Page 14 of Hellfire to Come
It hadn’t rotted. It hadn’t collapsed.
It waited, just like they did.
It was massive, three stories of cracked stone and ivy-choked windows. Most of the roof had collapsed inward, and sections of the façade looked scorched, like someone had tried to burn the place out of existence and failed. The gates had long since rusted off their hinges. Nature had tried to reclaim it, but the mansion refused to rot. It sat like a corpse that hadn’t learned it was dead.
“Looks abandoned,” Echo muttered, leaning between the front seats squinting through the fog.
“It’s not,” I replied without hesitation. I could feel the monsters in wait behind those walls.
She didn’t argue.
Dominic cut the engine and eased the car behind a line of trees, parking under the cover of overgrowth. We got out slowly, every movement deliberate, ears straining. The silence wasn’t natural. It was held. Like the land itself was holding its breath.
“No wards on the perimeter,” Chester noted, running a hand along the air near the trees. “Not the usual kind, anyway.”
“They don’t need them,” I said. “They want us to think there’s nothing there. They are hoping no one would be stupid enough to look twice.”
I stepped forward, gaze locked on the windows.
“I don’t like this,” Dominic muttered, his animal prowling restlessly behind his green gaze. “We are too exposed. They didn’t pick this place for nothing. It’s strategic.”
“Which means it’s a trap,” Echo finished for him, inching closer to Chester, the two demons testing the area for witch magic and wards.
“Of course, it’s a trap.” I crouched and swept a line through the dirt with my fingers, eyes narrowing. There were fresh tire marks leading around the parameter instead of straight to the front steps. Barely visible, but there. “They’ve been using the back road.”
Chester tilted his head. “Think she’s in there?” Red circles of demon magic spiraled around each of his arms.
“I know she is.” The words came out ice cold. “She’s in there; I can bet my life on it. And they know we’re coming.” Rolling my shoulders didn’t help remove the crawling feeling under my skin.
“We could wait till dark,” Dominic suggested, squinting at the darkening sky which still had shades of light gray and blue in it. “Send the wolf around the perimeter. Check for Guardians. Get the layout. I’ll shift and go with him.”
I nodded. “Do it.”
The wolf bolted off into the brush without hesitation, paws silent on the damp earth the second a black panther stretched his powerful body in the spot where Dominic stood not a second ago. I watched them go, jaw tight.
Echo stepped up beside me, scanning the structure. “We need at least two entry points. One silent. One violent. Some of us can keep them busy while someone takes Alice out.”
“I’ll take violent,” Chester chimed in from behind her, cracking his knuckles.
“Of course, you will,” I muttered, a smile tugging at my lips despite the rage and fear twisting in my chest. Chester was too calm, too cheerful to be real. There was rage churning behind those sparkling-with-amusement eyes of his ticking like a bomb.
I took a long, slow breath, trying to ignore the way my pulse thudded in my ears. My eyes drifted back to the mansion.
Somewhere behind one of those blackened windows, Alice was waiting.
Maybe she didn’t even know we were here yet.
If she couldn’t feel the connection like I did, maybe she thought she had to do this alone.
She didn’t.
I turned to the others, voice low and sure. “We go in tonight. Silent as we can. Split at the south wing. Echo and Chester cause a distraction. Dominic and I go through the cellar. No one lives unless they have to. Except Frederic.”
Chester raised an eyebrow. “And if we have no other option but to kill him?”
“You’ll have plenty of options,” I said, voice flat as a blade.
Killing Frederic would be a mercy.
