The Devouring Gray(47)

“You know what?” he said. “You’ve earned it.”

Which was how, a few days later, Harper found herself sneaking out of her bedroom after an evening spent helping her mother watch Brett and Nora. Mitzi and Seth were at some party she hadn’t been invited to, so her mother had needed the help. Harper felt a pang of guilt for deceiving her as she made her way to the workshop, even though they weren’t close.

But when her father smiled and presented her with a sleek silver dagger, the hilt ornately carved from red-brown stone, Harper found her regrets fading.

Maurice Carlisle hadn’t let Seth or Mitzi in on this secret. He hadn’t even told her mother.

But he was telling her. That meant something.

Harper knew the woods fairly well, although she’d stopped using them after dark when news of the deaths began to filter through Four Paths every couple of months. Most of the town had done the same.

The Beast had almost killed her three years ago. She didn’t want it to come back for seconds.

But there was nothing amiss in the woods. The only noises Harper heard were the soft rustle of the leaves and the occasional chirping of sparrows in the trees. It was a perfect late-summer night in upstate New York, just cold enough for Harper’s favorite light jacket, with the sleeve tied off at the elbow.

But she kept her hand on the hilt of her new dagger, just in case.

They stopped behind the row of buildings on Main Street, a few feet away from the back lot behind the library.

“Here,” said Maurice, producing a rough burlap robe from somewhere within his coat. “Put this on.”

The cloth had the same color and rough consistency as a potato sack. Harper wrinkled her nose, but she pulled it over her head, wincing at the whiff of mildew. She took an extra minute to tie the left sleeve in a knot just after the end of her arm.

Harper didn’t mind that it drew others’ attention to her missing hand. If she could live with half a left arm, other people could certainly handle looking at it.

“Why the robes?” she asked, careful to keep her voice down. The sheriff’s office was only a turn off Main Street away.

Maurice Carlisle finished pulling his own hood over his forehead. When he turned to her, she could no longer see his face—the darkness and the robe had left it utterly in shadow. “They’re tradition,” he said simply. “In these humble clothes, we are all equal: founder or not. Now come. We must be absolutely silent for this next part.”

Harper had never heard of such a tradition, for any part of the town. But she trailed behind her father without protest as he walked across the empty lot, trying to make as little noise as possible.

If she questioned this, he could still make her go home. And she wanted so badly to know what was going on. To be on the inside, for once, after those years of lingering painfully outside of everything.

So she stayed silent when he drew a key out of his coat and deftly unlocked the library’s back door. And she stayed silent when he pulled her inside into total darkness—until something was shoved over her head, and two hands yanked her upper arms behind her back.

“Dad!” Her panic was muffled by the fabric over her head. Whoever had grabbed her hadn’t fumbled for a wrist that wasn’t there—they’d known it was her. Phantom pain coursed through her left arm, making her shudder. “What is this?”

“No need to fret, Miss Carlisle,” said a smooth voice she didn’t recognize. “No one here means you harm. We merely want to make sure of where your loyalties lie before we allow you to glimpse our secrets.”

“It’s standard procedure, Harper,” added her father’s voice. The sound of it soothed her wildly ratcheting heartbeat, although it didn’t entirely dispel her panic. She was led up what felt like a flight of stairs, then made to sit. They let her arms go free then, but she was too frightened to move. Harper could hear enough rustles and murmurs to know she was far from alone.

“Now, Miss Carlisle,” said the first voice. “We understand you’ve been tasked by your father with befriending Violet Saunders.”

Harper pushed down questions like who are you and how dare you. She trusted her father. She had to trust that this was all going to be fine. “Yes.”

“A task he says you’ve completed beyond our expectations.”

“Yes.”

“Would you like to share with us how you’ve managed to win over a girl you barely know?”

Harper wasn’t really sure how she’d managed to gain Violet’s attention. But she didn’t think that would go over so well right now. She scrambled for another answer, a real one. “We’re not that different, really,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady. “And I think she could tell that I was telling her the truth about wanting to help her. While the Hawthornes…” She hesitated.

It didn’t feel safe to insult them so publicly, when she had no idea who she was talking to. Her feelings weren’t popular ones.

“Do go on,” said the voice. “And know that no one here will protest if you share some less than pleasant thoughts about your fellow founders.”

“Right.” Harper bit her lip, suddenly glad no one could see her face. “Well. The Hawthornes had already made her feel uneasy. She seemed to understand they weren’t telling her everything.”