Mark of Betrayal (Dark Secrets #3)(161)
Author: A.M. Hudson

“Are you okay, Ara?” David came up beside me.

I flattened the doll’s hair and hugged her to my chest before placing her back and tucking the blanket around her. “It’s so sad. What happened here?”

“She died.”

“How?”

“Some say it was losing the summer, some say it was heartache.”

I touched the torn white curtain over her bed, unthreading a web from the base. “How old was she?”

“She would have been nine the year she died, as far as I’ve read.”

“What was her name?”

“Evangeline—The Rose of Winter. She was born on the first day it snowed that year, with lips red as a rose, and there was never a more loved little girl.”

“Evangeline? Wasn’t Lilith’s granddaughter named Evangeline, too—my ancestor?”

“Something I’ve learned recently?” he said, like he was asking if I wanted to know. “None of Lilith’s children reached adulthood. Everything we’ve been taught about her is lies. I’m not sure how your bloodline survived, but I’m starting to wonder if you’re even related to Lilith.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.”

“So…this Evangeline—” I nodded around the room, “—isn’t the one I descended from?”

“Not in the version of the story I read.”

I took a moment to combine that with the information Arthur had given me about Drake and his reasons for killing Lilith. “What broke her heart so badly—Evangeline? Why did she lose the summer?”

He wandered over to the rug, then bent down and picked something up, dusting it off as he stood. “Here.”

“What is that?” I reached for it, smiling when I felt its round body, smooth and cool in my palm. “An apple?”

“Her father Christian, Lilith’s first husband, had this preserved in gold for Eve when she had her accident. It was his way of bringing some of the outside back to a little girl who would never see it again.”

“So, what happened?” I spun the apple between my fingers softly.

He sat down on Eve’s bed. “She liked to play in the orchards, back when we still grew apples here. But, one winter, she went down there alone and climbed the oak tree where the workers would sit for lunch, but her foot slipped. She fell.”

“And she died?”

“No. She was paralysed. If she’d been of age, they would have given her blood, but they were afraid it would trigger immortality and she would be trapped as a child for eternity. So, they prayed. But as the weeks passed, that vibrant, spirited little girl became a ghost, and she grew ill. She died before she saw the summer again, and I guess they locked this room off to forget.”

“How do you know all that?” I sat beside him, sinking into the mattress.

“I’ve been doing some reading.”

“Is there a book about all this?”

“There are some. But this was in a maid’s diary—at Elysium.”

“Can you get it for me—when you go there?”

“Of course. I already planned to bring you all the books, anyway. I just need to take a car with me next time so I can collect all the stuff from my old room, too.”

I looked down at the apple, polishing it with my fingertip; it was small, for an apple—only the size of a plum. “Why is it so tiny?”

“It was winter. Apples don’t grow in the winter.” He took it and studied it. “Legend has it that her father went down to the orchard to scream at the gods, and when he looked up at the oak tree, this was sitting on the branch his daughter had fallen from.”

I smiled. “You’re having me on. That’s a lie.”

He shook his head, closing my fingers around the apple. “This is just what I read. Wanna know something else?”

“Okay.”

“After Eve died, Lilith had the orchard torn down—forbid apples to be grown here or eaten here for the rest of eternity. But Christian, believing this apple to be a gift from the gods, couldn’t bear to tear that oak tree down. It now marks the centre of what once was the orchard.”

I looked up at him, my eyes becoming wide. “The field?”

He nodded, smiling.

“Wow. How come you never told me any of this?”

He shrugged. “We haven’t had a lot of time for small talk, Ara. And I only read this one a few weeks ago. I might even be wrong about whose room this was.”

“Will you tell me more stories?” I said, using the bedpost to stand myself up as David wandered across the room again, touching everything.

“Of course.” He stopped by the armchair and picked up the book, his lips turning down with thought.

“What were they reading?”

“No title.” He held the cover up.

“Can I have the book?” I asked. “Like, can I keep it?”

He placed it in my hand. “It belongs to you, I guess—all this stuff does.”

“No.” I placed the apple and the book on the dresser next to a small wooden jewellery box. “It belongs to Evangeline.”

“I’m sure she won’t care. She’s dead.”

“Even still. It doesn’t seem right.” I opened the jewellery box and smiled when I saw the collection of trinkets Eve saved; there was a lock of golden hair, tied with a pink ribbon, which might have been hers—beside that was an oval pendant on a long silver chain and a small bracelet with a flat name plaque. I picked it up and traced the letters, reading them aloud.

“What did you just say?” David appeared beside me.

“Morgana.” I held the bracelet up.

He took it and studied it carefully. “I thought she was just a myth.”

“Who?”

“Morgana.”

“Who was she?”

“No one knows. I’ve read parchments that mentioned a lost child, and found only one that named her, but never any proof that she existed.”

“Maybe she died as a child, too.”

He shook his head and placed the bracelet against my arm. “Not if this was hers. It would fit a girl who was grown—beyond childhood.”

I looked back at the wooden box. “I wonder what it’s doing in here then.”

“I don’t know.” He picked up the little box, placed the bracelet in it and closed the lid, looking at the base, the sides and the top.

“What are you doing?”

“Ah!” he said, spotting something in the mess of fake jewels and other ornaments. He picked up a small crank handle, pressed it into the side of the box, then wound it around and set the box down again, taking a step back. “Open it.”