The Vanishing at Loxby Manor by Abigail Wilson (grave mercy .TXT) 📕

Hardly anything was left of the curved stone cloisters of Kinwich Abbey, but I recognized the glowing remains straightaway—alonely remnant of another time, another place. The people who lived around the village of East Whitloe believed the ruinsof the old abbey still housed the ghostly spirit of a monk who once lived there. As girls, Seline and I had been too scaredto venture anywhere near the rubble.

I shook my head. Seline and I were girls no longer. My hand inched over my lips as I stared into the abyss. Whoever placedthat light within the cloisters had drawn Seline racing from the house to meet them.

Chapter 2

I ate the supper on my tray by the bow window as I listened to the ebb and flow of the wind, my gaze glued to the light flickeringamid the ruins of Kinwich Abbey. Who exactly had Seline scrambled from the house to meet, and what on earth did she have planned?

I tucked my feet beneath my nightgown and tipped my head against the window’s hard wooden frame. June’s daytime warmth hadvanished with the sun and ushered in the cool, layered depths of nightfall in the countryside. Nearby tree branches whippedback and forth in the moonlight while the growing gusts charged against Loxby’s ancient stones.

The wind had always fascinated me. I suppose it was the pure relentlessness of it. Heaven’s invisible hand sweeping over theworld. Sometimes it was as light as a feathered touch, a soft whisper on my skin, and other times a fevered fury that leftnothing untouched. My father once explained that the wind was a promise of things to come. He said all we needed to do waslisten to its call.

Another strong gust pounded the wall and my heart lurched. It was not an evening to be out and about. Why had I ever let Selineleave?

As I sat quivering on the window seat, still exhausted from the events of the day, the hours stretched on endlessly. The remains of my supper grew cold on the tray. Yet I could not abandon my post, not when Seline was out there somewhere in the gloom. I glanced at the clock for the hundredth time. Eleven thirty. Where on earth could she be? Whatever she had planned, she hadn’t indicated it would take all that long.

A great deal of time had passed since she escaped my room, yet the strange beacon on the hill remained fixed in place. Theimpulse to leave the house and initiate a search wavered in and out of my mind, charging my nerves for flight. But it hadbeen so long since I’d ventured into Loxby’s expansive woods, and I’d promised myself in Ceylon that I’d never be so foolishabout my surroundings again. Besides, I had little chance of finding my way in the darkness. I pressed the palm of my handto my forehead. Why had I ever agreed to her ridiculousness?

The pit-pat of rain tickled the window, and I sat up just in time to see the light on the hill jolt and weave.

I pushed the drapes aside and pressed in close. The dithering glow seemed to vacillate then split in two, the smaller lightbobbing its way toward Loxby, while the larger simply disappeared into the opposing hillside.

I kept my focus on the small glow as it crawled toward the house, dipping in and out of the trees, up and over the gradualcurve of the land. I was forced to wait several minutes until a dimly lit figure scampered across the rose garden and I wasrewarded by the outline of a black cloak.

I released a trapped breath. The onset of the drizzle must have sent Seline scurrying back to the house. Thank goodness. Isat for a moment, then took a few relieved steps onto the rug.

A door slammed somewhere in the distance, and Loxby’s old walls seemed to groan in response. Muffled footsteps resonated through the twisting corridors of the ground floor, and then an unexpected silence took hold.

I stood for some time in the center of my room completely still, straining to hear the least movement beyond my door. Butthe quiet was deafening. Slowly, the hair began to rise on my arms.

Seline would have to venture back this way. The side stairs were the fastest and easiest way to the family wing. I inchedto my bedchamber door and cracked it open, peering into the blackened hall. Surely it would only be a moment before my dearfriend crested the stairs and I could calm my frantic heart.

“Seline,” I whispered into the gloom.

Nothing.

I tied my dressing gown a bit tighter about my waist and tiptoed to the edge of the steps. “Seline.”

Again, nothing but my heartbeat throbbing against my ears.

Where was she? I stared down the curved stairwell then fleetingly at my bedchamber door. It was possible she had taken analternate way to her room. Perhaps she did not wish to discuss anything further with me tonight. I knit my brow—that is, ifit was indeed Seline who had entered the house. My chest tightened.

I would never sleep if I didn’t find out for certain.

Seline had occupied the same bedchamber at Loxby for all the years I knew her. Perhaps a quick peek in her room would easemy mind, and then I could make my way back to bed. The silvery haze of moonlight would be ample to guide my slippered steps.I secured the ribbons on my robe and turned down the main corridor.

Little had changed at the manor house in the years I’d been away—the same floor-length paintings hung in the hall, the sparse furniture with a flair for the Orient, the familiar white wainscoting that appeared gray in the dim light—every inch conjured a memory from my past.

It didn’t even occur to me that I might need to be cautious until I heard a cough a few paces from the door to Seline’s room.

Not any cough, mind you—a deep, manly cough. My gaze snapped to my robe. Heaven help me if I’d