Chapter 9 #2
“Ye’re not listening,” Max said, his concerned tone sharpening. “Now’s the worst time for us to get all careless. Something ain’t been right and ye know that. Even the hounds are spooked tonight. And if I’m bein’ honest, so am I.”
Lucien forced his attention back, through the cloud of Verity’s essence which lingered on him, a phantom caress that made his skin prickle.
Max’s voice was a low rumble that filled the dank confines of the cellar like smoke from a fire.
“Please hear me, m’lord, the castle’s not the only place at risk.
That crofter’s still missing. The one from the edge of the fen.
Villagers’ve been sending out search parties all day, tramping through the snow with lanterns and dogs, calling his name till their throats are raw.
But so far, no sign. No body, no tracks, nothing.
It’s like the earth swallowed him whole. ”
Lucien’s chains clinked softly as he shifted again, the sound a grim underscore to Max’s words.
He forced his gaze to meet Max’s, though the effort cost him dearly.
How could he focus on missing crofters when his mind replayed the curve of Verity’s buttocks, the gasp of her surrender?
Yet Max’s words pierced the haze, stirring a fresh wave of guilt that churned in his gut like poisoned wine.
“The crofter,” he repeated, his voice flat and distant, as if speaking from the bottom of a well.
Max nodded grimly, his broad shoulders hunching under the weight of unspoken fears.
“Aye, and that’s not all. A sheep vanished from old Widow Hargrove’s fold last night.
Clean gone, no blood, no wool scattered about.
Just an empty spot where there shouldn’t be one.
And two dogs from the farms down by the river.
They’re missin’ too. Big brutes, the sort that’d give a fox second thoughts.
Folks are whispering it’s the work of something unnatural. Something that’s getting bolder.”
Lucien closed his eyes briefly, the cellar’s chill seeping deeper into his bones, mingling with the feverish heat of the quickening.
He could almost taste the metallic tang of blood on his tongue, a memory or a premonition he could not distinguish.
Verity’s essence faded momentarily under the assault of these horrors, replaced by visions of the full moon.
His other form had escaped the chains the previous night, and these disappearances had to be the result.
The curse was not content to ravage him alone. It hungered for the world beyond.
Max paced a tight circle before him, the lantern’s flame dancing shadows across his worried face.
“I wonder if the curse is worse, m’lord.
Yes, ye’ve been this way for years, but now, this feels different.
Is there any chance ye’re getting out because ye’re stronger?
Perhaps a werewolf reaches some sort of peak maturity, in the manner that a man does?
Ye know what I mean, to have full power, like a stag growing his antlers proper. ”
Lucien’s laugh escaped as a bitter bark, echoing off the stone walls.
“How would I know such a thing, Max? It is not as if I have someone to ask. If my father had made an effort to discuss the condition with me, to prepare me for what was coming, then he might still be alive. And I might have answers to such questions instead of groping in the dark like a blind fool.”
The words hung heavy between them, laced with the old anguish that never truly faded.
Lucien’s mind flashed to that fateful night in the woods, the crack of the rifle, the horror of his father’s form having shifted from beast to man in death’s cold embrace.
The earl had guarded his secret too zealously, never sharing the truth.
Now Lucien bore the burden alone, a solitary and unprepared guardian against the monster within.
And Verity … oh, Verity. The feel of her ignited him anew, a spark in the tinder of his soul.
If the curse was indeed strengthening, reaching some infernal maturity, then his lapse with her was but a harbinger of greater perils.
He could not permit the wolf to claim dominion, to turn his passion into marauding.
Max’s eyes softened with the rough sympathy of a man’s tenderness.
“I’m sorry, m’lord. Perhaps I’m worryin’ too much.
And I believe yer father did what he thought best. Did it to protect ye.
But, aye, it left ye in the lurch. Still, we can’t dwell on what’s gone.
We’ve got tonight to face, and what’s in ye. ”
Lucien tested the chains again, the silver burning faintly against his wrists, a reminder of his fragility.
“Protect me? He condemned me to ignorance. And now innocents pay the price. A person vanished. Valuable animals spirited away. If I am growing stronger, as you suggest, then these restraints may prove futile. What then, Max? Shall I roam the woods, a scourge upon my own lands?”
Max fell silent, the quiet settling between them like frost upon stone.
The cellar seemed to shrink, the air thickening with the unspoken dread that had shadowed Blackfen for generations.
Lucien stared at the damp ground, tracing the faint veins of moss with his gaze as though they might reveal some hidden pattern, some answer to the unraveling of his world.
He wanted to speak the name that burned upon his tongue. Verity. Her arrival had coincided with this escalation, this sudden ferocity of the curse. Surely the coincidence was no accident. Her presence had stirred the beast, awakened hungers long suppressed, and now the moon exacted its price.
Yet reason whispered otherwise. The trouble had begun the night before her coach rattled into the village. He had slipped the chains then, before her scent had ever touched his senses, before her presence had filled his castle.
A man had vanished under that same merciless moon. The thought twisted in him. If Verity’s coming had intensified the curse, it was only because the wolf had already begun to grow restless, to test its limits. She had not caused the storm. She had merely stepped into its path.
Lucien lifted his head, the silver manacles biting deeper as he straightened.
“Additional chains, Max. Bring every length we possess. Bind me twice over. Thrice, if need be. I will not escape. Not tonight.” Lucien’s voice was low, edged with steel.
“Tonight the moon rides too high, and I feel it clawing at me already. I will not risk another soul. Not my mother. Not the servants. Not …” He faltered, the name dying on his lips. Not her.
Max made to move, turning toward the doorway. Lucien knew that beyond it, the hounds waited in the gloom. The dogs sensed the change as keenly as their master did.