Sadie swallowed, squeezed her amulet tight, and met Nicholas’s eyes. “What if the forest really was haunted? And now the demon is in the manor?”
Twenty-Seven
???
Nicholas’s first instinctwas to scoff. A demon, really?
But he remembered what the Gloaming Forest had felt like the other day. Nor was Sadie one to jump at shadows.
And a demon would be an intangible threat.
“How do we even test such a theory?” he asked. “And what do we do if it is right?”
He didn’t expect Sadie to have an answer to either question. He wasn’t sure answers existed.
A demon.
Spirits, there hadn’t been any credible stories of demons in over a hundred years. Rumors, tales that got exaggerated with every telling, but nothing concrete.
“We can’t tell anyone else,” Sadie said. “They’ll panic, which would only serve the demon if there is one. And we can’t let anyone leave, either. What if the demon had made its way to Linzen with Lenora?”
“So, we have to detect an invisible demon and find a way to trap it all within the next two weeks. Without letting it do whatever it is demons do to hurt humans in the meantime. That’s not daunting at all.”
Sadie bit her lip, and for a moment Nicholas didn’t worry about a potential demon, wanting only to haul her close and sinkhis own teeth into that plump lower lip. Her focus, however, was better than his. “I might be able to detect the demon.”
That snapped his thoughts back to serious matters. “How?”
She shook her head. “If I can, I’ll… I’ll explain. But let me test it first.”
Was it bad that he wanted there to be a demon now, because it meant Sadie would finally confide in him? Probably.
Nicholas didn’t push. “I can make more charms with that glyph and give them to everyone, but that might only incite panic if the charms are reacting constantly.”
“Maybe once we’ve identified the demon?” Sadie suggested. “If you gave a charm to everyone not possessed, we’d then know it couldn’t jump to another host.”
“Unless there are bats around.” Perhaps he had judged Lenora too harshly. She might have truly been attacked by a demon-possessed bat.
Sadie’s lips rounded, her eyes going wide. “Or spiders.” She rubbed a hand over her face. “I think I know how it entered the manor. Remember how I said the forest felt different the other day when Abigail was in it with me?”
He nodded.
“Well, there was a strange moment with a spider that landed on her, then Abigail went back to the manor, and the woods no longer made my skin creep. I assumed it was just Abigail’s nerves affecting me, but if the demon really did transfer from the spider to her…”
“Then when she left, the forest was no longer haunted,” Nicholas finished. “And when she met us there yesterday, it was haunted once more.”
Sadie nodded. “And just now in the brewing room, I only looked up from reading because I was shivering, though it wasn’t cold. It wasn’t as bad as the feeling in the forest, perhaps becausethe demon hasn’t been in the manor as long, but that might have been the same sensation.”
Nicholas pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m tempted to believe there really is a demon, but you said you think you can sense it so we’re sure?”
Sadie nodded. “I think I have sensed it before, but now I can pay closer attention and get a better idea if it really is a demon.”
“How dangerous will this be for you?” He didn’t like the idea of her catching the demon’s attention.
“No more dangerous than doing nothing. Plus, I have the charm you gave me.”
“You swear you won’t be putting yourself more at risk? You nearly fainted twice because of sensing this demon, if you are right.”
“I didn’t nearly faint. And I’ll have my amulet if I get overwhelmed. It means I can’t do anything until the power you charged it with fades, but I can at least add a trickle of power if needed, then.”
