by Lani Lenore
Why had Adam left her? Of course there was a logical explanation—he’d been gone when she’d woken up before—but she refused to accept that reasoning. This time, it was all about her and what she hadn’t done right. Was he finished with her the moment that he’d finished with her body?
Celia wandered downstairs aimlessly, passing along the second floor. There was one less LaCroix in the house now. One less person to stop her from leaving. Could she bring herself to do it? Could she open the door and wander down the mountainside alone?
Or will I be stopped by the hooded slayer?
Absently, Celia was brought down to the first floor by her own feet, and there was no one else in sight. Where were they all? Were they having breakfast over the table as always, ignoring that one of them was missing? She wondered if Maynard’s body was still laying outside on the ground, no one bothering to bury him or clean up the mess.
But that has nothing to do with me anymore. Here I am. Here I will stay.
Walking down a hallway, unconsciously taking herself to the front entrance of the house, Celia noticed a door that was open just a crack. It halted her in her tracks for the simple reason that she hadn’t remembered this room being open before.
Unable to help herself, Celia stretched out her hand and pushed the door in. It swung leisurely back to reveal the room to her, and she did not have to go inside to see what she had found. It was a study, smelling of musty books, dust, and neglect. Inside, it was dark and cold, but the thing that stood out was a large portrait on the wall above the mantle, which depicted a man and woman. Staring at it, she couldn’t help moving closer to see the caption on the bronze plaque beneath.
Hugh and Leanna LaCroix.
This would have been the master of this house in his younger days, with a wife that must have passed away. There had been no mention of this woman, but only of him. The couple was in their early twenties in this painting, and judging by the age of Irving—which she had estimated to be near forty years—the portrait must have been near that age itself. These were marks of interest, but that was not what kept Celia’s attention on the painting, or what made her heart speed as she looked at it. There was familiarity there. The woman, Leanna, was not someone she recognized, but the man was notable, and it was not only a slight resemblance.
There was no mistaking it, despite the age of the picture. The man in the portrait was Adam.
Chapter Sixteen
The faces in the painting stared at Celia, so lifelike that the man and woman may have been sitting in a secret room. They lived in a separate dimension in the wall, all to themselves, immortal and beautiful as the years passed on. Anyone who cared to look was shown the truth of life that had been Hugh and Leanna LaCroix.
Celia’s eyes traced the outlines, staggered so much by what she had found that her body itself recoiled from the portrait. She turned away, sweeping out into the hall in order to escape, but the image of the brush strokes was still imprinted on her mind.
The portrait has to be forty years old, but the man is Adam. There’s no mistaking it. I can’t be wrong.
She insisted upon this as she rushed down the corridor, moving once again without a destination. The house was a sprawling maze without end, every passage leading into another until she would be cursed to travel in circles for eternity. The weaving of her path was like the twisting of her thoughts as she tried to straighten them.
If she could possibly accept that the man in the portrait was not Adam, but he was only some descendant or reincarnation, then she would still have to accept a horrible reality. No matter how she could hope to turn it, God’s honest truth was apparent. Adam was a LaCroix.
Celia was angry, thinking only the worst about her discovery. Putting aside how it confused her, she knew that Adam must have been lying to her for these past few days. He was one of them; he was in on the plot, whatever that might have been. Celia couldn’t remember what it was like to feel betrayed, but she knew it now. It came on as a warm and sour feeling in her stomach that made her sick.
Why? Why would he lie?
Her head was feeling heavy, and her feet were sticking to the floor. She couldn’t take another step. Celia stopped in the hallway, turned her back to the wall just beside a pedestal with the bust of an ancient woman upon it, and began to cry.
Adam is one of them, she thought as warm tears trailed down her face. He’s been lying to me this whole time, pretending to have lost his memory to earn my trust. But what would he gain?
She imagined his touch and she sobbed. She had allowed herself to be tricked by his handsome features and sweet words, and she felt like a grand fool. He had told her that they were going to be free of this place; that they would leave here together. He had made her promises, and she had believed them. She sniffled, remembering his words.
“I’m not going to let anything terrible happen to you. Do you believe me?”
She remembered the way his eyes had looked when he’d said it, and she had taken every word down her throat. She had swallowed everything he’d told her about how he cared only for her, and he’d had the gall to seem so genuine. As she thought on it, she choked—but realized that she still wanted to believe him. Maybe he really had been sincere. She groped desperately for a kinder explanation.
Maybe… Maybe I’m wrong. Could he not know that he’s one of them?
That was a possibility in her mind. Perhaps they had forced the memory loss on him. When he had said those things to her, he had meant them because he wasn’t aware of the truth. The sound of her cries faded down the hallways, and she slowly composed herself. Adam was not her enemy; she could believe that. He had told her just last night that he’d discovered something about the master of the house. Could he have found that portrait as well? He hadn’t told her because she would become afraid, and she would…
I would cease to trust him.
Her reasoning soothed her fears and she felt better. Celia wiped her tears away with her hand, but her troubles were not over. She no longer had freedom in this house, for she had lost her keys, and the only one she was willing to put her trust in had fled from her bed. She needed to find Adam, and she would not accept him veering from her again. She took in a deep breath of stale air, preparing herself for her task.
A footstep. It fell along the corridor behind her—beyond where she was hidden by the statue on the pedestal. Her heart did not respond well to it, leaping inside, for she refused to believe the step could belong to anyone who meant well. The sound of the heel was a gradual click, and she had heard enough of these footsteps to know who they belonged to.
Celia didn’t dare to move, not brave enough to turn around and peer toward the footsteps that had stopped in the hallway. She closed her eyes and imagined the one behind her, standing so perfectly still without wavering. She would have black hair and steely eyes, and she would be staring straight forward as if there were no thoughts in her head. But wait. The footsteps had started up again. Slow and painfully measured, they fell against the floor, clicking—coming closer. Celia held her breath, waiting to be caught.
“Where are you going?”
The dullness of the voice was unmistakable. Celia’s first response was to answer, and so she bit her lip, keeping her own voice stifled. Unless someone stepped up beside her and looked her in the eye, she would not reveal her position.
“I’m looking for the young ones,” another voice said, and Celia was surprised to hear it, though glad that she was not the one being addressed. The tones were similar, and she recognized them. It was Luci and Margot together—unless one sister was simply talking to herself; she could not see.
Feeling that she had not been spotted, Celia dared to turn herself and peek, and through the space behind the crooked back of the statue, she watched the scene unfold.
Margot and Luci were standing further down the corridor, rigid and facing each other. They were near a table that held a white vase with red flowers painted onto it. They were wearing those matching dres
ses, and their hair was sleekly bobbed in the same fashion. Celia could not tell them apart until their conversation led her to a conclusion.
“I was told to watch you, Luci. Master Irving has said that you are beginning to cause trouble.”
“I am efficient enough to mind myself,” Luci insisted to her sister, though none too adamantly.
“The master says that you have been minding another. Why did you take the young gentleman into the old father’s room?”
“I do not need your reprimands. I follow a higher master than you.”
Higher master? Who could she have been speaking of? There was someone she revered more than Irving or Baltus? Perhaps the “old father”? Hugh LaCroix? Celia silenced her thoughts in order to concentrate.
“You should reconsider,” Margot warned her darkly.
“There is none to be done. I know what I will do.”
Pivoting stiffly, Luci turned herself like a soldier, preparing to go her own way once again. She took a step forward—and Margot imitated the motion perfectly.
“Why is it that you are following me,” Luci asked without turning her head.
“You will do what you were told, and I will watch you,” Margot insisted. “That is the order.”
Celia considered all these words. What was Margot accusing her sister of? She didn’t know. Celia watched quietly, and she wondered to herself what would happen next. Would Luci begin to argue with Margot over this? Raise her hand in protest? Everything that had been said between them was simple statements without much feeling. Surely Luci would feel frustrated and indignant—but Celia had never seen such a thing from either of them, and couldn’t imagine it possible. Then, to Celia’s surprise, she saw what she was looking for.
It began as a curling of fingers on Luci’s hands. Her hands became fists, and they began to shake, but there was no twist of her face. Her anger was only noticeable through her hands, and it was those that she used. In a motion quicker than lightning, those hands snatched the nearby vase off a table—such a lovely vase—and took it alongside her sister’s head.
The thick glass shattered on impact with her skull, but it was not all that broke. The skin of Margot’s face ripped, and a spider-webbing gash began to leak blood. Margot fell to her knees, and Celia covered her mouth so that she would not scream, but she did not intervene.
Almost as immediately as her knees hit the floor, Margot began to get herself back to her feet. She did not seem to know that she was bleeding, for though it dripped down her face, she did not put a concerned hand to her wound.
“That…felt…wrong,” Margot muttered, rising up and seeming only slightly disoriented by the blow. Celia certainly did not understand it, cowering as she was behind the statue, but she shifted her attention back to Luci. The other maid stood over her twin, expressionless, like an executioner. She seemed particularly interested in a piece of the broken vase that was resting along the floor, and leaning over, she took it up.
“I am sorry,” Luci said, and slashed Margot’s throat with the opaque glass. Blood began to spurt from the open wound, a dark color, but Margot did not protest. She stood still and upright as her blood flooded out of her, staining her neatly pressed uniform.
“What are you doing, Luci,” Margot gurgled, staring into her sister’s eyes and refusing to know she was dying.
“I am sorry,” Luci repeated, slicing her again. “I am sorry. I am sorry.”
Margot opened her mouth again, perhaps to ask the same question, but no sound came out from her ruined throat. Celia had never seen anyone have their throat cut, but as quickly as Maynard had gone down at the blade’s penetration, she was sure that Margot should not still be standing.
It’s like the hooded man. He was shot. He bled and yet he didn’t die.
The thought of fleeing did not even cross Celia’s mind, struck as she was by these events. Before her horrified eyes, Luci was murdering her sister, and Margot did not realize that she was supposed to die. Luci seemed to notice this as Celia did, and she immediately began to take other measures. Still holding the glass, she raised her fist and smashed it repeatedly into Margot’s face, and it was then that Celia witnessed something truly horrifying.
Margot’s face began to cave inward, sinking more with each punch. She took the beating standing upright, refusing to fall or defend herself. Celia heard the cracking sounds as the maid’s skull broke apart into fragments, and her face disappeared. Beyond it was a dark and leathery mass that seeped murky blood. When that was exposed, and Luci put her fist into that soft tissue, Margot’s body fell to the floor, and did not move.
She’s dead, Celia realized. Dead, but not human. Definitely not human.
But if not, then what?
Luci looked across her sister’s body, and she did not appear to feel any guilt or sense of loss for her act. There was no shock on her face for revealing that Margot was a monster behind a human mask. Looking down at the one who could no longer hear her, Luci spoke in a flat manner.
“I have tried to be more like you, and less like them, but I cannot. My insides crave to be what they are, with my own will and own thoughts. I am not as perfect as she is. I was passed over for the task, just as you were. I hate her for that. I would take her place, but it is not his will. I understand. I have chosen my own master, and if you will stand in my way, then I must remove you.”
Celia listened, and the words all seemed a bit late to her, but they had been spoken, and she could not say that she understood fully. It did not matter much. The time had come for her to make her choice: to flee or to keep her hiding place. She looked behind her, wondering if there was a door nearby that she could slip inside. Being noticed would not be a good—
“I see you there,” she heard Luci say, and Celia’s heart was clenched in a secret fist.
When she turned her face, Luci was standing directly on the other side of the pedestal, and their eyes met through the space behind the statue. Her sudden appearance was enough to startle Celia into jumping backward. She was out in the open then, shielded by nothing, and the murderous maid began to advance on her.
“You have witnessed my sin,” Luci said, “but you do not know the whole truth of it. I have envied you more than I have hated my false masters. I tried to get rid of you before you were awake, but I was stopped.”
What? These words were complete nonsense to Celia. She backed away as Luci advanced, trying not to trip over her own feet. She watched Luci’s hand that was still holding the shard of the vase in her fist, mixing her own blood with that of her fallen sister. It, too, was unnaturally dark and thick.
“He would not like it if I hurt you,” Luci said thoughtfully. “But perhaps just a bruise or two. He would not know it was me.”
Alarms went off inside Celia then, and she was lingering no longer. She had to put some space between Luci and herself, or the maid was going to harm her outright. Celia’s joints unlocked and she turned without further hesitation. The girl began to run, not knowing whether or not the fearsome maid was behind her. Without any other choice, Celia fled through the halls of her prison, though where she would run or hide, she could not say. Anywhere she went, she was trapped.
Chapter Seventeen
The stairs that Adam traveled plunged deeply into the gut of the house. As he passed them, he imagined the belly of a dragon, and he was weaving his way down the esophagus toward digestion in the pit.
He did not know where he was headed, but with every step he took, the place seemed more familiar to him. This was not the first time that he'd felt as if he knew the house, but he didn't want to think about it much further than he had to.
I just can't be one of them. I won't believe I belong to such scum.
He moved on with a shift of thought, wondering what he would find in Baltus’s secret room. His hunt for answers had led him to search for journals beyond a hidden passage in the wall. The way was taking him deeper into the house with every crook of the stairs, and there was only an occasional la
mp to light his way. He supposed he should have brought his own, but it was too late to turn back now.
Finally, after many minutes had passed, he came out at the bottom.
The room around him was dank and meager—possibly the most unpleasant place he’d seen, rivaling the cage room where the nameless woman had died. Down here, there were no windows, not even an ounce of light coming from anything other than fire. The thought was smothering. The walls were made of large stone blocks stacked atop one another to form the foundation of the house. They were uneven, unpolished and dirty. The floor beneath his feet was paved, but was covered with dirt, straw, and stains of unknown kinds. It was no secret that the maids weren’t allowed down here to clean, for whatever reason. There were dirty sheets hanging about, seeming to separate the room into smaller parts. The space held very little furniture, and seemed to have a few smaller rooms leading off from it, but they had no doors.
Dungeon, Adam pronounced to himself. And Celia didn’t want to believe me.
This was not an enticing or comfortable place to be, but the thing that bothered Adam most was the smell. There was a sour odor on the air, which was at the same time sweet and sickeningly putrid. If Adam had simply been on a leisure tour, he would have fled from the stench alone, but he had a purpose that was more important than aggravation to his nose.
Standing still as he peered around, Adam listened. This was Baltus LaCroix’s private chamber. Was this where he spent his days? Where he had been through every meal they’d had at the table aside from the first? Was he here now?
“Hello?” Adam called out for his own sake. He hadn’t expected anyone to answer—even if there was someone hiding in the shadows, ready to put him down. But in the moments that they hesitated, he would get what he could from this place.
