by Ava Stone
The Eilbeck butler opened the door and his eyes widened when they landed on Braden. “Lord Bradenham?” he said in surprise.
Braden took a deep breath and asked the question that had been haunting him as soon as he’d left Marisdùn grounds. “Is Miss Eilbeck at home?”
The butler shook his head. “No, sir, she left quite a while ago.”
Dread and panic washed over him like an icy rain. “And what about Sir Cyrus?” he managed to choke out. Callie couldn’t be missing. She couldn’t really be missing. There had to be some explanation, something other than the castle had taken her.
“In his study,” the servant said calmly, though he did frown at Braden as though trying to make sense of his presence at the manor.
“I need to see him straight away.”
The butler opened the door wider for Braden and led him towards the same yellow parlor where he’d been the first time he visited Braewood, then left him there while he went to retrieve his employer.
She wasn’t here. Where could she be? Braden paced the room back and forth. Where else would she go? What could have delayed her visit to Marisdùn?
“Bradenham?” Sir Cyrus said from the threshold. “What are you doing here?”
Braden stopped mid-pace and turned to face his would-be brother-in-law. The man looked far from happy to see him, and Braden was about to make him even less so. “I think something may have happened to Callie. Your butler says she’s not here. She was supposed to meet me, and—”
“She’s gone to the vicarage.” The magistrate frowned. “Wait. Why was she to meet you?”
The vicarage! “Oh, thank God!” As though the man had thrown Braden a life preserver, his heart lifted in his chest. Of course the vicarage made all the sense in the world. She must have gone to visit Miss Southward, got distracted and lost track of time.
He started for the doorway, but the large magistrate was most definitely blocking his path. “Not so fast.” Sir Cyrus folded his arms across his chest. “What is going on, Bradenham?”
“Nothing,” Braden breathed out. “I’m certain all is fine. She said she’d meet me in my gardens, but she didn’t arrive.” He thought the better of mentioning the fact that Quent thought Callie had vanished into the shrubbery. “So she must still be at the vicarage if she was headed there first.”
Still the man didn’t budge from his spot. “She said she’d meet you?” her brother echoed. “She didn’t tell me she was headed to Marisdùn at all today.”
Braden reached into his jacket and retrieved Callie’s note, lifting it out for her brother. Sir Cyrus snatched it in his hands and scanned the words quickly. Then he lifted his crestfallen gaze to meet Braden’s once more.
“She lied to me.” The way he said the words made it sound as though she’d broken his heart.
Braden heaved a sigh. “Is it possible she thought you wouldn’t approve?”
The magistrate slowly shook his head. “But she’s never lied to me before.”
The image of Callie crossing her fingers behind her back that first day when she’d told her brother the vicar approved of the masquerade flashed in Braden’s mind, but he kept that memory to himself. There was no reason to make this worse for the man.
“She’ll marry you no matter what I say, won’t she?” He stepped further into the parlor and dropped onto the brocade settee with a thud. “If she has to run off to Scotland or wherever else, I’ll lose her and there’s nothing I can do about it.”
Braden followed the magistrate further into the parlor and grasped the back of one of the chairs with his hands. “You won’t lose her, Eilbeck. She’ll always be your sister. She adores you. Give us your blessing, and she’ll love you more for it.”
The man winced in response. “You’ll take her to Buckinghamshire, and I’ll never see her again.”
Well, that was overly dramatic. But as he was being sincere, Braden took pity on Sir Cyrus. He rounded the chair in front of him and sat across from the man. “You’ll always be welcome at Highfield and I’m certain we’ll visit Ravenglass from time to time.”
“But it won’t be the same,” the magistrate sulked.
“Nothing ever is,” Braden replied. Change was always inevitable. How many times had his own life changed without any way to reverse it? “But sometimes it ends up better than it was. You never know what is right around the corner.”
The man glanced up at Braden, a confused expression across his face. “Better?”
Braden shrugged. “Like perhaps a slew of nieces and nephews climbing up your leg and begging for bedtime stories.”
At that Sir Cyrus laughed. “You do love her?”
“Since the first moment I saw her.”
“Very well, Bradenham.” The magistrate release a sigh, then pushed back to his feet. “I’ll head over to the vicarage with you. I’ll tell Callie that I’ll give you my blessing and that there’s no need to lie to me again.”
Braden smiled in return. At least he’d accomplished something of merit. “I’m certain she’ll be happy to hear it.”
Who knew the suggestion of nieces and nephews was all it would take to gain Sir Cyrus’ blessing? The entire length of the trip from Braewood to the vicarage, the man spoke of little else. He’d probably make a decent father himself some day.
They walked up the path to the front door, but it opened before either of them could knock.
“Cyrus Eilbeck.” Lila Southward frowned, standing sentry in the doorway. “If my father sees you here…”
Braden stepped in front of the magistrate as though to protect the man from the vicar’s daughter. “Miss Southward, is Callie here?”
Her frown deepened and she shook her head. “Is she supposed to be?”
“She told me she was coming here,” Sir Cyrus said, poking his head from behind Braden to see the girl.
“Oh.” Miss Southward stepped outside the vicarage and shut the door behind her as though to keep anyone inside from overhearing them. “I haven’t seen her all day. Is everything all right?”
Nothing was all right, not if Callie wasn’t here. Despair settled in Braden’s heart and he scrubbed a hand across his brow. “Then she’s been missing for hours.”
“Hours?” Miss Southward blinked with concern. “Just because she’s not here? She could be in town or visiting Daphne or anywhere.”
But she couldn’t be anywhere. She was supposed to have met Braden. She wouldn’t have gone into town or anywhere else, not after days of not seeing him. That much he was certain of. “My brother saw her.”
“What?” Sir Cyrus said, stepping around Braden. “Why didn’t you say so?”
“In the gardens at the castle,” he said, all hope gone from his voice. “Quent said she vanished right in front of him, into a hedge. We’ve searched the place over, every inch of the castle, but she’s not there. She doesn’t seem to be anywhere. My last hope was to find her here.”
“Vanished?” Miss Southward echoed in horror. “Into a hedge?”
“I could smell her scent. Gardenias, right where Quent said she’d been.” Though it still didn’t make any more sense now than it had all those hours ago.
“On my word,” Sir Cyrus barked, his face purple and bulging, “if you have harmed my sister in any way, Bradenham, I will see you hanged. I will—”
“Don’t be a dolt, Sir Cyrus,” Miss Southward said, her sympathetic gaze on Braden. “Can’t you see the anguish he’s in? Wherever Callie is, he had nothing to do with her being there.”
The magistrate released an irritable sigh. “I want to see this hedge, Bradenham.”
“So do I,” Miss Southward replied. “Let me just fetch my wrap.”
Marisdùn’s courtyard was overrun with carriages in the fading light. And there were enough Londoners milling about that Braden’s Cumberland castle was now more populated than Rotten Row during the fashionable hour. Damn it all! The last thing he needed was this insanity swirling about.
“Good God,” Sir Cyru
s muttered under his breath. “I’ve never seen so many people.”
“Neither have I,” Miss Southward added in awe.
Braden shook his head in frustration. Why did they all have to arrive today? Exactly how many people did Quent tell to arrive early? His jackanapes of a brother…
“Bradenham!” the Earl of Kilworth called from across the courtyard, with a woman on each of his arms. “There you are.”
Damned Kilworth. The fellow wasn’t Braden’s favorite on his best day. And today was quite far from his best day.
The earl crossed the courtyard, towing the two women with him. Then he smiled in greeting. “Brought a couple of ladies with me. Hope you don’t mind.”
Ladies? From the look of the pair, Kilworth had acquired them at some bawdy house along the way. They were nearly spilling out of their too-tight bodices and their hair was unbundled about their shoulders as though they’d just been tumbled. But, at the moment, Braden couldn’t care less about Kilworth or his companions. Nothing mattered right now, nothing except finding Callie and then keeping her safe the rest of his life.
“In a bit of a hurry at the moment, Kilworth,” he replied, trying to usher Sir Cyrus and the very innocent Lila Southward past the reprobate and his ladies.
“Do tell me Lady Hope is here somewhere,” the earl called after them, making Braden’s step nearly falter and his pulse pound in his ears. “I haven’t spotted her yet.”
Braden swung back towards the degenerate earl and growled, “If you so much as take one step towards any of my sisters, I’ll stick your head on a pike.”
Kilworth’s eyes widened in surprise.
Then before the earl could find his tongue to respond to the threat, Braden turned once more on his heel, and directed Sir Cyrus and Miss Southward towards the garden gate.
“Who was that?” Sir Cyrus asked once they were out of earshot.
“A friend of my brother’s,” Braden replied, anger still coursing through his veins. How dare the man ask after Hope with not one, but two lightskirts on his arm? If Miss Southward wasn’t in his company, he’d have crashed his fist right into to Kilworth’s nose.
He stalked through the garden gate with Callie’s brother and her friend on his heels. He navigated their way through the winding hedges and shrubs until they came to the hedge. The last place anyone had seen his Callie.
“Right here,” he said, wishing his voice hadn’t cracked as he did so. But he couldn’t help it. The longer Callie was gone, the more fragile he became. It didn’t make any sense for her to have disappeared here. It just didn’t. But what if she really had?
Sir Cyrus stepped closer to the hedge and touched the leaves with his hands. “Here?” he asked.
That’s what Quent had said. So Braden nodded, not certain he could speak without his voice failing him.
“Oh, Braden!” Quent sighed with relief as he rounded a hedge. “We’re in luck. Chetwey knows a witch.”
Miss Southward gasped and Quent seemed, just then, to realize that Braden wasn’t alone.
“Apologies, Miss Southward.” Quent nodded in greeting. “Didn’t see you there.”
“Lord Quentin,” she began, a hand above her heart. “What do you mean a witch?”
That was Braden’s question as well. If this was about that damned Samhain party, he was going to stick his brother’s head on a pike right next to Kilworth’s. “I hardly think this is the time, Quent,” he grumbled.
“You’re right,” his brother agreed. “It’s not the time yet. Mrs. Small says that midnight on Samhain is the right time, but we need a witch, and like I said, Chetwey knows one, so we are in luck there.”
“What the devil are you talking about?” Sir Cyrus bellowed.
“I’m not explaining myself well.” Quent heaved a sigh. “Mrs. Small said—”
“The housekeeper?” Braden interrupted, not liking at all where this conversation was going. He had warned that woman not to say Callie had been taken by the castle even one more time if she wanted to keep her post.
“I know you think it’s madness, Braden,” Quent said softly. “But what if she’s right? What if the castle has taken Miss Eilbeck? Are you going to let your logic and reason, your pride, stand in the way of getting her back?”
As though he’d been smashed in the face with a cudgel, Braden gaped at his brother. There wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do to get Callie back. He’d walk across hot coals, swim the English Channel, climb the Himalayas with his bare feet. And he’d listen to madness, apparently. “What does Mrs. Small say?”
“She says there’s a portal in the dungeons. A portal that our great-grandmother opened and is the cause of most of the spirits filling the corridors of the castle.”
“A portal?” Sir Cyrus echoed.
Quent nodded. “And that midnight on Samhain the veil between the worlds of the living and the dead will be at its thinnest. That we can get Miss Eilbeck by then or…” His voice trailed off as though he didn’t want to say anything further.
“Or what, Lord Quentin?” Miss Southward prodded.
Quent shifted a bit in his boots. “Or she’ll be lost to the other side forever.” Then he shook his head as though to shake the maudlin thought from his own mind and a smile lit his face. “But we have a witch, Braden. Mrs. Small said we needed one. That a witch opened the portal and another witch could use it to get Miss Eilbeck back.”
“A witch?” Braden shook his own head. There was no such thing as witches. Or ghosts. Or castles that stole the living.
“Miss Glace.” Quent almost beamed. “She’s been right here at Marisdùn since we arrived and we are quite lucky for it.”
“Brighid Glace is a healer,” Miss Southward said, frustration lacing her voice. “She’s not a witch.”
Braden looked from the vicar’s daughter to his brother. Was Quent’s master plan resting on the shoulders of a local healer?
“Chetwey says she is.” Quent kept his gaze trained on Braden. “He’s talking to her now.”
Braden, Sir Cyrus and Miss Southward followed Quent back into the castle and then around a maze of corridors towards the kitchens. If this healer or witch or whatever she was could save Callie, it would be foolish not to see what she had to say. It was, after all, the very least Braden could do. And he hadn’t done much thus far. He’d actually never been as helpless as he’d felt this entire day.
“Here we are,” Quent said affably as the reached a small door off to the side of the kitchens.
Half a second later, Blake Chetwey stood in the threshold, arms folded across his middle as though to bar Braden from the room. Before Braden could tell his friend to get out of the way, he spotted Miss Glace inside the room, bent over a scarred, wooden table, reading old books.
“My eye is much better, thanks to you,” Quent called cheerfully into the room at the girl.
“I am glad to hear it, Lord Quentin,” Miss Glace replied softly.
For God’s sake. Callie had been missing for hours and Quent was talking about his blasted eye? Braden brushed past his brother and his gaze landed on Blake Chetwey, still standing sentry in front of the room as though to protect Miss Glace from anyone or anything in the castle. Honorable as that was, Braden didn’t have time for it. He frowned at the girl who was still sitting at the old table. “Are you really a witch, Miss Glace?”
She pushed to her feet and met Braden’s eyes as regally as any queen and said, “Yes.”
“And can you help me get Callie back?” Braden took a step towards the door, prepared to push Chetwey from his path, but he couldn’t move an inch further. It was as though some invisible barrier meant to keep him in the corridor. But that wasn’t possible. He pressed his hand against the barrier, but a force as strong as iron kept him firmly in place. “What the devil!” he cursed. “Why can’t I get in there?”
“It is not permitted,” Miss Glace’ s lyrical voice hit his ears. “You are blood of the castle.”
Chetwey glanced back over his shoul
der at the girl. “He is what?”
“Blood of the castle,” she repeated. “This room was sealed off by my ancestors to keep it safe.”
“Safe from me?” Braden frowned. He did own the damn place. It wasn’t the least bit acceptable that someone was able to seal off his own rooms from him. But someone most definitely had. He couldn’t penetrate the invisible force in front of that room with all his strength.
“Safe from any descendant of Mary Routledge. Her blood runs through your veins too, my lord.” His veins? At the mention of his great-grandmother, Braden’s blood ran a little cold. What did his missing ancestor want with Callie?
“I was in there,” Quent said, breaking Braden from his thoughts. “We have the same blood.”
Quent had been in the mysterious little room? Braden cast his brother a sidelong glance.
“A mistake on my part, Lord Quentin,” Miss Glace replied, sounding quite contrite. “The room has been sealed once more. You won’t be able to enter it again.”
Sir Cyrus snorted out in frustration. “Unless Callie’s in there somewhere, I don’t care one whit about who can or cannot enter the damned room.” He puffed out his chest. “Can you find my sister or not, Miss Glace?”
And truly, that was all Braden cared about as well.
The pretty witch swallowed a bit nervously. “I’ll do everything in my power to bring her back, Sir Cyrus.”
A bit of hope sparked in Braden’s heart. Before this jaunt to Marisdùn, he’d laughed off the idea of ghosts and witches and disappearing great-grandmothers. But the force around that mysterious little room was quite real. He couldn’t see it with his eyes, but it was there. And if that force was there, then who knew what else was real? Who knew what might bring Callie back to him?
Miss Glace seemed to think she could pull off such a miracle, and Braden prayed she was right.
Candle in hand, Braden descended the steps into the dungeons, lighting the torches along the staircase as he went. A portal. Mrs. Small was adamant that a portal between their world and the next was down here, that Callie was trapped somewhere in between. If there was a portal, he’d find it. He had to.