House of Salt and Sorrows(51)

As I passed the gallery, a rustle caught my attention.

Clearly, the Graces hadn’t made their way upstairs after all.

I entered the long room. Portraits of distant family members stared down at me from elaborate, heavy frames. No amount of passing years could erase the sharp scent of oil paints and varnishes burning my nose. Small statues, busts of previous dukes on marble plinths, dotted the room.

Coming around a particularly large bust, I stopped in my tracks. “Verity?”

She didn’t respond, and I glanced around the room, wondering if Mercy and Honor had planted her there to surprise me.

She sat in the middle of a moonbeam, tracing pictures across the floor with her fingertips.

“Verity?” I repeated, struck cold and suddenly convinced this wasn’t my little sister at all. When I finally reached her side, I feared a stranger would be in her place.

A stranger with black tears running down her face.

But it was Verity, all curls and round cheeks.

“Look at my drawing, Annaleigh!” she exclaimed.

I glanced at the floor. There was no paper, no pastels.

“I think you were sleepwalking, dear heart,” I murmured gently.

She shook her head, her eyes lucid and bright. “Come here.” She patted the floor in front of her.

I knelt down, certain Mercy and Honor were poised to rush out from a dark corner to startle me. When they didn’t, I gestured to the checkered tiles between us. “Tell me about your picture.”

“It’s Edgar,” she said, pointing to a blank square as my heart thudded to a stop.

“What?”

“See, here’s where he fell…” Her finger mimed a pool of blood.

I shook my head. “You didn’t see that.”

“…and here are his glasses….”

“You didn’t see any of that.”

Verity glanced up, surprised. “I didn’t need to. Eulalie told me.” She placed her warm hand over mine, misjudging the look of horror on my face. “Don’t be sad for Edgar, Annaleigh. He’s with Eulalie now. They’re together.”

“Eulalie told you this?” I echoed, my stomach twisting into painful knots. This was not normal. This was not a phase. Something was terribly, terribly wrong with my little sister.

She nodded, unconcerned, and a memory sparked within me. Something Fisher had said.

She was never one for a short story, was she?

“Verity…when Eulalie comes to visit, how do you talk to her? If there was something we wanted to ask her…could we?”

“Of course.”

“How do you find her? Do you have to wait for her to show up?”

“Do you want to talk with Eulalie?”

I paused. This was utter madness. I shouldn’t be encouraging it.

I nodded all the same.

Verity’s eyes flitted from mine, staring just past my shoulder. “You can ask her now if you like.”

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled. “What do you mean?”

“She’s right there. They both are.”

I followed her finger, spotting two dark silhouettes in the window before I snapped my neck back, facing Verity. It was a trick of the light, long shadows cast from the plinths around the room. That was not Eulalie.

And then I heard it.

It was a soft rustling, silk skirts raking across the marble tiles, accompanied by the click of a man’s dress shoes.

They were heading toward me.

The footsteps stopped behind me, and I suddenly felt them, felt their presence, like a fish trained to sense the movements of its school even before they were made. My chest constricted, pulled too tight to take in a proper breath. Verity smiled up at the visitors, but I couldn’t bring myself to turn and do the same. I didn’t want to see my sister. Not like that. I leaned forward, resolutely keeping my eyes on the floor.

“She wants to know why you won’t look at her,” Verity said, her voice soft and distant.

“Eulalie?” I whispered faintly, feeling as though I’d gone mad. I tried to imagine I was in the crypt, sitting before her statue. What would I say then? “I…I miss you so much.”

“She misses you too.”

“Can you tell me about that night, out on the cliff walk? Edgar said he was supposed to meet you—but someone else was there instead?”

From the corner of my vision, I saw Verity slowly nod, her own eyes unspeakably large.

“Who was it? Who murdered you?”

My skin tingled, sensing Eulalie step even closer to me. A foul odor flooded my nostrils, like the funk of a fish market at the end of a hot day, the meat turned and spoiled.

A pair of cold hands grabbed my shoulder, and I sank my teeth into my lower lip, jerked backward. Her fingernails had been painted a cheerful coral, but the ends were scratched ragged, and two nails were missing from the waterlogged flesh. My eyes squeezed shut as a keening whimper escaped me.

“You!” Eulalie screeched, then shoved me forward with such force, I struck my head on the marble tiles.

I blinked away stars, ready to grab Verity and run, but the room was empty.

“Verity!” I called out, then lowered my voice. “Eulalie?”

From the far end of the room came the rustle of skirts again, near the windows. She must have snatched Verity and spirited her behind the drapes. Eulalie had always loved playing hide-and-seek.