Chapter 33 #2
“I’ll find her,” I promise. I can’t decide whether it’s better or worse to tell Rylan, but I need the soldiers to be aware. “The duchess is the Beast of Brimmond.”
Rylan gapes at me before saying, “What?”
“Get my sister out of here,” I tell Anders. “I’ll be right down.”
Anders scoops my sister up in a cradle carry and walks toward the door. I do a search to be sure that no soldiers remain—and that my mother is not on another floor of the smoking building.
By the time I descend, the squadron of W?chter soldiers has filed out the door in an orderly fashion. Most of the women already have their hands on the hilts of their swords, and their red-shot eyes are scanning the area. Coughs and gagging are the only sounds other than one woman’s retching.
Outside, Alain is slumped on the ground.
Nolan is beside him, alternating between coughs and issuing orders.
He sees me and says, “The steward says the monster goes to her husband’s tomb several times a day and at night.
If she’s not there, Alain says that the duke’s study in the castle is where the woman can be found. There or in the duke’s bedroom.”
Anders lowers Rylan to the ground.
“Keep her safe at all costs, Anders. Have someone tend Alain.” I swallow my panic. “The rest of you with me. The duchess is the Beast of Brimmond,” I repeat, “and she has my mother.”
Sword in hand, I stalk across the courtyard, trailed by eight soldiers.
A few stray birds sing in the nearby treetops, and the rustling of leaves interrupts their song as the wind shifts. At the main door, I let myself into the massive structure.
“Two of you here, so no one comes behind me,” I order before carrying on into the castle proper.
Inside, I search each room with the six soldiers still with me. On the ground floor we find a few unconscious servants, whom two soldiers break off to carry outside to what is becoming a makeshift infirmary.
Unexpectedly, when I push open the door to the kitchen, I find the entire kitchen staff seemingly oblivious to the chaos on the grounds.
“Oh my!”
“M’lady! You startled us,” one of the bakers says sternly, hands still kneading a ball of dough on the wooden tray in front of her.
Are they oblivious or complicit? doubt demands.
“Stay alert,” I tell the remaining four soldiers with me. “Two here. You two with me.”
We begin a search of the vast room. The larder is a good spot to hide, as are a few of the largest cupboards. I check every possible hiding place—including the rafters overhead. With such claws, the Beast of Brimmond surely can climb.
One of the older women finally loses the edge of her temper. “What are you doing? Coming in here, waving a sword and scaring—”
“There was an attack.” I check the windows. “The garrison was set on fire. Alain was injured.”
“What?”
I ignore the question and ask, “Has anyone seen the duchess or the countess?”
“They were taking the air earlier,” a woman with a handful of turnips offers. “Her Grace is fond of a brisk walk.”
The kitchen staff seems uninjured, unaware, and unhelpful. I’m not sure I want to send more bodies into the courtyard, so I tell them, “Stay inside. Barricade the door, and do not open it unless Alain or I come to you. No one else, not even the duchess.”
“Who are you to overrule Her G—”
“The Hunter. No one but me or the steward.” I cannot tell them that the dowager duchess isn’t human. That conversation isn’t my place—or my priority right now.
A hasty search of the rest of the rooms turns up more of the same—a few oblivious people and a couple more maids who are hiding or injured. No dead.
And no countess.
Back outside I can’t stop from scanning the tall grasses and shrubs. The sky is painted in colors of evening. The red and gold swaths of light start to make the world seem beautiful, but it’s hard to believe that there can be beauty when my mother is missing and the dowager duchess is a killer.
I spy fresh footprints disturbing the muddy path toward the Maudite tomb. A few flecks of purple goop and red blood spot the crushed seashells that line the path, signifying that both women are injured.
My mother’s blood.
The Beast of Brimmond has shed my mother’s blood.
The purple is the beast’s blood!
Memories of my father holding his organs inside flash to mind as I hurry toward the tomb overlooking the sea. The roar of the waves battering the cliff is loud enough that between it and the wind rustling the long grasses, I think my approach is surely silent.
“Mother,” I breathe at the sight of her. I know she’s injured, but she’s alive. Her throat is unbloodied, and her stomach is intact.
Her eyes burn when she sees me, and I am reminded that she is the last Hunter’s widow and the current Hunter’s mother. Her mouth shapes only two words: “Kill it.”
My mother is on the ground, half pinned under a part of the tomb that was recently broken off. She does not ask for rescue or even help. She asks for vengeance.
At first the dowager duchess seems not to notice me.
She’s clawing at the stone of the tomb. Great furrows look as if the beast has dragged claws deep into the stone although the duchess still looks human.
Her hands are bloodied in several places, and the wind from the sea rips at her hair and clothing.
I move toward my mother slowly, and the dowager duchess pivots. “Oh, the Hunter has come to call,” the dowager duchess says. “I see my daughter didn’t kill you.”
“Why would she? We are to be wed,” I say, glancing at my mother. The urge to run to her vies with my training. Impulsivity leads to mistakes, but she’s my mother.
The duchess pulls something from a pocket. “Bite this, and I’ll let Honora live.”
“A binding bargain?” I ask. I know that within Faerie are fruits that can trap a person, but this must simply be poison.
“Yes. Bite the fruit.” The Beast of Brimmond hurls it toward me.
I pluck it out of the air. “You will not hurt her?”
“Correct. If you bite the fruit.” The dowager duchess points at the fruit in my hand and then she kicks the stone off my mother and jerks her to her feet. The distant splash of the stone hitting the sea below is swallowed under the sound of the crashing waves.
The dowager duchess’ hand shifts. Claws lengthen and stretch, and I can see exactly why she was so able to sever men’s heads.
Those blade-sharp fingers are too near my mother’s delicate skin.
I step closer, and the beastly part of the duchess comes fully to the surface.
Hair sprouts all over her, and claws extend from the other hand.
“Bite it, or she goes over next.” The beast shakes my mother like a wolf shakes a small mammal.
My mother kicks at her. She may not be Hunter-strong or have a faery’s strength, but she is no meek bunny. Her attempt earns nothing more than a stronger shake.
I bite down on the green fruit. The juice floods my mouth, and I wonder how much poison I need to swallow before I die. I hold the fruit in my cheek and say, “Let her go.”
“Swallow it,” the beast orders as I toss the rest of the poisonous faery fruit behind me.
Mother squirms again to get free, ripping her gown in the process. “You’re unwell.”
“I am grieving,” the beast growls. “I told Isabeau to let me stay with my husband in the tomb. She refused.”
Her face is a furrier, angrier version of Isabeau’s beastly visage. The Beast of Brimmond’s gaze is fixed on me as if I am an adder crossing her path—although she is the one insisting I eat poison.
I swallow the fruit as my mother shoves the beast with all her strength.
Mother falls to the ground, but the Beast of Brimmond stares at her. It doesn’t touch her or react in any way as I walk over and lift my mother from the ground. She simply stares at us.
And the geas compels me to try to kill her before the poison ends me. I put myself between the beast and my mother, glance back, and say, “I am sorry for this. Tell Rylan.”
My mother looks at me with heartbreak in her expression. The sky darkens, and soon, the walk back will be treacherous.
“Go. Please.” I nudge her toward the path. “Let me . . .” I don’t say the rest aloud. Declaring my intent to kill the Beast of Brimmond seems foolhardy at best. I am surely dying already since I ate the poisoned fruit. I simply hope I have time to kill the beast before I die.