On the morning of December 31st, a heavy silence had settled over the mansion. Snow had battered the windows all night; by morning, the world was buried beneath a white shroud. While getting dressed, I stood before the mirror, shirt, waistcoat, jacket… everything had to look perfect. The servants' fingers worked deftly, smoothing the fabric, sharpening the line of my shoulders, closing the collar.
I studied my reflection carefully. On my face, despite a full day having passed, there were still faint but visible marks, scratches from fingernails. Depending on the angle of the light, they sometimes disappeared, sometimes surfaced as a purplish shadow. I brought my fingers to my chin; perhaps I should have torn her head off that day. I don't understand why I keep showing restraint every time.
Elora appeared at the door. Today she was exceptionally elegant. Her hair cascaded in soft waves over her shoulders, and the new ribbons she wore matched her dress perfectly colors blending harmoniously, subtle yet unmistakably eye-catching. Her eyes were sparkling.
"Brother," she said, stepping closer, "do you think the new year will be a good one?"
I looked at her through the mirror; the corner of my lips curved into a vague smile. Turning toward her, I stroked her chin.
"It will certainly be better than the last one, my dear."
Just then, there was a knock at the door. When Laurence entered, his shoulders tensed instinctively. He glanced around and grimaced.
"God," he said, "even though this mansion has been renovated, it still gives me the creeps."
As he rubbed his arms, Jasper came up behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder. Laurence jumped.
"Don't be disrespectful to our family home, brother," Jasper said with a faint smile. "Let's go downstairs, let's not keep the guests waiting."
Laurence suddenly focused on my face.
"What happened to your cheeks, brother?"
The corner of my mouth and the skin beneath my eyes twitched. My anger was still a weight inside me.
That night, after I had wrapped my hand around Jane's throat, I watched her eyes drift, her face darken in the gloom. As the pulse beneath my hand slowed, I heard footsteps in the corridor someone was waking up, or perhaps they had been awake all along. The only way Miss Jane could have made it into my bed was with help. But the meals we ate weren't consumed by servants alone. That meant she had received help from one of them but which one? Had Thornwick grown too old to notice?
When I released her throat, she collapsed to the floor, coughing and gasping for air. I was beginning to regain control of my knees.
"You," I said, breathless. "Get out of here. Once the paralysis fully leaves me, I will search for you in this mansion and its surroundingsmand if I find you, I will tear you apart. I am completely serious. I am so furious that I want to see the flesh I carve from your thigh served on my table. Leave before I find you, Jane."
While she was still on the floor clutching her throat, I shouted at her face:
"Run! Go! What are you waiting for!?"
Fifteen minutes after she left, the very first thing I did was turn toward the window. I looked down through the gap; a man was hurriedly ushering the flustered Miss Jane into a car amid that storm. So the mole was a man.
I pressed the hand that had just held her life against the cold glass and watched her go.
"Thank God, she's leaving. I hope she makes it home safely." I rested my forehead against the icy surface of the window without realizing it. "Happy New Year, Jane." My voice came out gentle and sincere in a way even I couldn't quite explain. How was it that I became one person when she was beside me, and another when she was leaving? I brought the hand that had felt her heartbeat to my mouth, inhaled its scent deeply.
"Stupid woman. I wish you could have gotten pregnant. Then I could have watched you for nine months. Now the time we could spend together is limited; when I kill Godfrey, you'll die too. And that time is close."
I hated the thought of killing Godfrey, because then there would no longer be a presence circling me with his schemes, his intelligence, his straight black hair. I sat back down on my bed and buried my face in my hands. The emptiness inside me, which I thought had lessened, only grew larger. I wanted to kill Miss Jane wanted even to see her dead but somehow, if she lay silently on a slab with a still body, she wouldn't speak to me. There were still reactions I wanted to see on her face, in the particular shade I craved, and time was limited.
Seconds were passing too quickly without my consent; I wanted to freeze time on the night of November 16th. Why was I constantly thinking about that night? I was the one bleeding, yet she was the one drenched in my blood. I hadn't even managed to get her pregnant so why had that night been special? I felt that I would never experience nights like that again.
Now two different things stood at opposite ends of the scale: Jane, and my appetite for killing. I was aware that the balance was swaying.
Killing was my art, my profession, a painting that defined me, the way I found relief. Jane, on the other hand, was a barren woman someone I feared growing bored of, someone I believed could erase the emptiness inside me forever if I involved her in my work, yet if she left, I would lose the first puzzle I had ever enjoyed, the one I wanted to complete. She had been honest with me today, and I was certain of it; the puzzle had come to me and begun solving itself. And yet I was accumulating curiosity about the parts of her I still didn't know. For instance, what game had she loved to play as a child? How had she killed her mother? By accident, or deliberately? What had she felt? Was it her first murder? What else was there between her and Godfrey? What color did she like? Or her favorite food? There were so many things I didn't know about her that my questions had no limits. And that was what frightened me. I was afraid of not growing bored of her as much as I was afraid of growing bored. If my interest in her outweighed my interest in killing, I would feel as though I were betraying my devotion to murder.
When I pulled away from my thoughts, I looked at my brothers, who were waiting for an answer after my long silence. I came back to myself and smiled.
"This mansion unsettles me too. I must have scratched myself too much."
Jasper shrugged. "I told you, Laurence. This place is creepy."
"All right, all right. I'll go with the majority, this place is bad. If only Hogmanay would end so we could leave."
Elora was the first to reach the door. "Let the day begin so it can end." As Jasper followed her, I grabbed Laurence by the arm and stopped him. "We'll catch up with you in a bit." After ordering the servants to leave, Laurence and I were alone in the room.
"Is there a problem, brother?"
"Laurence, I've never felt this cornered before."
"Alright," he said, focusing. "What are the options?"
"Miss MacLeod and the corpses that fill my void."
I could see the surprise on his face especially in his eyes. "What's making this difficult? Aren't you going to kill Miss MacLeod anyway? Then why is she among the options?"
He looked at my silence, then his surprise doubled. "Oh. This could be a problem. Especially for you."
I began pacing the room. "I want to kill her, truly. But will I be able to endure her silence?"
"Why wouldn't you? You lived before that woman existed."
"I wasn't having as thrilling a time as I do with her."
"And what do you think will happen when the thrill fades?"
"A vast emptiness as if no matter whom I kill, it won't be enough. But what, am I not going to kill her and play house instead? I want her to speak as much as I want, and to be silent as much as she is silent." I stopped. "I want her to look at me but I also want to gouge out those eyes. I want to take her heart from between her ribs and keep it, yet even if I did that, I feel I still wouldn't truly possess her." One hand on my waist, I wiped the sweat gathered on my brow with the other, breathing deeply. "My God…"
Laurence spoke behind me. "So you like her, your victim."
My eyes flew open in shock; my entire body went cold. I turned my head, then my body, toward him. "Do I?"
"What happens when a hunter feels sympathy for his prey, brother?" He touched my shoulder as if to console me. "He lets it escape. You can't expect a lion to approach a deer gently. Even if you're gentle and it accepts, the paw you raise to love becomes its claw."
"Are you telling me to kill her?"
"No… either leave Miss MacLeod alone to live a life separate from you… or kill her properly and accept her absence." He walked toward the door. "I hope I've been helpful, again. Come along without keeping the guests waiting."
Either Miss Jane or a magnificent bloody signature…
As I descended the stairs, the mansion slowly came to life. Fireplaces were lit, candles were kindled, the sound of footsteps increased at the front door. In the center of the hall, everyone gathered with a vague sense of expectation.
According to Scottish tradition:
The burdens of the old year must not remain in the house. Doors are swept, trash is thrown out.
For someone like me, this is nothing but a mockery of the past; because in this house, the past isn't truly dead. No matter how much I renovate it, its old air still lingers there with the memories.
Toward evening, the cold sharpened, the snow intensified. The guests came down to the hall in heavy garments. Laurence played music with the musicians; first he sat at the piano, then took up the violin.
Champagne circulated, but everyone drank sparingly; the night would be long. As for me, I wasn't inclined to drink, after what happened the other day, it didn't sit right with me. Besides, I still hadn't questioned the mole among the servants, nor had I even mentioned it to Thornwick. As much as I trusted him, a single mistake of his had put me in a difficult position. He, too, was suspicious.
As the hour approached eleven, conversations slowed. Curtains were drawn; the fire in the fireplace was stoked higher.
Normally, if we were in the city, bells would have rung, but since we were far from it, Auld Lang Syne was sung an old Scottish poem written by Robert Burns in 1788. Then the music stopped, and the chime of the clock was heard.
Now glances kept drifting toward the door. There was a silent tension over who would take the first step into the new year.
The door opened.
Blond Godfrey entered.
For a moment, time stopped. Whispers ceased, glasses hung suspended in midair. If the first person to enter through an unlocked door was blond, it was an ill omen. That sense of misfortune spread inexplicably through the hall. No one voiced it, but the silence said enough.
Jasper couldn't endure the atmosphere any longer. He began to wander the hall, threw remarks at a few people, laughed, pulled someone into a dance. The tension slowly dissolved beneath the sound of his voice and his movements. Laurence took the violin in hand; when the bow touched the strings, the music rose toward the ceiling of the hall.
Elora stood beside me as well. She leaned lightly against my shoulder, her gaze roaming over the crowd.
Godfrey was wearing a suit; the fabric reflected the lights of the mansion, and its cut fit his tall body flawlessly. His hair was more meticulously styled than ever, clearly arranged especially for today, not a single strand left to chance. He took a glass from a servant and walked toward me, cutting through the crowd. I was surprised, because I was certain he didn't drink. The ease in his steps didn't diminish in the slightest, despite the weight of all the eyes upon him.
When he reached me, he lowered his voice.
"Why is everyone staring at me? Did I do something wrong?"
"There's no problem, Godfrey. If the first person through the door is dark-haired, it's good luck; if blond, it's ill omen... that's all."
Godfrey raised an eyebrow, a half-smile forming on his lips.
"So you're saying I've ruined everyone's lives for an entire year, Mr. Adrian?"
"That's one way to put it," I said calmly. "But it's just superstition."
Godfrey didn't take even a small sip of his drink; it merely stood in his hand as decoration. His eyes wandered around the hall the sound of the violin, the whispers, the dancing couples… Then, when he turned his gaze back to me, I began to speak.
"How are things going?"
"At last, the Crow Father showed me his art."
"What was your first thought?"
"That it was impressive. As if whoever did it had taken special care… for me." His eyes gleamed as he said this.
I smiled and took a very small sip of my drink. "Where has it ever been seen that a detective praises a killer?"
"I appreciate everyone's work; it's just that sometimes certain works stand in opposition to others. That's what's happening here, I admire it, but that doesn't mean it won't be handed over to justice."
"Are you someone who would be satisfied with merely throwing such a serial killer into prison? Would that satisfy you, Mr. Godfrey?"
He chuckled, his face flushing slightly, then glanced at Elora, who was listening to us. "I won't speak too much about my own thoughts in the presence of your beautiful sister; I wouldn't want her to be afraid of me."
I placed my arm around Elora's shoulder. "Believe me, my sister Elora doesn't frighten easily."
"Is that so? Miss Elora, wouldn't you be afraid of me?"
Elora took a deep breath, her hands clasped in front of her.
"You should be afraid of me, Mr. Godfrey."
When Godfrey laughed without restraint, the focus of the entire room shifted to us. Sir Malcolm Reed and Lady Harrington, those recent fixtures of society, graced us with their presence.
"Won't you introduce us to this Englishman, Mr. Ravencroft?" they asked.
I tapped my glass with a spoon taken from a passing tray. "If I may have your attention. You're all familiar with the Crow Father how he cares nothing for class, high or low, how he devastates everyone so long as a life is taken. And our savior," I added, touching Godfrey's shoulder, "is the man appointed here: Mr. Alistair Godfrey. An excellent detective, some say even more handsome than I am."
Godfrey smiled and inclined his head to the room. "My thanks to Baron Adrian for such impeccable hospitality. He is a true gentleman. I hope one day you may eat from his hand, he is meticulous, clean, orderly. A veritable artist. Believe me, if I were to die, I would be delighted for his cuisine to be my last."
My polite smile froze for a heartbeat. As I lowered my glass from my lips, my gaze remained fixed on Godfrey. The air in the hall tightened visibly with that final sentence. A few guests cut their laughter short; some forced smiles, mistaking it for a subtle joke; others looked around, unsure of what they had just witnessed.
Elora squeezed my hand lightly. She was neither frightened nor retreating on the contrary, her eyes traced Godfrey's face with careful attention, weighing the meaning beneath his words.
At last I recovered and spoke... calmly, very calmly.
"What a delicate compliment," I said. "But I assure you, Mr. Godfrey, none of my guests are ever on the menu."
Godfrey's lips curved upward again.
"A pity," he said with a small shrug. "It seems we'll have to admire your works of art from afar."
Someone from the crowd interjected, eager to diffuse the tension.
"Quite a… unconventional conversation for a Hogmanay night."
"Edinburgh is an unconventional city," Godfrey replied. "If you're welcoming the new year here, you should be prepared to hear more than the usual wishes."
Laurence drew the bow across the violin strings with a touch more force; the music quickened, the dancers surrendered once more to the rhythm. Jasper slipped between a couple, pulling them laughing into the center of the floor, and slowly the room returned to its former clamor. Still, every ear strained, involuntarily, toward where Godfrey and I stood.
"Then," I said, never taking my eyes off him, "to art, to truth, and to the final night of the year."
"And," Godfrey added, his voice dropping just slightly, "to certain truths revealing themselves at precisely the right moment."
The glasses clinked. A thin chime spread through the hall.
As time crept on, the balance of the room had shifted without anyone noticing. Godfrey, amid gleaming fabrics and whispers, had been enclosed by a circle of women questions, laughter, deliberately lingering glances… The strangeness still clung to him, yet it did nothing to dim his handsomeness. Even so, his eyes, even at the loudest moments of conversation, stubbornly drifted back to me. It was as if, between fragments of broken sentences, he was calling me, like he had left something unsaid, or as though he wanted me to rescue him.
Just then, Mr. MacLeod approached and shook my hand. Business was discussed, numbers, estates, future plans, the railway line… Godfrey entered the conversation; his name was mentioned, a few measured remarks floated in the air. By the time the conversation ended, the hall had already fractured; each corner carried its own laughter, its own whispered secrets.
A hand found my arm from behind. It tugged downward through the fabric hurried, but commanding. The woman wore a cloak; her face was lost in the shadow of the hood.
"Come upstairs, Adrian."
When I nodded, she melted back into the crowd and disappeared from sight. The hall was crowded anyway; it was hard for anyone to notice a single person missing. I finished my drink; the cold the glass left on my lips faded quickly. I turned toward the stairs. Even as I climbed, I felt the weight of a gaze on the nape of my neck; I was certain Godfrey was watching me.
The upper floor was dimmer. Behind closed doors came flirtatious conversations, suppressed laughter, voices that rose and fell abruptly. I slowed my steps. Where was the woman?
"Which one is your room?" said a voice from behind.
I walked ahead and showed the way. I opened the door; we went into my room.
"I don't recall inviting you, Margaret."
Margaret lowered the hood of her cloak. Her face emerged into the light.
"Why didn't you invite me?"
I stepped closer; my fingers paused on her cheek, stroking it as if reading her skin. I looked into her eyes.
"How did you get inside?" This time my question was sharper. I could see that my touch frightened her; she was struggling even to swallow.
"Is my love nothing more than a game to you?"
"You have no idea how busy I am."
Margaret took a step closer. Her words sharpened, each syllable heavier than the last.
"But you can make time for me right now, so you do have time."
My jaw tightened involuntarily. I loosened my fingers, then clenched them again; it was obvious I was at the limit of my patience. The only reason I wasn't killing her at that moment wasn't just the guests downstairs, it was the presence of Godfrey, whom I was certain had followed me.
"For God's sake, Margaret, what do you want from me right now, this very minute?"
The woman fell silent for a moment. She took a breath; her chest rose slightly she had been nurturing this sentence inside her for years.
"Your love. That's what I've wanted from you from the very beginning."
A void appeared in my gaze. I was so angry with her that, perhaps for the first time, I spoke honestly.
"I can't give it. Don't ask me for something I don't even understand."
Those words tore something loose in Margaret's face. Her eyes darkened; her lips thinned into a narrow line.
"If you won't give it to me…" she said, her voice dropping almost to a whisper, "…then I don't want you to give it to anyone."
Her movement was swift; the dagger she secretly drew from beneath her cloak caught the light. When it plunged into my abdomen, the presence of metal inside me was clearer than anything else in the room.
Her face tightened with a brief flash of pain, but there was no panic; she hadn't even aimed for the right spot to kill me. Before Margaret could pull the blade back, I lunged forward and wrapped her in a tight embrace. My arms were firm enough to keep her from escaping; my breathing, despite the pain, was steady.
Margaret struggled in shock.
"What are you doing? Why are you hugging me?"
I rested my face against her shoulder.
"Even though you wounded me, I—" I cut myself off. When I drew my head back slightly, I looked at her with a bitter expression, tinged even with disgust. My lips twisted as if I were about to retch.
"—love you. Is that what you wanted to hear?"
I leaned in. Before Margaret had time to object, I pressed my lips to hers. My only chance was the shadow cast under the door by the corridor light.
The door burst open, slamming into the wall under the force of a kick. Cold air and noise flooded the room. The person standing in the doorway was etched into the frame by the darkness of his suit; his blond hair was disheveled, his gaze locked onto the scene inside.
"How very clever, Mr. Adrian. Stopping the culprit by playing with her emotions before she can escape? Ingenious."
Idiot, Godfrey. Idiot. Was this really the moment to say that?
Margaret's body trembled in my arms. Her earlier fury gave way to a panic that was beginning to unravel. Tears spilled from her eyes; her voice broke.
"Did you… deceive me?"
Everything was already out of control. As Margaret recoiled, her arm tensed involuntarily, and the dagger tore free from my flesh with a wet, dull sound.
My breath was naturally cut short. As warmth spread together with the pain, my shirt darkened quickly. The weight of my body had shifted; I clenched my teeth to steady my steps.
As blood slipped through my fingers, I didn't take my eyes off Margaret. There was neither shock nor regret on my face.
Godfrey's gaze moved to my wound; his eyes narrowed. The room held only the sound of my growingly labored breathing and the muffled noises of the distant celebration.
As my vision dimmed, a hum of voices rang in my ears.
"You're incompetent, Miss Wood. If you're going to do it, at least do it properly."
My tongue didn't move, but inwardly I was saying, No, Godfrey. Don't provoke her.
"What are you saying?"
"But I can't allow Mr. Adrian to die like this… after all… he is my… dear… friend."