RoseBlood(49)

Erik took a seat at the edge of Thorn’s four-poster bed and slumped, elbows on knees. His eyes looked dull behind the mask . . . drained. He’d spent too much energy in the lab. Thorn knew it couldn’t go on much longer. Erik was practically committing suicide, spending all of the extra life he’d obtained through bloodshed and butchery. Thorn had been the one to convince him to stop his murderous ways, years ago, although he had blood on his hands, too. Now he’d thrown a wrench into everything, and would have only himself to blame should the killing start again.

He strode to his fish tank and settled on the far side so he could face his father with the glass and water between them. He sprinkled flakes of food atop the surface. The bluish glow tinged Erik’s gaunt, bony outline, and the ripples in the water created waves in his image, causing him to resemble the ghost all the rumors made him out to be.

“Busy caring for your pets and animal patients as usual.” Erik batted Ange’s bill playfully. “But have you eaten today?” He’d always been diligent about seeing to Thorn’s physical needs: clothing, food, shelter. It was as if he was trying to make up for all Thorn lacked as a child before he found him . . . or possibly, all he’d lacked himself.

“Before I showered,” Thorn answered, battling even more guilt for his father’s kind concern. “I had some dried beef. Some figs and cheese. And wine.”

“So, your body is fed. Then why this discontent I sense? It’s been some time since you’ve written new music, but from what I remember, your compositions were never so insatiate or bleak.”

“I came face-to-face with her in the chapel.” Thorn leaned against the cool glass, his arms propped in place at the top. His fingertip tapped the temperate water, bringing the fish to tickle his skin with eager, puffy-lipped kisses.

Erik stiffened, sitting straighter, his golden eyes fixed on Thorn.

“I was wearing a half-mask. She thinks I’m you. The phantom from the stories.” Ange tottered over and pecked Thorn’s toes with her bill, as if prompting him to confess everything. He frowned and nudged her away with his foot.

Erik’s flawless chin twitched—a tick that always made Thorn uneasy, as it indicated a shift in mood. “You were wise to wear a mask. Surely she’s wise enough not to tell anyone. Our spy within the academy has informed me that the staff now thinks she hid her own uniforms. No one would believe her, were she to claim she saw a fictional character from a book. But you sparked her curiosity, yes? Offered the clues that would bring her to me for answers.”

Thorn silently relived what he’d shared with Rune. How he’d allowed her to look upon the reflection of his identity. She knew she was like him. Now all she needed was to discover what he was.

“I led her to the grave and the roses,” Thorn answered, wary of how much he disclosed. “She saw the message. The storm chased her into the chapel, where I’d planted the wristband and the tubing of blood.”

Erik nodded, calling Ange over with a flick of his fingers so Thorn could finish feeding his fish without distraction. “All of that was in keeping with the plan. So, you improvised, as any good performer. I am curious how the sighting happened. You’re not usually that careless.”

“Ange filled the baptismal with water. Rune fell in and panicked. She was going to drown.”

Watching her sink, like a deadweight, had shaken him to the core. It was too similar to their nightly interactions. He’d always wondered what horrible event had spawned such torments in her dreams. Earlier, when he shared his memories with her—a connection only possible with two pieces of one soul—he’d taken some of her own. After all this time, he’d finally seen the old woman who had tried to drown her. He was shocked to have recognized her. She was the same one who Erik had visited in a Versailles prison three years ago, and several times since. Thorn always accompanied him, but stood back in the shadows, and could only hear what Erik said as they spoke through telephones with a glass partition between them. Now he was even more curious. The old woman had been instrumental in bringing Rune to them. What was her angle . . . why did she wish to harm Rune, her own granddaughter?

“Then you were right to step in and save her.” Father Erik’s observation dragged Thorn back to his bedroom and their dark conspiring, against his will. “A corpse would do us little good.”

Thorn almost groaned at the irony of the words, considering what was in their cellar.

“How did seeing you affect her?” There was an undertone of almost desperate interest in Erik’s question. Although the urgency wasn’t for Rune, but for someone else, someone Erik had obsessed over and put above every other aspect of his life for more than a century. Every aspect including Thorn.

Thorn grimaced against the acid sting of that knowledge. “She was afraid.” Until I revealed myself as her maestro. After that . . . Thorn’s jaw twitched. “Once she realized I’d helped her, she trusted me.”

Erik huffed. “Trust. A weak and visionary concept, for the lonely and the lost. We’re going to fix her . . . make her better. For that, she’ll only need trust herself.” He reached into his shirt pocket and dragged out two crumpled pieces of paper. “She’s in the perfect frame of mind now. Isolated and miserable, trying to live in a world where she doesn’t fit. These unfinished notes were in the trash in the foyer. She left some boy in a coma back home and somehow feels responsible.”