Their words tangled in the quiet between breaths.
I pressed my hand over my mouth to keep from gasping aloud. Poe shifted nervously on my shoulder, claws gripping my gown.
Sylum exhaled shakily. “Just… leave it, Isolde. Please.”
Her tone softened, just barely. “You cannot save her from what she is.”
Footsteps sounded as Isolde approached the door. I pulled back into the darkness just as the lamplight shifted.
The door creaked open. Her silhouette emerged, tall, elegant, and predatory in the low amber glow. Her chin lifted, eyes sweeping the dark hall.
I held my breath, praying to whatever God had not yet abandoned me that she wouldn’t see me.
After a moment, Isolde turned the opposite direction and glided away, her gown trailing over the floors like a snake withdrawing its coils.
Inside, Sylum remained at the hearth for several long moments, his breathing ragged, his hands no doubt clenched in his hair the way he always did when the world became too heavy for him.
He whispered something I could barely make out.
“God help me… I don’t know what to do.”
My chest constricted painfully. My husband, my possible tormentor, my possible salvation, was unraveling too.
But not as beautifully nor as precisely as I was.
Pressed into the alcove’s shadows, I held my breath until my lungs ached. Poe crouched on my shoulder with eerie stillness, his claws digging into my wrapper. Only when Sylum left the room and the sound of his footsteps quieted, did I slip out, silent as breath, following after him.
He moved quickly through the manor, his stride long, purposeful, nothing like the tender lover who had kissed me senseless only hours before. This Sylum was a stranger carved from ice. His shoulders were tense and the weight of secrets was heavy in each of his steps.
He reached his study and pushed the door open. I darted behind a tall marble statue—some Grecian goddess whose blind stone eyes seemed to judge my every trembling breath.
Mrs. Ashby was already there, waiting as if expected.
The first thing she said was too quiet to hear, strained and cracked at the edges.
“What should I tell the other servants? They are already whispering about Her Grace and… Lydia…”
Her voice broke on Lydia’s name.
Sylum exhaled, long and weary, rubbing the bridge of his nose.
“Tell them she broke a vase. That’s why there was blood on her nightgown.” His tone was clipped, decisive.
“And remind them that Lydia’s death was a tragic accident.”
A lie. A lie delivered so casually my own throat burned with it.
Mrs. Ashby hesitated. “Yes, Your Grace… though I’m not certain they will believe it.”
His jaw tightened. “They will if you say it.”
The housekeeper nodded once, resigned, but her face remained troubled.
Silence pooled thickly before she spoke again.
“And… the tower, Your Grace?”
My heart lurched violently, slamming against my ribs so hard I thought Sylum might hear it through the door.
