“I would give anything for you to go back upside and forget everyone here, especially me,” he whispered.
“That’s impossible, isn’t it?” I asked.
“I hope not. I hope we can find a way for you to get back home.”
“I meant forgetting you,” I said, searching his face as it dimmed.
“I can’t…I can’t tell you to stay here. I would never be that selfish. I want you to be safe and far away from here. You need to listen to the life that’s still left in you, follow your heart.”
“Well, that’s going to be hard, my heart feels like it’s been shattered into a million tiny pieces. Which one of those pieces should I follow?”
But of course he didn’t answer, because he was gone.
Faded away to nothing but an empty space in front of me.
Chapter 9
The door creaked open at once, the lock that kept it shut rusting and dropping to the floor in a heap of crimson soot. I stood and stared frozenly at the walls and watched them crack and rot with age and blacken with time and mold. The ceiling crumbled around me, and gathered in drifts at my feet. Within moments, the room became a ruin, my very own tomb, skimmed with dust and thick opaque shadows.
I walked quickly through the halls, my shoes leaving fresh tracks in the layers of filth like a trail of breadcrumbs for someone to follow. I stopped at the foot of the long winding staircase when a hush fell over the stone steps that lay before me. It was a strange quiet, one thick with dread. It crept up the skin of my arms like a slow bitter-cold wind. Below me, engulfing most of the steps, was nothing but blackness.
I held my breath and started down the steps. I could only see part of the walls and stones beneath me and the gray curling mist that seemed to seep from cracks in the rock to climb up around my legs.
I crouched down, trying to see through the darkness.
And there huddled against the wall were silhouettes, small rippling forms, almost a dozen or so, slowly one by one turning their faces toward me.
My breath came out in a loud gasp and terror rushed through my veins. There werethingsdown there. The bells had rung and the dead were somewhere else, but Ravenswood was still not empty.
At the far end of the stairs, the crunch and scrape of dead leaves dragged along the floor and ran its polar fingers down my spine. My body shuddered, the hair standing straight up along my arms.
“I can feel her heartbeat,” something whispered against my ear.
A bitter glacial wind fluttered against my neck. A small breath gasped out in a low cry. “Help us,” the voice whispered, “Please, help us.”
My bottom hit the steps instantly, my palms landing flat against the cold stones. “Who are you?” I called out in a choked garble of words. “How do I help you?”
Then, one at a time, the fiery white torches along the walls lit themselves, and the dark outlines of the creatures faded into shimmery dust.
I bolted down the rest of the stairs and stood before the wall where the voices had come from, holding out a trembling hand. I swept my fingers through the air and blinked back at the sudden despair and sorrow that filled me. “Tell me how to help, tell me how to beat Hemlock and I will,” I whispered.
Behind me down the long corridor, soft whispers answered me. I followed the echoes, soft wispy sounds like sighs, straight to the door of Mathias and Liam’s parlor rooms.
There was more debris than the last time I was there. Filth covered the floor, making it hard to walk through, and I stumbled a few times until I reached the door to Mathias’s private room.
I went straight for his desk, stacked with books and papers and dust. And there in the middle, on top of it all, was a beautiful inked drawing of me. I was asleep on a bed, my bare shoulder peeking out of the blankets, and an open book next to my head.
You’re the perfect combination of everything I have ever craved from life…doomed and beautiful, fearless and full of life and hope. I love that you read the same books over and over, trying to capture the feeling of being the main character in somebody’s book. One day, maybe we’ll find each other and you’ll know. Maybe in some different world, if our souls ever break free of this condemned one. Maybe then we could find each other. I wonder if you could love me. I like to think you would.
Oh God, I think I so would. My knees buckled and I sat down heavily on his chair, dust flying out in puffs around me.
“Tell me how, Mathias. Show me how to break this curse,” I said, holding the picture up to my chest, squeezing my eyes shut tight. Around my fingertips, the paper crumbled. I could feel its edges lighten and rot, floating to the floor like feathers.
I pulled the paper away. I didn’t want it to decompose. I wanted to keep the beautiful picture of me. I wanted to keep his words. But everywhere around my fingers, the paper deteriorated to ash until there were just two small areas where my fingers held onto the paper.
I stared at the small pieces that were left.
Wait a minute.
