Nevan.
"Get out of her."
I growled, pinning Rosamund's wrists to the bed.
She lay beneath me, her body still warm, carrying the shape of the woman I had been kissing moments ago. But whatever was looking up at me right now was no longer Rosamund.
"Out of her?" Rosamund's mouth moved, but the voice that came out of her was not hers. It was a resonance, like two voices speaking the same words a fraction apart. "But I've only just arrived. And she let me in so easily, Nevan. You should be disappointed."
My grip tightened on her wrists. "I said get out."
It tilted her face against the pillow, studying me with an amusement that made my skin crawl.
"You really thought this one would be different, didn't you?" It laughed, the sound echoing off the stone walls of the room. "You and your witch and your desperate little prophecies. Born on the Hollow Night.Raised in obscurity. Unclaimed." The smile widened. "She's not your salvation, Duke. She's the weakest one yet."
"You're lying."
"Am I?" it snickered. "Catherine lasted eleven days before I reached her. Elowen, eight. Margaret held out for nearly three weeks, the stubborn thing." It paused, savouring the next words. "Your precious Rosamund? I was inside her before she finished her first glass of wine. One evening in this house, that's all it took, and she cracked open like a door left unlatched."
Fear twisted in my chest as snippets of flashes from when I found Catherine that night flitted into my mind.
"She's not like them," I said, though the words sounded hollow. "She's different, and you know it."
"They never are, at first," it shifted beneath me, arching lazily. "You always think the next one will be different. You bring them here, to this rotting house, and feed them to me one by one. But this one?" The smile turned tender, almost pitying. "This one you kissed. This one you gave your mother's brooch. You've never done that before, have you? Not since the first."
"You have no right to bring up her memories," I fumed, trying to control the angry tremors running through me. Anger would only make it worse.
"Oh, Nevan," it laughed. "That makes it worse because when I take her, and I will, you'll feel it more than all the others combined. You belong to me, Nevan Wilder. Save us both the stress and accept what you are."
Something in me snapped.
"Enough!" I growled, feeling the room vibrate and that familiar surge race up from my core, flooding my veins. My fingers crackled. The air around me thickened, humming with a pressure that made the window groan against its frame.
The moonlight pouring into the room flickered as though something had passed between us and the sky. For a single, terrifying second, I felt the mask shift against my skin, straining against what was pushing from underneath.
I clenched my fists and forced it back down until my breathing steadied and the room settled.
When I looked at Rosamund, the thing was watching the entire display with delight.
"You know, you could just let go and for once feel the sheer beauty of that monster in you," it said with a cocky grin.
"Enough of this nonsense!" I said through clenched teeth. "Leave her now!"
"Does she know?" It continued ignoring me. "Does she know what happens in the east wing when the moon is full? Does she know what you become? Or are you still playing the gentle, tragic Duke, hoping she'll love you before she sees the truth?"
I released Rosamund's wrists and pulled back from the bed, my chest heaving. The scent was everywhere now, thick and sweet and suffocating, coating the inside of my throat like hot oil.
The thing sat up slowly, using Rosamund's body with a fluid, boneless grace that no human possessed. It swung her legs off the bed and stood, naked, staring at me. Then it took a step toward me.
"Run along, little Duke," it said softly. "Go plan your wedding. Light your candles and whisper your chants." Rosamund's hand reached up and touched my cheek. The fingers were warm and gentle, stirring desires I'd paused. "I'll be right here, waiting. Like always."
"I will break this curse," I closed the space between us, towering over it easily. "This time around, I will do it."
"With her?" The thing glanced down at Rosamund's body, then back at me. Its expression shifting into sympathy. "Oh, Nevan. She won't last the month. Jennifer was right."
Then, as suddenly as a candle being snuffed, the presence vanished.
Rosamund's eyes rolled back, and her body went limp, folding in on itself like a puppet with its strings cut. I caught her before she hit the floor, my arms wrapping around her naked frame, her head falling against my shoulder.
The scent was gone, thankfully.
I carried her to the bed and laid her down carefully, pulling the sheets over her body and tucking them around her shoulders. Her face was pale but peaceful. I pressed my hand to her forehead, thankful there was no trace of the fever that had ravaged Catherine in the hours after her possession.
That should have been comforting. It wasn't; instead, I was filled with a strange dread.
I pulled on my shirt and went to find Clyde.
~~~
He was in the corridor before I reached the stairwell. The look on my face must have told him everything he needed to know, because he didn't ask a single question. He fell into step beside me and followed me to the study.
I locked the door, walked to my desk, then braced both hands against it and tried to breathe.
'It reached her," I said. "This is just her first night here, Clyde."
Clyde was silent for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice was careful. "How bad?"
"Full possession. It was speaking through her. That has never happened before. It was as if her body was its medium." I stared at my hands. The same hands that had been touching her minutes ago, lost in her warmth, her taste, blind and stupid with desire. "It used her body to get to me. And it nearly worked."
Clyde shifted his weight from one foot to another, then asked quietly. "What did it say?"
"That she's the weakest one yet. That it was inside her within hours." I swallowed. "It mentioned Catherine and Elowen. It knows their names, Clyde. It remembers all of them."
Clyde lowered himself into the chair across from the desk. He looked older than I'd ever seen him. The lines around his eyes had deepened, and his hands were clasped tightly together.
"Send her away."
I looked up. "What do you mean?"
"Send her away, Nevan." His voice was filled with fear, something I rarely heard from him. "At dawn, if possible. Put her in a carriage, send her back to her father, and end this before it goes any further. You've seen it six times now. Whatever the witch promised you, whatever prophecy you're clinging to, it's not worth another woman's life."
"I can't."
"You can. You don't want to."
"No." I straightened and faced him. "I mean, I cannot. If I sent her away now, the curse accelerates. You know this. The seer was clear: If the bond is broken before it's complete, the Ashenmoor consumes Wellspring within a year. The blight would reach the capital within two. This isn't just about me anymore, Clyde. It hasn't been for a long time."
"And if she dies here?"
The question hung in the air between us.
"She won't."
"Catherine almost did. Elowen—"
"I know what happened to them," I said sharply, cutting him off. "I know, and I carry the weight of it every day. But the entity reached Catherine and Elowen in days, but for Rosamund, it happened in hours. That's not weakness, Clyde. Think about it. Why would it move so quickly? Why would it risk revealing itself on the very first night unless it was afraid?"
Clyde frowned. "Afraid?"
"It's never done this before. It's never shown itself this openly or early. With the others, it crept in slowly." I leaned forward. "It didn't wait for Rosamund, because it panicked. And the only reason it would panic is if the seer was right. Rosamund might be the one who really ends this."
Clyde stared at me for a long time. I could see him turning it over, wanting to believe it.
"And if you're wrong? If something happens to her like the others. This would be the seventh time, Nevan. Already, your reputation is in tatters. This happens, and you'll go down. I don't want that for you. Please!"
"This time is different, Clyde, I promise."
"No!" he shook his head. "It will only get worse, and you know this too."
"No, it won't. I'll be careful."
"Listen to me, Nevan," he said, his voice dropping. "At the first sign of trouble, I'll personally see that Rosamund is taken back to her father. I will not let you destroy what little reputation you have."
We stared at each other, and then I nodded.
"Fine. Then let's make sure it doesn't come to that. Send word to Morwen. Tell her it's already begun."
Clyde's face paled. "Nevan, if you're summoning her, things are worse than you're telling me."
"Just send the word, Clyde."