Elizabeth stepped close, leaning over me until death-rotted breath fanned across my cheek. Her form pulsed—the face beneath the veil rippling between Elizabeth and something else, something raven-eyed and terrible. A skeletal smile curled along her gray lips.
“Lucy,” she rasped, lifting the blade, “he will kill you too.”
Poe’s shriek split the night, grief and terror braided in the sound.
“Nevermore! Nevermore!”
The cry chased me down as the darkness surged forward, folding over me, swallowing me whole just as the blade swung straight for my heart.
Darkness there and nothing more.
**********
“Lucy!”
The voice was distant at first, carried through the fog like an echo from another world.
“Lucy!”
Closer now, roughened with fear.
I groaned, the sound trailing off. The ground was cold beneath me, damp with dew. My head throbbed as though something had split behind my eyes. When I tried to move, pain lanced through the back of my skull.
Above me, Poe’s cry broke the night hush.
“My Lenore!”
“Poe…” I rasped, lifting an unsteady hand. My fingers trembled. The bird circled frantically overhead, wings gleaming against the moonlit sky.
Then I heard it again. His voice, clearer this time.
“Lucy!”
I turned my head weakly toward the sound, the world blurring into streaks of silver and black. “Sylum…” I managed, the name scraping out of my throat.
“Lucy!”
Through the mist, he emerged—his dark coat stark against the pallid moonlight, his hair disheveled, his face drawn with panic. He crossed the final stretch of the hedge row in long, desperate strides and dropped to his knees beside me.
“Lucy… dear God.” His arms slid around me, lifting me gently against his chest. “We’ve been searching everywhere for you.”
I blinked up at him, trying to focus on his face. Fear darkened his eyes and his jaw was set tight. He brushed the tangle of hair from my cheek as his gaze flicked down my body, searching for the source of the blood.
“Are you hurt?” he demanded, voice thick with alarm.
My lips parted, but the truth tangled in my throat. Elizabeth… the knife… the laughter. None of it made sense, not even to me.
“I must have…” I swallowed hard, forcing a steady tone. “I must have fallen and hit my head… how did you find me?”
He exhaled sharply, relief and disbelief warring in his eyes. Then he drew me closer, holding me so closely I could feel the hammer of his heart through his coat.
He glanced up at Poe still circling overhead. “I noticed Poe was gone too. Figured he wouldn’t be far from your side.”
I winced from the pain that shot through my temple.
“I was so worried,” he said, his breath stirring my hair. “I thought I’d lost you.”
I let my eyes drift shut for a moment, allowing the warmth of him to ground me. But then, his body went still.
