Page 7 of Ashborne Phoenix

Women curtseyed and left their gazes at my feet unless I spoke to them directly.

My mother walked at my side, beaming with pride and buzzing with something I could only describe as triumph. And my father…

My father spoke to me as a man. He told me of the workings of the estate. Asked me to consider the dilemmas he faced in leading the Cruors—and complained of the men and women who irritated him.

I woke every morning, sick to my stomach, then walked into the day with increasing power, presence, and admiration. And I wanted it. All of it. Except the memories.

I wanted to make my parents proud. I wanted to be a man in my father’s eyes. I wanted adults to step quietly out of my way when I passed through the hall as they were being greeted.

I delighted in it.

I bragged to their children—some of whom competed for my approval, while others shrank in fear.

If only the nightmares would stop. If only my appetite would return.

Then, one night, weeks after my birthday, I woke in the night to a wet bed, and the too-quiet dark.

Horrified, and embarrassed, I tore my pajamas from my body, and the bedclothes from the bed, and piled them in the corner, ringing the bell for the manservant, who appeared in the doorway just a minute later, panting, and begging for grace.

“A servant has soiled my bed!” I insisted. “Bring my mother!”

“Please, Young Master Ashford, I will take the linens to the laundry for you—”

“I said, bring my mother!”

The man shook. I stood in the light of his candle, naked and blinking, on the verge of tears, but hands fisted at my sides. And the man shrank from me.

That sense of pressure and cold under my skin surged and my breath grew faster.

“I will, the moment she returns, Young Master Ashford. You have my word. But she—that is, both the Lord and Lady Ashford are… engaged with their peers.”

Fear crawled up my throat, but I was old enough to know, to understand that she couldn’t be called away. Yet, the knowledge that another ritual was taking place below only brought a heavier weight against my chest.

Panic reigned.

“Take the b-bed c-clothes, and b-bring Mrs. Voss,” I demanded a moment later when the man stared, obviously awaiting instruction.

He nodded and gathered up the bedding—including the blankets and quilt—and hurried from the room. He’d left me his candle, but it shivered in the breeze of his passage and my shadow danced on the wall before me.

I stood naked, chilled, and on the verge of panic, trying desperately to remember anything that might slow my racing heart. But by the time the manservant returned with Mrs. Voss, I was on the floor, sitting, curled up, hugging my knees and trying desperately not to cry.

The woman bustled in, her expression falling into sadness. But she hurried forward, her voice light and sweet as she swept a lady’s lap-rug from one of the chairs in the sitting room, then opened it, hurrying to wrap me in it.

“Vane… oh dear, my sweet boy. Don’t cry.”

“I’m not crying!”

“Of course not,” she said, ducking her head. She lifted me to my feet and wrapped the blanket firmly around me, tucking the corner to keep it closed at my shoulder like a cloak, while she bustled over to my drawers and shook out a new pair of pajamas.

I felt ashamed. I was old enough to have thought of that myself.

“Grange, run to the kitchens for hot chocolate—made with milk.”

The man, whom I’d almost forgotten at the appearance of the housekeeper, sighed, but bowed once, then darted out of the room.

“Now, Vane,” Mrs. Voss said, sinking to her knees on the carpet, despite her heavy body, and helping me into the pajamas as if it were entirely expected that she be ushered to my room in the middle of the night. “With your parents absent, you are in charge. You must tell me what monsters have assailed us this night, so I might call the men to hunt them down.”

I scowled at her. “Monsters aren’t real.”