Page 108 of Tales of a Monstrous Heart
My heart dropped within my chest, sinking into a horrid coldness of my own grief. All the sound seemed to fade away and all I could see was that board. The small stone pieces carved with a different creature.
Lo Karun.The Game of Beasts.
A fey game from the wilder lands. One my father taught me; one I hadn’t seen since. Not beyond the memories of my childhood. I could feel the rough callouses of my fathers hands as he curled my fingers around the dice. Hear the deep echo of his laugh. My mother’s soft hands would be on my shoulders, the tickle of her breath at my ear as she showed me the best way to beat him.
No cheating, Eria.He’d warn her with a laugh. How it would fill the whole room.
Eria–my lovein Kysillian. How much tenderness he could press into the word.
Memories buried too long. Ones I’d almost forgotten that seared my chest with the pain of them. As if Lord Fairfax had fished down deep into my soul and found something I missed the most.
‘I haven’t seen one of these in a very long time,’ I barely whispered. Unable to swallow down that horrid weakness in my voice.
‘Do you play?’ Fairfax asked, that kind smile still in place.
‘Not since I was a child.’ I shook my head, blinking hard to stop the fall of tears. How something so small could unman me so easily.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you, Miss Woodrow.’ He reached out for my arm cautiously.
‘You haven’t.’ I ran my hands over my skirts in an attempt to stifle my grief. ‘I’m just tired from the day.’
‘Perhaps I could interest you in a quiet game?’ His voice was so soft and alluring. Speaking to that weaker part inside of me that needed it. ‘In the library if the noise is too much?’
I wanted to say yes, for a moment to go back. To hear that laughter again, but out of the corner of my eye, for a moment, there was something wrong with his face. His smile too sharp, eyes too intent and the skin beneath them rimmed grey. I blinked and it was gone. Just a kind old man waiting for company.
That wishing stone against my skin fluttered quickly before falling silent once more.
I’d definitely drunk too much.
‘I would …’ A strange sensation washed over my skin, the same moment that wishing stone against my breastbone began to flutter again. Insistently. Pinpricks of icy pain wererunning down my arms, turning me to see the entrance to the hall, but there was no threat there. Just a gathering of people conversing drunkenly.
My eyes moved around the room, finding … Lord Percy surveying me with suspicion from the corner of the room, Thean surrounded by flushed ladies as Emrys watched me cautiously from the shadows, seeming to ignore every word from Lady Lovell, who chatted endlessly next to him.
Please, whispered through my mind, telling me it wasn’t a mistake. The wishing stone almost vibrating against my skin, forcing my hand to rest on my chest, feeling it beneath my dress. Turning me back towards the main doors just as something rushed passed them. I could have mistaken it for a trick of the eye, but I knew it wasn’t.
Something inside of me grew unsettled by that darkness beyond the ballroom, as if something was watching from that hallway.
‘Miss Woodrow?’ Lord Fairfax asked gently, almost making me jump as I turned to see his concerned expression.
‘I’m afraid all the entertainment has taken it out of me tonight.’ I tried my best to smile, to shake off the feeling, but I couldn’t.
Please, it whispered against my ear, as soft as breath, turning me in the direction of the doors of the main ballroom again. There sat a small tabby cat with familiar green eyes and one ginger leg.
Alma.
She turned and ran off into the darkness, fear constricting my chest. She shouldn’t be here.
‘Excuse me,’ I mumbled, working my way quickly across the room, trying not to run as I pressed passed the other guests. I ignored their sneers as I slipped into the dark hallway, thelamps struggling under the damp darkness. I pressed my hand to the cracked wood panelling, letting my fingers drag across it as I heard the cry of a cat, pulling me further into the dark.
‘Alma?’ I hissed, checking under the side tables. Finding nothing but cobwebs as I moved further down the hall. I hitched up my skirts and raced further down the hall after the sound, not caring if any servants saw. Past rooms illuminated with nothing but moonlight, doors creaking in a breeze as the sheet-covered furniture made odd, foreboding shapes.
Deeper and deeper down mould-speckled corridors I hurried, until nothing but a covered mirror stood before me at a dead end. All the peeling doors closed. Nowhere she could have gone.
The sheet hanging over the mirror rippled, something moving beneath. I lurched forward, pulling it free. Dust swirled in the disturbance, only to see a reflection of myself and the endless darkness behind me. Rust consumed the outer filigreed edge. The roses looked like skulls before I leant closer. That ache in my temples deepening making me wonder if I’d imagined the movement as I studied my own confused expression.
‘Behave,’ I whispered, frustrated with my own foolishness as I looked at the ground and surrounding walls for a crack or hole a cat version of Alma could have gone through, only for the small tabby shape to dart behind me in the reflection.
The echo of her cry came once more. I turned, hearing the distant clatter of movement, something drifting across piano keys that were out of tune from a distant room.
