Chapter 34

A ringing bang echoed through the hall.

Candle flames jumped at the sudden disturbance of air, and Ivy's hand flew to her mouth as she watched the old man recoil. The pistol clattered to the ground with a sickening finality. He couldn't possibly be dead, could he? But then a spot of red was blooming on the general's white shirt, spreading as the man fell first to his knees, then face forward, with a terrible groan.

For a moment everything stood still, an audience holding its collective breath before the curtain dropped. Blood seeped out across the stone floor, an echo of the vignette of the pool behind them. Somewhere beyond the open roof, a night bird let out a melancholy cry. The world seemed to have called a truce while the shock of the moment settled in. But then there was a stampede of bodies as everyone came back to life.

"He's dead!"

"Get the girl!"

A press of bodies and then hands grabbing for her, the smell of gunpowder choking the air. Anger rose off the men like steam off a lake in winter. Ivy's fingers were stiff from gripping the gun, but she clawed the group off, buttons and shirt collars coming off in her hands. Someone grabbed her hair, another an arm. She might have been a lady, but her title would not save her now, not against men who had until moments ago believed they would hold the key to eternal life, only to see it snatched away.

Her vision blurred as she fought for air against the press of bodies. But just as suddenly as they had fallen upon her, the men fell back, air rushing in where she had been suffocating. Someone was lifting her, not with hungry, clawing arms, but strong and gentle ones. When she felt rough wool beneath her cheek, she knew that she was safe. Holding her against his chest with one arm, Ralph wielded the pistol in the other.

"I'll start shooting and I won't stop. I don't care if you're a bloody duke or the king himself, I'll kill you all and be glad to do it."

It was like a dousing of cold water, the mob instantly falling apart. Most made for the doorway, but a few lingered, unsure if they should avenge their leader or not. In the end, it was self-preservation that won out over loyalty, and the hall emptied.

The candles were burning low, and all Ivy could see of Ralph was his tense posture, a stormy expression. Whatever had caused him to freeze, he seemed to be released from the spell. Taking her chin in his hand, he made a quick inspection of her. "You're in shock," he said.

She hadn't realized she was shaking until he draped Hewitt's coat over her shoulders and she heard the chattering of her own teeth.

"Come on," he said, tugging her along.

Ivy cast a glance back at the abandoned experiment. Arthur was somewhere under the surface, a premature slumber born of desperation to please an impossible father. "We can't just leave him there."

"Oh, yes we can," Ralph said without looking back.

He pulled her along, and secretly she was glad that she wasn't forced to see Arthur's body, wasn't privy to the outcome of whatever the Sphinxes had been trying to accomplish. Outside, motorcars were pulling out of the drive, flustered chauffeurs scrambling to pull them around as the rest of the Sphinxes fled back to the safety of their estates and castles.

"Do you think they'll come back?"

Ralph didn't say anything as he navigated her behind the drive and to the stables by the light of the full moon. Inside, it was warm and safe and smelled of sweet hay and horses. Feeling was slowly returning to her tingling hands and feet, and she was able to follow him up the steep stairs that led to the loft.

Ivy watched as he moved about the small space, lighting old oil lamps and getting out stacks of folded blankets. I've killed a man, she thought, and now I am in Ralph's bedroom. Laughter bubbled up inside her at the absurdity of it, and she swayed back and forth like a lunatic.

"Sit," he instructed, guiding her to the bed. Her laughter gradually subsided as she perched on the edge of the quilt, suddenly aware that she was still in her nightgown, with only an old coat draped over her shoulders to afford her any sense of modesty.

Ralph's quarters were sparse, but homey: a neatly made bed, an old chest of drawers, and gingham curtains pinned to a small window which looked out onto the abbey. So this was where he slept and dreamed while she had pottered about the big empty house. Given the choice, she would have rather made her home here, curled up with a book in the little loft, watching the seasons change from the window, the gentle sound of the ponies whickering below.

She thought he might sit beside her, but ever the gentleman, he pulled up a wood chair and perched with elbows on his knees, fingers tented in thought. She shifted her weight on the creaking bed, watching as his stormy expression faded into something else, something softer but that sent chills racing along her arms.

He let out a curse, pushing his hand through his hair. "Christ. Ivy—" He broke off.

Below them, a horse stamped in its stall and whinnied to its neighbor. Ivy desperately wanted him to say something else, to give words to whatever it was that was spiraling through his mind. But whatever it was, was too heavy, and stayed lodged in his throat.

"Mr. and Mrs. Hewitt," she finally asked, "are they all right?"

"Both still resting at the cottage, assuming they have any sense."

She nodded. "What now?"

Ralph hitched a shoulder, eyes trained on the burnt visage of the abbey through the small window. "That's up to you," he said. "Rebuild, or..." he paused, gave an uncomfortable swallow, "or leave."

Could it really be that simple? After every kind of imprisonment and tether that had bound her to the abbey, could she just simply leave it all behind? Where would she go? And did she even want to? Her body still ached, her hands fidgety at the memory of the pistol in them.

"Are you sure that it's truly over?" she asked. "The other members of the club won't press charges against me? They'll leave me alone now?"

"They'd be bloody fools to try," Ralph said. "The curse, or whatever it was, is broken, there's nothing left for them in the library. Their leader is dead." He paused, his hands clasped tight as if he did not know what to do with them. "Will you—will you stay?"

All the lovely dreams of Ralph that she had read of in the book were nothing more than that—dreams. A painful lump sat heavy in Ivy's chest. She was a widow now. She had made her choice with Arthur and look where that had gotten her. There was no denying that Ralph was a good, upstanding man, but the Ralph of her dreams was not the man who sat before her.

"I'm staying," she said, her decision crystallizing as the words came out of her mouth. "We'll rebuild everything that was damaged, restore it to an even higher standard than it was before." The only way to push the memories of the hellish night out of her mind would be to throw herself into a new project, one that would require all of her time and attention. This would be the fresh start she had been denied the first time around. Besides, there was something that still bound her to the abbey, though she could not name it.

Ralph's shoulders relaxed a little. "Right," he said, his voice a storm cloud with just a hint of sunshine peeking through. Pushing back the chair, he stood and shrugged into his old work coat.

"Where are you going?"

"To clean up that mess," he said with a grimace.

Ivy started to sit up, but one look from Ralph told her that her presence would thankfully not be tolerated.

"Get some rest," he instructed. He hesitated by the stairs, then doubled back and dropped a featherlight kiss on her temple. Before she could blink her shock away, he had gently tucked a quilt around her and then was descending, the steps creaking under his weight.