The Kingdom (36 page)

It was eerie how clearly I could see her in the moonlight. The gloss of her dark hair. The contemptuous curl of her lips. The gleam of madness in her eyes.

Thane was right. Ivy
wasn’t
like other girls. She was lonely and needy and because Thane had probably shown her some kindness, she’d spun a fantasy that had eventually become her reality.

If she lived in another town, she might have outgrown her infatuation. But here in Asher Falls…who could say if Evil had played on her weakness? Who knew if even now she was driven by a rage far greater than her own?

A wave of terror washed over me because now I understood. There would always be someone greedy and power-mad like Pell and Luna, someone lonely and needy like Ivy, waiting to invite Evil in. It wasn’t over. So long as I remained in Asher Falls, it would never be over.

I drew a shuddering breath. “What kind of tattoo do you have on your ankle? A pentacle with an open point?”

She glared at me in the moonlight. “I warned you, didn’t I? I told you to go home that day you gave us a ride. You should have listened.”

I glanced down where a curved blade, much like the ones I’d seen in Luna’s office, now glinted in her hand.

I eased farther back and felt the porch steps against my heels. I could try to fight her off. I was strong. I’d had years of physical labor to build up my muscles, but the knife gave her the advantage.

I began to sift through possible scenarios in my head. I couldn’t get on the porch without turning my back on her. I might be able to outrun her to the woods, but once inside the trees, she’d know the terrain far better than I. And I felt certain she’d set traps all over the place.

The only other means of escape was the lake.

I stood with my back to the porch, facing down the stepping-stones. If I could make it to the water, I could lose myself in the mist… .

She advanced on me even as I calculated my chances. I heard something in the woods, the trample of brush near the tree line, and I thought of Tilly. Ivy heard it, too. She whipped around, and in that split second that she was caught off guard, I bolted for the lake, keeping my balance on the slippery rocks only by some miracle. The mist crept over the pier as I sprinted toward the end, my bare feet thundering on the wooden floorboards.

I’d had some hazy notion of making it to the boat, somehow unmooring and launching toward the far shore. But I could hear Ivy behind me, and as I reached the end, I ducked under the railing and slid into the lake.

Stunned by the chill, I went under, my arms flailing in panic. I fought back the terror and as my head broke the surface, I had a new plan. I’d swim out a few yards from the pier and head toward the near bank. But the mist had condensed, and I found myself disoriented. I put out a hand, trying to find the pier, but I’d already drifted away from it.

I glanced around. Nothing in any direction but that white, floating wall. It was almost as if the mist had thickened to give me cover, but the notion was hardly a comfort.

I heard Ivy’s muffled voice calling to me, and I swam out several yards, letting the haze and that silence swallow me. My breath was already ragged, my limbs numb from the cold. The cotton nightgown was weightless, but the thick sweater felt like an anvil on my shoulders. Now I didn’t have the strength to drag it over my head.

For what seemed an eternity, I listened to the silence. I heard something scrape against the wooden pilings and then a wave lifted me. I thought at first Ivy had jumped into the water, but then I realized she’d launched the boat. I heard the lap of water against the oars, and I kicked away from the sound and circled back around to where I thought the pier should be.

My shoulder bumped up against one of the pilings, and I put out a hand to balance myself only to find the side of the boat. A light came on in my face, and as I pushed off, she swung an oar. The blow dazed me, and I sank like a stone in the water.

Down, down, I drifted. My arms floated over my head. Moonlight shone through the water and I could see Thane’s angel reaching out for me as the bells called me to the fold. There were other angels, too, alabaster faces veiled in algae. The bottom of the lake was strewn with broken wings, with toppled monuments and exposed coffins, and deep within a forest of wavering reeds, the statue of a child beckoned. The underwater garden was eerily beautiful, and it came to me that I might already be dead. Maybe that was why I could see everything in such detail—the Gothic spires of the mausoleums, the half-buried headstones. I could even see some of the names: FOUGERANT, HIBBERD and, etched into three tiny markers, MOULTRIE.

And then everything grew gray and hazy, as if I’d drifted too far. Now there was nothing but shadows and ghosts and those half-beings that belonged to both worlds and neither world. Abominations with gleaming eyes and primal faces.

One of them detached from the shadows and I recognized him. It was the hideous creature from the cemetery. The one who had slithered under the fence like a snake. The one who had crawled like a spider into the bushes. Only now, in this realm, he didn’t seem hideous at all, but ancient and wizened.

We were no longer underwater, I realized, but in some strange dreamscape. He stood in front of the entrance to a great cave or tomb. I could see nothing behind him but darkness, a black void from which the smell of death emanated. The odor clung to his clothes, his skin, but now I was more intrigued than repulsed. Who was he?
What
was he?

When I tried to move around him, he glided in front of me, coattails flapping, as if to keep me from entering. Lifting a gnarled hand, he motioned for me to go back. But I’d glimpsed something in the tomb behind him. Something beautiful and glowing. The fragile aura of a ghost child.

Was that Devlin’s little girl?

She beckoned desperately and my desire to go to her was nearly irresistible.

Suddenly I was being pulled from the other direction and I found myself once again in a fierce tug-of-war. The guardian stepped aside then, as though he could no longer guide or protect me. As if the decision had to be mine.

When I reached for that tiny hand, a claw shot out from the tomb and curled around my wrist. For one brief moment, I stared into the monstrous countenance of something ancient, smelled the fetid breath of pure evil… .

Even as I thrashed and tore at the arm clamped around my neck, I felt myself swathed in something warm and peaceful. Like a baby being cradled in her mother’s arms.

To this day, I’m not sure how I lasted so long underwater. Maybe I didn’t. Maybe I really did cross over. But the will to live is a powerful instinct, even for someone born on the other side. Even for ghosts.

I never remembered breaking the surface or the resuscitation. My first recollection was staring up into three pale faces.

Later, I would learn that exhaustion had driven Thane back to the Covey house, a dream had awakened Tilly and a suspicious Sidra had followed Ivy out into the night. As the three of them converged on the lake, Ivy had fled.

Their faces floated above me now, and when they spoke, their voices were like distant echoes.

“Amelia, can you hear me?”

“He brought you back, girl.”

And Sidra’s cold lips against my ear, “I saw your ghost.”

I looked past them to the end of the pier where Freya wavered in the moonlight, and I somehow knew that she’d helped Thane pull me back from that abyss. And now she’d come to say goodbye.

Forty

T
he sun was shining when I left Asher Falls the next day. I hated to abandon Thorngate before it was completed and I was sorry to leave Thane when he needed me the most, but it was too dangerous for me in that town. Acting as executor of his grandfather’s estate—soon to be
his
estate—Thane had released me from my contract and promised to hire a new restorer.

He and Tilly and Sidra had all come down to the dock to see Angus and me off.

Tilly took my hand in both of hers. “Keep safe, girl.”

“I will, Grandmother.”

Her eyes glistened as she glanced away.

Sidra looped her arm through Tilly’s. She would be staying with her for a while, and I liked the idea of her in Freya’s little blue bedroom. That somehow seemed right to me. And Thane would be nearby in the Covey house. That seemed right to me, too.

After we’d said our goodbyes, Thane walked with me to the ferry.

“So this is it,” he said. “Full circle.”

“I’m worried about Sidra,” I said. “I don’t think Bryn’s death and Ivy’s arrest have really sunken in yet.”

“Maybe the funeral will help,” he said. “I’ll be there to look after her.”

“And Tilly?”

“Of course, I’ll look after Tilly.” He bent and scratched behind Angus’s ear nubs. “And you take care of
her,
” he said to the dog.

“He will.”

Thane straightened. “Are you sure you’re okay to drive?”

I brushed a hand against the mark near my temple left by the oar. “It’s just a bump and a bruise. No concussion. I’m fine.”

“Still, I wish I could convince you to stay. At least for a few more days. I don’t like the idea of you being on the road alone. It’s too soon.”

“You know I can’t stay,” I said softly. “It’s too dangerous for me here.”

“Yes, I know.”

But I wasn’t just running scared. I was going home where I belonged. We both understood that. We each had unfinished business.

“Thane…I need to tell you something your grandfather said to me about Harper… .”

“I heard.” Anger flashed across his handsome face. “Don’t take this on yourself, Amelia. He had no right.”

“I wish there was something I could do.”

“There is. Go back to Charleston and find a way to be happy. That’s what I want for you.”

“I want that for you, too.”

Thane tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. “Maybe if we’d met before…”

“Maybe. But things happen for a reason. And we’ll always be connected. You saved my life. You brought me back from the other side.”

His eyes were very green in the sunlight. As lush and deep as a Carolina marsh. “If you ever need me…”

My throat tightened. This was harder than I thought it would be. “I’ll miss you.”

“This isn’t goodbye,” he promised. “I’ll see you again.” He smiled then, bringing us truly full circle. Only this time, I knew that behind that deceptively charming smile was a complex man, one who cared very deeply. One who would move heaven and earth to find the woman he still loved.

A little while later, I stood at the rail and watched the shoreline recede. Thane towered over Tilly and Sidra, and I knew that I would always remember him that way. Not as an Asher. Not as a pawn in his grandfather’s cruel game. But as the protector of strays.

Farther down the shore, I saw a shadow emerge from the trees, coat flapping in the breeze. Was he real or had I dreamed him? Was he a guardian or a watcher like the old white-haired ghost of Rosehill Cemetery? Whoever he was,
whatever
he was, I had a feeling our paths would cross again someday. He was there one moment, gone the next, and I turned to face the other shore as we inched our way home.

Halfway across Bell Lake, my phone dinged, alerting me to an incoming text.

My heart quickened as I opened the message from Devlin.

It read simply:
I need you.

* * * * *