Chapter 18
The tiny blue orb of light appears before we reach the end of the passage. It dips and dances in midair, waiting as my mother and I approach. When we come close, it zooms away, darting ahead, then waiting again until we catch up.
When the passage ends, we turn left, following the light, and proceed down a long, wide hallway of dark blue stone, carved to look like wooden panels.
Cracks of luminous blue branch through the stone walls, like fractured threads of light illuminating our path.
It’s bright enough, so my mother abandons the lantern she’s carrying and grips the short iron skewer she brought instead.
Beresford told us that iron might cause the Barrow-Man some pain if he was pierced with it.
My thoughts are torn. Part of my mind lingers with Beresford and Henry behind us, engaged in their dreadful task. Part of me is with Anne, suffering in the clutches of the Barrow-Man.
My job is to bargain, to buy time, and to be a distraction for the wight so Beresford can get close enough at the right moment.
“When we meet him, I may have to behave badly,” I whisper to my mother.
She grimaces, but replies, “I understand. We will endure what we must to free your sister.”
The ceiling of the passage has risen significantly, high and arched like the vaulted ceiling of a temple. Ahead, the blue orb hovers before a stone archway in the right-hand wall. A warmer glow issues from that entrance.
During our trek through Wormsloe, I felt the presence of the wight like a faint pressure on my skin, like a whisper against my bones. But the closer I get to that archway, the more intense the pressure becomes.
“He’s there,” I whisper to my mother, hastily unfastening my cloak and unslinging the satchel I brought.
I hang the satchel over her shoulder and shove the cloak into her free hand.
“I want you to wait outside, please. Listen to our conversation, and enter if you must, but only if things sound dire. Please, Mama… wait.”
She puckers her lips, dissatisfied at the idea, but she nods. Her mouth goes thin as she watches me disrobe, shedding my shoes, stockings, dress, and underwear until I’m entirely naked.
Beresford would hate this, but I will try anything to throw the wight off his guard.
Most humans would be startled by sudden nudity, and the majority of men would be entirely befuddled by the appearance of a beautiful naked woman.
If there’s any part of the wight that’s attracted to the female body, appearing like this could unsettle him enough to give me a slight advantage.
It’s a risk, of course. If the Barrow-Man desires me strongly enough, he could decide to rape me immediately. But from what Beresford has told me of his personality, he’ll be more interested in bargaining and baiting me. He’ll want to talk.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” my mother whispers.
“We’ll soon find out.” Stepping over my discarded clothes, I continue a few steps along the hall and then turn right, passing through the archway.
The room is filled with long, narrow planters, each one overflowing with luminous mushrooms, frilly fungi, lichen, succulents, and other plants that I’ve never seen and have no name for.
Similar to the demons he creates, the wight seems to be interbreeding species of plants and fungi from both his world and mine.
Thanks to the various bioluminescent varieties, the room is filled with multicolored light—amber, soft blue, muted green, golden, and rosy red.
At the far side of the room, opposite the door, my sister sits in a sort of metal throne, bound there with coils of black vines.
She’s been stripped down to her underwear, and she’s bleeding from her brow as well as from shallow cuts along her collarbones, arms, and thighs.
The wight has carved symbols into her skin, including his own mark just above her breasts.
Anne has a padded bit in her mouth, part of a harness that’s locked around her head. Her tearful eyes flare with alarm when I step into the room.
The Barrow-Man stands near her with his back to me. He has long black hair, an inky, glossy sheet of it. He’s taller than Beresford and so thin it looks as if a brisk wind could blow him away. The dark silken clothing he wears clings to him like a second skin.
“Welcome, Sybil.” His voice is like gauzy black silk. He rotates to face me, an ethereal fluidity in his movements.
Beresford told me the wight was beautiful, and yet I’m still shocked at his lethal loveliness.
Snow-white skin is sucked tight against the sharp, prominent bones of his face.
His eyes burn like white stars set in dark sockets, smudged black around the edges and rimmed with long, thick lashes.
His lips are plush and purple, with the bluish hint of death.
His long, sharp ears are decorated with twinkling gems, and threadlike silver necklaces lie across his bony chest.
He looks like death incarnate, if death were a beautiful, starving prince.
The Barrow-Man holds a silver chalice, cupped between skeletal white hands laden with diamonds. When he notices my nudity, his fingers tighten on the cup, pointed nails scratching its surface. His pale, fiery eyes take in my form, and the tip of a purple tongue slips out, tracing his lips.
So he does like women.
I bow deeply, then walk toward him, my heart pounding. I try to keep my face soft and pleasant, and I let my hips sway more than usual. “Lord of the Barrow, Genius of Living Design, Prince of Corruption. I heard you wanted to trade. Me for my sister.”
“You,” he breathes. “You have caused me quite a bit of irritation. At last I know why my test subjects have kept disappearing at the most inopportune times. Now that you’re here, with me, perhaps that will no longer be a problem.”
I continue advancing toward him. He doesn’t move, but I notice a slight bulge under the drapery that cloaks his thighs. My body is definitely having an effect on him.
“Why don’t you let Anne go?” I suggest, halting within arm’s reach. “I’m the one you want.”
“Not the only one,” he replies. “Where is the matagot? I know he entered my domain with you. Why isn’t he here?”
“He wouldn’t come any farther. He’s too afraid.” I push out my lower lip in a pout. “You hurt him very badly. Are you going to hurt me, too?”
“A pretty thing like you?” The wight smiles, showing two rows of pointed teeth. “It would be my pleasure.”
He moves so fast I barely see it. One second he’s in front of me, holding the chalice, and the next second the chalice is sitting on a nearby table and the wight is behind me, one cold hand covering my breast and the other splayed against my belly, pulling me tight against his chest. His touch floods my body with a sickening pain and a terrible sense of impending corruption.
It’s like I can feel my flesh quivering, waiting, ready for his dreadful command.
If he says the word, if he so much as thinks it, my own body will turn against me and begin to rot.
My skin will peel, my flesh will blacken, and I’ll decay right here, in his arms.
“You feel it.” His icy breath chills my ear. “You know what I could do to you.”
“Yes,” I manage.
“Tell me why I shouldn’t end you now, you warm, soft thing, you fleshy blood-sac, you needy little human cunt.”
My sister is watching, weeping silently, bleeding. But she hasn’t been rotted or corrupted. She’s hurt, but not damaged beyond repair.
Like the original Beresford, this bastard likes to toy with his victims.
“You want to play with me first,” I say faintly.
“Do I?” His cold fingers compress the flesh of my bare breast. “Do you know what would happen to you if I came inside you, female? Can you imagine what my seed would do to your insides? I’m curious if you could survive it.
Perhaps you could. The tonic I gave your father, the one your mother was supposed to drink—it was an experiment of mine.
It should have transformed you, not just into a male, but into something unheard of, something marvelous.
But we’ll never know if it would have had the desired result, because your fucking cow of a mother didn’t drink it all like a good girl. ”
His hand slides down my belly, his long nail teasing my clit viciously, to the point of pain. Anne whimpers, wrenching against the bonds that hold her to the chair.
“What if I impregnate you?” he mutters. “What if we do a little experiment of that kind, to see if you can carry my offspring? Then I’ll have you and our child as subjects. So many possibilities.”
His hand moves lower. It’s an atrocity, being touched by him, and it’s more horrifying because I know what he’s going to do—he’s going to poke that sharp-nailed finger into my slit. He could tear me up on the inside and not feel a speck of remorse.
I should never have to come him like this.
And yet, the distraction has been very fucking effective.
Beresford, I scream in my mind, as the wight’s claws travel deeper between my legs. Beresford, now!
I see my salvation in my sister’s eyes the second before it happens.
Something crashes against me and the wight, sending us both to the floor.
The wight’s body jerks—he’s trying to use his inhuman speed to break loose and dart away, but Beresford’s weight holds him down.
My breath is being slowly crushed out of me by the two bodies on my back, but I don’t care, as long as Beresford has the time to finish the task.
Beresford has never done this before. All he has to go on is hearsay and stories from others of his kind. I can only hope that instinct will kick in and guide him.
I hear the crunch of teeth through flesh, grating on bone, and the wight howls. Beresford is biting him.
Pain explodes through my body, a corrosive, horrific agony beyond anything I’ve ever felt. As I lie there on my stomach, under the combined weight of the Barrow-Man and my husband, I can see my hand lying against the stone floor.
It’s rotting.