Saige
Sleep paralysis had been a long torment of mine, but I’d never experienced it quite like this. I knew I was lying numb on the cold, dusty floor in the attic. The blow to my head had been like a red-hot poker straight through my temple. Each stab of pain made my entire skull feel like it was being ripped open. I had vague impressions of moving in and out of consciousness, sometimes aware of what was happening around me but powerless to do anything about it. Other times, I was trapped in Anna’s twisted memory, her tragic demise playing out for me like scenes in a horror film.
Anna.
The girl who’d had dreams and ambition.
Anna.
The girl who’d been brutally murdered.
Anna!
The girl who’d turned into a monster.
I’d always known there was a presence that lingered around me. What I hadn’t understood was that Anna had not only haunted me but possessed me. The pained, lonely sensations that plagued me night and day hadn’t always been mine. They’d been Anna’s, her emotions, her desire for revenge, polluting my mind and soul.
I did, truly, feel sorry for Anna. Her life had been taken from her, but she’d taken mine too. She’d brought terror and sorrow to generations of my family. The Wolvercrafts may have descended from a murderer, but we weren’t the Roma Witch. Xavier and Zoe were not Frederick and Margaret.
Jasper and I are not Frederick and Margaret.
My heart shattered.
God, Anna has Jasper!
I strained, demanding all my muscles to wake, but my body refused to move. It was ironic. Now that my thoughts were my own for the first time, I was helpless to do anything about them. I loved Jasper so much it hurt. The world had been wonderful and exciting with him, and we’d already been parted once by Anna.
I will not let that happen again.
I will not let her… kill him.
Move. Move.
My heart was beating. Blood pounded through my veins, but my body remained paralysed.
Move. Move. Move!
The spell broke. Sensation rushed back into my arms and legs. I jerked up, gasping for breath, and gingerly got to my feet. Nausea swept through my stomach, the pain in my head causing black dots to span across my sight, but I wouldn’t give up. Not now. Not ever. I’d been on the sidelines of my own life for far too long. It was time for me to take control.
And that started with confronting my fear.
I picked up Jasper’s discarded flashlight, flicked it on, and followed the sounds of Theodosia’s cries, which sharply rose in volume. She was still kneeling in front of Anna’s wedding portrait. Her translucent hands stroked her daughter’s painted face. I wondered if she was trying to remember Anna as the person she once was. Was Theodosia mourning a daughter she’d lost? A daughter who’d turned into a twisted version of herself?
The stiffness in my muscles made me feel like a tense coil of rusty wire, but I moved toward Theodosia. The boards creaked under my weight. She turned her head, her death wound still evident on her long neck. The slit still bled, the blood saturating her elegant green gown.
My mouth curled into a pathetic smile. Anything to show her I was on her side. “Please. How do I end this curse? How do I stop Anna?”
How do I save Jasper?
Theodosia bared her teeth and let out a demonic wail that caused my insides to loop themselves into knots. She pointed to something against the far wall. I strained to see in the darkness. Besides cobwebs that hung like the loose, broken threads of a ghost ship, all I saw were shadows. Then lightning spilled through cracks in the roof, revealing what I’d missed. A room in the southeast corner of the attic. Its open door faced me, inviting me into the dark.
Don’t be afraid. You can do this.
But just to be sure, I checked with Theodosia. “In there?”
She nodded.
I walked toward the doorway. Slivers of lightning leaked through the boarded-up windows inside, the cobwebs dancing in the cold air. If anything waited in the darkness beyond, say a massive spider waiting to gobble me whole, I was fair game.
It’s for Jasper. The answer is in this room.
I parted the cobwebs as though they were draperies and stepped into the dark. My flashlight shakily crisscrossed left and right, revealing scattered objects that would have looked more at home in Mildred’s house. Grimoires, crumpled and covered in grime, lined the bookcases. Some of the shelves had collapsed, books and paper scattered across the floor. My eyes swept over crystals of all shapes and colours, skulls that didn’t look like they’d been made out of face moulds, and drawings of constellations. And candles. So many black and purple candles.
I drew closer. The candles surrounded a large black pot. Images of witches around a boiling cauldron leapt to mind. Not the childhood fantasy type but the murderous, heinous men and women who cast curses and hexes.
Margaret was the Roma Witch. Did all of this belong to her?
I jumped, sensing something behind me. Fear pushed out through my chest.
Theodosia was standing in the doorway. She flickered in and out like a static image on a screen. Her eyes bored into mine, her voice an eerie rasp. “In there.”
I aimed my flashlight in the direction she pointed. An antique wooden chest, something I imagined pirate treasure would be hidden in, was concealed behind one of the crooked bookcases. I moved toward it, running my fingers over the intricate domed lid. A name had been inscribed on a plate just above the lock.
Margaret Wolvercraft.
This belonged to her.
Nervous with either adrenaline or terror, I opened the chest. The most exquisite dresses, silks, ribbons, and priceless jewellery were inside. Frederick really had lavished his second bride with the most expensive and finest gifts.
But how do these help me?
Theodosia’s voice rolled through the dark. “Dig deeper.”
I lifted the beautiful dresses and jewellery out of the chest, almost feeling guilty when I dropped them onto the filthy floorboards. One object remained inside—a black velvet bag. I pulled the drawstring. Inside was a blade with green gems along the silver hilt. Inscriptions of runes and other symbols I didn’t understand ran down the length of the knife.
Margaret’s blade. Some kind of witch’s tool.
Recognition started to solidify within me. “This is what Margaret used to kill you.”
Theodosia’s voice sounded like the thunder outside. “The gorge. That is where Anna has taken him. You do not have long.”
She turned around, floating eerily back to the wedding portrait, her feet hovering a few inches off the floor.
I looked at the blade in my hand. It wasn’t heavy, but it was alien to me. I knew what Theodosia wanted me to do. She’d given me the answer days ago, I just hadn’t understood. Now I did. My mind felt like it was being sucked down into something the size of a pinhole as acceptance closed in.
I would do this for Jasper.
For my family.
Maybe even for Anna too.
* * *
I tore out of the attic. My legs struggled with the instructions from my brain, or maybe it was my mounting anxiety taking control again, because my feet were as loose and slippery as butter. I took the staircase that twisted down to the fourth floor, feeling as though every part of me might rupture.
Please. Please. Please.
Don’t let me be too late.
I’d never been a firm believer in religion, but right then, I was willing to pray to any of them that would listen.
Jasper.
What horror must he be going through?
More windows had shattered on the third floor, the carpets littered with shards of coloured glass, the curtains and drapes blowing like flags in a heavy gale. Doors slammed. The chandelier lights along the ceiling juddered, as though Wolvercraft Manor was positioned on a fault line.
My ears strained to hear anything above the violent storm, so it was a surprise when I tore around the corner into the next hallway to see a figure hobbling toward me. My shock was eclipsed by immediate terror. It was the woman from the woods, the one who hung from the tree, only now she was very much animated and… active. She shuffled toward me. Her neck was snapped, the veins black where the pressure of the noose had suffocated the life out of her. Her eyes bulged from their sockets.
I darted back the way I’d come.
Someone else waited at the end of the hall. The woman in the bridal dress, the one Anna had thrown off the clock tower. She lurched toward me, wobbling like she was inebriated, only her eyes were locked on me with a clarity that was frightening. Her veil was torn, bits of it arranged in grotesque threads through her hair.
I dashed into the hall on my right and kept running, my mind frantic to bring up a mental blueprint of the house.
I have to get to the chamber.
There was no way I’d get to the gorge without going underground. The storm and flood made sure of that. I had to use the tunnel.
At the end of this hall, turn right, then left. There’s another staircase.
Soft shuffling resonated behind me. I stole a glance over my shoulder. The dead brides were coming after me. They hobbled down the hall in fast pursuit, arms outstretched. More joined them. Men and women—all victims of Anna’s horrible vengeance. Some of them were missing limbs or faces, and some had the implements of their deaths still embedded in their bodies.
Anna is trying to stop me.
She’d summoned her dead captives, controlling them like marionettes.
I reached the end of the hall, twisted round into the passage on my right, and scrambled into a separate corridor. I kept going, turn after turn, long passage after passage, but there was never any sight of the staircase.
No. Not again.
Anna was playing mind games. I was a mouse caught in her maze.
I whipped my head around to see how far back the corpses were. The floor suddenly went out beneath me, swallowing me into the yawning deep. I screamed, my lungs wedged between my ribs. The sensation of falling, of being tossed down something with a straight blunt edge, over and over again, knocked the wind out of me. I rolled onto soft carpet, blinking to get my surroundings in focus. My flashlight lay a metre ahead. Silver light streaked onto a staircase.
The frigging staircase.
In my haste, I’d fallen down it.
Anna’s puppets descended the stairs in creepy unison, eyes not blinking, faces pallid from putrefaction. The smell of them brought something toxic up from my stomach.
I scrambled onto my feet, grabbed the flashlight, and darted into the corridor opposite. I kept running, past doors, past windows, never looking back. I didn’t want to know if the corpses were close. I just focused on getting the hell out of there.
Sweat beaded on my skin, my scalp itchy from it.
Where is the chamber?
“Saige.”
I nearly screamed at the sound of the voice.
My mother stood at the end of the hallway, flickering in and out like a static image on a screen. She stood by the secret door that led into the chamber. It was open.
Her smile faded. “Hurry, sweetheart. Jasper’s time is running out.”