His breaths were gurgling and shallow. Blood spread steadily through his waistcoat from the knife buried in his chest, darkening the straw beneath him.
Charlotte hesitated, frozen between horror and pity. Then, with trembling steps, she crossed the stable and knelt beside him. His hand twitched weakly, reaching towards her, and she took it instinctively.
‘Cousin... I am... sorr—ry,’ he rasped, blood flecking his lips.
Charlotte did not correct him. ‘Who stabbed you? Give me a name,’ she whispered urgently.
He struggled for breath, his eyes glassy with pain. ‘Tell... tell him...’
‘Tell me who stabbed you?’ she pressed, leaning closer.
He gurgled, a wet, terrible sound. With his remaining strength, he pressed a crumpled letter into her hand. ‘Odd Fellows... codes...’
The words barely left his mouth. She recognised it instantly as the same parchment she had seen earlier that evening—the one Wolf had brandished in the garden. He must have snatched it from Wolf’s coat before he realised.
Then his hand fell limp.
His eyes stared blankly.
Charlotte took a sharp intake of breath.
He was dead.
The silence that followed felt deafening.
Charlotte stared at the lifeless boy—for he was little more than that—and the enormity of it crashed over her. ‘Dear Lord,’ she whispered hoarsely. ‘What have I walked into?’
She looked at his face once more—a foolish, reckless boy drawn into a world far darker than he understood.
She reached out and gently closed his eyes. ‘May God forgive you,’ she whispered.
The straw beneath him was damp with blood, already cooling. She staggered back and turned away, bracing herself against the stable wall. The wood was rough beneath her palm.
‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured again, though she was not sure to whom—to herself, or to the boy she had just condemned by saving another. Guilt tightened in her throat. Had she caused this?
She may not have discovered the identity of the Wolf, but she had the code—the proof that the Odd Fellows were behind this. Whoever this Wolf was, and whatever secrets that parchment held, she would uncover them. Perhaps now the Ice Baron would believe her. She needed to speak to him and warn him. His life was still in danger.
Outside, a horse whinnied sharply, followed by the sound of boots crunching on gravel. Someone was coming back.
She stuffed the parchment into her bodice and wiped her trembling hands on her skirts, unintentionally smearing blood across them.
‘Who goes there!’a stable boy shouted from the front entrance.
Charlotte had only seconds. If she were found here with a dead man, the news would spread through the ball like wildfire, and she would be branded a murderer before she could offer any explanation. Panic seized her like a vice.
She fled.
Her silk slippers were silent on the hay-strewn ground as she bolted from the stall and darted out through the side door she had entered moments before.
Chapter 4
The biting night air hit her face like a slap, but she did not stop. She gathered her mud-splattered skirts and sprinted across the damp lawn, her silk slippers squelching and leaving dark, incriminating prints on the pale stone steps of the terrace.
Without glancing back to see if she was pursued, she yanked open the nearest door and slipped into the blinding blaze of candlelight and chatter.
Bodies, heat, perfume, and the shrill hum of conversation closed around her once more. She stumbled, gasping, her pulse galloping wildly. Her face burned; her hair had come loose in wild tendrils. Thank heavens her oversized mask concealed most of her features—though her gown had fared far worse. Coffee stains mottled the bodice, her hem was soaked through, and her once-delicate slippers looked as though she had trampled through a pigsty. And good heavens—was that blood?
She needed to disappear—quickly.
