Belladonna (Belladonna #1)(30)

“All animals can see me,” Death said, patting the hound on the head. She almost thought she could see a hint of a smile peeking out from his shadows, but when Signa blinked again, he was gone.

There was so much. So much she didn’t know. So much happening that she could barely process.

She had Death’s powers.

Lillian had been murdered.

And now, to save Blythe, it was up to Signa to discover who had done it.





FOURTEEN





BY THE TIME SYLAS FOUND HER, SIGNA WAS LEANING AGAINST Mitra, gripping the reins to hold herself upright. Sylas’s hair was mussed and peppered with twigs, like he’d taken a tumble into the bushes. Beneath him, Balwin seemed delighted and not at all out of breath.

“Miss Farrow!” Sylas exhaled a relieved breath. “You shouldn’t have taken off like that!”

“It’s not my fault you couldn’t keep up,” she managed. She wiped her mouth with her forearm and sucked in gulping breaths of the cool air, letting it flood her lungs and cool her skin. She hadn’t realized before that interacting with a spirit took so much of a toll on her, but as it was, she could barely lift her hands. No longer could she feel Mitra there beside her, holding her up. No longer could she feel anything.

“Signa?” Sylas’s voice was faint. “Are you ill?”

“Quite,” she managed to say. “I believe… I believe I must have eaten something foul.” She couldn’t stop shivering, couldn’t stop the press of cold deep within her bones. Couldn’t think of anything other than how they needed to hurry because Blythe’s killer was on the loose somewhere within Thorn Grove.

Signa groaned as Sylas hauled her atop Balwin. She had half a mind to protest as his arms wound around her waist to secure her in front of him on the saddle, though as it was she could hardly see straight. She tried not to flinch from his touch. Tried to accept the help and let herself remember that she couldn’t hurt anyone now that the belladonna had faded from her blood.

“If you’re going to lose your stomach,” he warned her, “make sure it’s not on my boots.”

She made no promises. It felt like someone had taken a cricket bat and bludgeoned her in the temple. Her stomach threatened to empty itself at any moment, and though Sylas had shed his cloak and settled it over her, she couldn’t stop shivering.

“What happened to you?” As kind as his actions were, Sylas’s voice had a hard edge. “Do you get ill like this often, or only when you disappear to frolic in the woods?”

“I would hardly call this a frolic,” Signa countered, curling her fingers in the offered cloak. “And no, it doesn’t happen often. I think I saw something in the forest.” She decided to slip a piece of truth into her next statement, just enough to sound a little bewildered. “It felt as though something in the woods was calling to me.”

With his chest against her back, she could feel his body become taut against hers. Her cheeks warmed, and she tried not to think about the inappropriateness of this situation or how strong his thighs felt around her, and instead on how he didn’t appear to be breathing. “Is something wrong?”

“It’s nothing you should worry yourself—”

“I can judge that for myself,” she cut him off, feeling brave with Sylas in a way she didn’t often get to be. “Whatever it is, tell me.”

There was a moment when the only sound was the crunch of leaves beneath the horses’ hooves. Signa twisted to look at him, and when his smoky eyes met hers in the dim moonlight, her mouth went dry.

Everything about this man had grated her nerves when they’d first met. Now, however, things were frustratingly the opposite. Her attention fell to the tunic that was rolled up on his arms, to his broad shoulders, down the deep neckline that revealed a glimpse of his chest.… And then she averted her eyes like the proper young lady she was and pretended he didn’t make her skin hot while simultaneously making her want to pummel him.

Sylas, fortunately, didn’t appear to notice her struggle. “There are rumors about Thorn Grove.” His whisper was as unnerving as the dark forest surrounding them. “Rumors I wanted to tell you the day I picked you up but didn’t know how. Had you anywhere else to go, I might have.” They had to duck beneath branches that clawed at them, and when one threatened to tear at the sleeve of her borrowed cloak, he paused to help her untangle it with deft fingers. The moment she was freed, she swayed forward in the saddle and cleared her throat.

“You were saying?” She could only pray that her skin was not flushed pink.

He frowned a little but continued nevertheless. “I was saying that, at night, the servants claim they can hear a woman crying. Some refuse to wander the halls after dark, for there are whispers of a ghost. A blond woman in a white dress, watching them one moment and gone the next. And Master Hawthorne… He’s the worst off. I think he hears her, too. I think that’s why he doesn’t sleep, doesn’t eat, doesn’t do much of anything anymore.”

“Other than throw soirees,” Signa added. The most lavish and risqué ones she’d ever heard of.

“To drown out the sound of her cries, I imagine,” Sylas defended. “To keep her at bay, and to forget. I’ve known the Hawthornes for a long while, and I assure you that he was not always like this.”