As she thought about all this, she couldn’t help but wonder about herself. Envision what you want to be, then you’ ll find a way to get there, Waysa had told her in the cave behind the waterfall. She knew she wasn’t going to invent a machine or build a great building, but she had to figure out who and what she wanted to be. She had to envision her future, and then she had to get there.
When she snuck back into the house that evening, she hunkered down in the second-floor airshaft and tried to think about what she could do. What trick could she use to trap Grathan? She had tried to get into his room and failed. She could barely keep track of where he was. But he had to have some kind of weakness.
Restless for any sort of plan, she crawled through the shaft and checked Braeden’s room, which was empty. So she made her way down to the library. As usual, she entered through the vent near the ceiling. Just as she began climbing down the bookshelves to the library’s second-floor walkway, Serafina heard footsteps approaching. She scurried into a hiding spot, crouched down and waited for someone to enter the room.
But no one did.
She kept waiting, curious. She was sure she had heard something. It was like the person had paused just outside the door and wasn’t coming in. The longer it went on, the more curious she became. Was she mistaken?
Suddenly, a figure appeared in the room, but not through the main door as she’d expected. Someone stepped out from behind the upper portion of the room’s massive fireplace mantel. It was Lady Rowena! Serafina realised she must have used the hidden passageway that led from the house’s second floor directly into the top level of the library.
Serafina thought she should reveal herself to Rowena, but there was something furtive about the girl’s movements, so she crouched down and watched her.
Rowena quickly ran down the finely wrought spiral staircase to the library’s main floor, her lavish, dusky-rose dress billowing behind her. She looked around as if to make sure no one else was in the room, then darted over to the walnut wall panels just to the left of the fireplace.
Serafina crept along the railing, but before she could get to a better vantage point she heard a faint metallic ratcheting, a turning sound and then a distinct click. This was followed by the squeak of what sounded like a hinge. Rowena must have found some sort of small hidden compartment in the wall. There was a rustling of paper and then a long sliding sound.
Rowena came back into view with a bundle of rolled documents in her hands. She took them over to one of the tables and opened them up. It was hard to tell from a distance what the rolls contained, but they seemed to be architectural drawings of some kind.
What was Rowena looking for? Was she studying a diagram of the house so that she would know it as well as Serafina and Braeden did? Or maybe she’d found the list of guests and was now matching them to the various rooms of the house like Serafina had told her to. It seemed wrong for Rowena to be snooping around in the library when no one else was there, but then Serafina realised that she herself was doing the exact same thing. Maybe Rowena had some theory she was pursuing about Detective Grathan. When Serafina had asked Rowena to join her and Braeden, she’d had no idea the girl would be so committed. She seemed to truly enjoy playing spy. Serafina was eager to hear what she had learned.
Just as she thought about revealing herself to Rowena, Serafina heard the sound of footsteps walking down the Tapestry Gallery towards the main door of the library. Lady Rowena quickly stuffed the drawings back into the hidden compartment in the wall, sat down on the sofa in front of the fire and pretended to read a book.
This girl is good, Serafina thought as she watched with a smile. That was a trick she’d never thought of before. The old act-like-everything-is-fine-here trick.
A footman came into the room. ‘I beg your pardon, my lady,’ the footman said, bowing slightly. ‘Dinner will be served at the normal hour of eight o’clock this evening, but please be advised that most of the clocks in the house have stopped, so we are letting our guests know that it’s currently seven o’clock and they may wish to start getting dressed for dinner at this time. Thank you.’
Serafina’s body jolted when she heard the footman’s words. The clocks had stopped! Lady Rowena was here in the library, so that meant Braeden had sounded the alarm! He was in trouble!
Rowena seemed to understand this as well, for she immediately brushed past the footman and hurried out of the room.
Serafina darted from her hiding spot and ran for the rooftop.
Serafina climbed through the fourth-floor window onto the roof of Biltmore House and hurried along the top side of the Grand Staircase’s copper dome. She made her way between the slanting slate roofs, rising chimneys, pointed towers and sculpted stone gargoyles of Biltmore’s rooftop realm. The ridges of the roof were capped with ornate copper trim embossed with patterns of oak leaves, acorns and George Vanderbilt’s gold-gilded initials burning bright in the moonlit night.
As she came to the edge of the roof, she had a nighthawk’s view of the Winter Garden’s glass rooftop and the estate’s many courtyards and gardens far below her. With the glistening stars above and the forested mountains rolling into the distance, the roof provided her a breathtaking view of her world.
She heard a tremendous racket coming her way and spun round.
‘The clocks have all stopped!’ Lady Rowena said breathlessly as she tried to climb through the window out onto the roof in her fancy dress.
Serafina went over to help her. Lady Rowena’s dress, which was decorated with a profusion of silk taffeta roses, was so long and cumbersome that when she tried to clamber through the opening her legs became entangled. The two of them worked together to push the fabric aside, avoiding stepping on the flower-encrusted skirt hem, and pull her through the small window without tearing anything.
‘We’ve almost got it,’ Lady Rowena groaned. ‘Just a little more.’
Finally, she popped through the opening and fell onto the rooftop.
‘I’m here,’ she said, gathering herself up like a soldier standing at attention. ‘Someone stopped the clock!’
‘I stopped it,’ Braeden said as he stepped easily through the window and onto the roof.
‘What’s happened?’ Serafina asked him. ‘Did you see something?’
‘Gidean and Cedric are missing,’ Braeden said, his voice cracking.
‘What do you mean, they’re missing?’ Serafina asked. Some dogs were natural wanderers, but losing track of a wounded Dobermann and a giant St Bernard seemed almost impossible to her.
‘We’ve searched all over the house and the grounds. Cedric seldom leaves my uncle’s side and Gidean has never gone missing before, but no one can find either of them,’ Braeden said in dismay.
Serafina tried to think it through. She walked to the edge of the roof and looked down, first at the gardens, with their many statues and paths, and then outward, across the forest.
She remembered what she had seen in the dark shadows of the pines the last time she’d gone out there.
She didn’t want to think about it.
She didn’t want it to be true.
But the memory kept rising up in her mind.
‘I think I may know where they are . . .’ she said, feeling a sickness in her stomach even as she said it. It was the last place on earth she wanted to go.
‘Thank you for meeting with us, sir,’ Serafina said as Mr Vanderbilt walked into the library.
‘Braeden told me that you had important information regarding the disappearance of the dogs,’ Mr Vanderbilt said, his voice grave. She could not tell whether he was angry with her for what had happened a few nights before, when Gidean was injured, but he was obviously deeply worried.
‘Serafina can help us, Uncle,’ Braeden said. ‘I trust her with my life, and with Gidean’s and Cedric’s too. The strange things that have been happening at Biltmore, the way Gidean attacked Serafina, Mr Rinaldi’s death, Cedric and now this . . . they’re all related.’
�
��In what way?’ he asked.
‘Mr Vanderbilt,’ Serafina began, ‘you met me for the first time a few weeks ago when the children disappeared.’
Mr Vanderbilt’s face turned even darker than it already was. ‘Yes,’ he said, looking at her. ‘Is this the same?’
‘No, not exactly,’ she said. ‘But you saw then that you could trust me.’
‘Yes, I remember,’ he said, studying her.
Serafina looked at Mr Vanderbilt and held his eyes. ‘I never meant to hurt Gidean. And I don’t believe he ever meant to hurt me. I’m not sure, but I think I might know where the dogs are. They’re in the forest. But I don’t want to go there alone. I think we should form a hunting party with men and horses and weapons, and I’ll lead us there. Whatever this turns out to be, we’ll fight it together this time.’
Mr Vanderbilt looked at her for a long time, clearly taken aback by what she was saying. He seemed to fathom how frightened she was.
‘This is that dangerous . . .’ he said quietly, thinking it through.
Still looking at him, she slowly nodded.
Mr Vanderbilt contemplated everything she’d said, then looked over at Braeden.
‘We need to go get the dogs, Uncle,’ he said, ‘and Serafina is the only one who can take us to them.’
‘What will we encounter when we get to this place you speak of?’ Mr Vanderbilt asked her.
‘I do not know for sure,’ she said, ‘but I think there will be animals in cages.’
‘Cages . . .’ he repeated, his face clouding with dismay as he tried to imagine it. ‘When would you want to do this?’
Serafina swallowed. ‘Now, sir,’ she said, feeling sick to her stomach even as she said it.
‘It’s pitch dark,’ he said.
‘I don’t think we have time to wait, sir. If my suspicions are right, then the dogs are in terrible danger. I think he’s going to kill them, sir. We have to go tonight. And one more thing: it should only be yourself and your most trusted men.’
‘There are many men here who will want to help,’ Mr Vanderbilt said. ‘And if there is something criminal going on Detective Grathan will insist on coming.’
Serafina pursed her lips. ‘He’s the main one who should not come, sir. I believe Mr Grathan to be a grave danger to us.’
Mr Vanderbilt stared at her with his penetrating dark eyes for several long seconds, seeming to take in everything she’d told him. She held his gaze, waiting for him to reply.
‘I understand,’ he said, slowly nodding. ‘We’ll do it exactly as you say.’
A half hour later, Mr Vanderbilt had assembled the rescue party in the courtyard just as he’d promised, including eleven handpicked men on horseback, and Serafina on foot along with two trackers and their dogs. Many of the men carried torches, the flames snapping and flickering in the darkness. When Serafina saw Braeden enter the courtyard on his thoroughbred, her heart sank, but she could tell by the determined look on his face that she couldn’t prevent him from coming. And Lady Rowena rode beside him, seeming just as determined. She no longer rode sidesaddle, but astride, the pretence of courtly daintiness set aside. Her cheeks were flushed in the chill air. She wore a fashionable riding coat, but it was dark and heavy and well suited to the task. She had pulled her red hair back and tucked it into the coat’s hood. Her hands were covered by leather gloves, and she carried a riding stick like many of the men. She looked the part. Serafina wasn’t surprised that the girl had insisted on coming – she just hoped Lady Rowena wouldn’t be sorry when they got there.
Mr Vanderbilt and the hunt master called everyone forward, and the horses set off at a trot. The hunting party rode out of Biltmore just after midnight under the dying glow of a clouded moon.
As Serafina walked through the forest with the mounted hunting party all around her, she felt like a general leading an invading army into battle. But the thudding hooves, shifting saddles, jangling bridles and breathing men made so much noise that it was impossible for her to hear anything else. She split off from the others and travelled ahead of them through the trees so she could better hear the forest around them.
She knew she shouldn’t get too far ahead. A swirling mist floated in the low areas of the land and in the boughs of the trees, moving through the forest like waves of ghosts, one after the other, dancing among the rocks and the trunks of the trees, sometimes blocking her view of the horses and the men.
She glanced back at Braeden, Rowena and Mr Vanderbilt riding on their horses with the men in a loose wedge formation. She knew that the master of Biltmore had always loved the beauty of the outdoors, but he was not a hunter, in spirit or experience, and he had asked the estate’s hunt master to lead the horsemen and the trackers during the search. The hunt master rode in front of the two Vanderbilts and all the other riders. He was a large, commanding man with a gruff voice and stout demeanor and looked like he had spent most of his life in a saddle. She could see the hunt master watching her with steady eyes, following her movement through the brush ahead of them. She was the only one who knew the way.
The trackers – two rugged-looking men in heavy coats – travelled on foot like she did, holding a pack of six Plott hounds, large and lanky black brindled dogs that had been bred for hunting bear in these mountains since the 1700s.
But as she led the search party up the mountain towards the stand of pines where the cages were located, the trackers looked confounded. Their dogs had their noses to the ground but seemed confused, barking and agitated, and sniffing all around. Rather than picking up a distinct scent that they could follow, the Plotts started growling.
‘Steady the hounds!’ the hunt master ordered the trackers sternly.
‘Jesse there is acting like he’s on a wildcat,’ one of the trackers said as he gestured at the dogs on their leashes. ‘Bax is lookin’ like he’s on a bear. And old Roamer is snarling like there’s somethin’ over yonder hill that he’s never smelled before.’
The hunt master glanced at Serafina.
They had finally come to the stand of pines that she was looking for, but the trees were so thick and the limbs so low that there was no way for them to get their horses through. And she knew enough about hunting to know that there was nothing the hunt master liked less then ordering his riders to get off their horses. He’d rather go around something than dismount, but she was certain that the cages were through the pines.
‘Straight through these trees,’ she said, signalling with her hand.
She had no authority to be telling the man how to manage his hunt, but she had to tell him what she knew. She glanced towards Mr Vanderbilt, who had reined his horse up beside the hunt master.
But before the hunt master could give the call to dismount, an explosion of strange howls erupted from the trees. The barking, yipping, screaming howls put a shiver down Serafina’s spine. They weren’t the howls of wolfhounds or wolves, but something else. The men looked all around, their eyes white with fear as their horses shifted and turned, crashing into one another.
Pairs of glowing eyes came at them through the darkness, at least fifty, moving this way and that.
The Plott hounds barked and snarled, ready to fight.
‘Hold steady, men!’ the hunt master shouted, trying to bring order to the rapidly deteriorating situation. ‘Keep your seat beneath you!’
A snarling, twisting wolflike creature lunged out of the darkness and attacked the hunt master’s horse. The panicked horse went screaming onto its hind legs, rearing and striking.
‘Pull back!’ the hunt master shouted as more of the wolflike creatures came charging in, biting at the horses’ legs, leaping onto the riders and pulling them from the saddle.
Fear exploded in Serafina. These weren’t dogs or wolves. They were coyotes, a massive band of them, brought into the mountains by an unnatural force. Coyotes didn’t normally come to these forests, for the wolves were their enemies.
Filled with panic, she sprinted towards Braeden, Rowena and Mr Vand
erbilt through kicking horses, snarling coyotes and screaming men. Her legs burst her forward, propelling her into the mayhem. She ducked and dived, dodging the vicious lunges of the coyotes as she ran.
The beasts took down the two trackers even as the Plott hounds tore into the coyotes, but there were far too many of them for the hounds to battle them all.
Braeden and Mr Vanderbilt were expert riders and had been alert to danger, so neither of them had fallen from their saddles in the initial surprise of the attack. But Mr Vanderbilt’s horse was bucking and shifting and throwing itself around, smashing into tree limbs, nearly knocking poor Mr Vanderbilt from its back. It seemed as if even their horses had become their enemies now.
‘Pull back!’ the hunt master shouted as he struck a coyote in the snout with his torch.
Serafina and the Twisted Staff (The Serafina Series) Page 19