her Majesty may stop others but not herself.

It wasn’t worth looking into, but Rooke read it. ”

“How long has he been planning this?” Otis muttered, covering his face that I didn’t need to see to know it was pained.

“Long enough to know what he needed,” I replied, the ache within me growing into a painful throb as I realized a truth, too. “Long enough to know that he couldn’t get through Carline’s defenses without a cursed soul to weaken her.”

Meaning I didn’t stumble on Ivory House.

That memory of the door there in the field was real, and it wasn’t Ivory House saving me; it was Rooke waiting for Carline to “take a risk.” Rooke had been playing a game from the start, feigning his disinterest, then putting his all into doing what needed to be done.

“He used me,” I said, clenching my hands into fists.

I wanted to scream, to shove the table over and break the windows. This had been a trick from the beginning for Rooke to get what he desired, and I was a pawn.

“Indy.” Otis settled his hand on mine.

I thought of all the times we shared, every moment that had been calculated. Earlier, too, the kiss, wanting me at Ivory House. Did that serve a purpose? His purpose?

“Did he ever truly care?”

“He did. He does.” Otis held my hands fiercely, having taken a seat to meet my eyes. He was fierce in his belief, in his trust in Rooke, even now. “We all do. He has been led astray, I am sure of it. You are, too, even if it hurts right now, and it should, but Indy, this isn’t him.”

I hoped it wasn’t.

“He certainly can’t save himself now, so we must do it for him.” The professor settled her elbow on the table and gestured toward Otis. “Do you happen to know what debt Rooke has to repay in the capital? ”

I kept hold of Otis’s hand as he leaned forward, dejected, but aware. “Saule Avagnon,” he said.

The sovereign’s brother, the prince who broke Rooke’s wrist during his childhood. I didn’t understand why. Being angry at him, sure, but to do all this? That was a mighty grudge to carry for over a decade.

“He told me about what happened, but is that enough to make this vast plan and give his soul up to a demon?” I asked.

“He must have not shared all of it.” Otis’s eyes went dark, his voice low.

“Luther and Colt were there when it happened. Luther did not take kindly to the prince harming his little brother. He punched Saule, and the Hawthorne family lost everything. They all worked at the palace until that moment, then Colt and Luther had to go into the mines. Otherwise, they would have been on the streets.”

“But Saule wasn’t punished,” Professor Kumir snarled, and Otis nodded.

“He wasn’t, and you can imagine that Rooke’s success has never sat well with Saule.

They have butted heads on occasion, but ultimately, Rooke has always blamed the prince for Luther’s death, the breakage in their family, for all the trials and tribulations they all faced, and that hatred has grown to be pointed at the royal family as a whole. ”

I couldn’t say I blamed him, that it wasn’t his right to be angered and want any semblance of justice. He had a debt to repay indeed, but the question became how he would fulfill that debt.

“Do you think he’ll…” I didn’t want to finish the thought.

“I doubt he spent this much time to end his revenge all in one shot,” Otis replied. “No, Rooke spent his life planning this. Whatever this plan entails, it will take time.”

We hoped it would.

“Then we shouldn’t waste that time.” I stood and held the pendant Rooke made, pouring a whole new will within. “We better save Rooke before he loses his soul for good.”