Monster

26. A Pair of Cold Hands

Author's Note: We're down to the last chapter, everyone. I hope you enjoy! Don't forget to comment below and vote for all of your favorite chapters. Thank you to everyone who has read and loved this book to the very end. It means quite a lot to me. Your comments made me so happy, and I couldn't wait to tell everyone about them. 

You know who you are. So thank you so much.

1832 March 3rd

Four O'clock in the morning

A Pair Of Cold Hands

Sven's silhouette hovered over Elsa's lifeless form for a few minutes, silently, before slipping away with the creak of footsteps, followed by the slam of a door somewhere above.

Shadows closed in on Elsa, whom lay strewn on the dust-laden floor like a broken doll, surrounded by debris and the skittering of rats all around. A few more minutes passed before she blinked and sat up, crystal eyes wide.

She turned and looked around the room, taking in the lurking gloom before remembering what had happened. With a start, she slapped her hands at her chest but to find no wound there, no piece of wood protruding it. She found only the bodice of her gown, clean, to her surprise, of any grit and dusty dead spiders.

Realizing this, she struggled to a stand and allowed her eyes to adjust to the dark as she peered around for Sven, only to turn and for the second time see her lifeless body on the ground. Her dress was soiled, her hair a wild mess. Her skin was paler than snow, blue bruises around her closed eyes, lips chapped.

Elsa felt her chest heave, head spin. She turned on her heel and the hems of her dress were wispy tendrils that followed her like spectral snakes.

A silent scream rose in her throat, clawing and tearing like a lion trapped at the bottom of a well, and she clutched at the sides of her head, pulling at her hair. She wasn't ready. One moment she was in that body, wielding that weapon as though the fate of her life was in her hands. As though she stood a chance in defeating Sven and avenging her parents. A chance at a normal life.

But suddenly, as though he had whipped that wooden dagger out of thin air, she was gone. Again, Elsa's fate had been ascertained by someone else with a weapon and whom hated and wanted her dead.

"It's not fair," she whispered with horror as she cried; no tears came. Her shoulders trembled, chest burned and ached, but her eyes never watered even in the slightest. All she felt was the agony, the lonesome hole in her chest where her heart had once been. A scream filled her head and throbbed, pushed, scratched there, but never escaped. Only silent dread.

She struggled up the stairs, the hems of her dress whispering in a gloomy draft. She slammed against the splintered oak door and fell straight through it to the other side, as though she had instead pushed on a waterfall. Stupefied, she quickly recovered and then rushed down the corridor as quickly as she could, her steps like the clamorous pounding on a door. Withered portraits trembled on the walls on either side. Icy wind whispered through the windows that watched her like blank yet attentive eyes.

But the house was empty.

There were no noises to tell her where Sven would be, where Charlotte and her followers had gone. Not even the skippering of a rat or skittering of a roach could be heard. Silence fell upon Elsa like the silent scream in her head.

She exploded out of the door in a shower of frost and dust to where she and Nicholas had buried Matilda, only to find nobody there except a fresh grave with a rose on top like a drop of blood. She rushed toward it and shouted: