Page 38 of Unbroken
What felt like an icy-cold needle plunged into his neck from behind.
He let out a shout of pain and tried to pull away. But hands grasped his arms, and there was a horrible sucking sensation on his neck, and…
Impressions flashed through his mind, glimpses from something outside of himself. Standing in this very room, lifting a slice of cake and stuffing it whole into his throat, even as he choked and fought to breathe.
A sleeping man, a woman bent over him. She wore a hooded cloak, but when she drew back, blood dripped onto his pillow from a hole in his neck.
Fury—the hooded woman’s. Breaking furniture, snarling, because it didn’t work, none of it had worked…
Sebastian staggered forward as the proboscis buried in the back of his neck was ripped free. He flung himself away from his attacker; for a moment, hands clung to him, before being torn away as well. His legs propelled him forward, and he tripped over a broken chair and went to the floor.
Ves grappled with the leech that had attacked him. Though its skin was gray with death, Sebastian recognized the woman in the portrait in its distorted features. It clawed at Ves, raking nails across his face as he gripped its proboscis, holding it away from him.
Sebastian reached for his abilities—he could break its arms—but a wave of dizziness swamped him. Fortunately, Ves didn’t need the help.
Keeping a tight grip on the thrashing tube, Ves forced two tentacles into the leech’s open mouth. He pulled its jaws wider and wider apart, until the lower one came off with a crack?—
The feeding tube came up by the root, dragging viscera with it. Ves hurled it away, and the leech collapsed into a motionless heap.
“Sebastian!” He rushed over.
“I’m fine,” Sebastian said, as Ves lifted him to his feet. “I lost some blood. And…saw things. While the leech was attached.”
“Later.” Irene yanked down Sebastian’s collar, even though she looked rather green herself. “You’re still bleeding. Here, hold this and apply pressure.”
She pressed a handkerchief to the wound. Sebastian did as she ordered, hoping the creature hadn’t injected him with anything foul, like an overgrown mosquito with malaria.
“I saw Mrs. Norris’s memories. Someone else was here,” Sebastian said. “A woman—I didn’t get a good look at her.”
“Damn it.” Ves rushed to the bedroom door, tore it off its hinges, and tossed it aside. “The window’s open—whoever it was must have fled.”
“We’re on the second story.” Mortimer followed him into the bedroom. “Those stupid flowers are underneath. I supposed they might have cushioned a fall.”
Sebastian joined them, handkerchief still firmly on his wound. The bedroom was in better shape than the sitting room, though the bedding had been piled into something like a nest atop the mattress. A forgotten spoon lay on the carpet, and a film of damp still clung to the tub in the adjacent bathroom, as if someone had used it only hours before.
The walls were covered in paintings.
Not framed pictures like the portrait in the sitting room, but painted, slashed, and gouged into the plaster, just as they’d seen in the abandoned house where the Book had been hidden. Mrs. Norris stuffed cake into a mouth painted as a gaping maw, and Rulkowski posed in a window. That painting had been slashed over, and a second done beside it: Rulkowski leaping from the cliff, while fireworks exploded all around. A twisted tree-like shape dominated one wall, with horrible toothed mouths showing between its drooping branches and long leaves.
A chill went through him. “This is like the building where the Book of Blood was hidden. Whoever was squatting there came here. Probably the woman I saw in my vision.”
Ves surveyed the paintings. “Was she already here, or did she relocate when she realized we’d disturbed her hiding place?”
“She must have snuck in here and done the painting of Mrs. Norris quickly, before she could be disturbed. Which suggests she was in a hurry to find somewhere to hole up.” Sebastian paused, trying to bring the glimpses he’d seen into better focus. “She killed Mr. Norris, too. By draining his blood.”
“Did she use the Book in a misguided attempt to turn herself into a vampire?” Mortimer wondered.
“I don’t know, but based on the empty plates returned to the maids, I assume she doesn’t subsist purely on blood.” Sebastian took a step closer to the tree drawing, then had to catch himself on the bed as a wave of dizziness swept over him.
Ves noticed. “You need to sit down—you’ve lost blood.” He put out an arm, and Sebastian gratefully leaned on it.
They returned to the hallway, where Irene had retreated to get away from the rotting corpse. “Stay here,” Ves said, and left Sebastian leaning against the wall while he went to the door at the far end. A few moments later, he returned. “Mr. Norris is dead in his bed, as Sebastian said.”
Mortimer cleared his throat. “We have a problem. The police won’t overlook something like this. They can’t—the Norrises are too rich, and the maid knows we were here. At one time, I might have been able to protect us, but…”
“Don’t concern yourself.” Irene waved a dismissive hand. “I’ll go to Hattie as soon as I return to the estate—she’ll arrange for everything to be put to rights, or at least as much as it can be. As for the maid, we’ll either hire her ourselves or find her employment away from Widdershins, with enough money in her pocket to keep her silent.”
“Why do I hear an ‘or else’ in there?” Mortimer asked.
