The Cursed Blood novel · Chapter 12 of 32
Chapter 12: Postcard
"The same week," I said.
"Signed on the Monday. She died on the Thursday."
Thursday.
Mushroom day.
The day she came up the mountain to breathe.
I sat down on the step because my legs decided it for me.
Conall sat beside me. The snow came down on both of us and neither of us brushed it off.
"Why didn't you tell me the first night?" I said. "At the warden house."
"Because I didn't know." He rubbed his face with both hands. "I had a date and a feeling. You had a dead mother. I wasn't going to hand you a feeling."
"And now?"
"Now the heir's handed you the sale."
Down the path, Hettie came trudging back up from the spring, alone, with her nightshirt soaked to the knee.
She stopped when she saw us.
"He got on the horse," she said. "He nearly fell off the other side. The horse looked at me like it was my fault." She looked from my face to Conall's. "What happened?"
I told her.
She sat down on my other side, so I was between them on the step.
She didn't say anything clever.
She just took my hand and held it in her lap, and the three of us sat there until the fire went low behind us.
At some point I took the postcard out of my dress pocket.
I'd carried it every day since I found it.
Stand on the stones. They remember.
"I've been reading it wrong," I said.
"How do you read it?" Hettie said.
"Stand at the stones. Stand by them. Stand among them, like we do every round." I turned it over. "She didn't write among. She wrote on."
Keep reading free with an account. Start The Cursed Blood from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.
← Chapter 11 · All chapters · Chapter 13 →
Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend