I was so engrossed in my conversation that I didn’t notice the Athan, who had appeared in the room, until the king asked the children to leave. Everybody’s heads shot up and the younger occupants started to protest.
“Go!” the king snapped, and that’s when I really knew something was wrong. I’d never seen him lose his temper with children before; I’d never even heard him raise his voice. It didn’t become him and his strange, placeless accent—not Canadian, like the adopted accent of many in his family, but warm and varying, telling of a man whose home had seen the rise and fall of cultures. It was meant to persuade, not shout.
They seemed as confused as me, and begrudgingly left the room with Alya.
Edmund moved closer to the sofas in the center of the room, clutching an official-looking slip and what looked like the back of a glossy photo in his hand. I wanted to move to see, but I was nailed to the seat, clutching its back. Something bad had happened, something really bad. I could just tell in my heart.
“Autumn, I have some . . . upsetting news,” Edmund explained. His slow, pitying voice spurred my legs into action and I walked to the chair beside the king and his wife, and sat down, feeling as though my body had moved while my mind floated somewhere outside it, watching the scene unfold like in a theater.
Fallon came and crouched beside my armchair, holding my hand. His uncle, aunt, Alfie, and Lisbeth approached, too, but when I looked up, Kaspar and Violet seemed like distant figures across the room, blurry and insignificant.
“Perhaps we could go somewhere else?” I heard the king say.
“Here is fine,” I replied. It didn’t sound like my voice. It sounded too calm.
Edmund took a long, rattling breath.
“The Extermino . . . I’m so sorry. Your human school, they . . . they attacked it, and . . .”
I bowed my head and fixed my eyes very, very hard on the carved maple leaf on the foot of the table, trying to remain detached and avoid the inevitable guilt and dread that began to rise.
“No guardians,” Fallon choked out, voicing my emotions and the horrible, horrible thought that had sprung to mind. No guardians, because we abandoned them.
“Were there casualties?” I heard the duke of Victoria ask.
“Some of the students said there were as many as ten Extermino. It was break time, most people were out on the field . . . they didn’t stand a chance. I—I have a list of the injured. There’s over a hundred,” he said quietly, laying a sheet of paper with names typed on it on the coffee table. My eyes were threatening to water, but I could see next to each name, without exception, there were only the words “critical” or “stable.”
“Christy, Tammy, Gwen, Valerie, and John Sylaeia are all on there . . .”
He said some other names I didn’t recognize but Fallon obviously did, because his hand suddenly tightened around mine.
“They were hit with curses but they’re stable.”
I couldn’t take my eyes off the list. I knew why they had done it: to make a stand. Like vultures, they had spotted an opportunity and taken it, shown they were vigilant in their “cause” and that we were not. But how had they done it? How could anybody hurt innocent, human children?
“Nobody was killed? Thank fate,” the duke sighed in relief.
I could hear Edmund swallow, hard. “One person was.”
My gaze shot up as Edmund walked over to the king and handed him the photograph. He met my gaze and then looked away. “Thyme. Thyme Carter.”
My heart burst from my chest, wrenched out from my back, punching holes in my lungs so when I inhaled nothing happened.
“Who?” someone asked, confused.
“Tee,” Fallon breathed next to me. “Tee.”
The world was spinning . . . Tee, little, sweet Tee was dead. Murdered.
“This can’t get out to the media,” the king said shakily, and I forced my oxygen-starved head to lift itself. He was staring at the photo, and slowly turning a faint shade of green.
“Let me see it,” I demanded, pulling my hand out of Fallon’s grip and clenching the arms of the chair instead. “Now!”
He handed it back to Edmund, who clutched it to his chest and brought it around the circle of chairs to me. Every pair of eyes in the room followed him.
“Autumn,” he whispered. “Don’t.”
My shaking hand reached up and my fingers pinched the corner, slowly lowering it down to my lap without moving my eyes from Edmund’s face. Beside me, Fallon wailed in horror and clapped his hands to his mouth, turning away until he was on his knees, doubled over.
I looked down.
It was a back. A child’s back. Tee’s back. There was a festering gash in the shoulder, oozing blood that had matted in the tightly curled hair that was in the shot. Her arm was bent back, broken, bone protruding, and across her wrists there were thick diagonal marks lined up in neat rows, which must have been from the fraying rope beside her hand.
And into her back, letters had been gouged, glistening red against her dark skin. Those letters formed words.
How long can you last, my lady?
We can make it stop, Duchess.
We will wait for you, Autumn.
All my love,
Nathan xxx
I threw the photo away from me, not caring where it landed, and stood up. I could not blink. I could not swallow. I stared at the wall for a moment, arid, as the room swayed, and then, for the second time in a day, walked away.
The floor was moving and I put my feet down carefully until the door to the entrance hall suddenly swung open and I caught the scent of fresh air. I followed it, steps quickening.
From behind me, Fallon shouted my name through his sobs. Somebody told him, “No.”
“Autumn?” Edmund asked, drawing level with me. I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t look at him. I blamed him. I wanted him as far away from me as possible.
Infanta . . . my horse, I managed to think through the heavy, sick haze in my head.
In the entrance hall, people crowded to the open doors before slowly backing away as they saw their sick, shocked Heroine floating toward them. As I passed through, I felt my clothes fall away as black garments wrapped around me to hide my nakedness, and in seconds I was in full mourning clothes: black trousers, black blouse. Black gloves. Lace around my neck, tied like a collar that bound me to her memory. My hair fell loose, and I hid my guilt behind it.
The huge outer doors were opened for me, and I was greeted with a world on fire. The sky was bright orange and yellow as the sun sank, topped with a thin strip of purple. At the end of the long boulevard created by the wings of the palace, I could see the silhouette of Infanta, held still by a lone stable boy.
She greeted me by tossing her head, and I knew she would keep me company. It was better than flying. Once I was in the saddle, Edmund caught up, taking the reins from the stable boy, who bowed low and scuttled away.
“I’m so sorry,” he breathed. “We should have left them protection. We should have—”
“Leave me alone,” I snarled, kicking into the horse’s haunches so she took off at a furious pace. But he didn’t. He followed me the whole way, sometimes running, sometimes flying, as Infanta fled across the grass plains, my hair streaming wildly behind me.
I wondered what it must look like to those who saw us, a black-and-gray outline against the bright sky, racing away from the palace like the sun was burning it down.
Magnificent, child. Whatever you do, you will be magnificent.
I don’t feel like that now, Grandmother.
In time, you will. Time will grant you magnificence, child.
Somewhere, I was running through the green grass, screaming her name in a tongue as familiar to me as the shadow that the tall gray-stone building cast in my path. Tears streaked my face and I struggled to climb the steps, hearing the babble behind the closed entrance doors, like the stream beside the lodge that would swell after the winter rains. My polished, square, school-approved heel
s squealed in protest as I burst through the double doors, coming across the same sight I had seen a thousand times: hundreds of faces turning to mine—and then black.
The Athenean Cathedral was a beautiful building. Outside it looked like a typical Gothic cathedral, like those dotted around the cities of Britain, complete with gargoyles whose faces were melted from years of suffering at the hands of the elements and a graveyard that stretched for miles, little rounded stones protruding from the earth as far as the eye could see, speckling the greenery with gray. Bells rang in the twilight, and through the open, inviting doors I could hear the sound of a choir singing.
Inside, it was anything but traditional. There were pews, but the space was divided into multiple areas of worship dedicated to most of the major religions; the echoes of the choir came from a small chapel to my immediate left. Most impressive, as far as I was concerned, however, was the ancient tree growing by magic in the building’s center. It was an oak, whose branches sprouted high above us in the spire of the church, sheltering the white tombs scattered beneath its shade.
It was in one of those tombs that my grandmother was buried.
There were a few men wearing brown habits—monks, I guessed—sweeping up leaves from beneath the tree, but I was otherwise left alone by the various religious leaders.
I settled beside her tomb, which was right at the front of the tree and scattered with adornments. There were wilting flowers placed in mildewed jars, which I cast away, and fresher ones, too, placed among fading photographs of her, of me . . . even of the Manderley mansion she despised so much.
I tucked my legs beneath me and rested my forehead against the cool marble. I inhaled, deeply, over and over. Beneath my skin I could feel the gouged letters leaving marks, and it wasn’t long before I was pressing my fingers into them, tracing the words.
“Rebecca,” I muttered as I traced her first name with my index finger, skipping her title. It wasn’t hers anymore. “Rebecca . . . Al-Summers,” I finished, following the flourish of the carved s.
I half expected her to answer, to push the lid of the tomb open, sit up, and snap at me to sit up straight and stop sniveling. But I had sealed her tomb with a spell myself, the last time I was in the cathedral.
I was angry, more so than I was horrified or upset. Angry at myself for never stopping to think about the humans at Kable, angry for being so selfish as to do what I did the day Valerie collapsed—if I had stuck it out, we might have remained in school long enough for replacement guardians to be found. I was angry at the Athan and Edmund, for failing again, for never keeping the humans safe. He sat in a pew in the very back row, watching me.
I was angry at the Athenea; at Violet and Kaspar, because they had distracted my thoughts from my friends and because they were vampires who killed people like Tee without thinking twice.
“I don’t understand,” I whispered to the marble, my lips so close to its cool surface I was almost kissing it. “Why me? I don’t know what I can do to change the world . . . to stop evil like this. I’m still a child. I’m still in your shadow.”
I heard a rustling above me and looked up in time to see several crisp, brown autumn leaves swaying from side to side, gradually falling in miniature cyclones until they were suddenly caught by a bitter draft, scattering across the tomb and turning my world brown for a second.
I shivered. Outside, the first few flakes of snow were beginning to fall.
The icy chill was cleansing, and I wanted to stay and freeze—it was better than thinking about Tee. But Infanta was outside, and she wasn’t as keen on the cold and wet as I was.
I reached up and gripped the rim of the tomb. “I’ll get revenge for you, Grandmother, and for Tee, too. I don’t know how . . . but I’ll have Nathan’s blood on my hands, I promise. I’ll make you proud, as a duchess and a Heroine. Watch me break from your shadow. Watch me grow.”
I hoisted myself up, careful not to knock over any of the flowers, and slowly made my way back down the aisle toward Edmund, who weakly smiled and said, “Ready?”
I nodded. For much more than you can ever know.
Together we plunged back out into the December air.
Child, one day I will be dead, and you will have to walk alone. The day you learn to do that will be an important day. It is the day I will cease to call you “child.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Autumn
I sorted out all the riding gear myself when we returned to the stables, happy to delay returning to the palace for as long as possible. I was calm. Really calm, or maybe just numb.
After I led Infanta back into her stall, I hung around in the entrance to the building, leaning against a post and staring out at the strange mix of the pink sky and the falling snow. It was eerily empty, and quiet, until from behind the wings of the palace several tiny dark figures emerged, running so fast they all blurred into a group. I squinted and then cast a vision-enhancing spell.
It was Kaspar Varn, his younger brother, the American, Felix, and Charity Faunder, all in dark clothing and sprinting at their incredible vamperic speed along the road that led to the east gate. Each carried a small backpack, and they were unguarded.
As they disappeared out of sight, I felt my heart sink, and was bombarded with confusion and pain as Violet tuned in live to my sight.
I can’t look after you, not tonight, I thought. My friend was murdered.
She didn’t withdraw—she couldn’t—but she threw a few angry thoughts my way and faded a little.
“They’re going hunting,” someone said from behind me. It was Fallon.
I half turned but didn’t uncross my arms. I was too cold and too numb to do anything about it.
“I figured you would still be out here,” he continued, pulling me into him so my cheek rested against his warm chest. He reached down to unfold my arms.
“Your hands are like Popsicles,” he murmured, waving his hand and casting a jacket into them, which he wrapped around my shoulders. He then lit a small flame that hovered between us, instantly defrosting my hands. “It’s December. You need to wear more layers,” he gently chided, fussing with my damp, frizzy hair so it parted neatly down the middle.
“I like the cold,” I whispered, peering up at him through my snow-adorned lashes as a flurry of the stuff blew into the stable.
He chuckled. “It fits your name. Cold to the touch, but fire to look at.”
My lips attempted a smile but only managed a flat line. “I think my grandmother looked into my eyes and saw my whole life mapped out ahead of me when she named me. I think she knew all of this.” I sidled into him, pushing the flame aside, and slotted myself in below his armpit so my back was half-pressed against his chest. He wrapped both arms around me and rested his chin on my shoulder. It felt safe.
“We’ll never know,” he whispered, squeezing me.
“We might. Violet sees the dead vamperic queen.”
He stilled, lifting his head up again. “Autumn, we don’t know enough about her powers yet to get hopes like those up.” He began gently rubbing my arms. “Don’t let yourself be hurt again. Let her go.”
“I have,” I assured him, doubting the statement myself.
“Good.”
The snow was definitely getting heavier, and though it wasn’t yet settling, I could see sludgy melt dripping from the gutter but never reaching the ground as it turned to ice right before my eyes.
“I want to go back for Tee’s funeral,” I said after a while. “It’s the least we can do.”
“I’m not sure we’ll be allowed, but yes, let’s try.”
“Tammy . . . Tammy will hate us. W-we let this happen,” I stuttered, feeling like I was actually going to cry. After everything she had done to help me . . .
He whirled me around and, with a finger, tilted my chin up toward him. “No, don’t play the blame game. The only evil in all this are the Extermino, and we won’t let them go unpunished. Tammy will understand.”
He kissed each ch
eek right below my eye, catching the first tears as they started to fall. Then he moved to my lips and caught them.
He suddenly pulled away and reached into his pocket. “I got you another charm for your bracelet.”
He unfurled his fingers to reveal a circle of gold threaded with black, about the size of a ring, and hanging from it a tiny black butterfly. Picking it up I could see there were tiny red roses engraved into its wings.
“Thank you,” I breathed, as astounded by the intricacy as I had been when I first received the bracelet.
He took it back from me and fiddled about, attaching it to one of the links of the bracelet I never took off.
“You’ve metamorphosed; left your chrysalis. That’s why I chose a butterfly. Sometimes I can’t even remember how you were once a caterpillar,” he muttered as he finally got the clip to catch on a ring.
I lifted my wrist into the light of the stable. “Is that a pickup line?” I asked, admiring my new charm.
“If it works, it is,” he retorted smugly. “But you’re an adult now, that’s the point.”
I lowered my wrist and took hold of his hands, wrapping them around my neck so he pulled me closer. “Can . . . I come back to your room, tonight?”
He narrowed his eyes and tilted his head slightly to the side. “What are you after?”
“Nothing,” I whispered, reaching up to kiss him but he got there first, placing a finger between our lips.
“You’re lying. Don’t lie to me.”
I nodded, moving his finger aside, and finally pressed my lips to his. Then I tore myself away and headed out into the snow, turning my back to the palace so that I could face him as I walked.
“Everything, Your Highness. I want everything.”
One side of his lips curled upward into a smirk, and with a click of his fingers, the lights in the stables dimmed. He pushed off from the wall and I whirled to walk in the direction of the servants’ entrance, hands outstretched to catch the snow, pursued by the prince in the chilly, December, Athenean air.
Autumn Rose: A Dark Heroine Novel Page 35