Ruined.
I roll the word around on my tongue until it is sharp, bitter, and hot before projecting it back in his face.
“In your eyes, Father, I already am.”
I go to move past, but his hand strikes like a viper, fingers burying into my upper arm. “What Erybrus has conceived with lust only births sin. Whatever you do, daughter-mine, do not let him touch you. The Lord Blacks are tricky gods.”
My lips wrinkle a sneer, and I take in my father for all he truly is. Broken, battered, a shell of a man. I bare my teeth in the low light of evening. “There is only one trickster god, Father. The one who looks back at you from the mirror every morning, whispering words of deceit and decency alike, while you keep your daughter tied to a chair.” I spit the words like belladonna berries and sweep past him, leaving behind nothing more than a trail of bitterness.
He does not move to stop me while I curl around the wall and into the foyer. A man stands on the threshold, his face pinched as though he has bitten something sour.
“Are you Ms. Adelaide Thorn?” he asks.
I bob my head. “I am.”
He angles out into the night, pointing a gloved hand toward the carriage, where wax-wick lamps glisten like will-o’-the-wisps. To lead me into darkness, take me down, swallow me whole, and spit out the bones. I gulp air, one finger pressing the vein bleating in my neck. The response is strong and steadying.
A-live, a-live, a-live.
“Do I need to bring anything?” I look back toward Father.
He still stands in the kitchen, one hand white-knuckling the back of a chair.
“Just yourself, Ms. Thorn.”
The words cut sharp. So, I will not be staying. Ransom will take what he needs, and I will be left powerless and—if Father has his way—boarded onto a coach and sent away.
Ruined. Cured.This is all I am to my father. Spoiled, in need of healing. I reach for my wool cloak, where it hangs by the door, and sweep it over my shoulders.
I slip my hands into my pocket, once more curling fingers around the bell.
Bells for protection.
I twist to look at Father, but he is gone. All the better. No one left to say goodbye to. I button my cloak against the cold and turn toward the man with the pinched, sour face.
“To Blackbourne Castle, then?” I step out into the darkening night, breath frosting on my lips.
“Aye, Ms. Thorn.” He nods. “To Blackbourne Castle.”
nine
There is a bitter smell in the air when the driver angles the carriage beneath a gate crowned in brown ivy and the skeletal remains of rhododendron blossoms. The stench creeps in through the open window, hollowing out the bones in my face and setting roots on my tongue. I bury my nose beneath the blue wool of my coat, taking small breaths as the world rushes by. It is an acidic smell, something like rotting pine and alcohol.
On the outskirts of Rixton, past the wheat fields and orchards around Avery Manor, the trees grow tall and dark before sweeping up into the mountains. The moon shines high above, silver rays tipping molten through the branches. I readjust in my seat, my fingers worrying in my lap, nails peeling at skin while my stomach boils like black-pine pitch.
Why has Ransom asked for me?
The young lord, that is what the driver said. Hiram Black is dead. Set to be buried in two days’ time. So, what does Ransom want with the vicar’sinfamousdaughter? The girl locked in a tower. I bite the inside of my cheek. Night leaks in through the window, and the driver whips the horses into a frenzy. I jerk backward in the seat, my head smacking the brocade-hung wall, pain exploding like hot coals.
“Damn Ithrandril,” I whisper, cradling the back of my skull.
Father would have my tongue for such language, but he is not here, and so I say it again. Again and again and again until the words are etched into my skin like firebrands.
I am not thevicar’sinfamous daughter. No, I am the infamous daughter of wind and sky and river. The infamous daughter of outcast women too strong for the men who caged them. I am the infamous daughter of the wood and the river, who sees the souls of the dead and conjures their ghosts with the ring of a bell.
Whatever Ransom Black wants,thatwill be who he deals with. Not the woman locked in her room, tied to a chair, chanting Blessed Scripture until her tongue turns black with ink.
The carriage lurches to a halt, and my palm flies out to catch the opposite seat. I curse again, the words sharp between my teeth, and straighten, smoothing out the wrinkles in my woolen plaid. The driver jangles down from his post with the latch of a footstep, the stamp of hooves. I grind my teeth, slipping one hand in my pocket to feel the curvature of the brass in its wrappings.
