Page 80 of Once Upon an Enchanted Castle

An ethereal mist crept through the trees, thick and unnatural, as the beast sat on the edge of the forest, his keen eyes focused on the small manor house she called Hawthorne Hall.

Something had changed. A subtle tremor in the world his wolf senses picked up. He could not name it, or explain it, but it was there. Stirring. Shifting. Coming.

It was not the wind he sensed. It was something else. More determined. More desperate. More dangerous. His senses pricked against the air. His instincts were on edge. The brand on his foreleg burned with a wicked intensity.

A ripple in the curse.

Theveil-shadewere coming. The curse was no longer dormant.

It was awoken by something or someone.

He glanced at the girl’s library window. For a brief time, yellow light flickered there. He saw movement through the opaque lace curtains. And then the light snuffed out abruptly. No more movement there, either.

Perhaps the girl left the room.

She was not safe. He knew this. He sensed this with a deep thrumming through him. His paws padded through the garden to the front of the manor house where the strange man who threatened her parked his carriage. Marks from the wheels still showed in the dirt.

Overhead, only the quiet stars twinkling in the night. The moon barely a crescent. His time was near. The time when he would transform for the last time. He swung his head toward the door, thinking of the girl there. The one who told him to go back into the shadows.

She protected him. As he protected her. She sensed he wanted to pounce on the pompous man who threatened her, who threatened him.

A clatter of distant wheels out on the road caught his attention. His head snapped in that direction, his sharp eyes piercing the darkness. There was nothing and no one.

But then he caught sight of it. The shadows moving against the wind when there was nothing. Forming shapes in the unnatural mist.

He knew who and what they were. He knew they were coming for her, for the book.

He dropped his head and growled low and deep in his throat. His front paws were spread, ready to pounce.

This was his last stand against theveil-shade. And he was not going to let them get to the girl behind that closed door.

He would stop them or die trying.

Chapter 33

Faintsunlightslashedacrossher closed eyes. The moment she came awake, she sat up, panic lancing through her.

It was past dawn.

The book was no longer in her arms. Frantically, she searched the area. The book had slid to the floor. It was upside down, the pages curled against the floor. Her parchment was scattered across the rug. She hastily picked up the papers, gathering them together. She put them inside the pages of the book.

Before she flipped it closed, she noticed something different. Every single page had a blooming rose on the page. Even the pages she had not yet read.

What did it mean? That the book held no more secrets? The curse was broken? Or—worse—the curse was forever?

She had to get to Leopold. She dashed from the room, flinging open the door and rushing into the hallway.

And halted in the foyer.

She gaped at the open casement.

There was no longer a door. And what remained was nothing more than shredded, splintered wood. As if something had tried to claw its way into the manor. Her heart thumped a wild beat.

What happened? She didn’t recall hearing anything the night before, but she had been so tired she must have slept through whatever it was that tried to get inside.

Stepping closer, she saw droplets of blood on the floor inside the doorway.

“Oh, gods,” she whispered.

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