Belladonna

IT WAS A RELIEF THAT PERCY HADN’T LINGERED. CLUELESS AS TO how to console him, Signa had only watched as he climbed the stairs, muttering that he needed to clear his head. Having decided it best not to loiter—lest she be caught snooping by anyone else—Signa left her hiding place in the shadows. She had every intention of returning to her room to try to clear her own head of the bizarre situation she’d witnessed. Only, the moment she stepped upon the landing, a wash of glowing white flashed in the corners of her eyes.

It was with dread in her chest that she turned, blinking clarity into her vision. When she looked again, nothing was there.

Perhaps she was more exhausted than she’d realized. It had been a long journey after all.

At least, that’s what she told herself as she paced the halls, struggling to find her room in what seemed to be an endless maze of hallways. Thorn Grove was eerier than she’d anticipated. She rubbed her arms, forcing her feet ahead one step at a time.

Though the manor was bustling on the lower level, the deeper into the second story Signa ventured, the emptier and gloomier the estate became. There was no sight of gilded cakes, and nothing more than the faint hum of a distant violin. Gone were the white marble pillars that had ghosted her reflection as she passed. In their place were strange iron sconces that reminded Signa of bird’s nests. Like the branches along the banister, they were intricately designed, with several thick twig-like pieces of iron stretching from them and a dimly lit candle towering in the center of each.

She looked behind her, and again a wash of white flickered just out of her view. This time, Signa could have sworn she saw a face.

She turned away at once, holding her breath. If it was a spirit, hopefully it hadn’t realized she’d noticed it. Continuing forward, she was determined to ignore it and to find her room again. It was difficult, though, to ignore the cool buzz on her skin as she journeyed past endless walls of paintings that were twice her size, each of them adorned with a gilded frame and featuring a person who must have once lived at Thorn Grove. The sheer number of them was less than reassuring; this estate was surely crawling with spirits.

She came to a painting of a well-decorated man with hair nearly as orange as Percy’s. He had a rifle slung over one shoulder, while his other hand rested upon the back of a whippet. The painting hung next to a large room with two leather couches the color of burnt molasses and shelves stuffed with musty books that took up the entire left wall.

Signa crossed the thick red rug to the shelves and scooped up one of the volumes, disappointed to find it was nothing more than a book about finances. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been surrounded by books—when she lived with her last uncle, perhaps?—and grumpily shoved the book back onto the shelf.

Next, she examined a large rosewood desk scattered with jars of ink and sheets of parchment. There were newspaper clippings, too. Some about Grey’s Gentleman’s Club, and an obituary for Lillian Rose Hawthorne. She picked it up, though the moment she touched the parchment, moss sprouted from the paper and curled around her fingertips. She’d never dropped something so fast.

Clutching her hand to her chest, Signa silently cursed herself for being so foolish. If the spirit hadn’t already realized Signa could see it, it certainly knew now. She had to be more careful.

Deciding the room, with its desk and ledgers, must be where Elijah worked, Signa left the office without touching anything else. The moment she stepped into the hall, the buzzing, prickling sensation was back like a gnat on her skin, and as she passed the next portrait, she could have sworn its eyes trailed her every step. This feeling was one she was familiar with, and one she refused to have any part of, especially with the possibility of normalcy so close within her reach. Determined to grasp it, she hurried on. Yet no matter which way she turned, the halls stretched on. The farther into them she ventured, the more goose bumps flared across her skin. She spun around only to find that no one was behind her. No humans. No spirits. Not even the reaper himself.

It’s in your head, she told herself. You’re just not used to such a large manor.

Signa had seen many spirits in her lifetime—too many, in fact—and knew that being in their presence would make one tired, and cold in a way that not even fire could ease. It was the same cold that sank into her bones in that moment.

A cold that came from the next room, waiting for her.

The painting outside the door was of a woman with pale skin and hair like a sunburst. Her smile was warm and rich, though her eyes were what made it impossible for Signa to look away—one blue, one hazel. So similar to her own that Signa found herself sucking in a breath. She’d never seen someone with eyes like hers, had never even imagined such a thing.

Signa reached for the doorknob, but the moment her skin touched the brass, she heard the dreadful sound of wet coughing from a room behind her. She turned toward it, and at once the chill in her body shattered, the spell broken. Warmth seeped back into her skin, and yet she shivered. Who else, she wondered, would still be upstairs, like her, and not at the party below? Her curiosity stronger than the pull of the dead, Signa crossed to the door where the sound came from and pushed it open without a knock.

Aside from its coloring, the suite was a mirror image to her own—with a beautiful reading room in pale blues and silvers, cast in a golden glow from a fire that roared beneath the polished ivory mantle above the fireplace. The space was lovely, but perhaps a little cold. It hardly seemed lived in, either. There were no books at the reading table, nor any quills or parchment strewn across the desk. She crossed the floor slowly, careful with her steps as she approached the adjoining bedroom. The door hung open, and try as she might to be quiet, whoever was inside heard her.

“Who’s there?”

Signa hovered at the threshold between the rooms. There was a waifish girl in the bed, nearly a skeleton; her skin was so translucent, it seemed she’d never seen the sun in her life. The girl’s hair was the pale yellow of dried straw, the color leeched away. Her eyes looked as though someone had carved the life out of them, hollowing them into empty, fathomless things. When the girl furrowed her brows, the full outline of her skull was visible.

“Who are you?” The girl frowned, her lips the palest shade of pink, like a winter-faded rose.

“You must be Elijah’s daughter.” Signa stepped inside the room and shut the door, glad for an excuse to leave behind the eerie hallway and the spirit that waited for her. “I heard you are ill.” Though she hadn’t quite realized the severity of the situation.

The girl’s laugh was brittle. “I have a name. It’s Blythe.” She didn’t seem to have the energy to lift herself from her pillows, though her glare never tired. “What are you doing in my room? Servants are forbidden from entering without permission.”

“My apologies, but I’m no servant. I’m your cousin, Signa Farrow.” She knew it wouldn’t be hard to make up an excuse to slip away. Blythe looked like she needed very little push until she was knocking on Death’s door, and Signa refused to play any part in it. Yet something about Blythe fastened Signa’s feet to the floor. Perhaps it was because the last time Signa had spoken to a girl near her own age had been years prior, back when she knew Charlotte Killinger. Or perhaps it was the desperation in Blythe’s eyes, and the fact that she seemed as starved for company as Signa. Whatever the reason, Signa remained.

“It’s rather dreary in here,” Signa said, pausing as she skimmed the shadows for any sign of Death. When she didn’t spot him, she relaxed, satisfied. “Shall I open a window?”

“Do you think I cannot manage a window on my own?” Though she made no effort to kick Signa out, each of Blythe’s words was clipped and deadly as poison. Signa suspected she could ask Blythe to sing a hymn, and the girl would somehow wield it like a weapon.

Signa had nothing to say to that. So much as a wrong breath would quite possibly get her head ripped off her neck and tossed out the window. Rather than answer, she took a seat on the edge of the four-poster bed. Her curiosity felt like the buzz one gets from coffee, making her fingertips twitch and fiddle at the hem of her dress. Signa looked her cousin over, assessing her. Pale skin, glum eyes, frail body… But Blythe didn’t smell like death. She didn’t smell like the spoiled sweetness of rot and disease. Her fingernails were cracked but not yellow or gray. And her giant blue eyes, despite their venom and the tired shadows that weighed them down, were clear of fog. “What are you sick with?” Signa asked.

“How bold you are,” Blythe scoffed. “If we knew that, perhaps I wouldn’t be stuck in this bed all day.” She dropped her head onto a pillow and sighed. “God forbid they send in someone tolerable to keep me company.”

Signa had the vague impression that Blythe knew no one had sent her and just wanted to take a jab at her. She ignored it and looked toward the door, thinking of the painting of the woman with twocolored eyes like her own. “I never imagined a place this large could feel so empty, even when there are so many people visiting,” Signa said absently. “Who else lives on this floor? I thought I heard someone in the room across from yours.”

The air went so frigid that Signa found herself wishing she hadn’t let Marjorie take her coat. Blythe’s eyes were icicles, ready to impale.

“You couldn’t have,” she whispered. “It belongs to my mother. No one’s been in there in ages.”

Before Signa could think about what the words might mean to someone not as closely associated with Death as she was, she asked, “You mean belonged, right? Your mother was Lillian Hawthorne?”

Those words were enough to melt the ice from Blythe and drown her. She turned a ghostly shade of white; even her lips paled. Her mouth opened as if to speak, but surprise halted her words. It took Signa too long before she realized her crassness.

“Oh, Blythe, I didn’t mean—” The apology was halfway out of her mouth when Blythe literally kicked her off the bed, grinding her heel into Signa’s thigh.

“Get out!” she spat. “You wicked girl, get out of my room!”

Signa scrambled from the bed, cursing herself for her insensitivity. “I’m sorry!” She reached to set a hand upon Blythe’s shoulder. “I didn’t mean—” Again her words cut off, but this time it was with an abrupt intake of breath. The moment she set her hand upon Blythe, all she could see was Blythe, and all she could feel… Well, she didn’t quite know how to describe it. It was unlike anything she’d ever experienced—an all-encompassing sort of feeling that tethered her there and made her breathing unsteady.

Whatever this feeling was, Blythe didn’t appear to be sharing it.

“Get out of here,” Blythe snarled. “You stupid girl, get out—” Her eyes went wide, and she doubled over without warning, chest rattling and body shaking as she was taken over by a violent fit of wet coughs. Blythe covered her mouth with the sheets, staining them a deep crimson. With each cough, the sheets grew darker.

The hairs along the back of Signa’s neck stood on end as a flood of coolness swept into the room. She knew full well what that coolness brought—who that coolness brought—and anger flared inside her.

“Oh no you don’t,” Signa growled in warning. Perhaps she’d been a fool to come. Perhaps the whole thing really was a ruse to damn her further. Regardless, Signa didn’t linger to confirm Death’s arrival. Instead, she turned on her heel and ran as fast as her legs would carry her—down the hall, down the stairs, and to the first servant she could find. Down to whoever might have a chance at saving Blythe and halting Death.

All she needed was to last six months. Six months, and yet she couldn’t last even a day without bringing Death into Thorn Grove.