“Chloris may speak as she wishes in her home.”
Adonijah glowered at Bennington. “You may be the town’s governor, sir, but I am its law.”
“What law are you upholding tonight, Adonijah?” asked Bennington. “And at the behest of whom?”
Chloris watched Rufus go into the first room—hers. Where she kept her diary. Which told of their visitor.
“I don’t favor Conal or anyone in my work,” said Adonijah.
“I’m relieved.”
Adonijah went to the corridor and met Rufus coming out. He hadn’t stayed long enough to have picked up the diary. Adonijah stepped into the room across from hers, a sewing room, while Rufus moved along.
Chloris whispered, “What will we tell them about the young man?”
“The truth. Adonijah can decide for himself if he wants that boy on the back of a horse behind him or his sons.”
Adonijah ambled back into the corridor. “When last you met with Hezekiah, were there words?”
“Of greeting, perhaps. Nothing more.”
Rufus reached the door at the end.
“You, ma’am?” Cooke asked Chloris.
“Me? No.” Her voice quaked as Rufus stepped into the guest room.
“And what of Glory Brightwell?”
“No.”
Cooke regarded them like he would a sheep or cow, judging. “Are you well, ma’am?”
He had sensed Chloris’s terror. She dared not speak, sure her voice would…
Rufus stepped out of the guest room, more bored than ever. “You should keep your windows closed, sir, as winter approaches.”
Bennington winked at Chloris. “What have I told you, Chloris?”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
“You keep an undeniably tidy house,” said the elder Cooke, perhaps accusingly, as he walked to the door, no longer scanning about.
“Please visit anytime,” said Bennington.
The sense of relief was short-lived. Urgent hoofbeats stopped just outside.
Adonijah swung open the door to find his other sons swinging down from their mounts. “We found Hezekiah, Father!”
“Yes?”
“In the barn.” Jonas drew his matchlock and raised it toward Bennington. “Torn utterly asunder.”
* * * *
Less than an hour after the Cooke boys locked her in the pillory, Chloris was aching from head to toe.
At least the rain, pouring earlier in the day, was only a fragrant memory—for now. Come the dawn and the rise of most Ember Hollowites, she would undoubtedly be pelted with everything from vegetables to mud to stones. She could only hope for a cool day or a quick resolution to the mystery of Hezekiah Hardison’s slaying.
The pillory, meant as both punishment and interrogatory torture, stood only four feet high, forcing suspects into a miserable stooped position with head and hands locked in circles cut out of the two planks that fitted together. The stress on her legs and waist could only be relieved by letting her throat and wrists bear the weight. It made her think of a guillotine, which seemed nearly humane compared to however long she would suffer in this position.
She had wept when the Cooke men arrested Bennington and her, mostly from fear. She felt the need to weep now from the pain, yet recognized the need to conserve fluids. Bennington was locked in jail. No one would be obliged to bring her water.
From off to her side, Chloris detected a muted shuffling sound.
Just a few yards beyond the rear of the street’s businesses and homes was the forest, carpeted with recently fallen foliage, and darkness. If she strained, Chloris could see the edge and the closest trees, but that was a waste of energy. She feared the thick, dark woods of the new world more than she ever had the sparse forest of her hovel back in England.
Though wolves, bears and other predators never ventured this close to the settlement, something had.
Her throat tightened with the recollection of Everett’s crushing grasp. He was loose now.
She thought of calling out to Jonas, currently standing watch over her master in the jail two buildings away. Of the Cooke clan, he had been roughest with her, to the point that even the hard-hearted Adonijah had to admonish him. If he were to come without his father here to restrain him…
The soft shuffling on the leaves became softer steps on the street, still muddy from the afternoon’s shower. The time had come to scream.
A hand smacked over her mouth; polished shoes fell just within her sight line. Then an insidiously sharp edge pressed against her neck. “Stay quiet, woman.”
Despite its whispered tone, Chloris recognized the voice of Conal O’Herlihy.
He removed his hand. “This is a sad state for such a loyal servant. And your master sheltered and safe over there in the jailhouse.”
She was helpless to stop the tears now.
“You need my help. No one can else can save you.” Conal allowed a scoff. “Not even the great Wilcott Bennington.”
She tried to raise her head to glower at him, wanting to show him some measure of defiance, even as her tears told a different tale. But she simply could not.
Conal showed her the bone knife he had taken from Schroeder, waving it near her eye line. “You declare that he killed Hezekiah, and I’ll see to it you are freed and held blameless.”
Chloris inhaled mightily to utter one word. “No.”
Conal pressed the blade, harder. “No hurry, dear. You can just stay right here like this until you’ve come to the right decision.”
The blade eased, the shoes disappeared, and Chloris was alone, more distressed and terrified than ever before.
* * * *
Modern day
Reaching the top of the ladder, Kyle Trainor leaned down to reach for a board from the dismantled pallet to brace the Community Center’s upper windows. It was a precarious task at best. He would never complete it.
The window shattered inward, pierced by a dripping wet vine-leg. Smaller tendrils writhing at its end wrapped around Kyle and yanked him through the window in a blur.
Inhuman screeches of varying pitches echoed around the brick walls and wood floors, as driving rain blew in.
Another tentacle whipped in and found the ladder, scooting it noisily around the floor and banging it against the wall, before the demon realized it did not have hold of anything useful.
“Get them into the
