FORTY-ONE
DAYS AT THORN GROVE WERE NO LONGER STRUCTURED AFFAIRS. Gone were the lessons and any remnants of etiquette, replaced by a somberness that fell upon the house like a mourning veil. For its part, Thorn Grove as a whole was eager to return to some semblance of normalcy. It was obvious in the way the servants kept their heads ducked low, and how no one dared speak of what had happened during the ball, or of Marjorie’s sudden disappearance three nights prior.
Without a governess to oversee her teachings and with all the Hawthornes in a state, Signa was left with little supervision and an abundance of time. Mostly she found herself sleuthing through Thorn Grove and poring over the remaining staff logs with Sylas by candlelight, investigating the estate’s inhabitants as she tried to find a way forward. Tried to find some sort of clue to show her where to look next.
Elijah had taken to drinking again. He spent his days with his sick children and his evenings pacing the halls, searching for a wife he’d never find.
Blythe was recovering alone in her bedroom, still so sick that she refused all company but her father’s. And while Signa wished more than anything to pay her a visit, she knew that if Blythe still had the mind not to want visitors, then she was at least faring well enough to be coherent and self-conscious.
Percy was finally walking without assistance, but he remained shaken from his mother’s appearance. While his skin had warmed with color and light had once again found its way into his eyes, he ate and drank so little that his skin clung to his bones, his face skeletal in its gauntness. He spent his days like his father spent his nights, pacing the halls and muttering to himself, so lost in his own thoughts that Signa only watched and dared not speak. She supposed his behavior was normal enough. Percy believed himself visited by his mother’s ghost. Just how was someone expected to deal with that?
What Signa didn’t expect was that Percy had taken to disappearing for long hours in the evening when he thought no one was watching. From her open balcony, she would hear him leave, and watch as he journeyed to the stables, then to the woods on horseback minutes later. He returned late in the evening and with enough dirt on his hands that Sylas had sent a note the evening prior, detailing Percy’s appearance.
“You should take a break,” Sylas told Signa when she joined him in the stables after Percy had disappeared one evening; she was determined to discover exactly where her cousin ventured. She was haggard, her hair sticking up at odd angles and her eyes weighed down by deep purple shadows. “You’ve done so much for the Hawthornes already. Look at what this is doing to you.”
Signa leaned against a wall, pinching the bridge of her nose as she waited for him to ready the horses. “I don’t care what it’s doing.” She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from spitting the words, not angry with him so much as she was frustrated by the entire situation.
There was more to this puzzle that she wasn’t seeing, and there could be no relaxing until she knew the truth of it all. The Hawthornes were the closest thing to a real family she’d ever had. If it meant a thousand more sleepless nights until she was able to ensure their safety, then so be it. “Would you please just ready the horses?”
“What do you think you’re going to find tonight that you won’t be able to find tomorrow?” Sylas insisted, sterner this time. “You need to take care of yourself—”
She pushed him aside and headed to the tack room to get the saddle herself. Her body buckled from the weight of it, and though Sylas was right there—arms folded as he glowered at her—he didn’t lift so much as a finger to help. When her mouth tightened and her eyes narrowed, he merely shrugged. “Figure it out yourself if you’re doing so well.”
She had half a mind to drop the saddle on his foot. Such a brute was he that it would serve him right, though Signa couldn’t deny that he was a brute who was nice to look at, even through the haze of her headache. Even with all she felt for Death, there were moments with Sylas—with his broad grin and annoying muscles and disheveled hair—when slivers of doubt crept in. A tiny, niggling curiosity about what could have been with Sylas, instead.
Not that it meant anything, of course. He had told her already that there was someone in his life that he cared for deeply, and now it was the same for her. She only wished she knew who, exactly, it was who had captured his heart. For now though, it was a trivial curiosity. There were far more pressing matters that demanded her attention.
“Are you going with me or not?” she asked at last, shoving aside those thoughts as she let herself into Mitra’s stall and hauled the saddle up and onto her back. The horse nudged her nose into Signa’s hand.
Only then did Sylas sigh with the realization that this wasn’t a fight he’d win. “Of course I am. Step aside.” He took a bridle and finished readying Mitra, everything about him exasperated. She tried not to let herself smile.
They left soon after, Gundry on their heels. Sylas led the charge through snow-covered moors, toward the woods that stretched ahead with branches waiting to snare them.
“It’s likely he’s gone to the garden,” Signa said as she peered down at hoof tracks in the snow that made a straight line toward the trees. “Has he ever said anything to you while waiting for a horse?”
“Your cousin isn’t one to speak with the help,” Sylas mused. “Too gentlemanly, that one.”
Signa followed the tracks through the clawing trees into the belly of the woods, where they converged with something that gave her pause—a new pair of boot tracks in the snow, too small to belong to Percy.
Sylas slid off his mount and stooped to inspect them. “Whoever these belong to may still be here.” His voice was barely a whisper. “The print is clearly defined, which means it’s fresh.”
Signa scanned Percy’s tracks again. He wasn’t in his right mind since being targeted with the poison, and for his own safety, these new tracks couldn’t be ignored. “Follow Percy,” she said. “See if you can find out what he’s up to, and make sure he doesn’t try anything reckless. I’ll follow these footprints. Perhaps they’ll lead to Marjorie.”
It was clear in the tension of his shoulders just how displeased Sylas was with this decision. Dragging a hand down his jaw, he sighed and pulled himself back onto his mount. “We meet back at the stables in an hour,” he said firmly. “If you’re not there, I’m coming to find you.”
“One hour,” she promised, giving him a hard look as she gripped the reins. “I’ll see you then.” And with a gentle kick to Mitra’s side Signa left him, following the tracks as they led her along a path she’d yet to explore.
Deeper and deeper into the forest she went, until the footprints disappeared beneath dirt and bramble and all that coated the forest floor. The woods were denser here. An area less traveled, where vegetation would be flourishing if not for the snow. Signa eased herself from Mitra, crunching twigs beneath her boots as she held the reins tight.
There was something peaceful about winter; a stillness that Signa often felt herself falling into. But this deep into the woods, with her head still pulsing, it was unnerving. Goose bumps rose along her skin as she pressed against the warmth of Mitra’s side, uncertain how much farther they could safely venture. She was bending to see if she could push some of the bramble aside to clear a path when a voice called from behind her, soft and familiar, “Careful. The bark is poisonous.”