Cerise put the knife on the counter. “And then?”
Richard touched her elbow, steering her from the sink, and pointed to the cabinet. Stains marked the doors, dark patches on dark wood. A thick crust had formed on the cabinet doorknob. Several long silver hairs were stuck to it.
“Whatever it was knocked her down.” Richard spread the leaves off the floor, revealing a long dark smudge. “And dragged her off.”
They chased the trail of blood through the kitchen, down the hallway, and to the bedroom. Blood spattered the walls. Dried to nearly black, it spanned the boards to the right and left of the headboard as if someone had bathed in blood and then danced around.
“The bed,” Richard murmured.
He grasped one side of the torn mattress, she grasped the other. Cerise heaved. The mattress gave, rising off the floor. A large fuzzy blotch of mold marred the underside. It didn’t look good. Cerise leaned closer and rubbed at the mold with her sleeve. Dark brown. Blood. Nobody could bleed that much and survive.
There was no plague, no fever, no sickness. Her grandparents were murdered.
She looked at Richard. His face was controlled fury.
“The family lied to us,” she said.
“Yes, they did.”
THE kitchen buzzed with angry voices. Forty-six adults, stressed to the limit, trying to outscream each other. The insult to the family was monumental. Gustave kidnapped, Genevieve fused, the house of cherished grandparents robbed.
Cerise let them rage. They had to vent enough to be reasoned with. She wished she had William with her, but he had to stay outside the room. This was a Mar affair.
“They came onto our land,” Mikita’s voice boomed. “Our land! They took our people. We’re Mars. Nobody does that to us and lives. We fuck them up and we fuck them up good.”
“We hit them with everything we have,” Kaldar yelled out.
“Y’all are out of your minds.” One of the older women, Joanna, pushed from the wall. She was Aunt Pete’s cousin. “We have kids to think about. That’s the Hand we’re talking about here.”
Kaldar turned to her. “You have three daughters. How the hell am I going to marry them off? We don’t have money and we don’t have prospects. Right now, the only reason people want to marry into our family is because they know if something happens, we’ll back them up. What do you want me to do when your eldest comes to me crying, because she’s in love, but the man won’t have her and we can’t even pay for her wedding? Love fades, fear stays.”
“If he really loves her, the name won’t matter,” Joanna yelled. “Love’s what does it.”
“Really? Speaking from experience, are you? Where the hell is your Bobby, and why isn’t he taking care of his kids?”
“You leave my kids out of it!”
“We must fight,” Murid’s voice cut through the noise with raspy precision. “We have no choice.”
“Aunt Murid.” Cerise made an effort to say it just right, sweet but with an edge to it. “You’ve lied to us.”
Instantly the room was silent.
“You, and Aunt Pete, and my parents. You’ve lied to all of us. We went down to Sene this morning. My grandparents didn’t die of the plague.”
Aunt Pete glanced at Murid.
“We found the blood,” Richard said. “Too much blood. And claw marks on the walls.”
Murid raised her head. “There was no fever. Your grandfather lost his mind and murdered your grandmother in the bedroom.”
A wave of cold rolled over Cerise. It couldn’t be. “Why?”
“We don’t know,” Aunt Pete said. “He had become withdrawn over that spring and summer. He rarely visited the main house. Your mother thought he was depressed. When your father and she came down to visit your grandparents, they found your grandmother’s body. He’d ripped her apart like a straw doll. All of you loved him very much. We spared you the pain of knowing what he did.”
“There were two coffins at the burial.” Cerise leveled her gaze at Aunt Murid.
“Your father must’ve killed Vernard,” Murid said. “That’s the most logical explanation. I never saw the bodies, and Gustave would not talk about what happened in Sene, except to say that we could never have an open-casket burial. I don’t know if it was self-defense or revenge. I only know that he came back with two coffins, with their lids nailed shut.”
The memory of the wall with the claw marks rose before her. She just couldn’t shake it off. The claws. The monster in the woods. Her grandparents. Somehow it all had to fit.
Cerise searched the room for Erian. “Erian?”
“Yes?” He pushed to the front.
“Once this meeting is over, I want you to take two boys and dig up Grandfather’s grave.”
A collective gasp rushed through the room.
Cerise stared them down. Just try and stop me. “I want to know how he died.” She looked from face to face. “The secrets stop now. Tonight we go to fight the Hand, and I will have to kill my mother. I’d like to have everything out in the open beforehand.”
“I don’t think you should go,” Erian said, his face calm. “I don’t think any of us should go. The Hand is too strong. Attacking them is risky.”
She stared at him. “Erian, you’re the first to run into every fight!”
He nodded, his expression oddly rational. “All the more reason to listen to me now. The Sheeriles are dead. The feud is dead. Our enemy is gone and this war is over. You would put all of us in danger and for what? Your mother is gone, and we don’t even know if Gustave is alive.”
The betrayal stung. Of all people, she had expected it from Richard, not Erian. Richard was cautious, while Erian hadn’t met a fight he didn’t want to win. “What the hell is wrong with you? You have been my brother since you were ten. My parents raised you. Erian!”