33. Amal
AMAL
Itry to scream. I fight against grips of iron and try to scream from behind this gag of lace. It’s no use though. No use.
In a flicker of time, a split second, they tore me from him.
They timed it perfectly. Of course they did.
One minute I was holding Jet’s hand. I was so close I could smell his aftershave.
It was familiar and comforting. I thought the worst was over.
I was with him. He had me. I had him. We would be safe.
Then the lights went out and in that same instant, hands grabbed me, one closing over my mouth as if I could scream. As if I could make a sound with this suffocating gag of lace.
And I watched in horror as a second me, another woman in this terrible red, took my place.
Just like that, she stood where I had stood.
Unreal how quickly it happened. I watched her slip her hand into his before that secret door slid closed and I was dragged deeper into the bowels of hell, a room black as night.
Black as that corridor had been for just that instant.
Now I watch in fresh horror from behind a sealed window as below, on the water’s edge, Jet and Severin and that other me climb into a boat, Jet holding her like she’s the most precious thing in the world. Jet not letting her go, not for a second. Too late though. Too late for me.
I pound my fists against that impenetrable glass and scream and scream for him to look up. To see me. To see it’s not me he’s holding.
But I’m too high up and even if the window were open, the storm would carry my screams away, somewhere no one will ever hear them.
“Such dramatics,” a man says from behind me as the boat pulls away from the pier and they set off into a too-angry sea.
Jameson.
I spin around, my hands fists at my sides, my cheeks hurting from where I scratched my own face open as I ripped that lace apart, my head aching for the hair I pulled out in my desperation to free my voice.
“What did you do? What did you do?” I scream, the salt of tears burning the fresh wounds.
I lunge toward him, but I’m caught by two men and even fighting with all I have left, I can’t get free of them.
“What did you do?” I demand again, my voice sounding like I feel. Like it’s done. Like they’ve won.
“Are we finished?” he asks, talking to me like I’m a toddler throwing a tantrum.
“What the hell do you want with me?” I ask, my voice breaking. “What is this?”
Jameson holds up a finger as if telling me to be quiet, makes like he’s listening hard and a moment later, I hear a distant pop.
My heart stops because I know what it is.
I know. And for as completely as that storm drowned out my screams, how cruel to let me hear that nothing of a sound. That so final a thing.
But no. No. It can’t be that easy. They couldn’t kill him so easily, that tiny little pop. Not Jet.
“There we go. Will we hear another?” He pauses, then shakes his head. “Well, no matter. The deed is done and, quite frankly, it’s a mercy. The sea is far too wild for that boat tonight. Of course we’ll have another to bring our boys back. We look after those who serve us.”
He’s talking like he did when he was showing me to my room. Like I’m at some resort, as if I’m here willingly and we’re having a simple conversation about the history of the place.
“No. No, I don’t believe you,” I say. “You were going to let them go. You said—”
“Ah, youth. I wonder if I was once so na?ve.” He walks toward me and I flinch when he brushes back a ringlet of hair that I freed as I tore the lace apart.
“Jethro Blackstone was never going to walk away. He wouldn’t leave you.
That was clear from the start. So, we had no choice, really.
I mean, if you think about it, he left us no choice.
His fate, the fate of his brother and that other you, it’s on him, isn’t it?
” He shrugs a shoulder. “Everything has a price. Jethro Blackstone of all people should have known that. Now, let’s see this mess you’ve made. ”
“I don’t believe you. I don’t fucking believe you.” I hear how crazed I sound. How out of control while he just stands there, calm and infuriatingly collected.
“Language, my dear. Certainly, your new husband will not put up with that. We do things differently here in The Society. Of course, I realize you are unfamiliar with our ways. Your mother saw to that. But that shall be remedied.”
My brain rattles in my head.
“What?” I hear myself ask.
New husband.
Mother.
“What the hell are you talking about?” But I can’t think about those things now.
It’s only Jet now. “Where is he? Where are they?” I ask, knowing where they are.
Where they must be. My mind cruelly creating the images for me, two bodies descending into that black water, slowly sinking to the depths of it.
How deep is it? How deep is this sea? It’s a stupid question.
It doesn’t matter. Dead is dead. Don’t I know that well enough?
Jameson moves to touch the shreds of lace around my face, but when he does, I snap my teeth over his hand and bite so hard I taste the copper of blood before one of the soldiers painfully yanks me off.
As soon as Jameson’s hand is free, he glances at it, then slaps me so hard my vision goes black and it’s a minute before the pain sets in.
If the soldiers weren’t holding me, I’d be on the floor.
I blink, my head heavy, the side of my face throbbing, my lip hurting where I bit it.
He grips my jaw, curling his fingers into my cheeks and forces me to look up at him.
“I didn’t think you had it in you,” I say before spitting blood at him. I’m not sure it’s his or my own.
His fingers dig harder, but I won’t let him see how much it hurts. I won’t give him the satisfaction.
The door opens behind him and the American whose name I can’t recall walks in followed by more soldiers.
“Be careful, Ms. Fairbairn. We are not gentle men,” Jameson hisses, a little spittle landing on my cheek.
“No, I never thought you were,” I say, trying not to think about that popping sound. About Jet out there on that water.
In that water.
Jet with a bullet in him.
No. He’s the Devil. He knows men like this. He kills men like this. He can’t be dead.
But we were so outnumbered. I saw the disappointment on his face when I told him I didn’t have the gun. I couldn’t get to it. I didn’t have a moment alone. They had planned for everything, these men. This Society. Did the watch even have anything to do with it?
A tear slides down my cheek and Jameson gives a satisfied grin. I guess he thinks he’s the reason for it. He thrusts me away like I’m a piece of old trash.
“Trouble, Jameson?” the American asks.
“Nothing I can’t handle. I’m surprised to see you here?” he asks, eyebrows raised. “Your part is done.”
“Master Robertson has invited me to stand in as witness.”
Jameson studies him like he doesn’t believe him, but Senna gives him a narrow-eyed, arrogant grin before turning to me.
He looks me over. I can’t read his expression. “You’ve ruined the lace and made a mess of your face. Pity. But no matter. Let’s go. I think Robertson is anxious to get this done.”
“Go where” I dig my heels in even though I know these men will drag me kicking and screaming and even with a ballroom full of people, I know not even one would raise a finger to help me.
“What the hell do you want with me?” I ask but my mind is still reeling with the thought that he’s gone.
Jet’s gone because of me. Jet’s dead because of me.
Does it even matter what they want? Don’t I deserve whatever it is? Whatever they’ll do to me?
Senna simply glances over his shoulder, barely stopping, and gestures for the soldiers to bring me. The two of them start moving, dragging me between them.
I think about how big the castle looked from the air and now, given the maze of corridors, all these secret spaces, I know I’ll never find my way out. This is where I’ll die.
My thoughts go to Daniel. My little brother who will never know what happened to his sister.
I fully expect to be taken back to the Great Hall so when someone opens a door that leads outside, I am surprised. Senna and Jameson barely miss a step as two men open umbrellas and hold them over their heads for the rain that’s turned to hail.
My bare feet crunch icy moss and jagged rocks as we cross a field.
No umbrella for me. I glance back to the castle to see light from the windows of the Great Hall.
I think I hear the quartet’s music and imagine all those people up there dancing, enjoying themselves.
Unaware or uncaring about the murder of two men and, most likely, the other woman in red.
If anyone is looking outside, they’ll see us. I wonder what they’d make of our creepy procession up a hill that looks like the movie set of Wuthering Heights. Nothing at all, probably. Glad it’s not them, probably.
I’m freezing, my teeth chattering, and we keep moving. My dress, drenched now, catches on rocks and I leave a red-silk trail except there’s no one to follow it. No one left to look for me.
Finally, we reach a hill, and I know our destination because all along a curving path lanterns glow.
Up at the top, is what at first I think is one of the cottages, but as we get closer, I see it’s a chapel.
And it’s old. Not built to look old but well and truly ancient with crumbling stone and a cross on top of the roof that looks like it’s been blackened by lightning.
Once we reach it, the door is opened from the inside.
I suppose whoever is in there was looking out for us.
We enter and umbrellas are set aside. The door is closed behind us.
Only then do I realize how loud the storm was.
How the wind and sea howled, a banshee’s screams warning of death. Too late though. They’re already dead.
It’s warm inside but I’m still shivering. The dress is clinging to me, silk that’s come undone creating a train behind me. I can barely feel my feet and my teeth are chattering loudly. But I have a feeling even if it was a hundred degrees in here, I’d still be cold.
“Christ. What the hell happened to her?” a voice at the far end of the chapel asks. I look across the candlelit space to see a man wearing the black cassock and collar of a priest and what Jameson said starts to make strange sense.
Your new husband.
“She’s a little bitch,” Jameson tells him, showing his hand where I’d bit it like a little bitch himself.
The priest’s eyebrows rise dismissively. Jameson is the lowest ranking man here, I think.
“Are we ready? Finally?” The priest asks, annoyed.
I wonder what the hell kind of church this is? What kind of priest?
I look around, search for an exit. The old chapel is bigger on the inside than it looks on the outside, and although there’s an altar, there’s no crucifix.
In its place is that plaque of interwoven vines and roses.
There are no pews, just the exposed stones of the floor, graves beneath where names and dates have been worn smooth and unreadable over time.
A chain bolted to a stone at the very center lies ominous and telling.
I hear my heart pound. Feel the blood thudding against my ears.
Where the Stations of the Cross should be are small portraits and inside each of them, something that makes me shiver. That fills me with a dread I don’t understand. Not yet.
Portraits of a man and woman inside each. The women are all in red. Each wore the dress I wear now. Around each of their throats is the shard necklace.
The men are interchangeable, all in dark cloaks, masks over their faces, anonymous.
The women’s faces have been exposed, that lace cut. They all wear the same expression. One of fear. Most are bruised and bloodied. None are smiling.
But there’s one thing we all have in common apart from the red dress. And I begin to understand.
This was never about the watch.
Never about the Blackstones.
It was about me. It was always about me.
Because that one thing the women and I share is our eyes. I see theirs every time I look in the mirror.
And as I’m dragged up the aisle, I see the most recent portrait. This one’s more modern and not a painting but a photograph.
Looking back at me from inside it is a younger version of my mother.