Serpent's Gate

by Jade Astor

  Justin must have seen that his confession had upset Stephen. In two quick steps, he crossed the room and pulled Stephen back into his arms.

  “I’m sorry I had to tell you all this, Stephen. And I’m not saying he’d go after you with a hunting knife, or push a heavy statue off the balcony onto your head or whatever. But Roark is a dangerous character. I’ve seen his bad side. It isn’t pretty.”

  “I…I wish I knew what to believe. He can’t possibly be the monster you describe. I mean, you’re not like that. Whatever his faults, he’s still your brother.”

  “Yes, he is. That’s why I can read him so well. Just be careful, Stephen. You don’t understand Roark like I do. No one does.” After giving Stephen’s fingers one last, reassuring squeeze, Justin let his hands drop to his sides. “Listen, I’ll take you to see your uncle and we can talk more on the way. No one can overhear us in the car.”

  “All right,” Stephen agreed. Too stunned to move or even react, he stood beside the door while Justin let himself out. Watching him go, Stephen felt a wave of exhaustion, both emotional and physical, wash over him with such force that he almost sagged to the floor.

  Justin took a few steps down the hall, pivoted, and came hurrying back. “I think I have a solution. Run away with me, Stephen.”

  “What?”

  “I mean, not to the ends of the earth. Just to the village. We can get a motel room and stay there until it’s safe to spring your uncle from the hospital. I mean, think about it. We’re going in the car anyway. Pack what you need and let’s get out of here. No one will think anything of it until we’re far away from this house.”

  “But what about Roark?”

  “He’ll be mad for a while when he realizes we’re gone. But over time, he’ll forget all about us, just like he forgot about me while I was wandering across Europe. Come on. What do you say?”

  Stephen thought about it for a moment. Leaving this place, and getting Uncle Vernon home as soon as possible, was all he had ever really wanted. Justin coming along was not a bad bonus. Maybe, away from here, things would be different for them. Better. “Okay.”

  “Great. Meet you downstairs in twenty minutes.”

  After the quickest shower he had ever taken, Stephen threw on some clothes and jammed the rest of his stuff into his travel bag. He wondered how he would get Uncle Vernon’s luggage back from the cottage, but decided that would have to wait.

  While he packed up his laptop, things at last began to fall into place—Roark’s apparent anger whenever he wandered off alone with Justin, the bitter rivalry between the brothers, Roark’s outrage whenever Stephen mentioned Justin’s name. Then, later, the sweet physical gestures and the attempts to make Stephen take pity on his loneliness. Suddenly, the whole picture came into a terrible kind of sense. Roark Fairbourne was a master manipulator, that much was certain. He could feign whatever emotions he needed to get people to do what he wanted…or get them to hurt Justin. And worst of all, Stephen had almost fallen for it.

  Justin’s theory seemed to fit. Roark, Stephen realized now, was not only desperately jealous of his more extroverted and charming brother. He wanted to take things from Justin—including what he perceived as his budding relationship with Stephen. What lengths would he go to in order to come between them? Roark struck him as the kind of guy who always got what he wanted. Stephen shuddered to think about it.

  Luckily, he saw no sign of either Roark or Ivy in the morning. Stephen didn’t wonder they were sleeping in. No doubt they’d stayed up quite late entertaining each other. His mouth turned down in disgust at his own gullibility. How long had their twisted affair been going on? Pretending to hate one another probably turned them on. They’d certainly perfected their act.

  He carried the bags outside and saw Justin’s sleek black sports car waiting in the driveway. The hood and sides, both painted with jaunty customized racing stripes, shimmered with fresh rain. That reminded him of another potential issue—how would he get Uncle Vernon’s car back for him? He wasn’t even sure where Leo had moved it—it certainly wasn’t in the same spot they had parked on that first morning. Perhaps the Fairbournes had an entirely separate building for their vehicles, the way rich people did in movies.

  “Nice ride,” Stephen muttered as he got in. Justin seemed pleased.

  “Amazingly enough, my brother kept it ready for me. I was afraid he’d junk it while I was gone, but I suppose it’s worth too much money. Frugality is just one of his many faults.”

  They didn’t speak as Stephen buckled himself in, as if Justin feared that the grounds themselves would eavesdrop on their conversation. Stephen wondered if he might be right. A glance into the backseat confirmed that Justin, too, had brought a full duffel bag, though his was decorated with a designer label. The tires squealed as Justin hit the gas. They were on their way.

  The Serpent’s Gate loomed into view, with a dark figure slouching in the bushes that grew on the left side. Leo, he assumed. The black jacket with its upturned collar and Greek fisherman’s cap made it impossible to be sure, but who else could it be, especially in this weather?

  “At least he’s opened it for us,” Justin said as they approached. He aimed for the gap between the bars without bothering to slow down. “Wish my dad had automated that damn thing. Waste of time waiting for that half-wit every time I want to go out.”

  Stephen noticed that Leo hadn’t moved from his place beside the gate despite Justin’s car barreling toward him. He assumed he was used to Justin blazing through at such speeds, and he was waiting to close the gates behind him. If it had been Stephen standing there, he would have put a bit more space between them just to be safe.

  “I don’t know about you, but I’ll be glad to see this place in the rear view mirror,” Justin said grimly. Stephen nodded. His throat felt dry and tight with nerves. He wasn’t sure why. Everything was proceeding smoothly so far.

  Then, just as the car began to clear the tall iron fence, Leo gripped the bars on one side and started to push the lefthand gate forward.

  “Hey!” Justin shouted, noticing. They continued to accelerate. Stephen could see every rain-spattered bar clearly. He could even see Leo’s strong hands as they swung the heavy gate toward Justin’s speeding car. “What the hell is he doing?”

  He hit the brakes, but there was no time to stop and nowhere to swerve. The tires screeched as the heavy gate, with Istharios’s grinning face right in its center, bore down on them.

  Stephen had never witnessed a bomb going off, but he imagined the sound would resemble what he heard when the car careened into the gate. Then the lights went out and the air smelled and tasted like warm rubber.

  He drifted along, half in a dream and half awake. He felt disconnected from his body somehow.

  “It’s okay. I’m okay,” he thought he heard Justin whisper in his ear. “I’ll be back later. Wait for me.”

  He wasn’t sure how much time had passed before he had the urge to move again. Enveloped in total silence, surrounded by an endless sea of white, he blinked and began to struggle. Something was pressing down on his limbs, holding him in place like the embrace of a clumsy giant.

  Belatedly he realized that the clean white surface of Justin’s recently exploded airbag was covering his upper body and pressing into his face. Pushing it aside and turning, he saw that Justin’s had deployed, too. Justin himself was no longer in the driver’s seat. Gone to summon help, he assumed. Why hadn’t he helped Stephen out first? Was Justin hurt?

  His muscles screaming in protest, Stephen braced himself and wrenched the passenger door open. It swung outwards with a shrill metallic squeal and caught at the halfway point. He slid out, dropping to his knees on the gravel. His neck and shoulders ached from being flung forward into the airbag, but otherwise nothing felt broken or tender.

  He took a moment to direct a creative stream of curses at the car, the gate, and Leo, who had apparently disappeared along with Justin. Any moment, Stephen expected to hear sirens. But noth
ing happened.

  Mentally he replayed those last terrible minutes before the crash. Common sense suggested the crash had simply been an accident caused by either Leo or Justin miscalculating the distance between the car and the gate. His own eyes, however, suggested that Leo had purposely swung the gate into Justin’s car. Why would he have done such a thing? True, Leo was coarse, rude, and even a little scary. But the Fairbourne brothers agreed that he was loyal to the family above all else. Why would he want to hurt or even kill Justin by wrecking his car?

  Suddenly Stephen recalled what Justin had confided in him earlier that morning, and a wild thought took hold of his mind. Justin and Stephen had only assumed it was Leo standing beside the gate as they went roaring toward it. Stephen, at least, never actually saw his face. He could think of another possible scenario, though, one that made a sinister kind of sense. Roark had known Justin would be taking Stephen to town that morning, and had been perturbed enough to make caustic remarks about their planned excursion. Had he disguised himself as Leo and tried to kill his brother?

  Kneeling on the ground, groggy and in pain, Stephen waited. Neither Justin nor Leo returned. His eyes drooped and he leaned forward, wondering how it might feel to fall asleep on the rain-soaked grass.

  “No,” he said, shaking his head just enough to make it hurt. Falling asleep after an injury could be dangerous, he had heard somewhere. He wasn’t sure why, but though it best to heed the advice. His body wailed in protest as he forced himself to his feet and began a wobbly march back toward the house. Even then, he expected to see Justin, Leo, or maybe even Roark himself come hurrying along the path to greet him, put an arm around him, make sure he was all right. But no one showed.

  The brick path remained flooded, and in no time Stephen’s shoes were soggy again. His body protested with every step, though he supposed walking might prevent stiffness later.

  Back at the front door, he managed to twist the knob and nearly fell inside. Mrs. Mulgrave hurried over to him, clearly startled. With a small cry, she produced a handkerchief from the pocket of her dress and dabbed at his forehead. He blinked in surprise when he saw the blood on the white cloth. So it wasn’t just raindrops oozing down the sides of his face.

  “What’s happened?” Mrs. Mulgrave demanded.

  “Car wreck,” Stephen managed to mumble. “Justin…the gate. It closed on us.”

  “The gate, was it? Was my crack-brained son involved, by any chance?”

  “I don’t know,” Stephen answered honestly.

  “Don’t feel you have to protect him on my account. If he caused an accident, he will certainly answer to me!”

  “We must have been hydroplaning,” Stephen murmured. “Water in the treads of the tires. Going too fast without enough traction to stop. Gate must have slipped out of his hands.”

  “All right. Never mind for now. Stay right here and I’ll see to you.”

  “Did Justin come back?” Stephen asked, but got no answer. Perhaps she hadn’t heard him. He was about to repeat the question when Mrs. Mulgrave helped him limp over to a chair in the corner of the foyer and guided him into it. It was made of polished wood, straight-backed and not terribly comfortable, but at least he was no longer inclined to doze off. Eventually Mrs. Mulgrave returned with a warm, damp towel and a cup of warm tea. Obviously she was one of those people who figured a dose of caffeine would cure most any ill. When he tasted it, he realized she had added something stronger to it. Brandy, he suspected. While he sipped it and felt her wrap the warm, soothing towel around his wrenched shoulders, he heard Leo come clomping through the front door. He was wearing a green t-shirt and worn-out blue jeans—not the dark jacket and Greek fisherman’s cap Stephen had seen before the crash. Had he ducked into the gatehouse pulled his outer garments off?

  Mrs. Mulgrave turned from Stephen and turned to confront her son. She led him out of Stephen’s earshot, but he could hear her lacing poor Leo out and almost felt sorry for him—especially since he was growing more and more convinced that Leo hadn’t been the one behind the gate.

  Leo was talking in an agitated voice when the two returned.

  “I’m telling you, Ma, it wasn’t me,” he insisted. “I didn’t go to the gate this morning. I was checking on your flowerbeds. It’s still raining, you know.”

  “Enough of your fibs. Bad enough you did it in the first place. You could at least have stuck around to make sure you hadn’t killed them. Where is Justin Fairbourne now?”

  “I don’t know. He wasn’t there.”

  “Then I suggest you go and find him.”

  Leo started to object again, but instead he stopped in front of Stephen’s chair.

  “Why don’t you like me?” he demanded.

  “What?” Stephen could hardly believe he’d heard right. He had staggered away from an accident that had most likely totaled Justin’s beautiful car and left his body feeling like a wrung-out dish rag. Justin had walked off and apparently vanished into thin air. And Leo was worried that he didn’t like him?

  Better to be patient with him, though. He remembered what Justin had said about his father’s cruelty toward him and Ivy. “Er-what makes you think I don’t?”

  “Don’t bother to hide it. Most people don’t. Justin, Roark, Mr. Argyle. Even my own father didn’t.”

  “I’m sure that’s not true,” Stephen soothed.

  “You don’t know. You weren’t there.” Leo clenched his fists. “He used to say he couldn’t bear the sight of me. I hated him, too. When he finally died…it was almost a relief. I was glad he was gone.”

  “Leo!” his mother scolded him. “That’s a terrible thing to say!”

  “Why? Stephen doesn’t know. He wasn’t there.”

  His tea finished, Stephen decided to stand up again. He had to move slowly since his torso ached worse now. Leo remained planted directly in his path. He was scowling at Stephen, his plump lower lip jutting out, clearly unwilling to move until he had an answer.

  “That’s true, I wasn’t…but I can’t believe parents hate their own children. It isn’t…” Stephen groped for a word that wouldn’t make Leo more upset. He couldn’t imagine why he’d brought his father up now. But then, as both Justin and Roark had warned him, there was no understanding the way his simple mind worked. “I don’t know…it isn’t natural.”

  “Natural?” Leo repeated as Stephen limped across the foyer toward the staircase. His angry laugh made Stephen shudder. “How can you say that? You’ve seen what they consider natural in this house. And as for parents and children—”

  “Leo!” Mrs. Mulgrave’s harsh reprimand cut him off. She grabbed his sleeve and pulled him back from following Stephen. “Enough of that nonsense. Mr. Carlyle is a guest. You must treat him with respect. It’s not polite to burden him with your personal problems.”

  “All right, Ma. I’m sorry.” Leo’s smirk suggested he wasn’t sorry in the least.

  “I’m going back up to my room now,” Stephen said. “Someone needs to find Justin. He might be hurt. And does anyone know where Roark is?”

  “You rest now,” Mrs. Mulgrave reassured him. “Leo and I will take care of everything.” She glared at her son, who cringed. “Leo, come with me,” she ordered before Stephen had a chance to answer. Leo shrugged and followed his mother back to the door that led to the study and other first-floor rooms. Stephen could hear her berating him while they walked away. “You’d be well advised to keep quiet around him, Leo. He’s no different than one of the family, when you get right down to it. You and your sister seem determined to get me turned out of this house.”

  “You know that will never happen, Ma,” Leo assured her.

  “No? Sometimes I wonder. And where is your useless sister, anyway? Had to serve breakfast on my own. The Fairbournes didn’t say anything, but I know they noticed.”

  Leo answered again, sassily, but a slamming door cut their voices off completely.

  He decided to go upstairs and change his clothes and shoes before Justin
came back. Drenched as they were, he toed them off right there in the foyer and carried them at arm’s length up the stairs. Not wanting to muddy the rug in the guest room, he left them upside down in the hall outside his door.

  With his hand on the doorknob, he paused.

  Stillness and silence hung around his like a soft, concealing veil. Justin was presumably out tending to his car, Mrs. Mulgrave and Leo were downstairs, and Malcolm had left for the day. Assuming Roark and Ivy had enough sense not to be caught together after their nighttime adventures, every bedroom now sat empty.

  Dropping his hand to his side, he padded up the hall in bare feet and listened outside Roark’s room for a moment. Just to be safe, he knocked before trying the knob. The door swung in to reveal no one inside.

  The first thing that caught his eye was the full-sized bed in the corner. The covers were pushed down and the dark blue sheets lay twisted and rumpled. Embarrassed, he averted his eyes, focusing instead on the desk to his right. That, he decided, was as good a place as any to begin a search for a missing book.

  An unremarkable collection of items littered its surface—a high-end laptop computer, some paperwork from law school, and a few pencils and paperclips. Behind the computer, half-buried under a colorful law school brochure, Stephen spotted the Coleridge book Roark had bought from his uncle’s store. Seeing it touched off a spark of resentment.

  Next he moved to the open closet on his left. He scanned Roark’s impressive wardrobe, all of it fashioned in subdued or even depressing dark colors. One garment lay on the floor, tossed behind a rack of soft leather shoes in various shades of black and brown.

  Curious, Stephen bent to retrieve it. At first he had assumed it was a dark hooded sweatshirt. When he picked it up, though, he noticed it wasn’t a hoodie. It was a long, dark robe like a monk’s—or like the ones in the Istharios book. It smelled faintly like smoke. The sleeve was charred…no doubt where Roark had caught his arm on fire after setting Justin’s room ablaze.