Long ago, Uriah had stolen this land from its rightful owners and formed his dark dominion in the hidden forests of these mountains. He had killed many of the forest animals, as well as Serafina’s panther father. But the arrival of Mr. Vanderbilt and the construction of Biltmore Estate freed the mountain folk and the forest animals from the conjurer’s spells and brought new light into the area. Uriah had been obsessed with destroying Biltmore ever since.
Filled with a hateful vengeance, he had created the Black Cloak, which allowed its wearer to steal the souls of its victims. And he had used the Twisted Staff to enslave the animals of the forest and attack Biltmore.
As Uriah was flying in owl form, she had raked him from the sky with her panther claws, sending the bloodied bird tumbling toward the ground. She and her allies had struck down Rowena that same night.
Serafina had hoped that she had destroyed both of them, but the truth was, she didn’t truly know. Waysa had told her, It is the way of his kind that even when he seems to be dead, he is not. His spirit lives on. He hides in a darkness the rest of us cannot see.
The morning after the battle, Biltmore’s groundskeepers had found a dead owl in the forest, and they had it mounted over this fireplace. She remembered that it had looked so lifelike, but now it seemed dead and worn, its feathers graying and tattered, the living spirit gone. It reminded her of the dried, white, desiccated shell of a rattlesnake after it had shed its skin and become anew.
She couldn’t help but wonder now if the robed sorcerer she’d seen by the river might have been Uriah in some new form.
Had Uriah been the one who attacked her on the Loggia the night of the full moon? Was he the sorcerer causing the storms in the forest?
Had he returned to destroy Biltmore once and for all? Or was it some new enemy that she’d never seen before?
Whatever the answer was, she had to stay watchful.
For the rest of the afternoon, she practiced moving particles of dust, shaping tendrils of steam, and causing candles to flicker as she studied the comings and goings of Biltmore. She followed people through their daily lives, watching them from the shadows, a shadow herself, looking for signs of suspicious behavior and clues to where something was amiss.
It wasn’t until later that evening that something caught her eye.
The formal dinner in the Banquet Hall started promptly at eight, with many of the guests and staff talking about the heavy rains, the muddy condition of the roads, and the water collecting in the fields where vast acres of crops were being lost to the flooding. Braeden was sitting near his aunt and uncle. Her friend seemed to be in somewhat better spirits than the night before, well enough to at least come to dinner, but there was still a dark and unsmiling gloominess to him.
A mustachioed gentleman at the table tried to speak with him. “It’s good to see you, Master Braeden. I was terribly sorry to hear that you’ve given up your riding. I know you have always enjoyed your time with your horses.”
It seemed as if the gentleman was trying to be kind, but Braeden’s face hardened at his words.
Serafina wondered if she could get Braeden’s attention by swirling the water in his water glass or something. There had to be some way to signal him, to let him know she was there with him. But as soon as she approached him, Braeden became even more upset, muttered that he was tired, and quickly excused himself from the table.
“Good night, Braeden,” Mrs. Vanderbilt said, concerned that he was leaving so soon.
“Sleep well,” Mr. Vanderbilt said to his nephew, but then touched Braeden’s arm, drew him closer in, and spoke to him in a soft and quiet tone. “Remember, the servants will be double-locking all the doors tonight and guards will be posted.”
Braeden clenched his jaw and walked away from his uncle without saying a word.
Serafina was taken aback by the rudeness of Braeden’s behavior. And she thought that if Mr. Vanderbilt had some inkling of the dangers surrounding Biltmore, then locking the doors and posting guards made perfect sense. But it almost seemed as if Mr. Vanderbilt was telling Braeden that the doors would be double-locked not to keep something out, but to make sure Braeden didn’t try to leave the house. And Braeden was none too happy about it.
She followed her friend as he trudged up the stairs to his room, dragging his metal-braced leg behind him. In months past, she had seen him heal a fox, a falcon, and other animals—it was part of his connection to them, part of his love for them—but he couldn’t heal humans, not even himself. And it was clear that something had gone terribly wrong with him. His dog, his horses…It was so sad that his grief had kept him from his only friends.
When Braeden arrived at his bedroom door, Gidean was waiting quietly for him outside his room.
“I don’t want you following me,” Braeden said harshly to Gidean. “Just stay away from me!”
The look on the dog’s face was so miserable that Serafina wished she could kneel down beside him and pet him like she used to. “I’m sure he doesn’t mean it,” she said to Gidean, even though the dog couldn’t hear her, and the truth was, she wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Maybe Braeden did mean it.
As Serafina followed Braeden into his bedroom, she was surprised by the state of it. The last time she’d seen his room, it had been warm and tidy, but now it was messy and disheveled, with days-old food trays piled on the dresser and dirty clothes all over the floor. The four-poster bed was unmade. The drapes were covered with dust. It looked like he hadn’t cleaned his room in months, and hadn’t let the servants in, either.
He exhaled a long, tired breath as he collapsed into the leather chair by the small, unlit fireplace. He rubbed his bad leg with his shaking hand. His other leg moved in constant restlessness. And he kept pulling his hand through his hair, then wiping the side of his face. He wasn’t just exhausted, but anxious and frustrated.
Serafina remembered visiting him here one night and curling up on the rug in front of the warm fire with Gidean as Braeden slept quietly in his bed. But now he just stared blankly into the dead ashes of the empty black hearth.
Suddenly, Braeden got up. His metal brace thumped the wooden floor as he paced, pressing his trembling fingers to his skull as if there were voices in his head.
More agitated than even before, he changed out of his black dinner jacket and trousers, and put on the rugged clothes he used for hiking. Then he got down onto his hands and knees and pulled a coil of rope out from under his bed.
“What in tarnation are you gonna do with that?” Serafina asked out loud.
As the rest of the house retired for the evening, Braeden opened one of his windows and hurled the rope out into the darkness. It had been raining hard all night, and now the wet spray of it blew into the room.
“Just what’s goin’ on in that head of yours, Braeden?” she asked him, feeling a terrible tightness in her chest.
She could see that his hands were trembling something awful as he struggled to tie the end of the rope to the bed. The shaking was so bad that he could barely manage it. Then he went over to the window.