Chapter 2
Chapter
Two
DARWIN DAYNE
My rounds almost always begin at the topmost point of the castle. Turrets, obviously. The views are spectacular from the slitted windows. I can see Canada when I look to the north and New York when I look to the south. Dark Island is just outside of Canadian waters.
I’ve always thought it funny that they put an imaginary line in the water. I get it. Neither country was willing to let the other have the whole water, and slicing it down the middle with an invisible line was the only logical solution to designating the separation between the two countries.
Still. I think it’s dumb.
That doesn’t change the fact that the turrets are my favorite spot in the castle because I can see both countries.
They look no different from here. Trees dotted with clearings where different cities are.
On the shore around Alexandria Bay, it’s primarily trees.
The towns out this way are small on both sides of the river.
I turn around and make my way down, room by room, ensuring the windows are sealed, and there’s no one creeping here who shouldn’t be. The last people left the island earlier today. It’s just me and Matty in the tunnels.
There is almost always more than just one person in the castle.
We’ve all seen the movie where solitude drives a man absolutely insane, and he attempts to murder his family.
Generally speaking, there are two of us in the castle, Rome and Triton in the tower, and Matty in his tunnel room.
Not the case right now. Just me and Matty, but Matty stays in his room.
Then there are the ghosts. I glance around the hall as I methodically make my checks. I’ve never seen or heard anything. I’m not entirely sure I believe in ghosts or that there are any on the island.
I’m only convinced otherwise when I’m in Matty’s presence.
Especially when I witness one of his moments where it looks like he’s being attacked by an invisible entity.
Not physically, but verbally. The way he begs for them to leave him alone, to leave the bodies alone.
All curled in on himself, hands over his ears, trying to block them out, and terror shining in his eyes.
It’s a far cry from who Matty is outside those moments. The change in him is enough to convince me that there’s something here.
I’ve heard it argued that it could just be a mental breakdown because of what he’s seen and what he was forced to do. The memories alone haunt him. Even the most adamant arguments tend to waver when they see Matty melting down.
Not an adult tantrum meltdown like when you’re not re-elected for president as you wanted to be, and you throw a tantrum. Not a spoiled rich boy who always gets what they want and is suddenly told no, so they throw a hissy fit.
You can see the terror in Matty’s eyes in those moments. They won’t let him forget what he’s seen or the blood on his hands.
But me, myself? I haven’t seen any ghosts. I haven’t heard phantom footsteps or disembodied voices or doors close. There’s no knocking or cabinet doors open that you’d left closed. The castle is silent. Comfortable.
Silent. I mentioned silent, right?
It’s the silence that can threaten to play tricks on you. I’m always looking over my shoulder. Not because I hear anything or catch a glimpse of something in my periphery, but because it’s just so quiet. I can almost hear my heartbeat.
Except that the wind is intense outside, so I do hear some noise. The howls of the wind moving through and around the island sound like a far-off werewolf or something. It’s creepy. This is the perfect setting for a horror film.
There’s no real alarm system on the island. It’s remote. Not like someone can just stumble in off the streets. We do have alarms at the docks and boathouses that are only turned on when we’re at a skeleton crew. Like now. It’s attached to my phone, so I’ll be notified if and when someone pulls up.
I have deliveries every few weeks, so I know when to expect someone. Anyone outside of that delivery is almost certainly an unwanted trespasser.
My trek through the castle can take me a solid hour on my own because I like to be thorough. If someone hung back, I want to know.
As I’m making my way through the primary floor, my feet pause. Did I imagine the light? It’s unusual that I can see light from the shore as I’m walking by a window. Especially inside, where the lights are on. But something bright caught my eye.
My heart races as I brace myself. Not to find something but to find nothing. It was a phantom. Nothing will be there.
Chills break out all over my body when I see… a heat lamp. Huh. Did someone leave it on when they left? Frowning, I walk through the room toward the doors and pause. There’s someone there. They look like a big bear by the way they’re hunched over and covered completely in a furry blanket.
I’d know if someone showed up without warning. I’d have gotten an alarm on my phone. That means whoever is out there simply never left with everyone else.
Pushing the door open, I step into the biting wind. It’s not necessarily freezing out, but the wind whipping on the wide-open river brings frigid fingers with it. Wrapping my arms around myself, I head for the heat lamp.
Their head is tucked inside the blanket, but I recognize the loud sneakers. “Zephyr?”
His head pops out of the blankets, and I laugh. He’s like a jack-in-the-box. He gives me a bemused smile at my laughter.
“What’re you doing here?” I ask and move closer to the heat lamp.
He shakes his head, shrugging. “I didn’t know you’d be here,” he answers. “I thought it was Moll.”
I nod. “It was supposed to be Moll, but I think she needed to go home following the sudden… disappearance of her brother.”
Zephyr rolls his eyes. “Who else is here?”
“You,” I answer, shrugging. “Matty.”
His frown deepens.
“I’m guessing that Reynold was likely the second person who was supposed to stay. Moll is the only one willing to stay with her dumbass brother, so… yeah. She asked me to take her shift, and she’ll take mine. Coincidentally, my shift was with Paisley after the new year.”
Zephyr smirks. “Not planned at all.”
Moll and Paisley have been an item for quite a while now.
Something that really pissed off Moll’s brother, Reynold, since Paisley had been his girlfriend until Moll moved in.
That’s not why Reynold disappeared, of course.
He disappeared after trying to get Jude Vincent’s visiting boyfriend murdered this summer.
Fun times.
“Why are you still here?” I ask.
He sighs, and I regret asking. The little amusement he’s shown fades. It’s unusual that I see Zephyr Deth with anything but a boisterous smile on his face. This strange melancholy is… almost haunting.
“I don’t know,” he answers, voice quiet.
I get the impression he’s been asked that question already. My eyes flicker around, wondering who would have asked it.
Instead of asking that, I drag a chair over and sit beside him, as close to the heat lamp as I can get without setting myself on fire. “You here because of Jude?” I ask.
He looks at me, right eyebrow rising.
I laugh at his expression and raise my hands in defense. Then I keep them raised because the heat from the lamp is warming.
“Maybe,” he admits, “though not in the way you mean.”
“What way is that?” I’m not entirely sure I even know what way I mean.
“I’m not in love with him. This isn’t some secret crush on my best friend scenario.”
“No? That’s good.”
Zephyr doesn’t answer. Even though he’s huddled inside a large blanket, I can almost see the way he tenses. As if I don’t believe him. He’s defensive.
“I’m tired of feeling left behind,” he mutters and hunkers down further in the blanket.
“By Jude?”
He nods but shrugs too. At least, that’s what I think that movement in the blankets was.
“I’m not in love with him, but I kinda thought that we’d be single together after hockey, you know? That our childhood antics and bestie partnership would continue where it left off.”
“Now he has Conner.”
Zephyr nods.
“I get it.”
“Yeah? Who’s leaving you behind?”
“No one. And everyone.”
He glances in my direction.
“One father is a hockey god. A fucking legend. His cold stare had the ability to trip up players on the ice as if he reached for them with an invisible hand. He’s in the Hockey Hall of Fame. He’s still referenced almost weekly in hockey.”
Zephyr nods. No doubt he knows that. Hockey is Jude’s life, and so Zephyr pays attention to hockey.
“My other father is an icon. Not just a queer icon but an icon for pioneering and paving the way for LGBTQIA+ progress in this country over the past twenty years.
Everyone knows his name. And before that, one dad came from some stupid amount of wealth, and the other has a rockstar parent married to a superstar big-time actor who made their own name to take gender roles out of titles in Hollywood to bring in a more even playing field.
“Then there’s me. Living off my parents’ money because I’m too afraid of trying something and failing. Or trying and not making the kind of impact that they have. Their legacy dies with me. Nothing I do will ever reach the heights that theirs have—separately and together.”
“Wow,” he says. “That’s… a lot.”
“It’s also why I don’t generally share it. But you seemed down, and I thought,”—I shrug—“maybe it’d help to know you’re not the only one feeling left behind.”
Zephyr sighs. “I guess I’m thankful that I don’t have an unattainable legacy to live up to in my family. Not like that, anyway.”
“The worst part is that I don’t try because I’m too afraid to fail,” I admit.
“I don’t have ambition because everything that I feel even a little bit of passion about, my brain thinks, how will the world look at you knowing that this is what the great Azure Dayne and Enoch Zayn left behind in the world?
And suddenly, that passion fades away because it’s not good enough. ”
He nods minutely. “I guess feeling alone is a little better than being crushed under all that pressure. Thanks. I feel better.”
I slap him on his arm—not that he probably felt it through the thick blanket—and he flashes a smile at me.
Not a typical Zephyr smile, but a smile nonetheless.
“It’s my own self-imposed pressure that I’m drowning under.
My parents don’t care what I do. Not once have they asked what I want to do with my life and to stop spending their money. ”
“They probably don’t even notice. I once saw an article stating that your parents’ net worth is in the top eight percent of people throughout the entire world. Unless you bought the state of Montana, they probably don’t notice what you’re spending.”
I huff, but… yeah, he’s right. “Imagine living with that kind of money,” I muse. “I like to think that my parents are relatively humble and down to earth, too. I don’t find them all that arrogant. I think my dad, Enoch, is relatively frugal in life, though he gives hugely to his charities.”
“Meanwhile, my parents live in a bubble and no one but us kids exists outside it,” Zephyr muses. “How very different lives we come from.”
“You have two brothers, so I’m actually really alone as an only child,” I point out.
“I’m not sure what that has to do with anything, but… touché?”
I laugh. “It made sense when I said it, but now I can’t remember why I said it. Maybe because… you’re not alone? I say that not knowing whether you’re actually close to your brothers.”
“I am. Relatively speaking. Lan has an antisocial disorder like one of my dads, so ‘close’ isn’t really in his personality. That doesn’t mean I’m not a little chick that he’d protect with lethal blows, but I wouldn’t say we’re close.”
“Ah. And your other brother?”
“Erez is haunted by the death of our sister, so, yeah, we’re close-ish, but there’s a canyon between us because he can’t seem to move on.”
“I didn’t know you had a sister,” I say and try to think back to when we were kids. Do I remember her?
“Alice. She used to come here with us… until nine years ago.”
I’m about to be really stupid and ask why she stopped coming, but I mentally wince at that stupid question. He just said she’s dead. And I feel like a big dick for not remembering her.
Then again, I’ve always been far more interested in the guys around me, and most of the girls fade into the background. I’m better now that I’m an adult, but as a kid, especially, I didn’t see girls at all.
“I’m sorry,” I say, not sure if it’s my sympathy or just for being an asshole.
He shrugs. “I’m not going to say I’m over it. I’m not sure a sibling’s death is something you ever really get over. But I’m… living. At least more than Erez, but less than Lanzo.”
I huff and shake my head. We’re quiet for a minute, and the wind is the only sound. “You planning to stay a while?”
Zephyr shrugs. “Dunno. I don’t have plans. Paisley didn’t need me in the office, and Jude has a boyfriend now, so… I had nowhere to go.”
Home. He could have gone home. I wonder why he didn’t.
“Want to join me for dinner and a movie after? I have a stew simmering on the stove. It should be about ready to add the dumplings, then we can eat. I was going to watch a rom-com to fight the haunted feeling of being alone in this big, spooky castle, though I’m open to something else.”
He chuckles. “Are you scared of the castle?”
I’m glad to see a glimmer of his usual personality peek through his somber mood. I grin. “Yes,” I lie. “There are ghosts everywhere.”
Zephyr looks around, but he doesn’t appear bothered by my statement. I’m not sure what he thinks about the ghosts. After a minute, he sits forward and sighs. “Yeah. Okay. Thanks.”
I nod and get to my feet, turning off the heat lamp. I unplug it on the way to the door as Zephyr, looking like a giant blob on legs with his massive blanket, makes his way almost blindly to the door. I laugh as he runs into one of the pillars.