Chapter Seven
A putrid, thick stench clawed down her throat when Charlotte sucked in a deep breath.
Peeling back her eyelids, she dug her nails into the wood bottom of the coffin, her forearm brushing up against the soft fabric of the white dress Alice was buried in.
“No, God no,” she spluttered, her eyes adjusting to the heavy darkness
This wasn’t possible. She’d fallen asleep in her bed at Sallow Manor, unless, the witches had come for her in her sleep and somehow…
Slowly, she turned her head, her heart pounding violently against her ribcage when she saw her sister’s corpse. Penny-shaped holes oozed sludgy liquids from her rotting skin as maggots burrowed deeper into Alice’s flesh, feasting upon her glistening, decaying tissues.
The cloying, rotten odor was overwhelming, invading her nose and throat, making her gag until a fit of coughs wracked her chest. Wood splinters drove into her nail beds as she pushed against the coffin lid, but it wouldn’t budge.
Her throat constricted when she choked on her cries, banging her fists against the lids, forced still by the confines of the coffin walls.
Bugs crawled over her body, their bites sending tiny shockwaves all over her skin. “Stop it,” she spluttered through coughs. “I’m alive. I’m still alive!”
Her throat was dry from screaming, the heavy silence punctuated only by the sound of the maggots and her own heartbeat.
A loud scream rattled her chest when her sister’s neck snapped to the side with a loud crack.
The corpse's maggot-infested lips pulled back, and Alice screeched, “You did this to me.”
With a jolt, Charlotte was wrenched from the nightmare and landed back in her bed.
Sweat dripped from her forehead and into her dark eyebrows, her hands clammy when she gripped the sheets, getting her bearings.
The soft moonlight filtered through the long, crimson drapes, and the sound of rain pattered gently against the window.
She must have slept all day and was dreaming again.
She did that a lot since they were gone, but this time it felt real.
The smell of her sister’s body still lingered in her mouth.
Her hand flew to her chest when an ache cracked through her core at the thought, her eyes brimming with fresh tears.
It was bittersweet, to have been loved so deeply by her family.
She was fortunate to have felt it, but it was all the worse now that it was gone, especially knowing she would never experience that kind of unconditional love again.
Her mother taught her so much, except for how to live without her.
A sharp pain shot through her hip, halting her thoughts. She angled her body to get a better look and hiked up the skirt of her nightgown. Her fingers brushed the dark veins spreading outward from the decaying core of the mark.
It was getting worse.
Tap, tap, tap.
The sound against her bedroom door sent her jumping to her feet and pulled her chemise over the decaying mark. She needed her clothes from home, or new ones. She couldn’t remain in that nightgown much longer.
“Hello?”
“Good evening, miss,” Hartley said shakily, walking inside with a tray before setting it down. “I didn’t mean to wake you. I assumed you would be up. Everyone else in the manor is.”
“I was already awake,” she said, although it had only been for a few minutes.
Hartley placed the tray down and lit a second candle. “How was your sleep?”
“Fitful,” she confessed. “Do you sleep during the day too?”
“We all do.”
“Of course,” Charlotte said with a shake of her head, feeling silly for asking the question.
“Is there anything else you need?”
“Yes. Some lavender, mint, and witch hazel, if you wouldn’t mind.”
It was a concoction her mother always used on bug bites, and she needed it before the one on her hip got any worse.
“I will bring that shortly after I attend to Mr. Young,” she explained.
“Alexander?” she asked, trying to recall his name.
“Yes. He retrieved some of your things last night,” she said before walking out the door. “You should check your wardrobe.”
Her eyes widened. “He was in here while I slept?”
“He wouldn’t hurt you, Miss,” she said upon spotting the horrified look crossing Charlotte’s face. “I will fetch you the herbs you require.”
“Thank you.”
She watched her leave, ensuring the door clicked shut, before turning to the wardrobe and pulling open the paneled, polished doors to reveal three shelves on one side, filled with drawers, stockings, petticoats, chemises, corsets, bonnets, gloves, silk hair ribbons, and a pair of unlaced brown boots.
On the left, hanging from a rail, were all her dresses, including the ones Alice had made for her.
Sighing relief, she pulled the skirt of one to her nose, breathing in the faint scent of perfume. While she was happy to have her clothes returned, she would rather have had Duke.
Biting her lip, she picked out a dusty-blue tea gown.
She was not yet out of deep mourning, but the entire charade of dressing in black was supposed to signal her respect for the deceased.
Wearing Alice’s dresses was more of a display of her grief than anything else could be and who was going to judge her?
The vampires? Or a society that wouldn’t see her?
Neither mattered.
With a long sigh, she decided to go and find Nathaniel. There was no more putting it off. She not only needed to know how much he saw while he was in her mind but persuade him, or Alexander, to retrieve Duke and her grimoires.
After dressing, she faced the window with a hard swallow.
A brush of lavender painted the horizon, and the scattered stars faded into the indigo canvas above the most magnificent gardens that stretched on forever.
She wished she could go outside, but before she could ask for a single thing, she needed to confront the vampire.
She looked at her outfit in the reflection of the window, as she’d quickly found out there were no looking glasses in any of the rooms, not even a hand-mirror.
Her fingers traced the delicate, hand-stitched petals of the flowers tracing over the skirt.
It was the last outfit Alice had made for her before she died.
Of her sister’s many skills, dressmaking was what she excelled at most, not that their father would have ever let her pursue such an occupation.
Despite all the horrible things about being trapped there, she found one small positive aspect to be away from the expectations of her uncle, staff, and society.
She didn’t have to worry about the remarks about her untamed curls and let them cascade down her chest and back.
The vampires surely didn’t care what she looked like, or that she was presentable.
Hell, Nathaniel had carried her out in her chemise.
She grabbed a candlestick and walked into the corridor, turning left toward the sound of music.
The oil-painted eyes followed her down the winding hallways.
She turned into the candlelit darkness, following the sound of the piano into a large room with tall, vaulted ceilings all arching down toward a beautiful crystal chandelier.
If she didn’t know him any better, she would have assumed he was heartbroken from the way he played. Except, he was a vampire who had no regard for human life and tracked them like food. By the way he acted, he didn’t act as if he had a heart at all, much less one that could be broken.
Yet, while she hadn’t heard the song before, it felt so familiar. She crossed over the threshold and slid down the side of the paneled wall, her eyes fixed on Nathaniel hunched over the mahogany piano, his fingers dancing effortlessly across the keys.
His shoulders tensed with each note, as if he were reaching into the deepest recesses of his soul. If he had much of one left.
The candlelight caught the angles of his face, highlighting the way he squeezed his eyes shut at certain notes. As the song faded into the stillness of the room, her breath hitched, and he whipped his head around to look at her.
Their gazes locked for a heartbeat, and in that fleeting moment, she saw the flicker of something unspoken—a glimmer of connection that shifted his expression into one of ruthless carnage.
“Leave,” he commanded with a deepening frown, his eyebrows slanting downward. “Now.”
“I just wanted to—”
“I do not have time to talk.”
She wasn’t sure what she expected, but that reception was not it. “I am not leaving until we speak.”
He turned to face her, their eyes clashing across the room. “What is it you want?” he deadpanned, his lips pulling into a grimace.
Be nice. You need him, she reminded herself. She searched his eyes for a hint of humanity that she could appeal to, but there was nothing there.
She chewed on the inside of her lip, breathing heavily as she stared at him. “I have a few questions.”
His eyes blazed to life when his gaze fell on her neck, lingering there for longer than she liked. After trailing his gaze over her body, he stated gruffly, “Find Alexander. He can answer any questions you have.”
“I want to talk to you, not him.”
“Why?”
Her chest heaved, shoulders tightening when she crossed her arms over her chest. “It must be because of your approachable demeanor,” she said with a feigned smile, her stomach swirling when she caught the corner of his lip twitch upward.
“I want to know if you got all the information you needed when you violated my mind?”
“Is that how you feel?” he asked, standing to face her. “Violated?”
“How could I not? You made me feel things I didn’t want to.”
His eyes blazed as if she’d lit a monochrome flame. “What did I make you feel, little lamb?”
There was that name again.
“Terrible things,” she bit out far too quickly. “You made me revisit memories I would have rather left in the past.”
“I was nothing but a spectator. Your mind went there on its own.”