Chapter 18 #2
Ransom swipes the glasses from the bar and sloshes toward us, his grin dripping on his face.
Bram grunts and leads us to a rough-hewn table tucked into a far corner. While we settle in, the alehouse returns to its heady noise, and I watch the patrons in awe-like horror.
Some are skeletal, ale sloshing out between their bones and staining meager scraps of clothing. Others appear more like Bram—whole, still mostly alive, the ashen sheen to their skin the only thing giving them away. Ransom passes us each a glass, but I shake my head.
“I think I’ll pass, thanks.”
Bram, who eyes the glasses with suspicion, grabs his and tips it back against his lips before I can stop him. When he places it back down on the table, a line of froth sticks to his upper lip.
“It’s fine for you two to drink. Seems to be the real stuff.”
Ransom does not need any more encouragement. He fists the glass and swallows the lot in four greedy gulps. “Glory be.”
I roll my eyes and turn to Bram. “I don’t understand. How can it be real ale if nothing grows here? You can’t make ale from dead crops.”
Bram shrugs, takes another drink. “You can and you can’t, I suppose. That’s what most of our food and drink is made from here—dead things. Okay for us to consume, deadly for someone still living. But things find their way into the wood. Sometimes, Reapers bring in more than just the dead.”
I stare down at the bubbles in my glass. Reapers. I do not want to think about my blood, what it might mean. If I have Reaper’s blood, which parent do I have to thank? Which parent has lied through their teeth?
“It’s safe enough to drink, Adelaide,” Bram says.
We spend the rest of the day holed up in the alehouse, talking to no one, explaining nothing.
But there is food to eat—a sort of meat pie I hope is rabbit—and the ale reminds me of home, though we rarely ever had it at the vicarage.
I snuck some when I was little to impress Clara.
It hadn’t worked, of course. After several sips, I found myself bent over in Mother’s garden beds, emptying my guts out on the soil.
So, I am careful, nursing the honeyed liquid. The same can’t be said for Ransom. By the time we are led up the stairs to the two rooms we will rest in, he is sloshing ahead of me, leaning heavily on Bram’s shoulder.
Bram’s face is pinched, and I hide a giggle in my hand at his irritation.
“You and Rascal can have the second room, Adelaide.” Bram fumbles the key in the lock while Ransom begins singing the opening notes of an old Rixton drinking song. “Wake me up if you need anything.”
“I don’t think I’ll be the one needing anything,” I say, nodding to Ransom.
Bram turns to him, features traced delicately in the moonlight. “I’ll make sure to tuck him in.”
For a moment, we stare at each other. Ransom begins the next verse.
I hear the voices of the mingling dead downstairs, the clinking of glasses, the clamping of exposed jaws, the clicking of dry bones.
But it is only Bram and I for a split-second, standing in the hall, the scent of rot all around us.
“Well, goodnight,” I whisper, breaking the tension. “Or good day. Who can say anymore?”
Bram readjusts his hold on Ransom. “Right, well, I hope you can get some sleep.”
“You too.” I open my door.
He does not respond, only nods, and I wonder if Bram Avery sleeps at all.
The room behind the door is as expected.
A bed, a window boarded over, no pictures on the walls.
The quilt is riddled with moth-chew, but the hues of powder blue and russet woven into the fabric remind me of home.
Rascal makes short work of bounding across the floor in springy strides, then circling up in all the dust-kissed pillows.
I laugh, almost forgetfully, as though I am not surrounded by dead things, searching for my mother to bring her back to life. It sounds ridiculous when I think it so plainly.
I slip off my boots and unlace my stays, almost crying when they release and allow my ribs to stretch. How long has it been since I last took them off? Days now.
I scurry from my woolen skirts until I am wearing nothing but a thin cotton chemise. The chill air licks my ankles, and I climb into the bed quicker than a whip. The mattress is soft, and I nestle down amidst the warm wool and linen. Rascal curls next to me, and I weave my fingers through his fur.
My legs will hurt like hell come morning, from all the walking, but we are getting closer to Mother.
We must be. I reach into my discarded skirts and lift the bell from my pocket, tucking it safely beneath my pillow.
Whatever its role in bringing Mother back home, I must keep it safe and whole. I can risk no harm to it.
Just as I am drifting off to restless sleep, Rascal straightens, a low growl starting in his throat.
My skin pricks with cold, and I sit up. Shadows pass beneath the door, back and forth.
I hold my breath, counting the seconds, tasting bile at the back of my tongue when knuckles rap on the soft wood.
Rascal leaps from the bed, the hair on his back sharp as needlepoints. I wait for my heart to rocket into my throat, but it doesn’t, so I curl my toes from the blankets and slip another over my shoulders.
The knock comes again, this time accompanied by a voice. “Thorn, it’s me.”
Ransom. Sounding less drunk than before but not by much.
I clutch the blanket tighter and move toward the door. On the other side, Ransom leans heavy against the frame. His hair is mussed, and there are wrinkles on his face from where he fell asleep on his pillow.
Here, in the reddish light streaming through the far windows, he almost looks like an avenging angel. His eyes go wide when he notices I’m not wearing my dress.
“Sorry, I should have—I can go back to bed.”
“No, it’s fine.” I brush hair from my eyes. “Is there something you wanted to say?”
He hesitates for a moment, makes a pained expression.
“I wanted to say that I am sorry for acting like an ass back there in the woods. When I gave you the bell. Of course, you would have thought I’d taken it.
If I’d been you, I would have thought the same.
I’m sorry I took my own feelings out on you. ”
“Your own feelings?” I step closer, so much so I can detect the lingering ale on his tongue.
He shrugs. “It is hard for me when people don’t trust me. I get angry, closed up. It’s not your problem, and I am sorry I tried to make it so.”
Never in a million years would I think Lord Ransom Black would be standing in front of me, apologizing for being an ass. I smile. “No harm done, Ransom.”
He sighs, like a weight has been lifted off his chest, and moves closer. His sweat is bitter and cold. I make a face and hope he doesn’t notice it in the shadowy light.
“We should do something to remember this, you know?”
“Remember this? Ransom, what are you talking about? Where’s Bram?” I peek around him, but the hall is empty. Perhaps we should not be alone.
“Went downstairs, I think. Listen, Adelaide. Wife.” He presses nearer, and Rascal growls a protest from the bed.
I plant my hands firmly on his chest. “I am not your wife yet. And you’re drunk. Perhaps you should—”
His finger goes to my mouth, flesh salty on my lips.
“Shh, listen to me. We should run away, you and I. Grab the bell, find a place here of our own. In the wood. Think of it. We could be the only living souls in this whole place. You saw how the dead downstairs treated us, like we were gods, Adelaide.” He pushes into my room and pins me against the wall, his hand hot and tight on my thigh.
“Ransom—”
“With that bell, we could rule. We could command who came and who went. Reapers, think of it. No more lordly duties, no more fathers telling us what we can and cannot do. We’d hold all the power, Thorn. All of it.”
His words run together like spring mud, and I blink, trying to slow their meaning down in my mind. Pick them apart until I understand them. But they are madness. Live here? Amongst all the rot and death? The idea creeps along my skin, leaving a feeling of damp in its wake.
“Ransom, you’re not making any sense.”
“I’m making perfect sense.” His hand goes to my waist, and my skin flares.
Do not trust him.
“Ransom.” My hands are back on his chest now, pushing. “Please.”
“There’s so much power here,” he whispers against my neck. “And it could all be ours.”
A knot of tension pulls taut in my stomach. His hands brush higher. Sweat breaks out on my neck.
“Ransom, get off.”
And then his lips are on mine, and they hurt.
They crush and bite, and all I want to do is claw and spit.
Rascal jumps down from the bed, jaws peeling back in a throaty growl, but even this does not stop Ransom Black and his greedy hands.
His entitlement to rule over those in these woods is sickening.
He has never been told no—a lord’s son, only told, Yes, take more. It is all yours.
My mouth tastes sour.
I think of the dead rabbit, the still-beating heart after I held it in my palm. Of my mother’s bitterbloom vines pushing through the soil, growing in a dead land without sun. Of Bram—the one person who has ever seemed to care. And I fight.
My knee comes up between Ransom’s legs, and my elbow connects with his jaw. He crumples, expression confused, pain leaking from his eyes.
“Adelaide, what the—”
I stare down at him while he wilts, eyes flashing, taste the ghost of blood in my mouth, the feeling of Father’s words cutting my throat.
“I will not live in this wood, Ransom. I will not become some puppet of Erybrus. And I’m calling our bargain off. When we return home, I will not be your wife. I will be myself.” The words come to me as easily as water from a pipe.
Ransom twists his features. “Do you even know what that is?”
Righteous anger floods my veins. “Get up and get out.”
Ransom scrambles up from the floor, wiping at his mouth. At the open door, he turns back.
“Adelaide, I’m—”
“I said, get out. I’ll see you in the morning, and there will be no more about it.” My skin shakes, but I remain resolute, my expression set in stone.
Ransom’s face hardens when the door creaks ajar and washes him in ruby light. He opens his mouth to say something more, but I do not give him the luxury. The sound of the resounding slam and the snick of the lock is a comfort to my ears.
Shaken, but strong, I make my way back to the bed and curl up against Rascal beneath the sheets. My fingers reach for the bell beneath the pillow, and I close my eyes, hot tears stinging my cheeks.
When I finally fall asleep, I dream of cutting Ransom open, spilling his guts out in the moonlight, and finding only rot and the wriggling shoots of bitterbloom flowers.