“I’m not sure. Possibly two living.”
I motioned for her to follow me. We crept into the kitchen, where a half-eaten sandwich sat on the table, then toward the bedroom. The deathly smell shoved more forcefully into my nostrils when we reached the door. It became so potent I forced myself to breathe through my mouth.
“You’re sure they’re living?” MJ pressed.
I flipped back to my normal vision, reining in my shadows. The girly door covered in pink butterflies filled me with a chilling dread. “I’m not sure of anything anymore.”
Blood smeared the handle. The latch sat halfway over the opening, as if someone had been too rushed to shut it fully.
“Ready?” I already knew in my gut that whatever we found wouldn’t be good.
She nodded, and I nudged the door open.
Fuck.
It was the nanny and the kid. Both their body cavities had caved inward. Liquids glistened and hissed grotesquely in their stomachs as the infection ate them from the inside out. The heat wasn’t a sign of life, but melting flesh.
“Look at the kid’s neck.” MJ pointed toward the oncepurple bed.
Like the nanny’s, it had a chunk ripped out. Unlike the nanny’s, there were red handprints on the kid’s skin, as if someone had tried to hold pressure against the wound. Someone had even placed a stuffed butterfly in the crook of the child’s arm.
“Did Cecilee do this to them?” she asked, sounding unable to believe it.
The front door had been easy to kick in, meaning it wasn’t locked. There were no signs of a struggle. And the dainty handprint on the kid’s neck was damning.
“If I had to guess.”
“What are we going to do?”
I cracked my knuckles. “You’re going to burn their remains. Then you’re going to check on Alexei while I find Ridigar.”
But this time, I planned to rip through his memories. I should’ve done it the first time, but I tended to trust my hand-selected Dreads until they gave me reason not to.
I searched the arena,finding no sign of Ridigar. He should’ve been there, surveying and directing the other squads. But when I asked Ian where he was, he said Ridigar left that morning and never returned. How fucking convenient.
Just like the fact that he was a soul, and for whatever reason, my shadows couldn’t track the dead through their blood the way I could the living.
After checking the barracks and castle grounds and receiving the same story from other trustworthy sources, my suspicion hardened.
Ridigar had something to do with Cecilee’s disappearance. He might’ve even been the one making the flyers. But why would he turn on us?
Chapter
Twenty-One
Lucille
After changing and forcing Oliver to stay with Aspen until I returned, I limped my way to the library.
At the Doors of Moirai, I paused to view the scene as I always did, and I stopped breathing.
They showed Hell’s gates standing open, but beneath the dark wrought iron lay mud soaked in bright, fresh blood. Enough to suggest slaughter.
But whose? Our blood-banded? Was that how the gates opened?
It couldn’t be. The thought was horrific and seemed too simple for a kingdom that thrived on pain and bloodshed.
There had to be another?—
