chapter Seven
"How was the bonding?" Jane asked as Bliss studied the papers on her lap and they drove deep into the night.
Bliss put down the newspaper clipping she was reading about the fire. She smiled a little, thinking of the happiness she had been part of so recently, which felt already as if it had happened many years before, as if the memory was already as worn as a sepia-tinged photograph. She thought of Schuyler's shining face and Jack's proud one. "It was wonderful," she said, blinking back tears, feeling a deep longing and an ache for something she knew she would never have. Love throughout eternity.
Jane reached over from the steering wheel and squeezed her arm in sympathy. "I know you're thinking about Dylan," she said. "But you were right to let him go."
Let him go ... an interesting choice of words. Bliss could never truly let Dylan Ward go. She thought of what he had done for her: kept her sane, given her the strength she needed to fight her father's spirit, to stand up to the Dark Prince. Her sacrifice had released her link to him - Dylan had moved on, gone to a better place - but she missed him with an ache that was a physical pain. She would never heal from it.
"One day, you will find a love as great as the one you two shared. You deserve happiness, my dear, and you will find it," said Jane.
Bliss sniffed, blinked back her tears. "I'm okay."
"I know you are." Jane smiled. "You are stronger than you know."
They drove the rest of the way in silence, and an hour later arrived at their destination. Jane pulled the rental car up to a police barricade around the remains of the burned-out house in the middle of the street. "I think this is it," Jane said. It was after midnight, and the streets were empty, the heavy cloak of darkness impenetrable. The only sound came from the crunching of their tires on the gravel. The night air was bracing cold.
They stepped out of the car. Bliss clicked on her flashlight and led the way. Once they'd reached what remained of the house, she swept the flashlight across what must have, at one time, been the living room. "What do you think?" she asked. True to the reports Jane had pulled up for her to read on the drive, only the front door was still standing. Otherwise, everything had burned to the ground, to ashes and dust, rubble and debris, covered by a light gray snow. "An accident? Arson? Or ... ?"
"Not sure yet," Jane said. "Let's take a closer look around, see if we find anything odd."
Jane had printed a story about the burned house from a blog that documented supernatural phenomena. Those who'd witnessed it burning said they had heard terrible screaming, eerie roars, and manic howling from inside the house as the fire raged. But it was an abandoned home - no one was supposed to be living there - and after the fire had consumed everything, the police had found no human remains, no proof that anyone had even been in the house when it burned.
The fire had been written off as an accident - the electric company had forgotten to turn off the power and a utility cable had sparked during a blackout. That was all.
Maybe the police were right. Maybe nothing had happened here. Maybe there was nothing to see, nothing here that would lead them to the hounds.
But Bliss kept staring at the door that was still standing, that hadn't burned. It was impossible that an entire house could burn down leaving just the one door. She could imagine it only if there had been some sort of spell, some kind of protection over the house that the fire had managed to extinguish, but only in part.
She shone her flashlight on the scarred face of the door, and up close she could see faint traces of writing on the burned wood. Runes of some kind, perhaps. Across the dark lot Jane sneezed from the dust. "Hamlet's ghost," she muttered, blowing her nose.
An accident, the official reports had concluded. Maybe the whole incident had been just a hoax. That was another possibility. There was no way to know for sure. No way to know, unless ...
Bliss kept her light fixed on the door, slowly sweeping it down to the ground. She pushed some splintered wood off to the side with the edge of her sneaker.
There. She saw something.
She moved closer and shone her light directly on it, her heart beating in excitement at the heady rush of discovery.
"Aunt Jane!" she called. "Here!"
In the middle of the burned wood, half-buried in the ashes, was a black pebble that shone as bright as a glittering diamond. Bliss knew what it was immediately. The Heart of Stone - it was a remnant of the Black Fire of Hell.
Bliss clicked off her flashlight with some satisfaction. They were right. The hounds had been here.