I’d still have it with me to this day, had it not gone missing when Grandma Liliana first arrived in America. Mom suspected she took it, and confronted her. Grandma admitted mailing it back to Paris. Mom was furious, assuming she wanted to sell it due to its value. It was a one-of-a-kind Stradivarius, handcrafted of wood so black and glossy I used to think it had been carved from an oil slick. The scroll curled at the neck’s tip like a snail’s shell, adding to its uniqueness. But Grandma selling it didn’t make sense. The instrument had been a family heirloom since the early 1800s. One of our ancestors, Octavius Germain, had even engraved his initials on the lower bout, just inches from the waist of the instrument. I used to trace my fingers along that O and G, imagining a man in Victorian finery playing the very instrument my dad loved.
Now, sitting here with this book in my hands, I think maybe we misjudged Grandma’s motives. Maybe—just like I needed that piece of red thread to brave being without my parents that day in first grade, and this book to give me courage at a new school—she needed a piece of her son to be waiting at home for her, so when she returned she could survive in a world he no longer occupied.
I glance into the distance and swallow the words I want to say: Mom, I still miss him. Every day. I don’t want to be away from you, too. I don’t want to be alone.
Our limo slows to a crawl as we take a stone bridge over a giant river. I lean into the window, unnerved by how close the water is. Were it to rise just a few more feet, it would overlap the bridge. The river encompasses the academy on all sides, similar to a moat. The only land is the hill where the academy sits, and the eighty-some acres of woods surrounding it. Without any way to cross, it would be like an island unto itself.
I return the stationery box and my book to their bags. Unease roils through my veins in time with the blue-black depths swirling beneath the limo. According to the pamphlet, the water even surges underground beneath the estate’s foundation, flooding the third basement.
Water. My least favorite element, second only to fire. And now I’ll be surrounded by it. The fact that the rain has finally subsided relaxes me a fraction. Fog settles across the landscape, clinging low to the road as we roll off the bridge. RoseBlood Academy rises up, grim and ominous. The baroque architecture, looming and majestic, looks more like a brooding castle than an opera house in this isolated location.
The auditorium’s cupola—a cap of bronze that cuts through the dreary sky like a ghostly crown—descends to a gabled roof where a winged horse stands guard beside Apollo. The god lifts his lyre, as if it were a bow and arrow. In the Phantom book, a similar roof played a pivotal and romantic role in the story line. It’s where Christine met with Raoul and they claimed their undying love. They were spied upon by the Phantom, who then unleashed a series of events to punish them and make Christine his forever. But the school brochure claims this roof’s stairway was sealed off along with the top three floors after the fire.
The driver turns the car onto the long, gravel drive leading up to the opera house. Glistening trees bend over us like sequined actors taking their final bow. As we plunge out from the overhanging limbs, I begin to understand the uniforms. It’s as if we’ve crossed into an alternate time.
Ivy and lichen cling to the huge edifice. The wet façade reflects our headlights so it appears an ethereal white, but as we get closer, the stone’s true color comes into view. Time has eroded it to a scaly turquoise green, like a mermaid’s tail. Antique street lamps—the kind you would expect to see on a Victorian greeting card—dot the front terrace and cast an eerie yellow glow in the grayish haze. So engrossed in the scenery, I barely hear the bags rattle as Mom puts away the stamps and address book.
The boarding school is flanked on one side by an overgrown garden. The early autumn blooms follow their own call; silvery-green leaves, crimson roses, and frothy white flowers tumble like waves across a wrought-iron fence that at one time held them contained.
Behind the garden, off in the distance, sits a graveyard and a chapel. The abandoned stone building stands tall and proud, despite that it’s every bit as old and decrepit as the headstones and statues surrounding it. Busted stained-glass windows glisten like the talons of some violent rainbow creature slashing through the fog. Yet even in its sinister beauty, it seems to cower in fear from the encroaching forest’s shadow creeping closer with evening’s arrival.
Our limo cruises around to the other side of the academy. Pebbles grind beneath the tires on our coast into a gravel parking area across from the garden. Mom starts digging in her purse, mumbling about lipstick. Out of the corner of my eye, I catch someone half covered by a rosebush that hangs over an iron spike. I angle myself to see him better, nose pressed against the chilled glass.
His tall body turns and watches us, broad shoulders tensed. He grips a cluster of deep red roses—so velvety they’re almost black on the edges—and holds a pair of pruning shears in his other hand. The tails of his cape swirl on the wind, stabbing at the fog around his muddy boots. The vintage clothing seems out of place in our century, yet right at home in this setting.
He appears close to my age. The left half of his face stands out beneath the hood: one side of plump lips, one squared angle of a chin. Two coppery-colored eyes look back at me—bright and metallic. The sight makes me do a double take. As far as he is from the car, I shouldn’t be able to make out the color, yet they glimmer in the shadow of his cape, like pennies catching a flashlight’s glare in a deep well.
I’ve seen those eyes before—countless times—since the age of seven. But I can’t even consider why I recognize them. I can’t think beyond what they’re broadcasting, loud and clear: He’s warning us not to approach him—a part of the sprawling wilderness, neglected yet beautiful and thriving in his solitude.
Transfixed, I don’t stop staring until Mom opens the glass panel to speak to the driver. A hot blush creeps up my neck and I glance at my worn Timberland boots, all too aware of the patchwork embroidered vest beneath my jacket and the faded and ripped boot-cut jeans hugging my legs. For the first time since I started sewing and designing, I’m uncomfortable in my bohemian style, even if it is a tribute to Dad’s heritage. Here at this castle, faced with the stranger’s somber formality, I feel too casual . . . wayward and misplaced.
I’m almost aching to put on that outdated school uniform.
When the limo stops, I brave a glance again, in search of the caped figure and those shimmery eyes. The gardening shears lie abandoned on the ground, and the cluster of red roses he held are now withered, leaving behind a whirl of petals—coal black and crinkled—aflutter on the wind.
An icy sense of foreboding prickles the nerves between my shoulder blades. The gardener’s gone without a trace, as if he were never there at all.
3
GHOST WALKER
“The ghosts . . . try to remember the sunlight. Light has died out of their skies.”
Robinson Jeffers, “Apology for Bad Dreams”
He flung off his cape’s hood as he glided underground, breathing in the scent of mildew and solitude. Dripping water echoed in the hollowed-out tunnel. The shadows embraced him—a welcoming comfort.
He’d walked as a ghost in the gloomy bowels of this opera house for so long, darkness had become his brother; which was fitting, since his father was the night, and sunlight their forgotten friend.
Jaw tightening, he secured the oars in their rowlocks and stretched his arms to reveal the skin between the cuffs of his sleeves and his leather gloves. The hot rush of vitality still pulsed red light through the veins in his wrists. He’d spent all afternoon in the graveyard. Being somewhere so devoid of life had drained him and prompted an unplanned visit to the garden.
He should never have risked roaming in such close proximity to the parking lot. Curse his weakness for the hybrid roses; there was no resisting their scent, their flavor, their ripeness.
Shrugging off his annoyance, he began to row once more, water slapping the sides of the cave.
He hadn’t expected anyone to be on the grounds this early. Not with what was taking place inside the academy. All the students and instructors were preoccupied. The garden should’ve been safe and isolated.
But there she was—appearing out of nowhere—several hours sooner than he’d expected. Damn his carelessness. Thankfully, he’d had the sense to wear his hooded cape; otherwise, she would’ve seen him unmasked.
Still, all wasn’t lost. If he’d learned anything watching the years play out on a stage, it was improvisation. He used the unplanned sighting to his advantage, vanishing and leaving nothing but dead roses in his wake. Though he’d hated siphoning away their life essence, it was a necessary sacrifice. A calling card for her eyes only.
No doubt she was puzzling over the event this very minute.
The boat scraped to a halt on a muddy embankment. He stepped out, alerted by movement in the darkness. His cape swept his ankles as he pivoted sharply at the familiar musical sound—similar to a trumpet yet softer and lower pitched.
He cast one of his gloves into the boat’s hull and flourished his bared hand, beckoning the life-force of a thousand larval fireflies along the cave’s roof. In reaction, spindly strings coated with orbs lit up and illuminated the surroundings with a tender greenish haze—like strands of glowing pearls strung high overhead. This particular genus wasn’t indigenous to this place but had been brought from a foreign land and kept alive over a century through an exchange of energy.
Reflections of rippling water flashed across the smooth stone walls and the curved pilasters supporting the opera house above him. A red swan waddled from the shadows, trumpeting another greeting. She lifted her long, slender neck and clacked her bill, wings spreading as she fluffed herself out, magnificent and fiery-rich—the same depth of the blossoms he’d murdered earlier.
“And hello to you, sweet Ange.” He knelt and stroked her silken feathers, fingers leaving trails in the crimson plumes. “Holding vigil for our new arrival, are you?”
She nudged a strand of hair from his temple with her beak. He smiled at her affectionate fussing.
“You shouldn’t be this close to the surface,” he scolded. “Diable’s on the prowl. We wouldn’t want the devil to catch our little angel.”
The swan nibbled his thumb, as his warning echoed in the cave. His voice magnified—bass and rumbling—an alien sound, as if pebbles filled his vocal cords and ground together with each word. The gruffness made him wince.
“Go on now,” he whispered this time and stroked her shimmery neck before standing. “Make yourself scarce.”
The red swan watched him with milky blue eyes too perceptive for any ordinary bird, especially one that was going blind. She waddled to the water and skimmed across the surface—afloat and waiting.
He studied her inquisitive pose. “I can’t come yet,” he answered softly. “You know your way through all the booby traps. Go on home. I’ll follow soon enough.”
Her head bent on an elegant curl, a nod actually, as if she were royalty and he a peasant who needed her permission to stay. She sailed toward the depths of the tunnel—growing smaller in the distance. He watched until she resembled a velvety rose petal drifting atop a midnight puddle. Plucking his glove from the boat, he slid his fingers back into their sheath of black.
He studied the strands of bioluminescent larvae he’d awakened overhead, lost in thoughts of the girl. He’d never expected her to be the one. To step out of the visions he’d had since his childhood into this place and this time. It was all wrong.
Maybe he was mistaken.
His thumb pressed his left temple, rubbing the pounding throb there. But even if she was the one from his visions, it couldn’t change things. She was haloed by an aura that fluctuated between white and gray . . . purity and melancholy. She was unsettled at being here. Lost, even. The perfect foil to that other narcissistic and ambitious young prima donna who’d been brought in over a year ago due to her bloodline.
There was depth beneath this new arrival’s wounded veneer . . . the essence of light and life in its most raw form: the energy of rhapsody. Music pulsed inside her blood—uncultivated and untamed. He could sense that much.
His mouth watered, hungry to taste those melodies, mocking his struggle to rein in his cravings. He’d never seen the girl’s face in their subconscious interactions. It was always covered by her wild, black hair, or submersed in murky water as she fought to break out of the wooden crate that entrapped her. But he’d glimpsed her eyes many times—a bright, electrified green with widened pupils when they were filled with song, reflections of her heart chakra.
He had to see her up close, to be sure; regardless that he didn’t know her features, he knew her soul.
And if his suspicions were right . . .
What then?
Nothing.
His chest muscles tangled between despair and hope, anger and urgency. Whatever he discovered today, he couldn’t forget the reason she was here. She was a means to an end. Payment for an outstanding debt. Nothing more.
He glanced up at the underbelly of the opera house where the tunnel met the foundation. A trapdoor waited there, an entrance to the hidden passages in the building: mirrored walls—the perfect vantage points for viewing the inside of the foyer and classrooms. For him, they were windows, unbeknownst to the academy’s occupants. On their side, they simply saw spans of reflective glass.
Trepidation lumped in his throat at the thought of being so close to her. He could pretend the reaction was a byproduct of another time, another place; a dark and cruel past that cloaked and obscured any human interactions he had, like an octopus’s ink cloud. But there was more—this newly born possibility he dared not entertain—which threatened all of his resolve.
He slammed a fist against his thigh, using the flash of pain to give him clarity.
There was no room for hesitation.
If she was the one, he would have to get even closer. He would have to prey on her . . . disrupt her daily routine, seduce her curiosity, lure her into the depths of his home. His hell.
His fingers twitched in his gloves. There were steps to follow that would ensure success. Calling cards to leave, strange novelties that would drive her to seek out the illumination only darkness could provide. She would find him of her own free will; and she would find herself and her purpose, whether she was prepared or not.
Until then, he’d take no other chances of being seen. Patience was key. He’d already been waiting for what felt like an eternity. What were a few more weeks?
A disturbing mix of anticipation and dread grated along his spine. Mud sucking at his boot soles, he scaled the embankment’s slope toward the window.
Let the dance begin.
Mom and I climb the stone stairs to the entrance. A crow flutters by above us. I hesitate when I hear its cry—a strained mewl, like a kitten in distress. I shake my head. Now I’m not only seeing things, but hearing them, too? My nerves are all over the place.
The scent of wet soil mingles with the perfume of flowers and reels me back in, reminding me of my perennials at home. I won’t be there to fight off the weeds so they can bloom. I’ve always honored Dad’s memory by keeping his flower garden alive. Having already lost his violin, I don’t want to lose yet another tie to him.
I stall halfway up the stairs and glance again at the overgrown garden where the cluster of dead roses sways in the wind. Is that what the guy was doing earlier? Fighting a battle against weeds? Considering what was left in his wake, it looks more like he’s the weed himself, like the phantom in the stories—someone who contaminates his surroundings with death and violence.
An outcast like me . . .
I haven’t always affected things around me adversely. I used to be the one Dad would come to when any of his plants were dying. Maybe that’s why I’m here, to find that healing side again . . . to save this garden. Maybe that’s why the gardener’s glinting eyes appeared so familiar—it was my imagination, trying to revive those
precious moments with Dad.
I’m totally losing it. I tap the end of my braid against my lips, nipping at the strands so they crinkle between my teeth.
“Rune, you’re chewing your hair, hon.” Mom pats my back.
“Did you see him?” I ask.
“Who?” She follows my gaze across to the garden.
“The guy by the roses earlier. He’s gone now. I think he works here . . .”
“What did he look like?” she asks.
“I could only see half his face.”
She rolls her eyes then looks over my head where the chauffer digs bags out of the limo’s trunk. “You’re not seriously asking me to believe you just saw the phantom in his half-mask, are you?”
“I didn’t say that,” I mumble around my wet hair. “Not exactly.” But now that I think about it, the side that was hidden from view could’ve had a mask.
Mom catches my braid and dries the end between her palms. “Sweetie, I understand you’re nervous. But I really need you to try. Stop convincing yourself this is going to be a bad experience before you even give it a chance. Okay?”
She kisses my forehead when I nod. I don’t dare tell her about the crow and its strange call. It would only validate what she left unsaid: that it’s all in my imagination.
As we reach the top step, the double doors—adorned with tarnished brass cherubs—swing open on a foreboding creak. Warm air and the scents of lemon oil and stale candle wax waft over us.
“Bon après-midi, mon chéri Emma!” An older woman squeals my mom’s name. The opening widens, revealing her height, taller than our average five-foot-six-inch stature by at least two inches.
Long, grayish-white braids dangle over both of her ears and skim her slim waist. A silk chiffon hanky wraps around her head to hold back stray strands. Round, gold-rimmed glasses soften the wrinkles at the edges of her eyes.
She’s dressed in a blue button-down short-sleeve shirt and khaki capri pants. Ballet-style slippers hug her feet. Judging by the dingy apron at her hipbones and the dust rag in her pocket, I’m guessing she’s with housekeeping.