by Lila Dubois
They blinked at her, then starting writing furiously.
* * * *
“Melissa Jane Heavey.”
Melissa froze in the castle foyer. Tristan stopped when she did.
“Damn,” she whispered. “I think I forgot to call her.”
Footsteps padded toward them, and Melissa turned, pasting a smile on her face. Her grandmother, wearing slacks and a sweater with a pretty scarf Melissa had brought her from Cape Town, was striding across the foyer.
“Granny! You’re here.”
“And what was I to do? You don’t answer my calls. You don’t call me. I had to read about my own granddaughter in The Irish Times.”
“I’m sorry, I’ve been busy.” It wasn’t a lie—she had been busy with the cemetery, and any time she wasn’t doing that she was with Tristan, having increasingly inventive sex.
They’d been in the process of sneaking away before dinner service in the restaurant started, but it appeared that would be delayed.
“Your Grand-Mère?”
Bridget Ferguson examined Tristan head to toe. “And who might you be?”
“Tristan Fontaine, Madame. Enchanté.”
“Oh, yes, enchanté.”
Tristan smiled, and it was a thing of beauty. Taking her grandmother’s hand, he tucked it over his arm and headed toward the restaurant. Melissa stared at their backs.
“What just happened?” she asked aloud.
“You’d better go after them.” Kristina, the blonde guest services staff member manning the desk, smiled.
“Agreed.”
Melissa dashed after them, ignoring the looks the guests gave her. She was used to it by this point, and she could only assume that the situation would get worse now that one of the newspapers had written an article about her. As Sorcha had hoped, the focus of the story was not Glenncailty, it was Melissa herself.
“Excuse me, where are you taking her?” She caught up to Tristan as they entered the restaurant.
He was still wearing his chef’s coat, and Melissa was starting to really enjoy that particular article of clothing—ripping it off him was one of her favorite things.
Tristan said something to Kris, who nodded solemnly.
“Bien sûr, Tristan. Madame Ferguson, this way, if you please.”
Tristan continued to escort Bridget, pulling out her chair when they reached the best table in the house.
“Aren’t you a lovely young man,” she said, placing her purse on the floor at her feet.
“You flatter me. If you’ll allow me, I’d like to prepare something special for you. Kris, wine.”
The maître d’ walked away while Bridget looked around the restaurant, finally returning her attention to Tristan. “Oh, well, that would be lovely, but I don’t want you to go to trouble. I didn’t expect such nice treatment.”
“Ah, well, how else would I treat the grandmother of the woman I love?” Tristan bowed his head to Bridget, winked at Melissa and headed into the kitchen.
Melissa blushed and couldn’t stop herself from smiling.
“He…you…” Bridget huffed out a sigh and tried to look stern. “Meeting a gentleman is no excuse for failing to call me.”
“I know, I’m so sorry.”
“Now sit down and tell me everything.”
Melissa took a seat, though she wasn’t dressed for the finery of the restaurant. Tristan appeared ten minutes later with small chunks of beef skewered on rosemary stalks, the smell of garlic strong and enticing.
“I am bringing you something hearty.”
Melissa’s stomach rumbled. “Thanks. I have to get back to work.” Without thinking, she took Tristan’s hand, lacing their fingers together. He kissed her knuckles.
“And if that wasn’t just a sight.” Bridget sighed in happiness.
Melissa blushed again and tried to pull away, but Tristan didn’t let her.
“And you’ve been taking care of her?” Bridget asked Tristan as she carefully cut into a chunk of beef.
“As much as she’ll let me.”
“That’s my Melissa. It’s the Ferguson in her. God rest my husband, but the man was stubborn as they came. He wouldn’t say he needed help if he was being crushed by a cow.”
“Best to simply love and help even when it’s not asked for,” Tristan said.
Bridget set her silverware down and pressed her fingers to her lips. “And isn’t that a lovely thing to say? I’ve waited a long time to see my little Melissa find a man who was good enough for her.”
“Granny, we’re not getting married, we’re just—” Melissa bit her tongue, realizing her mistake.
“You’re what? I’m sure you’re not doing something you shouldn’t, considering that you’re not married.”
“Uh…”
“Melissa Jane Heavey.”
“I assure you my intentions toward your granddaughter are entirely honorable.”
His intentions were honorable?
Melissa kicked him under the table. Tristan planted his foot on top of hers, smiling all the while.
“Well, I think that we might need to have a conversation.” Whatever else Bridget was going to say was lost as she took her first bite. Her eyes widened, then closed in an expression Melissa recognized—food bliss.
Tristan leaned into Melissa, whispering in her ear. “I’m sorry we did not make it to the room.”
“Me too,” she replied. “Sorry about this, I should have called her.”
“I am happy to meet her. I forgot she lived so close.”
“Dublin seems like a world away right now.”
Tristan rubbed her back. “More of the same?” He seemed to know without her explaining that her thoughts had shifted to the graveyard.
“Yes. A woman. She was pregnant—nearly seven months pregnant. The bones of the fetus were mixed in with her vertebrae and pelvis.”
He closed his eyes and then kissed her temple. “I hate that you have to see such things.”
“It’s what I do.”
“I know. But I see how it hurts you.”
“I like having you to come back to.”
Their gazes met, held.
A discreet cough jerked Melissa’s attention back to Bridget. Her grandmother was smiling softly. “You’re happy, Melissa?”
“Yes, I am.”
“And you, young man?”
“I have never been so happy.”
“This is a bit quick for my liking, but I know how it feels to find the person you’re meant to love.”
Melissa’s cheeks felt permanently hot. “I have to get back to work.”
“Go, go.” Bridget waved her away. “I’ll talk to your young man. I need to know his family.”
“Save me something to eat.” She rose.
“Always.” Tristan rose too, kissing her cheek.
Melissa slipped through the kitchen, checking on Robert, who was busy cleaning bones. One of the sous chefs gave her a slice off one of the turkeys they’d roasted, and Melissa ate that along with some bread while she returned to the cemetery. Usually when she was working she was so far from home that it was easy to compartmentalize what she was doing, what was happening.
Tristan and their relationship were a departure from that, though not totally unfamiliar, since the relationships she’d had in the past had all been the result of work situations. In a way, that made it hard for her to think of what they had as something real—if the pattern of her life held true, when this was over they’d go their separate ways.
Doing that would kill her. She loved that man with both mind and spirit. He challenged her even as he made her feel like she was home.
But for the first time in her life, all the pieces were coming together—she was working, she was in love and her lover was meeting her family. Her mind insisted that when all this was over Tristan would leave, or she would leave for work, and when she came back he would no longer love her. But her heart said that this was it, that he was both her present and her future.
“She needs you, go now!”
Tristan jumped at Jacques’ words, the knife falling from his hand. It slipped off the counter and clattered on the floor. The chefs at the dessert station looked up.
“Chef?”
“A moment,” he muttered, grabbing the knife and setting it in the wash sink. He took the steps down to the underground hall that connected the kitchen to the pub.
Jacques was already there. “Why are you here? Help her!”
“Melissa?” Tristan tensed. “Where is she?”
“In that church.”
He bounded back up the steps. “You finish,” he ordered the remaining kitchen staff as he ran past. They nodded, then looked at each other before getting back to work. It had been a strange few weeks, and he had no doubt that they would deal with his sudden departure the way they’d dealt with everything else.
Tristan bolted out the door and ran across the dark gardens, his feet crunching over gravel, then falling silent as he pounded across grass.
“Where have you been?” he asked Jacques, who was running alongside him. Unlike Tristan, he simply went through, rather than around, bushes and trees.
“I don’t know. I just…didn’t need to be here.”
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know how to explain it.”
The policeman wasn’t at his post. Tristan cursed as he darted through the gate. The doors of the church were open, and light spilled out. A generator hummed inside, cords running from it to large work lights mounted on poles.
Melissa was the only one there. It was after nine, and the rest of them must have gone to bed. He stopped at the door, panting.
Melissa was seated on a crate, a large freestanding magnifying glass between her face and the bone she held. He watched as she turned it in her fingers. She saw things in that little bit of leftover person that he never would—it was as if she spoke a language he could never learn. Even if she taught him the science, he would not have her passion or her ability to take tiny pieces of information and reconstruct a life from them.
“Jacques, tu es un imbicile.”
“Look.”
Tristan frowned at his brother’s transparent figure, then returned his attention to Melissa.
This time he saw it.
A ghost hovered at Melissa’s shoulder. It was a woman, and one he’d seen before.
“The maid in chains,” Tristan said.
It was the ghost most commonly seen in Glenncailty’s halls, and Sorcha had given her that nickname after many different guests had described seeing a pretty young woman with long hair, her body draped in chains. Sometimes she carried a bucket, other times a broom. He’d seen her more than once, and she was always a still, silent figure. Séan said that the maid in chains had talked to him, and some visitors claimed they’d been chased through the castle by her. Tristan had tried to engage her, but she never responded. He assumed that the sight of the ghost had been so startling and frightening that those who claimed she was dangerous or gory had imagined much of their stories.
“Why is she this far away from the castle?” he wondered.
“She’s the one.”
“The one what?”
“She will end it.”
“Jacques, I don’t understand, explain what—” Tristan’s breath caught.
The ghost’s head turned. She’d been staring out into space, but now she focused on Melissa, and Tristan was reminded of the way the figures in the cemetery had watched his beloved.
The maid raised her hands to her face. An unholy scream echoed in the church as she raked her nails down her face, gouging out her own eyes. The simple dress she wore fell away in tatters, and wounds opened up along her skin, black blood pouring from her sliced flesh.
“Melissa!”
She looked up and smiled at him, totally unaware of the terrifying figure standing beside her.
“You’re done for the night?”
“There’s a ghost,” Tristan said, raising his voice to be heard over the screams.
Melissa shrugged. “Aren’t there always, around here? I’ll be done in a few minutes.”
“Come with me, now.”
“I’m almost finished with this femur.”
Tristan watched, his heart in his throat, as the maid’s face aged, her eyeless sockets retreating further into her head, lips pulled back to reveal not just teeth but the jaw bones themselves. The chains were wrapped around her arms, neck, chest and legs. Her naked breasts were a mess of grated flesh and black with blood.
“Mon dieu.” Tristan moved toward Melissa, each step slow and careful. “The bones, mon ange. Who were they?”
“This is the grave Seamus was trying to dig up. The casket was too rotted and wet to take out, so we dried it out in place and added bracing. We were finally able to exhume it earlier today. It was a woman—a girl, really. She was approximately seventeen or eighteen when she died. Her remains show extensive signs of abuse. Based on healed versus newer marks, I would say that whatever happened to her happened over the course of several years.”
“What did they do to her?”
“So far I’ve got multiple small fractures of the wrist and ankle bones, probably a result of sustained bondage. There are also nicks along the ribs and scapula indicative of severe soft tissue wounds, perhaps from a knife. There are also some marks around the eye sockets—they’re more healed on the left than on the right. If I had to guess, I’d say that she was blinded—her eyes forcibly removed with a sharp instrument, and it was done one eye at a time.”
The maid wailed louder, the scream increasing in volume until Tristan covered his ears with his hands, his eyes watering.
“Tristan, are you okay?” Melissa’s voice was barely audible.
“We found your body. Give me your name and we’ll bury you.” Tristan’s words were a desperate bid to get the screaming to stop. He’d never tried to reason with a ghost before. Never attempted to guess what they needed or wanted. Melissa’s belief that each person’s life deserved the recognition of burial and ceremony had changed that for him.
The noise didn’t stop.
“Who are you?” he yelled.
The screaming stopped, the silence deafening. Tristan looked at the maid. She was once more a pretty girl with a sad face, wearing a simple dress and a few lengths of chain.
“I know her.” The woman’s voice came from the entrance to the church. “She’s my sister.”
Tristan turned slowly. Even if he hadn’t recognized the voice, he would have known who would be there. There was no one else it could be.
Elizabeth wore a pale-blue sweater and gray slacks. Her hair was loose and she looked younger than normal.
“Tristan, what’s going on?” Melissa asked.
“Elizabeth is here.”
“Oh. Her. Well, tell her I said ‘hi’. I’m almost finished.”
Melissa’s casual attitude was almost comical. Tristan’s muscles were tense, and a quick glance around told him that Jacques was gone. Elizabeth’s boots thumped over the stone. She turned to look at the back wall, ignoring the skeletons laid out all around the small space.
“You see them, don’t you?” she asked, gesturing at the image of wings burned into the stone on either side of the door.
“Yes.” Tristan was taken by surprise. “No one else can.” He’d started to think that the wings weren’t real.
“A pity, and they’re lovely.” Elizabeth faced him. “She’s protected, but you know that, don’t you?”
“What are you?” Tristan tried to keep his tone casual, but the words came out harsher than he’d planned.
“Your brother explained it to you, I assume?”
“You know about Jacques?”
“I can feel him. We are not the same, but when you took the job I felt something new arrive. There’re many ghosts here, but still I knew.”
“How do you look and feel so real?” Tristan asked.
“Because she’s not a ghost.” Now it was Seamus who was standing in the door. The master of the castle wore a long, gray coat and his face was half in shadow. With a small gesture of his hand, the hounds sat on the threshold, guards at the door.
“You!” Melissa jumped to her feet. “Don’t touch the graveyard.” She rushed toward the door.
“Stay here.” Tristan grabbed her hand as she passed him, pulling her to a stop.
“Why?” Melissa demanded.
Tristan looked from Elizabeth to Seamus. “This ends tonight.”
“Ends?” Seamus asked. “I wish that were so. But there is no end.” As he moved into the light, Tristan could see the weary lines that marked Seamus’ face.
“There is,” Tristan countered. He couldn’t say why he was so certain, but the air was thick and time seemed to have slowed. It felt like a moment when things would change.
Melissa stilled, her gaze searching his face. She couldn’t hear Elizabeth, so she didn’t know the extent of what had been said. He expected her to protest, but instead she nodded. “Tell me what to do,” she whispered, lacing her fingers into his.
Tristan squeezed her hand.
“You say she’s not a ghost,” Tristan said. “What is she?”
“I’m interested to know why Dr. Heavey isn’t able to see her,” Seamus said.
“I told you, Seamus.” Elizabeth folded her arms. “She’s protected.”
“What by?”
Elizabeth looked at the wall of the church and the outline of wings that was burned into the stone. “I won’t tell you that.” She looked at Tristan.
“Is it really…are they real?” Tristan didn’t dare be any more specific with his question.
Elizabeth shrugged. “Good exists, same as evil. I suspect the manifestation has more to do with your beliefs, or hers, than the true nature of it. Your mind needed a way to process what you were in the presence of.”
“What are you talking about?” Seamus asked. He made his way into the church and followed their gaze to the wall. His limp, which he normally hid with a measured walking style, was more apparent than Tristan had ever seen it.
“What are you talking about?” Melissa repeated. Despite her earlier words, he could tell her patience was wearing thin.