Serafina and the Splintered Heart

by Robert Beatty

  “Be careful, Braeden!” Serafina shouted at him angrily, the storm whipping her hair as she leaned out. All of a sudden, a gust of wind lifted her off her feet, trying to sweep her away with the blowing rain. She felt herself rising upward, pieces of her spirit, her soul, whatever it was, tearing away and disappearing into the gale. All she could do was cling for dear life to the window jamb and try to stay whole.

  As Braeden climbed down the outside of the building, she watched helplessly. If he lost his grip, she couldn’t save him! He’d fall and die.

  Lightning flashed through the sky, then a roar of thunder cracked overhead.

  Serafina clung to the window feeling like the universe itself was trying to pull apart what little was left of her, but she finally managed to climb down the side of the building and put her feet on the solid ground. Spirit or ghost or whatever she was, she squatted down and put her hands on the stone tile of the terrace, grateful for the plenum of the earth.

  It was becoming clear that the universe was taking her back, that her spirit only had so much more time to roam the earth before it faded into the elements from whence all things came.

  When Braeden made it safely to the ground on the Library Terrace beside her, he took a moment to catch his breath and wipe the rain out of his eyes.

  “Where are you off to in the middle of the night?” she asked in the rain, still angry with him for endangering himself like that.

  As if in reply, he gathered himself and headed into the storm. Tonight there was no party or music, just darkness and rain.

  She followed him down the steps and through the garden. He couldn’t move quickly with his braced leg. He dragged it behind him, the metal scraping along the stone with each step, but he moved with determination and made pretty good time. It was clear that he knew where he wanted to go.

  He followed the winding path of the shrub garden, past the golden-rain tree, then down the steps, through the archway and into the Walled Garden.

  She didn’t know where he was going, but it felt good to be with him and a part of his adventure into the night, whatever it was. Despite her narrow escape on the windowsill, she was still clinging to the hope that she could figure out what had happened to Braeden since she’d been gone, how she could communicate with him, and somehow get back to him. But she felt a wrenching loneliness, too, a separation from him that tore at her gut. She couldn’t speak to him or help him. She couldn’t ask him what he was thinking. When she looked at his stark, grim face, it was filled with such desperation that it frightened her.

  She followed him down the length of the central arbor and into the rose garden. He ducked into the small stone shed used by the master rosarian, Mr. Fetlan. The shed was filled with rakes, hoes, and other garden tools along with pots, trays, and wired wooden apple crates.

  Braeden grabbed a lantern and a shovel and headed back out into the rain again. The boy was soaked to the bone, and she could see him trembling, but he pressed on regardless.

  Through the garden he went, then down the path that led toward the pond. After passing the boathouse, it appeared he was going to cross the large redbrick bridge that arched over the eastern spur of the pond, but at the last moment, he diverted to the left and went into the woods.

  “This is getting stranger and stranger,” she said. “Where are you going now?”

  He followed the edge of the pond beneath the overhang of the trees until she heard the sound of rushing water. They had come to the stream that fed into the pond. But the water didn’t go straight in. A low brick structure had been built across the stream to block and control its flow. The structure was overgrown with several seasons of bushes, moss, and vines. It took her a moment to remember what it was.

  Years before, when Biltmore House was built, her old friend Mr. Olmsted, the estate’s landscape architect, had decided that no estate was complete without a tranquil garden pond. He had told her that he had designed a similar pond in Central Park. She’d never been to New York City or anyplace outside the mountains. She couldn’t even imagine what flat ground looked like, how strange and disorienting it must be. But she remembered enjoying Mr. Olmsted’s stories of the great city’s park. There were no natural lakes on the Biltmore property, or anywhere else in these mountains, but years before, an old farmer had dammed the creek to make a mill pond, so Mr. Olmsted expanded it, redesigned it, and made it part of Mr. Vanderbilt’s garden.

  Serafina remembered that her pa had brought her out to this very spot and showed her the inlet to the pond.

  “It’s a gentle little creek,” her pa had explained, “but every time a storm comes in, it swells up bad and wants to dump muddy water, sticks, and debris into the pond. A farmer and a bunch of cows don’t pay no never mind about a muck-filled pond, but it would never do for an elegant gentleman like Mr. Vanderbilt, so Mr. Olmsted had an idea.”

  As Serafina remembered her pa’s words, she couldn’t help but think about how happy and filled with life he’d been when he told her these stories.

  “Mr. Olmsted had his workers build this brickwork structure across the creek to gather in the water and control how it flowed. You see, the water slips real smooth-like right into that big hole there. If the water’s clean, then it runs on toward the pond. But look down in the hole real close, Sera. You see that metal contraption in there? Mr. Olmsted asked me to rig up a steel basket and a sluice gate so that if there’s a big storm, and the creek water is all muddy and full of debris, then it won’t flow into the pond.”

  “But I don’t understand,” Serafina had asked in confusion. “Where’s the storm water go? It’s gotta go somewhere, doesn’t it?”

  “Ah, you see! There’s the trick of it. When we built this thing, Mr. Olmsted instructed his work crews to construct a long, winding brick tunnel called a flume under the pond. The tunnel goes from the inlet here, all the way underneath the pond to the far end, nigh on a thousand feet away. So, now, when it rains hard and the creek overflows with muddy storm water, the metal basket fills with sticks and debris, the weight of it tilts the mechanism, the sluice gate opens the entrance to the tunnel, and the whole mess of it pours in. The storm water and debris flows through the tunnel underneath the pond and gushes out at the far end without ever having a chance to muck up the clean water in the pond. From there, the storm water continues on its natural course down the creek, eventually ending up in the big river the way God intended.”

  As her pa finished his story, Serafina could hear the reverence in his voice. “You see, Sera, you can accept things the way they are. Or you can make them better.” And Serafina knew that both her pa and Mr. Olmsted were the kind of the people who made them better.

  As Serafina remembered her pa’s story, Braeden leaned down into the brick structure and used his lantern to look around inside. The stream was running strong and smooth with a large volume of rainwater pouring down into the main intake hole, but the water was clear of debris, so the metal sluice gate had not yet opened, allowing the water to flow directly into the pond.

  Braeden began chucking sticks and branches into the metal basket.

  “What in the world are you doing that for?” Serafina asked.

  As he filled the basket with the weight of the branches, the sluice gate scraped slowly open. Braeden grabbed his equipment and climbed into the flume tunnel.

  “Braeden!” she said in astonishment.

  Down in a tunnel that ran beneath the pond was the last place on earth she wanted to go tonight. She’d already been buried once. She definitely didn’t want to do it again—especially if it involved getting drowned at the same time.

  But as Braeden disappeared, she had no choice. She had no idea where his new recklessness was coming from, but she couldn’t let her friend go into that awful place on his own.

  Pulling in a frightened breath, she climbed into the tunnel behind him.

  Following the light of Braeden’s lantern ahead of her, Serafina made her way through the flume. It was a narrow brick passag
e with a low arched ceiling. An inch of water was running along the floor. At first the tunnel was high enough that they could both walk normally, but the farther they went, the lower and narrower the tunnel became.

  She didn’t like this place one bit, but what she truly hated was the water dripping down from the ceiling onto the back of her neck, sending tingles down her shivering spine. And she hated the dark runnels of water sliding down the black, slimy, algae-coated walls like spidery tentacles. The heavy, putrid smell of the water hung in the air. She and Braeden were actually walking under the water of the pond.

  As they went deeper, Serafina felt the cool temperature of the damp air, the clamminess of the walls, and the rising storm water at their feet. She wasn’t sure if the sensations she was experiencing were real or shadow, but they felt as sharp as if she herself was part of the water, part of the stone, part of the bits and pieces from which the world was made.

  The water in the tunnel was soon flowing around their ankles. Braeden had forced the sluice gate open, so the stream was pouring in. She had no idea why he was going through the flume, but it was even more mystifying why he would do it now, tonight, in the middle of a rainstorm with the water gushing in. What in the world could be so important?

  Crack!

  Startled by the sound, Serafina hit the floor with a splash, accidentally taking in a gulp of the water.

  Crack!

  It was steel against brick. Then she heard a prying sound.

  She got back up onto her feet and sloshed through the rising water toward Braeden. He had set the lantern on a small ledge to give himself light to work by as he dug into the tunnel floor.

  Using the tip of the shovel, he pried up one of the bricks. He pulled it up out of the water, set it aside, then picked up the shovel again and started working on the next one. Working in what was now six inches of rushing water, he was digging out the floor brick by brick!

  Braeden’s movement was hampered by the metal brace on his leg, but he worked with a steady deliberateness. Soon he had removed a dozen bricks. Then he reached down into the dark water, deep into a hole, and pulled out a dripping metal box.

  “You’ve hidden something here,” Serafina said.

  With the storm water rising by the second, Braeden seemed to understand the danger he was in. Now that he’d gotten what he’d come for, she expected he’d turn around and go back up toward the opening of the tunnel. But he didn’t. Leaving the shovel and lantern behind, he grabbed the box and continued forward into the darkness, down into the narrowest part of the flume.

  “Now, where are you going, you crazy boy?” she shouted at him over the sound of the rushing water. “We’ve got to go back up!”

  But he paid her no mind. As they proceeded down the tunnel, the ceiling became so low that she and Braeden could no longer walk upright. They hunched themselves down to fit, then they had to crouch. Finally they had to crawl on their hands and knees, the hinges of Braeden’s brace creaking and twisting under the strain of his bending leg. At the same time, the level of the storm water gushing through the tunnel continued to rise. The flood of water pushed hard against her, now inches from her chin, almost to the ceiling, splashing and swirling with great force around her neck and shoulders, making it more and more difficult to breathe.

  As she crawled, it felt like the water wasn’t just rising around her, but dragging at her, wearing at her, pulling her skin away, tugging at her bones. Soon she’d become nothing more than tiny droplets scattered in the stream. Just hold on, she thought, gritting her teeth. I’m not done yet!

  Braeden crawled faster and faster into the darkness, pushing himself through the water, pressing his mouth up toward the ceiling for air, but still dragging the metal box along with him.

  Suddenly, a huge swell with a tumbling raft of branches came gushing down through the flume and crashed into them, filling the entire tunnel with water. She closed her mouth and held her breath, for whatever good that would do, and refused to die. She braced herself against the slimy brick walls so that the water couldn’t take her. She had to hold on! But it was no use. The powerful current slammed into her, tore her fingers from the walls, and pulled her somersaulting upside down through the rushing water.

  The storm water swept her away, tumbling her down through the narrow chute of the flume. Her arms and legs twisted and crashed with the turbulence of the rushing water. It didn’t feel like she was going to drown, but like the last pieces of her soul were going to wash away.

  Finally, she shot out of the flume’s gushing outlet pipe and splashed into a swollen creek. She came up quickly, gasping for air and struggling to get to her feet. She grabbed frantically at her arms and legs, incredibly relieved that they were still there. She hadn’t dissolved into the elements just yet. She’d fought it off one more time.

  Braeden lay at the edge of the creek in the torrential rain, exhausted and pulling in great lungfuls of air, but still gripping the metal box as if his very life depended upon it.

  Serafina climbed up onto the creek’s rocky shore and looked around her in bewilderment, trying to figure out where she was. It took her several seconds to realize that she and Braeden were in the narrow ravine at the base of the pond’s dam.

  When the water had started coming down the flume in force, Braeden had made the decision that it was better to escape through the outlet rather than trying to fight upstream. That decision had saved his life. And maybe hers too—if the thing she was clinging to was indeed a life.

  Serafina couldn’t help but smile, relieved that they’d both made it. She gazed up through the pouring rain at the stone face of the dam. The water of the overflowing pond was pouring over the spillway high above her, coming down in a great waterfall into the creek.

  As she turned back toward Braeden, a flash of lightning struck the sky with a piercing crack of thunder. Braeden tightened his jaw, wiped his wet hair out of his eyes, and got up onto his feet. Whatever he was doing, it was clear he wasn’t done.

  He knelt down on the rocks at the edge of the storm-swollen creek and opened the metal box.

  Serafina had no idea what was inside it, but the moment he opened it, she could see something extremely black inside.

  She stepped back in uncertainty.

  Braeden pulled out a long black garment—fine black wool on the outside, and an inner lining of black satin.

  A sickening feeling gripped Serafina’s stomach and twisted hard.

  She could see that the garment had been badly torn. Many parts were nearly shredded, as if by the claws of a wild beast.

  A blinding glare of white light glinted on the garment’s small silver clasp as a lightning bolt burned up the sky.

  Her palms started sweating. Her lips tightened. The rain poured down her face.

  As Braeden gathered the garment in his hands, it began to writhe and rattle like a living snake. A smoky cloud began to hiss out from it, as if it was annoyed that it had been closed in the box so long.

  Then, with the rain pouring down all around him, and the lightning flashing in the sky behind him, Braeden stood, and with a great sweep of fabric roiling around his shoulders, he pulled on the Black Cloak.

  Serafina watched in dread.

  She could see that the cloak had been badly torn, but it was still the Black Cloak she feared and hated. Its dark, slithering folds hung down from Braeden’s shoulders, writhing with power. But in the tears of the cloak was not simply the absence of cloth, but an impenetrable darkness blacker than she had ever seen. No! That was wrong. She had seen it! It was the same black as the black shapes she’d seen floating in the forest.

  Whenever Braeden moved, the cloak’s fabric moved with him and the terrible black shapes came wheeling outward into the world around him, tearing through time and space. The cloak threw these torn fragments of roiling, inky black shadow in all directions, blotting out the ground and the leaves of the trees and the stars above.

  You’ve done well, boy…the cloak hissed in its ras
py voice.

  As soon as she heard it, Serafina wanted to pounce on the cloak and kill it. But she had no claws, no fangs, nothing but fear and confusion filling her heart.

  I’m not going to hurt you, child…the cloak hissed.

  Months before, she and Braeden had seen the cloak’s evil with their own eyes. It had many powers, but the most sinister was that it allowed the wearer to absorb people, body and soul, deep into the black void of its inner folds. Her mother had been imprisoned in the cloak for twelve years until Serafina cut it to pieces on the angel’s sword in the graveyard and freed her back into the world. Destroying the cloak that night had also freed Clara Brahms, Anastasia Rostonova, and the other children who had gone missing.

  But the point was that she had slashed the cloak! She had destroyed it! How could it be here again? The last time she remembered seeing any sign of it, there had been nothing left of it but the silver clasp. Detective Grathan had found the clasp in the graveyard and died with it in his hand the night he was killed by the rattlesnakes. Had Braeden somehow retrieved the clasp and reconstituted the black fabric of the cloak? But if so, for what terrible purpose would he bring such an evil thing back into the world? And if it had been remade, why was it so badly torn?

  Still wearing the cloak, Braeden stared at the ground, his face clouded with what looked like hatred, violence, and bitter despair all at once, his mind consumed with thoughts he could not bear. “Please forgive me, Serafina,” he whispered to himself.

  “Forgive you?” she said even though he couldn’t hear her. “What did you do?”

  She still couldn’t believe what she was seeing. Braeden was actually wearing the Black Cloak.

  “Tell me what you did, Braeden!” she shouted at him. She didn’t understand what was happening. Had he turned evil?