Vampyre Bride ✔️

XVII⎮The Wall Of Cannibals

Emma passed the night fitfully, half wakeful and half sleeping, and if she had dreamt at all she could not be sure of what, for it had been too obscured; she only recalled a vague sense of terror and a heaviness atop her chest. Finally, she gave up the notion of sleep and rose from her bed even before the cockerel did.

When she had completed her toilette she studied the looking glass and took note of the dark smudges that lay beneath her eyes. They were an attestation of her dearth of slumber, and she gave a dissatisfied shake of her head as she pulled at the silver chain around her neck, the one attached to the small, glass vile that Anna had given her, lifting it from where it had lain warmly between her breasts.

She removed the stopper and liberally applied the hawthorn perfume at her pulse points. Evil spirits or no, there was something altogether unsavory about Winterly Castle and its inmates; and she would employ whatever apotropaic was necessary to preclude any nefarious assaults on her person.

That done, she left her room, tiptoeing quietly to Milli's and, once there, she applied the 'perfume' to her sister's wrists and throat as the purr of Milli's gentle snoring staved off the oppressive silence of the room. When she was satisfied that she had properly safeguarded her sister, she made her way down to the foyer with the intention of finding herself a book in the library.

"Will Miss be requiring breakfast now?" came the lifeless voice of Mrs. Skinner as she emerged from the shadows.

Emma's poor heart could not take much more of these constant frights. It seemed that every time she ventured from her room she was given a turn from some or other skulking body. Last night it had been Winterly that had affrighted her and this morning it was Mrs. Skinner's turn to startle her.

This old manor was more like a mausoleum or on old, haunted schloss than a home, and the whole atmosphere seemed so steeped in gloom that even the lamplight in the sconces were cheerless and desolate.

"No, thank you," she answered, "I shall wait for the rest of the household to rise before I break my fast." When she was thereat informed that his Lordship had already eaten, she could not forbear the surprise that lit her face. "Upon my word! but he eats very early." Or not at all.

The housekeeper merely gave a brief, haughty arch of one brow, as though the eyebrow itself had shrugged. "The master has always been in the habit of taking his meals at odd hours."

"Well then, be so kind as to point me in the direction of the library, if you would."

"It is just through there, Miss." The rangy creature pointed a long, white finger towards a door at the far end of the large gallery that lead towards the southern wing of the lower floor. "The last door on the right."

She thanked the housekeeper and requested that her chocolate be brought to her in that room, and then she promptly left Mrs. Skinner standing in the foyer. That, however, did not mean the woman's eyes were not wholly fused to Emma's back. In fact, she felt as though even the dust motes watched her, for there was a constant pressure of eyes affixed to her head no matter where in the castle she moved.

Whatever these people were, she was coming to believe that none of them were perfectly ... mortal. Was that even possible?! She did not know anymore. There was something odd about them all, even Winterly. Especially Winterly.

In her mind's eye she could still see the eerie glow of chatoyancy in his pupils — the vitreous glow of a predator's eyes as though something inside of him, something demoniacal, had glared out ravenously at her.

The memory of her last sight of him, just before he'd left her, had been branded across the back of her eyelids, and no matter how often she tried to shut it out the image remained despite her best efforts.