Hemlock Veils

by Davenport, Jennie

  “Looking for you.” His eyes moved down her and she realized her shirt was nearly transparent. She folded her arms over her chest, trying not to give into the warmth in her face, and he quickly went on, “I went to Jean’s and you weren’t there.”

  She turned, walking the thinner trail that veered from the path. “No point in staying when there are no customers.”

  “No one?” he asked from behind, walking with her. He sounded surprised.

  “No one.”

  Silence came and went. “Well, you would have had one. I was coming.”

  “Shouldn’t you be in Portland, Mr. Clayton?”

  “I returned early.” Her brows pulled together at the heat of him behind her, at the reminder of what she couldn’t have. “Ms. Ashton, I’m sorry.”

  She stopped, turning. She didn’t bother to hide her surprise, or confusion.

  “For no one coming today. But mostly, I’m sorry for the things I said when you first arrived in town. I didn’t mean them, and I was only trying to…” He sighed. “I was just trying to keep you away, trying to protect myself…trying to protect you.”

  “I know. But I don’t need protecting.”

  He looked down, and beads of water dripped from his bearded chin and the tips of his hair.

  “Mr. Clayton…if you want me to make you a cup of coffee…”

  He gave a short laugh, shaking his head. “I’m not your customer right now, not out here.”

  She began walking again and felt him following, heard his boots in the mud. “I’m not asking you as my customer. I’m asking you as my friend. I ask because I want to. It’s all I’ve been trying to do this whole time, you know: be your friend.”

  “Why?” His tone was clipped again, frustrated.

  “You mean why care about you when all you’ve done is push me away?” He didn’t answer and she turned to him. “Because I’m not giving up on you.”

  “So I’m a charity case, is that it? Save mean, old Mr. Clayton’s soul?”

  Her brow knitted at the pain saturating his voice. “No,” she gently said. “I think I thought maybe we could save each other.”

  His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, and his eyes softened. “I thought you didn’t need saving, Ms. Ashton.”

  “Protecting and saving are different. And everyone needs saving, Mr. Clayton.” Her voice was quiet, barely there, and she looked down, trying not to shiver. “I’m sorry too, you know. I’m sorry for the way I’ve turned things upside-down here. And I’m sorry for leaving things out at first.” She met his eyes. “But thank you. For allowing me to stay.”

  He grew closer, making her chest throb, and for the briefest moment she expected he might kiss her. But instead he walked around her, leaving her behind. His vine-clad stone wall stood just ahead, protecting his unruly garden.

  “Mr. Clayton,” she called. She followed him with a clamped jaw when he didn’t turn. “You are the most frustrating person I have ever known, you know that?”

  “Same goes for you, Ms. Ashton.”

  “You found me for what reason? To walk away the second it gets personal?”

  He huffed, only shaking his head, and stopped at the wall.

  “What are you so afraid of?”

  “You!” he said, turning on her. “I’m afraid of what you make me feel, and afraid of what will happen to you when you wander out here by yourself.”

  Nothing but his breathing and the sound of rain could be heard, and with a sigh he reached a hand into his pocket. When he pulled it out, her locket—shiny and freshly polished—dangled from his hand. The chain appeared more delicate than it usually did, just from being between his fingers, and her mouth hung open.

  She found herself recoiling from it, from the reminder.

  “I…took this yesterday,” he said, appearing extremely uncomfortable. “That’s really what I wanted to find you about. The clasp on the pendant was broken, and of course the chain, so I…had them fixed.” That was why the chain looked more delicate: it was a different chain all together.

  Her heart felt a handful of things all at once, while his eyes avoided hers. “I don’t want it back,” she said. She walked around him in an attempt to hide all it triggered, facing the wall. The vine’s leaves danced with the patter of rain.

  “Take it.”

  “Thank you, really, but I don’t want it.” Heat scorched her eyes, the vines swimming in her vision.

  He turned her around, and his voice was determined but soft. “You have to.”

  She was tired, too tired to hide it, and looked up at him, his body close. She could barely get out, “Why?”

  “Because, Elizabeth, you’re not you without it.”

  Her eyes widened at the sound of his voice saying her name. It stunned her, in a way that left her heart stuttering, and she thought maybe it was an accident because he appeared uneasy for the briefest moment, running a hand through his dripping hair. It wasn’t just the informal name he’d used though. It was what he said, that he’d been paying enough attention to know such a thing.

  While she stared, he unfastened the hook and eye and stepped closer as he fastened them behind her neck. He stood so close she could feel the cool, moist air attached to his skin, so close she could smell him—that same musky scent that reminded her of the forest. The burden of her locket around her neck felt lighter than expected and he kept one hand there, where his fingers slid down the necklace’s delicate chain and cradled the locket.

  He inched closer and her breaths were shallow—from the cold air, from the wetness of her body, from the way her chest became heavy with a warm, euphoric weight. His head bowed, his hair dripping into hers as he stared at the pendant he held, low on her chest. With every inhalation, the skin over her heart touched the warmth of the back of his hand, and she recognized what it was in his hooded eyes she’d never seen before.

  Desire.

  They didn’t just stare at the locket; they moved all over her. In that moment, and for the first liberating moment she could recall, she didn’t want to cover herself. She lifted her face toward the warmth of his breath, and the racing of her heart stole her own.

  “Henry.” He met her eyes with every ounce of his soul exposed. The man here was the man she’d been falling in love with, and she desperately whispered, “Tell me what you want.”

  As though first names were all that was needed to break the formal barrier between them, he met her mouth with a sigh of surrender, moving his hand eagerly to her neck. His lips, his breath, his tongue: she never knew such gratification could leave her with contradictory want. The long overdue satisfaction of hunger made them press against each other at once, and she couldn’t seem to kiss him deeply enough.

  Heat melted through their wet clothing, the lowest part of her abdomen heavy, and that heat intensified when he backed her into the wall, her hair mingling with vines. With a tortured-sounding exhalation, his lips parted from hers, just barely. “Elizabeth,” he breathed, and her pulse faltered at the sound of it. He drew down her lower lip with his thumb and kissed her again, slow and sensual and passionate.

  With a murmur, his movements grew slightly aggressive. He thrust her more firmly against the wall and, with his fingers around her neck, she gasped. She arched, offering her flesh to his hand. Such aggression should have frightened her, but her trust in him freed her of fear; it was unlike anything she’d ever experienced. She wanted it to overtake her. She wanted to overtake him.

  She pulled him against her by his belt loops, aiding him, and while his tongue thrust deep inside her, the hard evidence of his desire pressed against her abdomen. She sighed at the feel of it, her head and heart faint, and his hand moved down her neck, over the base of her throat. His thumb stopped over her artery, her pulse rapid beneath it. Perhaps even in his human form he desired her quickened heart rate.

  His hands became tremulous. Then, almost as abruptly as he’d shoved her against the wall, he broke the suction of their lips, gasping. His grip relax
ed, but he kept his open mouth against hers, their breath mingling, laboring together. She didn’t open her eyes for fear she would see hesitation, or even shame, in his.

  “Come home with me,” she said into his mouth, on the faintest breath, and he sighed. She dared to open her eyes and swallowed her fear as she caressed him, feeling the soundness of his chest. She’d never wanted anything more in her life. “Please.”

  With a scrunch of his eyes, he lowered his head, fighting as usual. “We can’t,” he managed, his voice gravelly, and emerging from between his teeth. “I can’t.”

  She relaxed her spine against the wall as her heart sank. “Henry,” she began.

  Scrunching his eyes tighter, he stepped away, his chest heaving. And the absence of his body made her own ache in all the parts she wanted him. He walked away and, when he reached the corner of the stone barricade, he finally had the courage to meet her eyes. His brows pulled together. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t…” She almost followed him, but he held out a hand, stopping her. He appeared to be in a great deal of pain.

  “This was a mistake, Ms. Ashton,” he said, his tone formal again.

  Then he was gone.

  She watched the empty corner, the empty forest—not sure how even the cold, unfeeling Mr. Clayton he pretended to be could walk away from such a moment, with a bond so cosmic and a chemistry so pure, it fulfilled her mentally and spiritually, not just physically. With her chest heavy, she buried her face in her hands, willing that ache to leave her. Begging it to.

  ***

  Henry pushed open his glass doors and moved to the back steps, bringing a bottle of bourbon whiskey to his mouth. He took a long pull, not bothering to wipe his lips when he lowered it. It was almost gone, this bottle lasting only days rather than the usual weeks. The setting sun hid somewhere in the trees, but the clouds in the dusk sky showed their usual pinkness. It had stopped raining only an hour before, and already the gray had dispersed.

  Thoughts of Elizabeth haunted him: the way she tasted, the way her body had pressed against him, how exhilarating it had been to touch her. The way the sight of her in the afternoon rainstorm had filled him with a want he could hardly tame. Briefly, he fantasized about what would have happened had he accepted her invitation. He bought the bottle again to his mouth.

  The whiskey did its job well, his body tingling and his head in a buzz: the conditions that made his transformation that much easier. Just when he expected them, throbbing tremors began to tear through his heart, changing it. It took his breath and his pulse heightened as he reminded himself, as he did every night, that he deserved this.

  He placed the bottle on the top step, his hand trembling. At the same time he descended them, he removed his pants, letting them fall to the weeds. His brokenness had long ago turned to numbness, but tonight was unlike any other. Walking forward, he welcomed the cool evening air against his naked skin…welcomed the pain.

  And at the sensation of being ripped apart from the inside out—rolling until every extremity had a taste—heat radiated from his skin. With a grunt, he leapt over the stone wall, where the paws of the monster hit the forest floor.

  Chapter 20

  Elizabeth rested her elbows on the railing, staring into midnight shadows. She knew he wouldn’t come. Part of her didn’t want him to. The part that felt angrier than she’d ever been. The other part, however—the part that would always ache for him—prayed that this time he would realize he didn’t have to be scared, not of her and not of him.

  She sighed, wrapping her jacket more snugly around herself. The storm had stopped before sunset, but the air still felt like rain: crisp, moist, and cool. It even smelled like rain. She turned, making her way to the back door, when a wretched scream echoed from within the forest, shooting a shiver up her spine.

  Her stomach dropped when his roar followed, more fierce and deafening than that of a lion’s. She could only watch the trees, as though they would tell her what lay within. The scream pierced the air again, high-pitched and drawn-out. But it wasn’t the scream of a person, since no human could leave such a chilling note in the air. The sound, ghostlike and unnatural, seemed to belong to a creature born of nightmares.

  It came over her then: the sensation that left her arms goose-fleshed and her chest tight. The evil loomed out there, and so did Henry.

  She jumped from the porch without taking the steps and ran the trail as fast as she could. She could see nothing and lifted her arms for protection against twigs and branches, praying her feet’s memorization wouldn’t fail her. As she ran, wishing for another sound to lead her, she recalled section eight of her father’s book, the section she had just read a couple of days before. The demon, Diableron, and its relation to Aglaé.

  The scream sounded again, a blood-curdling eeeeee hanging in the air, and before it could ebb away, a growl overpowered it, making Elizabeth run harder and faster. Though she was close, a strange stillness suddenly settled over the forest, hitting her and the trees as though a physical drape. She stopped short, and with a heaving chest and sweating neck, she looked through the blackness all around her. She wanted to call for him but couldn’t catch her breath.

  Before she could take one more step, she was thrown into the air, her back breaking twigs as it slammed into the trunk of a cedar. It knocked the wind from her, and with her back against the trunk—the tree seeming to hold her itself—she winced, looking for the source.

  “Brave Elizabeth,” she heard at her ear, startling her. It was a whisper and a voice at the same time, as though the words were spoken on the tongue of a snake; but she saw nothing. She struggled against invisible shackles, unable to move. “Fearlesss,” it hissed again, and this time it came from her other side. Still, nothing there.

  Her pulse heightened, her face perspired. “Show yourself,” she managed through tight ribs.

  It appeared before her then, right at her eye level, and Elizabeth flinched. This Diableron, unfortunately, appeared less cartoonish than the one in her book. Much more frightening. Her face of flesh, bone, and black nothingness melted, and as Elizabeth tried to steady her breaths, wondering where to look since the creature seemed to have no eyes, it smiled, revealing the black void inside its mouth. Elizabeth swallowed deeply, recoiling.

  “Not so fearlessss anymore, are you, Elizabeth Ashton?” Elizabeth waited for a slithering, long tongue to appear.

  “Where is he?”

  The Diableron’s face pressed against Elizabeth’s, her cold and damp being akin to the dense air from an underground cave. “He’sss worth dying over, mortal?”

  Before Elizabeth could answer, a dim light glowed from within the demon, from the place a heart would reside, and then it wasn’t the demon at all. Elizabeth squinted as the light faded, and in the Diableron’s place was an image she couldn’t accept. She blinked to make sure she saw it correctly.

  “Beth,” a shaky voice said. His blue eyes were bloodshot and sunk-in, his head shaved, his tall body scrawny, and his face glistening with sweat. Desperation fueled him as he grasped the collar of her jacket. “Help me, please. They’re gonna kill me, Beth.”

  Elizabeth’s jaw fell slack as she recoiled, and tears welled in her eyes. “Willem,” she said in a painful breath.

  “How could you let me die?” He shook her, the sensation jarring, and blood began to pour from a hole in his chest, then from his mouth—so much blood it looked like too much to fit in a human body. He brought his hands to his chest and gagged, then coughed blood all over her in the way he’d done the last time she saw him. She hyperventilated, his face swirling in her vision. She’d been brave at his death once before. She had no bravery left.

  “No, Willem…I tried,” she sobbed.

  “You killed me.” With blood still pouring from his mouth, he grasped her jacket again, and her chest shuddered. Through the blood, he shouted, “You killed me!”

  She shook her head, beyond words.

  Then his face transformed, grew younger. Ev
en his hair grew, and every stage of his life passed in reverse on his face, until it was the face of a seven-year-old boy—the same as the one she remembered most, the one in her locket. “Bethy?” he said in the boyish voice she had almost forgotten, the one that knocked the air from her lungs yet again. He looked around in confusion. He brought a hand to his face then pulled it away, viewing the blood on his small, childish fingers. With eyes enlarging, he screamed, the prepubescent sound catching in his throat. “Bethy!” They seemed to hyperventilate at the same time. “Bethy, what’s wrong with me?”

  “Will, it’s all right,” she managed.

  He sobbed in confusion, as though the demon had plucked him from the past and placed him before her. Even the cowlick that used to spring up at the crown of his head danced with his movement. “Did you hurt me?” he asked with betrayal in his eyes, and she shook her head. “Why would you hurt me?”

  “No, Will, I would never hurt you!” She tried reaching for him, tried not to let him see her sob. But he’d never been covered in so much blood. “You’re going to be all right,” she assured, but through her weeping it sounded less than convincing.

  He grasped her jacket, pleading as blood began to escape his nose in addition to his chest and mouth. All she wanted to do was save her young, helpless brother, and she couldn’t escape this damn tree. “You can’t let me die, Bethy! Don’t let me!” As his face grew more ashen, his voice weakened, and so did her limbs. His blue Dr. Seuss shirt—his favorite—was covered in so much blood that Thing One and Thing Two were unrecognizable, and she hoped she could get the blood out, that she could get it clean for him again.

  Her stomach rose, her head spun, and she closed her eyes, trying to breathe, trying to replace his bloodied image with a different one—one that didn’t pull her under. “It’s all right, Willem,” she barely managed in a breath. She thought of him in the park with her and their father. Laughing. It was the best image.