A Cold Legacy Read Free

see him sit up and speak?” I asked.
    Balthazar’s lips folded in indecision. He’d developed a sweet protective instinct for Lucy, but he also wasn’t one to lie. “No, miss,” he admitted. “I was just outside the door. I think Miss Lucy . . . she might have wanted it badly enough to imagine it.”
    Bitter disappointment twisted my heart. Of course. We all wanted Edward back so badly that it was easy to hope for miracles. This was the boy who had come back to theisland to protect me, who’d understood both my dark and light sides. The only other person who had ever stood in my leaky London attic with a mangy dog and threadbare quilt and wanted nothing more out of life.
    My hand hovered a few inches above Edward’s shoulder. His eyes were closed, his face still as death. I felt his pulse; it was raging fast. The idea of him calmly sitting up and speaking seemed impossible. I didn’t blame Lucy for imagining it, though—only moments ago I’d been nearly desperate enough to believe the words of a fortune-teller.
    Lucy stumbled through the doorway with Montgomery behind her, medical bag in hand. He sank to his knees and checked Edward’s vital signs with the well-practiced skill of a surgeon.
    â€œWell?” Lucy asked anxiously.
    Montgomery set down his stethoscope. He wiped a hand over his face, but not before I saw the flicker of sadness there. The two men had once been at odds, but that had changed since Edward had sacrificed himself for us. Breaking the code in Father’s journals had revealed that Edward had been made with Montgomery’s own blood. Now he was the closest thing Montgomery had to a brother, in spirit and in flesh. “He’s still deep in the fever. His temperature is high, but it hasn’t broken.”
    â€œHe sat up,” Lucy insisted. “He looked right at me, and it was Edward , I swear. It wasn’t that monster.”
    The rest of us stood awkwardly, none of us willing to tell her what we were all thinking—that stress and sleepless nights were making her imagine things.
    â€œI know you care for him,” I said softly. “We all do. But we need to be prepared for any eventuality. The Beast was incredibly strong. The chances of Edward overpowering him aren’t high.”
    Lucy dragged a hand through her dark curls. Her eyes were bleary with exhaustion and just a touch of madness. “I swear, Juliet. I saw it. I saw him .”
    I touched her shoulder gently as Montgomery packed away his medical bag. “Come to bed, Lucy. You need rest. Let Montgomery watch over Edward for a while.”
    She started to object again but broke into a frustrated sob, and I led her across the hall to the room we shared. We climbed onto the straw mattress that made my skin itch even through the layers of my dress. Through the thin walls, I heard Montgomery pacing in the room next to ours, exchanging low words with Balthazar as they discussed how much longer Edward could survive the fever. My body was heavy with worry and sleep, and with the lingering words of the fortune-teller.
    I pulled the blanket tighter as the wind whistled outside. Lucy fell asleep quickly, exhausted. I watched the faint light play on her face as she slept through nightmares. The blanket had slipped from around her shoulders, replaced by a mantle of gooseflesh. I tucked the covers around her neck. In that space between awake and asleep, fears turned over in my head.
    Would we wake to find a cadaver wrapped in chains? Or would the Beast win, and Edward be lost to us forever?
    The thoughts worked my insides the way a bakerkneads tough bread. Father had won in life; now he was winning in death, too. He’d created Edward and now he was the arbiter of his destruction. I sank deeper into sleep, anger and worry tangling with the uneasy feeling from my meeting with the fortune-teller. Mind reading was impossible, I knew that. But then again, many things I