by Ava Stone
The floor began to move beneath their feet and the wind in the circle increased in intensity. Then Brighid Glace stepped into the middle of the circle and tossed a doll into the hearth. A ball of fire shot upwards and the winds stopped as suddenly as they had started. The witch moved her hand in a sweeping motion over the hearth and said, “Be sealed,” before she collapsed to the floor.
Chetwey scooped the girl up into his arms and bellowed for the others to make way. Then he started for the stone steps, leaving the rest of the assembled group staring at each other.
Quent made a direct path for Braden and whispered, “Are you all right?”
Braden was shaken, and his back ached like the devil, but none of that mattered at the moment. “Callie?” he whispered back. “Do you see her anywhere?”
Quent spun on his heels to glance around the dungeons, and Braden did the same. His heart sank to his toes when there was no sign of his beloved. He raced back to the hearth and peered down into it. Just a few ashes were inside, but nothing else. Was that the portal? Had Brighid Glace closed it without retrieving Callie first?
Braden stumbled forward, pressing against the bottom of the hearth. It couldn’t be closed. It couldn’t be! Not if Callie was still trapped on the other side. “Callie!” he bellowed, hitting the hearth with his fists until they were bloody. “Callie! Oh, dear God, where is she?”
The ground had shaken. There’d been a wind. A blazing ball of fire had shot into the air, for God’s sake. This had been their chance. This had been their one opportunity to save his Callie. And they’d failed. An anguished sob escaped him, he couldn’t help it. There was no way to keep his suffering silent.
The dungeons were deathly quiet when he finally lifted his head. His friends and the others assembled were all staring helplessly at him. There was nothing any of them could do.
Quent stepped forward a moment later and offered his arm to Braden. “Doctor Alcott left some laudanum.”
Laudanum! Quent’s answer to Callie being lost forever was to sedate Braden? “I don’t need any damned laudanum,” he growled.
“You’ve barely slept,” Quent said softly. “You need some rest, Braden.”
A gasp sounded behind him and Braden turned to find Mrs. Small gesturing to him. “Your back, my lord! You’re bleeding.”
He was?
Quent grasped Braden’s shoulder and turned him away so he could inspect his back. “Good God, Braden! You’re nearly shredded to pieces.” Then he glanced towards the housekeeper. “You’d better send for Doctor Alcott.”
Morning light was just as depressing as the evening darkness had been. Braden had drained one entire bottle of whiskey, but it still hadn’t been enough to knock him unconscious. In retrospect, he probably should have used Doctor Alcott’s laudanum after all.
A scratch came at his door and he glared in that direction. There was no one he wanted to see today and no one who wanted to see him the way he was this morning. “Go away,” he called, his head pounding and the scratches across his back pulsing, as they had all night long.
“My lord,” came Mrs. Small’s voice through the crack in his door. “Sir Cyrus and Miss Southward are here. I’ve left them in the library.”
Braden’s heart twisted in his chest once more. How could he look Cyrus Eilbeck in the eyes and tell the man his sister was lost forever? “Very well.” He winced. “I’ll be right down.”
Damn it all. He should have brought his valet with him. It was bloody difficult throwing on a shirt with his back wrapped up like a mummy. Still, he managed to toss on a clean shirt and struggled into his waistcoat and jacket. A cravat he would do without, however. He didn’t have the patience or inclination to fight with the thing this morning.
He ran a quick brush through his hair, glancing briefly at his reflection. Dark circles rested beneath his eyes, he hadn’t shaved in two days, and his color was most definitely pale. “You’re a pretty sight,” he mumbled to himself as he turned on his heel and started for the corridor.
Party guests lined the hallways and people offered their morning felicitations. But Braden barely heard them, grumbling his greetings, wanting nothing more than to be past the people all together. He found his way into the library and heaved a sigh at the sight of Callie’s brother.
Sir Cyrus’s gaze dropped to his feet. “Mrs. Small said there was no word about Callie.”
Braden shook his head. “You don’t know how I wish otherwise, Eilbeck.”
“The portal is sealed?” Miss Southward asked, her grey eyes keenly focused on Braden.
He nodded as a lump lodged in his throat. “And I don’t know how we’ll get her back with it closed.”
At that moment, Quent strode into the room. He nodded towards the magistrate and smiled at the vicar’s daughter. “Didn’t mean to interrupt,” he began. “But Miss Glace seems to be stirring.”
The witch was stirring. Bloody wonderful. She hadn’t been a ton of help thus far, had she? “Unless she has Callie with her, I don’t care if I ever see Miss Glace again.”
Lila Southward gasped slightly. “I don’t know what happened last night, my lord, but I’ve known Brighid Glace all my life. So has Callie. I’m sure she’s only trying to help.”
“And we can use every bit of help we can get,” Quent added. “Tonight is the thirty-first, Braden. Mrs. Small says we can still get Miss Eilbeck back tonight when the veil is at its thinnest.”
So the portal was closed, but the veil would be thin enough to retrieve Callie? Was that what he was supposed to believe now? Braden heaved a sigh. Getting his hopes up was going to destroy his soul from the inside out. But, what other choice did he have?
A knock sounded on the door and then Doctor Alcott ushered his sister over the threshold of the library. The young doctor met Braden’s eyes and said, “How is your back this morning?”
It hurt like the devil, but Braden shrugged instead of saying so. “The only thing I’m focused on is locating Miss Eilbeck.”
Doctor Alcott agreed with an incline of his head. “Yes, you said as much last night. Many times. I still think you ought to take a bit of laudanum tonight. If you don’t get some rest, my lord, you won’t be any good to anyone, including Miss Eilbeck.”
“Oh good!” Quent said, striding into the library behind the pair. “You’re all here.” Then he was followed by Thorn, Wolf, and Garrick, whom Braden nodded towards in greeting. “Chetwey is bringing Miss Glace just now so we can sort out the plan for today.”
The plan for today had been very odd up ‘til now. Braden, Lila Southward, Cyrus Eilbeck and Daphne Alcott had all sat in Miss Glace’s herb garden, focusing on Callie while the little witch stared into a crystal and mumbled things about colors. None of it had made any sense to Braden and since Miss Glace hadn’t been able to see where Callie was, he suspected none of it made any sense to her either. And that was the worst of it. The despair for any tangible plan to find Callie and to bring her back from wherever she was.
He cradled a tumbler of whiskey in his hands as he leaned against the desk in his study. Midnight was still hours away and he wasn’t any closer to finding her now than he had been the first day she’d gone missing.
A knock came from the door and Braden glanced from his desk towards the entrance. Miss Southward stood in the threshold, a worried expression etched across her face. “I don’t mean to interrupt,” she began.
There was nothing to interrupt other than Braden’s tortured thoughts. “Do come in, Miss Southward,” he said, forcing a smile to his face.
She stepped further into the study, stopping once she reached one of the overstuffed leather chairs before his desk. “I have to return home, my lord, or my father will be quite angry otherwise.” She shook her head as though to shake that thought away, and her dark curls bobbed against her shoulders. “I just wanted to tell you that I’ll be back tonight, one way or the other. So please don’t start without me.”
With or without her, Braden feared the result would
be the same. He said nothing in response, only lifted his glass of whiskey to his lips.
“Oh, no,” Miss Southward whispered in panic, touching a hand to her heart.
Her alarm was enough to draw Braden’s attention away from his drink long enough to ask, “What is it?”
“You’ve lost faith.” Her pretty face looked quite a bit paler all of a sudden.
“Faith?” he scoffed. “Miss Southward, I am not one to believe in faith on my best day and this is far from my best day.”
She stepped closer to him, her blue eyes clouded in concern. “But you have to have faith, my lord. We all have to have faith if we’re to bring her home tonight.”
Poor misguided girl. Braden tipped back another drink of whiskey.
“I’ve heard my father talk about faith all of my life…”
“And I heard mine talk about honor, but that doesn’t mean he had any. Words, Miss Southward, are just words.”
“Faith is real,” Miss Southward insisted, the sincerity in her voice touching something in Braden’s soul. “I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve seen the sick believe they’ll get healthy and then do so. I’ve seen a child have faith he can take his first steps and then do so. I’ve seen—”
“Have you seen a girl vanish and then reappear?” he asked.
“I will tonight.” The pitying glance Miss Southward cast him made Braden more than a bit uncomfortable. “Faith is powerful, Lord Bradenham. It can move mountains.”
“So they say.”
“And they are right,” she said with such conviction, Braden could almost imagine her at her father’s pulpit. “I’ve known Callie Eilbeck my whole life. I’ve never seen the light in her eyes shine as they did that day the two of you came to the vicarage. She loves you, my lord. Love her enough to believe she’ll return, and she will.”
But if he did that and Callie didn’t appear, whatever was left of him would crumble to ash.
“I know it’s difficult,” she said a bit softer. “But we all have to believe, my lord. When we all band together, when we all will her to return, we won’t be disappointed. I have no doubt.”
“And how is you have such faith, Miss Southward?” he asked.
She shook her head. “Because it’s the only thing I have to hold on to. I have to believe I’ll see Callie again. The alternative is too awful to contemplate.”
The alternative was all Braden had been contemplating. Of course, most of his life had been one loss after another. So contemplating one more loss came rather naturally.
“Don’t give up on her,” the girl urged quietly. “She needs each of us. You more than anyone else.”
Somehow Braden found himself nodding. “Very well, Miss Southward, I will try.”
She flashed him a radiant grin. “And I will succeed on escaping the vicarage and being here to help you.”
The masquerade was in full swing. Half of London was overflowing Marisdùn’s ballroom, parlors and gardens. But Braden hardly noticed them or anything else. He’d spent the afternoon letting Lila Southward’s advice flit about his heart. He had everything to gain by having a little faith, everything to gain by focusing his whole heart and soul on following Miss Glace’s instructions, and everything to lose if he didn’t.
Hope had burgeoned up inside him all evening and now midnight was nearly upon them. Miss Alcott, Miss Southward, Blake Chetwey, Sir Cyrus and Brighid Glace had all assembled in the small herb garden off the kitchens to watch Braden toss hemp seeds over his shoulder. He didn’t know why it was necessary for him to do so and mutter, “Tilleadh thugam, troghad,” nine times; but Brighid Glace had told him to do so while picturing Callie in his mind, and he was bound and determined to do everything he needed to do in order to bring Callie home.
With each handful of seeds he tossed, he imagined Callie as he’d seen her that first day in Marisdùn’s gardens. She’d been the prettiest sight he’d ever seen. Her flaxen curls had framed her lovely face and her eyes—so green, so piercing, she seemed to see straight into his soul like no one had ever done before or since.
He remembered encountering her in Ravenglass and every moment of their walk to the vicarage. He told her things on that walk that he’d never divulged to another living soul. And there was more he wanted to tell her, more he wanted to learn about her. And he wanted to spend the rest of his life learning those things, kissing her, making love to her, keeping her safe, giving her children, sharing every moment the two of them would ever have.
In the distance, twelve bells rang out over Ravenglass.
“It is past midnight,” Sir Cyrus hissed.
Braden stopped where he stood and glanced at the little witch, who was hunched over her crystal a few feet away.
“It just turned,” Miss Alcott muttered softly.
Brighid Glace nodded at Braden. It was time to see Callie. Dear God, let this work. Braden glanced over his shoulder where the last of his hemp seeds had landed and his heart nearly burst from his chest. A vision of Callie appeared behind him and she reached a tentative hand out to him. “I see her!”
“Braden?” she said, her voice sounding distant, but she was there! Damn it all, it had worked.
“Where?” Miss Glace asked calmly, but Braden paid her no attention. How could he when he could finally see Callie?
“Callie sweetheart, is that really you?”
“Oh, Braden, I’m so scared,” she said, her green eyes piercing him where he stood.
“Stay there. I’m coming for you,” he promised. Then he turned and reached his hands out to her, but she vanished as though she’d never been there at all. As though a dagger had pierced his heart, Braden sucked in an anguished breath as his arms fell to his sides. “She’s gone.”
“Where is she?” the witch asked, standing at Braden’s side in an instant.
Where was she? How was he to know that? She’d been here and then…And then he knew as surely as he knew his own name. “The fountain in the gardens. Where we first met,” he gasped out. Right beside the gazanias.
Miss Glace grabbed her satchel from Chetwey and started for the castle door. She called out, “We must hurry,” to the rest of the assembled group. “Follow Lord Bradenham to the fountain he means.”
They all followed Braden, racing through the castle and into the formal gardens. They pushed past masked merrymakers and townsfolk, hurrying as fast as they could down the garden path. There was no time to waste, no excuses to be made. Time was ticking away and Braden had no idea how much time they had left.
As soon as they reached the fountain, Brighid Glace arranged them all in the shape of a triangle. Then she began chanting nonsensically, her voice calm and steady as though she’d done this a hundred times before.
Braden glanced across the triangle, his eyes landing on Miss Southward who nodded with approval. For a moment, doubt began to creep into his mind. What if this didn’t work? What if all of this had been for naught? What if…
A soft, gardenia-scented wind filled the triangle and Braden’s uncertainty fell away. Callie was there. He could feel it!
Callie blinked into the fog that surrounded her. The air was much thinner than the dark thickness that had encompassed her the last few days. And she could move again, which was more than wonderful. What was happening, though? Where was she now?
She tried to focus beyond the fog and…Braden!
She blinked her eyes again. He was still there, staring right at her. She glanced around her and spotted Cyrus, Daphne, Lila, Brighid, and a few people she didn’t recognize all circled around her spot.
And everyone was looking right at her. They could see her! She felt certain they could finally see her.
A sob burst from her, and she’d never been so happy to hear any sound in her life. And then, from the surrounding darkness, applause hit her ears as well. Applause? Before she had time to think on that at all, Braden rushed towards her and pulled Callie into his embrace.
She clutched his jacket, determined never to l
et him go. “You can see me,” she said softly, which was a silly thing to say as he could very clearly see and touch her.
“I can see you,” he affirmed, his gravelly voice warming her from the inside out. She would have shivered, but his arms tightened around her and she’d never felt so safe in all her life. And after the last few days, feeling safe was something she would never take for granted again.
Callie held on tightly to Braden, afraid that if she let go of him, that she’d vanish once more. She was afraid to blink and discover that all of this was a dream and that she’d wake up in that blackness all over again. But Braden didn’t seem inclined to release her either. He pressed his lips to the top of her head over and over, as though assuring himself that she was really there.
“Callie,” Cyrus said from somewhere behind them. And then she felt her brother’s hand on her shoulder.
She glanced up at Braden who reluctantly released her. Callie turned to embrace her brother.
“Oh, Callie!” Cyrus said. “I’ve never been so worried in all my life.”
“Me too,” she said, swiping at tears that were beginning to trail down her cheeks. She wasn’t even certain what had happened to her, but it had been more than terrifying.
Then Cyrus pulled away from her and he glanced at Braden beside her. “Bradenham was a mess with you gone. He truly does care for you. I have no doubt about that.”
Braden’s hand was on Callie’s back, filling her with the warmth she’d been so absent of these last few days. “I love him too, Cyrus.”
“I know.” Her brother swiped at a tear of his own. “And if you really do want to marry him, you have my full blessing to do so.”
She threw her arms around her brother’s neck once more. “Thank you, Cyrus,” she said before pressing her lips to his cheek. “I want that more than anything.”