28. Nora

28

NORA

The sign outside the greenhouse said classes were cancelled, and the door was locked. I knocked a few times, but Alec didn’t answer.

I barely slept last night. Once I’d processed the shock of realising what Alec was, my curiosity became unbearable. I needed to question him. Getting through classes today had been insufferable because all I could think about was him.

I frowned when I noticed blood on the door. I looked down at my feet, seeing that there was more darkening the dirt.

Had he killed someone? Was that what he was doing right now?

I lifted my hands to knock again, but the door suddenly flew open. Alec’s nostrils flared, his eyes dark and brooding.

“You’re interrupting my work,” he snapped. “Go away, Nora.”

I fought a cruel smile. “Did you find the monster last night?”

He glowered. “We both know the answer to that, don’t we?”

No, we both don’t. “Can I come in? I need to talk with you.”

“No,” he said. “The Dean brought me a creature. I’m in the middle of testing poison.”

“But—”

He yanked me forward and crushed his mouth against mine, kissing me deeply. I groaned against him, my thoughts swirling as he bit my bottom lip and then kissed down my neck. He reached for my hand and brought it to the outline of his erection.

“Oh,” I rasped, feeling how hard he was.

“I dreamed about you, belladonna,” he murmured. “Meet me in the library at midnight.”

He released me and slammed the door before I could ask anything else. I was breathless as I heard it lock.

Gods damn it. Now I was frustrated, obsessed, and aroused.

I licked my lips, tasting the faint metallic hint of my blood. The pain from his bite lingered for a moment, a reminder of more to come.

My hyperfixation would have to wait. I had so many questions that I wanted to ask him just to see what sort of connections there were between him and the monster. But, those would have to wait until later.

While he was distracted though…

“Sorry, Alec,” I whispered.

Whether he wanted to be or not, he was now my patient. He was my problem, my experiment, and my greatest curiosity. I wanted to understand his mind. All of the darkness there, I wished to dissect piece by piece.

Hurting him was the only way to save him.

To save both parts of him.

I turned my head, looking up at the university. Spires stuck into the heavy clouds, and rain dampened the ground. He was going to be preoccupied for some time, which meant that I could do some more investigating on my own.

With a heavy sigh, I turned and followed the path into the maze. My heartbeat quickened as I crossed the area where I had killed John. I swallowed hard, trying not to think about everything that happened. But, it was impossible to ignore the memories flashing through my mind. Despite the nausea I felt just walking through here, I made my way through the rest of the maze and came back to the path that led to the university.

It took about twenty minutes to make my way to the houses. I paid attention to those who watched me, but none of them met my gaze. On the street, in the halls—none of the students seemed to want to be around me.

All of the interrogating we’d done throughout the last week had certainly frightened the students. Aligning myself with Alec had turned my reputation into something that was more lore than fact, but part of me enjoyed the advantage of being whispered about. Even if it meant none of my colleagues wanted to speak to me now.

Once again, I was doing something that was of questionable morals, and I didn’t care.

Alec’s house sat at the very end of the row, loneliness reeking from it. Vines twisted up the iron fence, overgrown and unkept. I glanced around to see if anyone watched me, and once I was satisfied that no one was, I pushed open the gate and went up the stairs.

I tried the door first and found that it was locked. I leaned up on my tiptoes and felt around the door frame, my eyes lighting up when I felt a key on the ledge. Lucky. It fit into the lock and I opened the door quickly, slipping inside.

I gagged, eyes watering. The entire house smelled like a rotting corpse.

Already, I could see a fine layer of dust over the floor. I winced, and wondered if he would notice if I walked through. That seemed like something he would notice.

Did I care?

Really would the punishment be that bad?

I thought about his erection and his wild whisper to meet him in the library at midnight, and decided to toss caution to the wind. I wanted to know if he had any more secrets in this place, especially if they could possibly shed light on him.

I knew who he was, but I didn’t know his history, except for him mentioning his mother’s death. Where did he come from? What about his father? Was Alec a human, was he cursed, was he fae?

The fact that I was even asking these questions still made me feel foolish. But I wasn’t imagining things.

Alec was very, very real.

And so was the monstrous part of him that had fucked me senseless last night.

I reached for a sconce and turned the knob, casting light down the hall. I sucked in a breath as it revealed what hung on the walls.

Butterflies, snakes, and other oddities all hung in framed cases on the faded blue floral wallpaper. All of the items were specimens, and some of them stranger than others.

How long had he lived here? Hell, how long had he been a professor at this university?

My lips parted as I moved down the hall and studied one of the pinned butterflies. It was as large as my hand with emerald wings. Papilio palinurus.

Next to it was another specimen behind glass, but this one was a skeleton. A two headed snake that coiled in on itself. I’d never seen a two headed snake before.

Walking down the hall felt like I was in a museum. I paused when I came to the opening of the parlour and my stomach twisted, nausea returning.

The remains of what appeared to be both humans and animals were scattered over the floors. Ribcages, skulls, spines. I stood in both horror and fascination before I carefully stepped into the room. There was a worn down sofa and a cabinet full of more strange things, but otherwise, the entire space was filled with either decayed bodies or plants.

I’d walked into a predator’s nest.

A bone cracked under my foot as I stepped towards that cabinet.

Was this the monster’s doing or was it Alec’s?

I breathed through my mouth as I leaned forward, peering through the dusty glass. Vines crawled up the cabinet, mushrooms sprouting in random places. I wasn’t familiar with plants, but they reminded me of the same ones I’d seen growing on the monster.

“What are you?” I whispered.

Behind the glass, there was a jar with what appeared to be a heart suspended in a thick yellow liquid. Bile rose in my throat, but I held it down for the sake of morbid curiosity. A taxidermied raven perched next to the jar, eyes cold and unblinking.

Aside from the horrifying objects in the cabinet, there were books. Books and books, all of them fairly tattered.

I stepped back, deciding to continue searching through the house. The back of my neck prickled, anticipation and fear icing my veins as I left the parlour and continued down the hall. The layout was the same as Harold’s house had been when I visited. I came to the dining room and sighed.

“Oh Alec,” I whispered.

There were eight seats set out around the table. Sitting in each one was the decayed carcass of a human.

How could the monster who had stroked me so gently with his claws be the same one who had murdered countless animals and humans?

The things Harold, Louis, and Jacob had told me the first night I’d gone to the pub came flooding back to me. Their warnings about not going into the woods, about how students died mysteriously.

These had to be the missing students.

But why didn’t The Hunt investigate? How was it that this house of bones was left untouched in the middle of campus? I’d thought originally that The Hunt was sacrificing students, but now I wasn’t so sure. I had so many questions and I knew that I couldn’t ask them. That wasn’t how I would get answers.

I crept closer to the table and wondered why he had chosen these particular people. What was it about each one that had provoked the monster? Or were the killings random?

Was I next?

My heart fluttered faster with fear, but beyond the fear was the worry that someone would get to Alec before I could help him.

I drew in another steady breath and then turned and left the room, going up a staircase that went to the second floor. There appeared to be two bedrooms. What else would I find here? Were there more bodies?

I opened one door slowly. It creaked as it swung open, revealing an empty room with a mirror. Dried blood stained the floor. I stepped in, looking for anything else out of the ordinary. Aside from the mirror, there was a large window with curtains that cut off any natural light. I went to them and slowly drew it back, noting the holes from where moths had feasted on the cotton.

I had one more room left to explore aside from the bathroom.

My eyes closed for a moment as I steeled my resolve.

I adjusted the curtain back to the way it was then left the room. The floorboards creaked underfoot as I went to the bathroom first. Surprisingly, it was empty. That left the final room. I almost didn’t even want to open the door, but I needed to.

This house held the darkest parts of him. If I could face this, I could face anything he could do. Every body, every drop of blood, every strange plant.

I opened the last door and sucked in a breath, turning away. I bit into my hand, trying to hold back the bile that rose, but I couldn’t stop it. I ran back to the bathroom and fell to my knees in front of the toilet, throwing up anything I’d eaten today.

I can’t go back but I have to.

“Oh gods.” I sat back on my heels, tears streaming down my cheeks. It took a few minutes before I could get up again. I flushed the commode and then got up, stumbling back to the room.

It was small and empty except for the body at the very centre that was pinned open. Scratches on the floor told me he had suffered.

What did he do? What did he do to Alec?

The body had mostly decomposed, but it was still far less along than anything else in the house. The scent nearly made me vomit again.

Past the blood and gore, I tried to focus on the small details. A circle was drawn on the floor with what appeared to be chalk. An interwoven knot with a line through it.

The symbol there was the same I’d seen on John Andrews' knife.

“What is happening?” I whispered.

This had to be the missing professor. The one everyone presumed was dead. I felt the walls erected in my mind around the night of the party start to weaken as I stepped closer to the body.

His face was nearly unrecognisable, and yet… the living version of him flashed through my mind. Dark eyes and a touch that made me feel sick.

Something truly terrible had happened and I couldn’t remember what it was. But as I left the room, I didn’t feel pity for the man that had been pinned open just like the insects behind glass cases.

I felt pity for my monster that was being used to whatever dark end.

Someone was pulling strings in a way that I couldn’t see. That Alec couldn’t see.

I wanted to find them and end them before everything unravelled beyond repair.

It was almost midnight. My steps quickened as I went through the doors of the library, looking for Alec. The discoveries I’d made today had left me feeling both sick and angry, and even stronger than those emotions was my eagerness to understand why he did the things he did.

But I needed to talk to the monster, not Alec. At least not yet.

The library was silent. “Alec?” I whispered.

I’d assumed he would be here already. I stepped silently down the rows of shelves in the dark, using the moonlight that filtered through the windows as my guide.

After I left Alec’s house, I went home and bathed three times. I’d forced myself to eat some dinner and had managed to keep it down despite the lingering nausea. It turned out that seeing dead bodies didn’t sit well with me.

I still wasn’t sure if I would end up in that house with them too.

I slowed as I came to the restricted section and slipped through the chains. It was becoming more and more apparent that I might need to confront the Dean. At this point, I didn’t care if I lost my job here. But, I did care about losing access to the university, and to Alec.

The nightmares were becoming more and more real. I wasn’t sure how far this twisted path of corruption would take me, but it was too late to turn back. Turning back would mean running away, and I’d never been one to do so.

I was risking my life for a monstrous man. There was something about him that drew me in. A darkness that I craved despite the morals I was raised with.

I was the last Woulfe and if Alec was the one to end me, then hopefully I’d at least die with some fucking answers.

My gaze roamed over the books as I searched for something else that might be helpful. Anything. I scanned the titles, racking my brain for the facts that I currently had.

I knew about The Hunt, a society that was ingrained into this university that practised the occult. The inner workings of their cult were still a mystery to me.

I knew Alec was a monster. I knew the monster had been killing students, animals, professors and that it was simply impossible that no one had discovered what was inside his house—unless they were in on it too.

I knew that Alec was unaware of his true nature.

But was the Dean aware? Was that why he’d always dodged my questions? And if he was aware, why would he have allowed Alec to question the entire university over his son’s death?

Why would he have chosen a botanist and psychologist to question in the first place?

I wasn’t sure the Dean was smart enough to play an invisible game of chess. And if he was, then I had severely underestimated him.

None of the titles stuck out to me. I listened for any movement and when I felt safe, slipped back through the chains that were a ridiculous guard for this section.

Where was Alec?

I made my way to the back of the library and found the section on myths and legends. I pulled out a book simply marked ‘Fae’ and flipped through the pages.

I paused on a page that said changelings.

A hand suddenly slipped around my mouth, stifling my cry as I was slammed forward. I gasped for air, but instead inhaled a chemical scent that turned my vision dark.

When I fell back, I knew it was into his arms.