Page 33 of Mortdale

“Why did you agree to this marriage?”

“I was made to. Like you were.”

“That’s a dirty fucking lie.”

Her pulse was about to hit prestissimo, and only inches away from my teeth. The tender pain was now radiating from my jaw down to the back of my head. “I had my reasons,” she said quietly. “Why did you accept it when you didn’t want this marriage?”

“I had my reasons,” I said. Namely one. “What have you been doing at the library?”

She climbed off my lap, standing on unsteady legs. “I have a feeling you might already know.” Slowly backing away, she said, “I like a fair game. If you’re allowed to have your secrets, I’m allowed to have mine.”

“I thought you didn’t like rules.”

“You set them, not me,” she said, stopping by the cellarette, picking out my finest whiskey bottle as she left.

My head rolled against the armchair rest. With a groan, I forced myself to my feet. It didn’t matter that Willow wasn’t a red maiden. Agnes had made sure I knew she’d sent her here with a mission. She’d wanted me to kill my wife at the earliest opportunity. And that pissed me off more than whatever Willow planned on doing here.

I brought the book to my nose as I went up the stairs. Notes of violet and jasmine had stuck to the pages, just like they’d stuck to everything else in my house. It was becoming harder to breathe in the air without my stomach rolling from hunger.

Gentle sobs filled the silent air, and I paused in front of her room, resting my brow against her door and listening until they faded into soft hiccups. When her pulse fell into a soft adagio, I peeled myself back and left.

Chapter 7

Willow

Iwoke up from my nap with a startle, narrowly missing hitting my head on the wooden bed slats. It didn’t help that a little human stood crouched only an arm’s length away from me, peeking under the bed with a frown.

“Mother of Hell!”

The little girl just blinked at me. She was somewhere between one, two, three, four, and five. The shrunken attire was throwing me off. Totty all-colours wore a blue-striped frilly top with no sleeves that only reached midway down her belly and a pair of too-tight red pants that only covered her just below her knees. A cross between a court jester and a prisoner. Her hair was sparse and very blond, set up into the tiniest ponytails in existence which made her look like a bald, middle-aged toddler with a potbelly poking out of her slightly too tight of a shirt.

“What are you?”

Her pale blond brows gathered in a very familiar scowl. “A girl.” Her nose scrunched up a little as she studied me. “Are you stupid?” she asked, sounding a little worried.

To be argued.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, attempting to crawl out. “Should you even be in this house?”

I leaned all the way back when she shoved something in my face.

Lady Death!

That’s where my rat was.

She had the poor thing grasped around its fat middle, squeezed so tightly in her hands his paws were pointing all the way up to the ceiling. Why…why was he wearing a yellow, frilly dress? “He says his name is Thomas and that he belongs to you.”

I just stared at her, trying to decipher what she’d said. It was like her tongue was stuck to the roof of her mouth because all her s’s came out like little hisses.

She studied me curiously when I stood there confused, lowering Thomas on the floor and then dashing out while yelling ‘bear’ at the top of her lungs.

Where?

I rolled out from under my bed, glancing around my room.

Where was the bear?

“You little asshole,” I whispered to my familiar, shaking him a little. “Were you trying to eat her?”