and reach in. My fingers find a scrap of paper, and I pull it out, unfolding it as I take in a long breath.
For my daughter, on her sixteenth birthday.
My only regret is not being here for you today when you need me. I hope this will help you understand what is to come.
I don’t realize I’m crying until a dark splotch appears on the paper. It was supposed to be for my
I read the note again.
My mom knew. She knew she was going to leave me, and she wrote this note, four years before I was supposed to read it.
Did she write it before or after she killed Greg?
I reach in and touch something hard and leathery, and as I pull it out, I realize it’s a book. A very old book.
My fingers trail over the dry, fading surface as I pull it onto my lap, the dust covering my jeans. It must be ancient. As I lift open the cover, the spine cracks.
The first aged, yellowed page is nearly blank, except for three words written in stark, perfect calligraphy:
For the cursed.
I take in a jagged breath of air, then slide my finger over the page and flip it over.
January 7, 1750
William doesn’t belong with Julia. Their betrothal is a business arrangement, nothing more. Now that he is in love with me, he wants to marry me, and not her. He has promised me he will end their engagement.
I suppose she does not care much what he wants, for it is William’s title she is after, and she will fight for that if he tries to jilt her. I hope he remains strong.
Tonight, when he dared dance with me at the Harksbury ball, I saw it in her eyes. I knew before the song was over that I had committed a sin. Afterward, I stood by, humiliated, as he lied to soothe her. He told her he was only being polite. Told her no one had asked me to dance and so, as a gentleman, he had asked me.
A pity dance.
And yet still she seethed, and I knew something had shifted between us.
She will do anything to have him, anything to become a duchess. That is why we must elope. Will has asked me to wait one month, and then he will be mine, and only mine.
Charlotte
January 18, 1750
I am terrified. Julia knows. She knows everything. She found me packing my bags, and she confronted me. She thinks just because I am her paid companion that she can control everything about me, but she cannot decide who I will love.
She told me I was a fool to believe him. She told me he compromised her and is duty bound to marry her. Her words left a dull ache in my chest. She must be lying. It is I who has been compromised. But I am little more than a servant. He cannot be forced to marry me. For the first time, I am not sure I have done the right thing these last months.
But I must trust in him. He loves me. He will honor all of his whispered promises. There is nothing I can do but believe in it for it is too late to go back and undo the things I have done.
Charlotte
February 7, 1750
Will was supposed to arrive last night to take me away. I sat on an overturned bucket behind the stables for three hours, shivering against the cold, and yet he did not arrive. I had to beg a groom to saddle a horse so that I could go to his estate. And yet it was useless because they said he has gone hunting up north with friends. How could he do such a thing at a time like this?
I was forced to go back home, but Julia soon discovered where I had gone. She came at me in a rage, and if not for her father’s valet, I might very well have been injured. Her father dismissed me not an hour later without references.
This afternoon, I stood on the stoop awaiting the carriage that would take me away from the only home I have known these last two years, when Julia positively flew up the drive on horseback, her hair undone and streaming behind her. I had never seen her so unkempt, and the look in her eyes was enough to put my stomach in knots.
She leapt from her horse and threw something at me. Some shimmery, dusty powder, which sent me into a coughing fit. It still burns in my lungs as I write this, miles away at a shabby inn.
It was a gypsy curse, she claimed. Her eyes were wide and frightening as she told me I would be as lonely and miserable as she was then. That I would pay for trying to steal her betrothed. I tried to tell her it was he who pursued me, but she would have none of it.
I have little to my name, but so long as Will keeps his promises to me, all will be right.
Charlotte
February 15, 1750
I have been unable to find Will. He has been away from his home for more than a week. I have rented a small room over a tavern, as it was all I could afford. I am but a few miles from Will’s home, just down the coast, near the Exmoor Cliffs. I had originally planned to travel inland, but I could not bear to leave the sea behind. Odd, as I had always loathed the smell of the salt in the air.
Charlotte
The lump in my throat grows. This is it. This is how it all started. Two hundred and fifty years ago. My fingers tremble as they slide across the curled yellow paper. I flip the page.
March 21, 1750
I found myself in the sea last night, swimming for no reason at all. I am lucky I did not drown for I have never learned how to swim. I want to go home, but I do not have a home anymore, and I must remember that.
I think I may be with child, and I do not know what to do. I have sent two letters for Will, but he has not answered. I suspect Julia is somehow intercepting my correspondence.
Charlotte
March 30, 1750
I cannot stay here any longer as I am nearly out of funds and I will be thrown out on the street soon. I must travel south to find my cousin and pray that she will take me in.
But I will not leave just yet. I cannot bear to go without seeing Will again. I am going to Varmoth Manor one last time in the hopes that he has returned.
I must know if he will truly marry Julia as the papers say.
Charlotte
April 2, 1750
He is dead. I’ve done something terrible. I do not understand what has happened to me, but I must flee.
Julia did something to me. I should have known by the crazed look of her she was desperate, that she’d done something so much worse than I had believed.
I must find her immediately. Before I am hanged for murder. I am but a servant and he a duke. They will not rest until they uncover the truth.
Until they uncover me.
Charlotte
I flip the page, but there are no more entries in Charlotte’s dark, angled cursive. I flip back and forth a few times, trying to figure out what happened.
The next dates are from late 1766. These entries are written in a different handwriting, lighter, curlier than
