I open the creaky gate and walk through, my gaze moving toward the grave of Nellie Bishop. I see the discarded whiskey bottle still in the ground, dug into the muddy earth from the rains over the last few weeks. I think it’s the one Jericho had left here the night I accused him of being a terrible father to Angelique. The night he lost his mind when he saw how I’d cleared and decorated Nellie’s grave.
I walk toward the grave. It’s overgrown again. I should tend to it. I will tomorrow. Tonight, I have other work to do.
I take a few steps before noticing the cigarette butts on the ground. Three of them. I squat down to get a closer look. They haven’t been here long or they’d have deteriorated further with the rain. I wonder who smokes. A groundskeeper maybe.
Wiping off my hands, I stand and go to the chapel. I climb the stairs, pulling the heavy door open, remembering the last time I was here. Well, not here but in the room behind the chapel. Where the pillory is.
Butterflies flutter their wings at the memory, and I shake my head. The sensation, the desire at odds with what I should be feeling. I wonder if it’s the pregnancy hormones skewing things. Making me think I feel things for my husband that I don’t. That I shouldn’t.
Jericho St. James is a walking contradiction. And he confuses me. His possessiveness. His protectiveness. The way the predator lurks just beneath the protector.
My mind wanders to what Julia said again. How Jericho didn’t answer my question. But maybe I didn’t ask the right one.
I walk into the chapel where only the tabernacle lamp is lit. Like last time, I pick up the faint scent of incense. It’s a comfort and a concern. I wonder who they are and when they are coming here to burn it.
Using the flashlight, I walk along the center aisle making a point of looking down at the grave markers. I read Draca’s name. The dates of his birth. His death. I don’t linger on Mary’s. Nineteen is too young to die. To kill yourself.
My mind wanders to Nellie Bishop. Did she truly kill herself? Throw herself into that well? Or did Draca murder her?
You should read their history. Your future is written in it.
I shudder at the thought although consciously I can’t make sense of why. What does Julia know? I have no doubt she has some knowledge of the ugly history between the families. How much can she know? What does IVI know? That’s got to be where she’d get her information from. Or from Carlton or the Bishop library. I don’t see how there could be much on the St. James’s there. Unless they stole something at some point in the last centuries. Which isn’t that outrageous an idea. They have hated each other for hundreds of years.
When I step up to the altar, I set the flashlight down and light all the candles. There are about half a dozen. Draca’s book sits unmoved from the last time. Set on the altar like some sort of bible. Like the word of Draca St. James is what is worshipped here.
Draca. It means dragon. It’s where the dragons come from, I guess. The tattoo on my back tingles and I shudder. The idea of Jericho’s mark on me gives me some comfort, some protection against this horrible man who hates me even from beyond the grave. For no other reason than the blood that runs in my veins.
I lift the heavy tome off the stand and set it down in front of me. I can’t help but glance back at the door like some sort of thief as I open the front cover. Guilt.
My first thought is, it’s beautiful. It belongs in a museum. I probably shouldn’t handle it without gloves but it’s here, others seem to be handling it, and I need information. I need to know if Julia is right.
No. I need to prove her wrong.
Wrong about my future.
Wrong about Jericho.
Because I know one thing about myself. I’m very clear on it, in fact. I don’t want him to be my devil. I want him to be my angel.
So I begin to read Draca’s history. I read about how the St. James family is connected to IVI. How lowly their beginnings were. I read about the work Draca did within The Society. See how he built a fortune for himself. For his eventual family. I see how hard his life was.
The script is difficult to decipher in some places. It’s faded in spots and the handwriting old-fashioned. But when I see the first reference to a Bishop within a few pages, I go back several paragraphs to make sure I haven’t missed anything.
Draca St. James and Reginald Bishop hated each other from the beginning. From when Draca worked for the Bishop family. As he grew wealthier and became more valuable to The Society, Reginald resented him. At least that’s how Draca wrote it.
I read how he purchased Bishop land. This part Jericho left out of his story. He’d tricked Reginald Bishop. Well, not quite tricked. It had all been done legally. He just made sure Bishop was backed into a corner when he presented the offer. Because Reginald had run into trouble with The Society. According to Draca, he was a gambler, a drunk and worse.
He goes on at length and I skip several pages of Draca spewing hate. It’s strangely visceral to read the words and I shudder, glancing back at the stone covering his grave more than once as if expecting him to rise up from beneath it, hate bringing him back to life.
I pick up the book and carry it to one of the pews. I sit down, setting it on my lap and turn the next few pages until I see Mary’s name. Her story is as Jericho told it. Draca fell in love with her at first sight and married her within weeks. The wall hadn’t been erected to divide the properties yet, but I wonder if what happened to her is what caused it to be built.
Mary’s story is a sad one. I read every word of it. Even the moment he found his beloved wife hanging from the wooden support in the cellar of the house he’d been building for her. It was their bedroom according to this account. I find myself feeling for Draca St. James. I feel his pain. His loss. I feel his heartbreak. And in some way, I understand the root of his hate, though I still can’t reconcile it with hate for all Bishops.
I glance to his grave again and shudder. I turn the page. This one is worn so badly I can’t make out many words, so I keep turning until I see Nellie’s name written in an angry oversized scrawl at the top of a sheet. This is different than the story-telling of the earlier pages. Here, Draca didn’t bother to weave any romantic tale. Nellie wasn’t a person. She was a thing. A pawn.
Like me.
I know this thought…these words are true. I am Jericho’s pawn. The devil’s pawn. The devil’s bride. The question is will I survive his game? His vengeance? Can I become his redemption?
Draca used bullet points in the pages devoted to Nellie Bishop. And I feel a little sick to read them.
The first entry is the night he took her. His initiating of the Rite. The Councilor, a man names David Bonaventure, signed off to give Nellie Bishop to Draca St. James.
The second bullet point describes Nellie. Describes how he stripped her bare and examined her. How he had her work as the lowest of the low of staff, keeping her naked as she scrubbed floors and cleaned bedpans. How he would wake her to send her to fetch water in the middle of the night. How he abused her until he exhausted her to the point she was skin and bones.
I think about the night Jericho took me. How he stripped me. There is a similarity, but where Draca was ruthless, Jericho gave me the shirt off his back, his warmth still clinging to it.
He talks about how he used her sexually. How he made sure never to deposit his seed where it might take root.