Chapter 40
A CRYPT
The room is long and rectangular with a coffin in the center.
“A crypt,” I whisper.
Only there’s no skeleton with a bowtie.
Jude shines his flashlight past the coffin, where a large stone table spans the length of the far wall.
It isn’t empty.
We hurry toward it.
A lantern with soot-streaked glass sits beside an inkwell crusted with dried ink.
A feather quill lays on a small piece of cloth next to a rolled up scroll secured with a cord.
There’s a pile of charcoal sketches, a leather-bound Bible so dry and cracked it looks like old bark, and a hand-drawn map that has curled in on itself.
I smooth it straight and take in the familiar geography—the Blackwillow River, the mountains, the forest. Along with historic landmarks, like assembly hall and St. Fortuna’s. A bold X marks a spot in what must have once been red ink but has since faded to rusty brown.
“This is in the cemetery,” I say, pointing at the X.
Jude shines his light on the annotated words at the bottom. “Where the blood must fall,” he reads.
“The compass will lead the way,” I finish.
He picks up the charcoal sketches. The first one is of Molly. There’s no symbol drawn in the corner. But there is an apology written in Ezra’s hand.
I’m sorry I loved you. I’m sorry it killed you.
I want to snatch the sketch from Jude and tear it into pieces.
The last thing he needs is more reason to shut me out.
Thankfully, he’s moving along, shuffling to the next, and the girl isn’t Molly.
The girl looks more like me. As though drawn from the vague recollection of a dream.
Each successive sketch bears more of my likeness.
In the final one, I’m wearing the locket.
With a pounding heart, I pick up the scroll. My hands tremble as I untie the leather cord and begin unrolling the vellum parchment. Ornamental script appears, written in more Latin, and there are two symbols at the top—the one that marked my mother, and another just as familiar.
“That’s your family crest,” I say.
Jude runs his thumb over it. The shield is missing, and the sun doesn’t have any sunbursts. But it’s the same basic structure.
I finish unrolling the scroll.
A small sheaf of paper slips out, filled with cramped handwriting.
Jude and I stand close as we read the words.
Taken from the Testament of the Watchers, AD 1053
In the beginning, God made the angels. He formed them in light and goodness, that they might serve His will. But many fell from grace, drawn by pride and the lust for dominion. Among these were Dante and Seraphina, glorious in form, terrible in purpose, bound together in a love corrupted by envy.
Dante, seeking to magnify his strength, begat a mortal line in secret, that his power might be increased through the mingling of blood. Unwilling to be lesser, Seraphina did likewise, and forged a lineage of her own.
But when Dante perceived her ambition, he rose up in fury. From her three amulets, wherein her gifts were bound, he did strip of power and sealed it within his tomb. The vessels left barren, he descended into the grave by his own hand.
She doth now wander the earth, awaiting her hour.
When his fire blazeth brightest in the heavens, when the amulets are set within the arch, and the mortal blood of Dante’s seed is willingly spilled upon the vault wherein her power was sealed, then shall she rise, more terrible and mighty than before.
Translated faithfully by my hand.
- Ezra Vandenberg, AD 1757
“1757,” I whisper.
The last time Dante’s comet appeared, blazing bright in the heavens.
Jude’s eyes meet mine. He hasn’t given me the chance to tell him about the gemstones, about Seraphina’s powers. But this does the job well enough.
I open the Bible, half-expecting it to be carved out like the one from Simon’s bedroom, only this will have the gemstones inside.
But the pages are intact and as dry as fallen leaves.
I flip through them, stopping in Lamentations, where three loose pages have been tucked, their edges ragged on one side.
As though torn from a book.
No. A journal.
The first was written the same year as Ezra’s translation.
She came to me not as an angel but in the likeness of a woman, fair to behold with a countenance that stirred longing in the hearts of men. She named herself Sara—a maiden with no kin, a damsel in need of saving. Many fell beneath her influence. I alone beheld the truth and would not receive her.
She turned then to my brother. He gave her his heart. I entreated him to reconsider, for I perceived she sought not love but power. She required our blood to reclaim that which had been taken from her. But he would not listen. Or perchance he did, and chose to love her still.
I resolved to destroy her, but every attempt failed. I came to suspect the endeavor an impossibility. That which hath fallen from heaven cannot be destroyed by earth. My only hope was to cast her out. Yet in my attempt, it was my brother whom I destroyed.
In my despair, I struck a bargain with the devil. My brother’s life for my heart. I believed I might outwit her.
As she brought Raphael back from death, I moved against her. I opened the tomb and sealed her within. The seal held. Yet what returned to me bore not the soul of my brother, but a shadow of a man filled with bitterness and rage.
He has fixed his hatred upon me, for it was I who imprisoned Seraphina.
“She was real?” Jude says.
It’s not so hard for me to believe. But for him? His face has gone a shade paler, casting the shadows beneath his eyes and cheekbones into sharper relief. This beautiful boy, tumbling deeper down Alice’s rabbit hole.
Seraphina and Dante.
Not just characters in a children’s fable.
But actual fallen angels.
As real as the curse.
I reread the entry, trying to make sense of the implications. Seraphina wanted her powers back. To do that, she needed to open the tomb. To open the tomb, she needed the blood of Dante’s mortal descendants. So she went after Ezra, and then Raphael. Which means …
“Jude,” I whisper.
But I don’t have to say it.
He has made the same connection.
If Ezra was a mortal descendant of Dante, then so is he. Which means Jude Vandenberg is part angel. And Rafe is, too.
My mind spins.
My blood pounds.
Here, too, is the reason for the brothers’ long-standing enmity. The beginning of the feud. In Ezra’s attempt to kill Seraphina, he accidentally killed Raphael, then begged her to bring him back from the dead. She did, and in so doing, he imprisoned her and Raphael came back different.
Jude turns to the second entry, written a year later.
My brother’s life in exchange for my heart. I had believed myself spared from her curse, for after I sealed Seraphina away, my heart beat whole.
But no longer.
My dearest Molly. I loved her, and she loved me. Yet somehow, he deceived her. He seduced her. He delighted in her ruin. And in her shame, she died by her own hand. This was no cruel accident. Raphael has ensured I understand as much.
I took from him the object of his devotion. Now he has taken mine. His life for my heart, and mine is lost. Broken. Ravaged.
My brother is no longer the man I knew. He is a creature remade in bitterness. Seraphina has cursed my blood and corrupted his.
Can blood be evil?
The question reverberates in my mind. It was first penned by Isaiah. A question about Lucian, who had Reuben, who had Frank, who had Thomas, who had Rafe. I picture him whispering to Lainey, and Twig, stuck under the trailer. And I know the answer.
Yes.
Blood can absolutely be evil.
I keep reading.
Raphael is gone now. He departed but recently, setting sail for England and leaving wreckage in his wake. I say good riddance, though our mother weeps.
For her beloved sons, who have become sworn enemies. For his absence, and for the sorrow that has settled in my soul. I have told her I shall not take a wife. I shall not bear heirs. This curse upon my blood shall perish with me.
Jude has gone ghostly pale now as he turns to the third and final page. The entry is written almost twenty years later.
I am ashamed. I am weak. A fool, and worse still, a fool who hath acted foolishly.
I saw her in the house of God, wearing a locket I have seen a hundred times before, though never in waking life. It has haunted my dreams, always upon Seraphina’s neck as she drives the blade into Molly’s heart. And yet, there she stood, adorned with it.
She told me she purchased it from a traveling peddler, who sold charms and oddments from a wooden cart. In that moment, my reason faltered. The sight of that wretched locket turned my heart to fury. I forgot my vow.
I was drawn in not by love, but madness, and hunger for what once was. I took pleasures where I ought not to have taken. What else could I do but offer her my hand? I would not leave her disgraced, as Raphael left Molly. I would be the better man.
Yet I do not love her. My heart is no longer capable of love. It lies buried with Molly in a grave left nameless.
But now I am afraid, for she is with child. And what if the curse passes to him?
I depart for war in a fortnight. Before I go, I must do all I can to protect the truth.
To keep her sealed away forever. I have found the amulets Raphael hid.
In their place, I have left clever facsimiles.
The key and the compass are hidden within the Word of God.
The truth is buried beneath sacred ground.
Should my brother return, his depraved soul shall not venture near either.
My mind spins as dots connect with cataclysmic speed. The compass, the key, the Bible. Three pieces of the same puzzle, separated over the centuries, and now, brought back together. By me, a girl Ezra foresaw. And Jude, a descendant of Dante.
I pick up the charcoal sketches, which would later become a painting. And in that painting, the locket was Seraphina’s.
She wore it in his dreams.
Then it showed up in his actual life.
I pick up the scroll, eying the two symbols at the top.
One, the Vandenberg crest, which belonged first to Dante.
The other, the symbol on the locket, which belonged first to Seraphina.
It isn’t the mark of the curse. It’s the mark of the one who cast it.
And every time it was triggered, she signed her name.
Then he painted me, wearing it …
“The revelation,” I say. Mysterious words written in his own hand, the year of his son’s birth. “What if it’s here?”
Jude flips through the rest of the Bible. He turns over the map. He does the same with the scroll. But there’s nothing else to be found. The mysterious revelation remains frustratingly elusive.
With the table thoroughly searched, he shines his light on the coffin.
It sits in a low stone recess, its surface warped and split with age.
We move closer, as though compelled. And I can’t help but think that this coffin doesn’t fit.
If someone were entombed in here, the crypt would have been written about.
But I’ve never read anything about a crypt under St. Fortuna’s.
I press my hand along the coffin’s seam and push. The lid groans but doesn’t move. I find a crack near the corner and wedge my fingers beneath it. Jude joins me. We pull and yank, and with a splintering sound, the wood gives way.
Just as I suspected, there are no bones inside.
But there is a jewelry box.
A domed walnut chest.
Slowly, I lift the lid.
And there it is.
Resting in the upper tray on a velvet cushion. The locket. My heart pounds as I pick it up. It’s cold to the touch. Heavy, too. I try to open it, but it’s locked tight. And for just a second, it pulses violently in my palm.
With a gasp, it clatters to the floor.
“Are you okay?” Jude asks.
“I-I’m fine,” I say.
He picks it up, and for one panicked moment, I want to shout at him to stop. Don’t touch it. But he’s too quick. And nothing happens.
The locket is silent and still.
I lift the upper tray to investigate the compartment beneath. And there they are. The two items Rafe has been searching for—the onyx and the pearl.
Not clever facsimiles.
But Seraphina’s amulets.
Empty vessels without any power.
Except to open the tomb.
With Vandenberg blood.
Under the light of Dante’s comet.
Finally, Rafe’s finish line has come into view.
We know exactly what he’s up to.