Page 117 of White Raven
Sarah swallowed, and it felt like inhaling a cotton ball. No matter where her eyes tried to roam, they kept coming right back to the mounted menace that might as well have been a flashing neon sign. She slowly stood and made her way over to read it. It mentioned the horrible history that people had sometimes been buried prematurely, and coffins were oftenfitted with bells so that the accidentally buried could cry for help. It went on to say that Poe thought the idea “entirely too horrible for the purposes of legitimate fiction”, but featured the act in several of his works. Maybe he didn’t find it so horrible after all. Or maybe her deranged father literally took a page from Poe’s book and had buried Athan somewhere on the grounds. Adrenaline started to take her limbs.
“You fucking psycho…you fu—”
A rapping on the small window across the room got her attention, and Sarah darted her head towards it. Poe watched her, tapping his beak lightly along the glass, and seemingly calling to her. She apprehensively walked toward him, noticing the turn of his head at another large plaque on the wall. It told a lot about Poe’s early life. She skimmed over a few lines; certain she already knew most of it—until she caught a name that nearly stopped her heart.
John fucking Allan.
A businessman living in Richmond, who fostered Poe as a child, after his father had abandoned him, and his mother had died. John had raised him as his own and had taken him with the family back to Scotland for a while…which meant that her father was much older than she initially thought. But…something wasn’t adding up.
“Miss Sarah?” a familiar voice said from behind her. She turned to see a set of bright blue eyes, under a tuft of ginger hair topped with his signature floppy cap.
“Tony!” Sarah choked, rushing him and throwing her arms around his neck. “What are you doing here? Are Decclan and Devin with you?”
They pulled apart, and he smiled sadly. “If Decclan ever gets back on an airplane, it’ll be the biggest shock of my long life. It’s just me. I had to come see for myself.”
“See…what?”
“I think you’re figuring it out. I went back to Scotland after we returned home. Did some digging of my own. I tried Athan’s number several times, but when it wasn’t off, there was never any answer.”
Sarah pulled his phone from her pocket and scrolled through the calls, turning the screen towards him. “Is one of these yours?”
“That one,” he pointed. “Just a cheap phone I picked up before my trip. He wouldn’t have recognized that number. Why do you have the phone? Where is he? I think we should all talk.”
Sarah shifted on her feet and hung her head. “Tony…Athan was taken. By John Allan. I’ve been turning every stone to find him and hanging onto every fucking clue. I thought he’d be here, but I haven’t seen a single sign of him.”
He was quiet for a moment, his jaw clenching as he stared up at the plaque. “What made you think he’d behere?”
“This,” Sarah said, pulling up the text message. “It’s from a poem Poe wrote called‘To One in Paradise’. Parts of it are here, and I thought this was where he was trying to tell me to go. Now, I feel like the mouse taking the bait in his fucked up trap.”
“Do you remember the story I told you? About John? The night that Dahlia let him live?” Sarah nodded. “I went back and was able to get records of the school John said he attended. There was never a John Allan enrolled at Kailyard Grammar School.” His face turned grave…and his eyes sympathetic.
“So…who the hell was he then? What are you trying to tell me?”
Tony rubbed the back of his neck and glanced at the plaque. “It wasn’t the last time that lad used a fake name. He used another name to enlist in the military. Even said he was older than he was at the time. And this was never his house.”
It felt like a handful of spiders were crawling down her spine.
No…there was no fucking way. No. Absolutely not.
“But that’s—I don’t…” Sarah turned to look at the statue sitting back against the far wall. “You can’t actually believe…Tony you’re unloading some really heavy shit.Preposterousshit.”
“BURIED ALIVE!”
“John Allan would have been in Scotland at the time I met the lad. But it wouldn’t have been the boy I met that night at the pub. He would have been an adult man. A terrified little boy would be justified in giving a fake name if he’d been faced with certain death. I’m no detective, but I’ve tended a bar for…centuries. I’m a very good listener. I’m extremely observant. I’ve lived a long time, doll. I’m telling you…it’s him.”
“You’re observant.”
Her mind was spinning, and she honestly thought she’d puke. She pulled up the search bar on Athan’s phone and tried to find any portraits of Edgar Allan Poe as a child…when she turned it to him, Tony’s already fair skin blanched a sickening shade of gray. It said enough.
“That’s the boy,” he said, hoarsely. “That’s the boy from the pub. How did you get this?” He held the phone like it was the most defying thing he’d ever seen.
“You’re not very tech-savvy, are you?” she smirked, not willing herself to believe what was likely the truth.
“Your father just led you to a treasure trove of family history, Miss Sarah. Whether Athan is here or not…I think you were meant to be here. It’s obvious he wants you to know who he really is.”
“Not one part of me is gonna believe this, Tony. Poe died. He wasburied. He—”
“Poe had already been buried in one place, and even though there were witnesses, some say they were nevercompletely sure they moved the right body to his final resting place. A lot of weird shit happened with that.”
