The Lady in Yellow: A Victorian Gothic Romance (35 page)

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Authors: Alyne de Winter

BOOK: The Lady in Yellow: A Victorian Gothic Romance

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The dog
whined, adding to the sorrows of the night.

Someone was sobbing close by as if her heart would break.

Veronica tore away from Rafe and stumbled toward the sound. Kneeling in the snow, her face glazed with tears, was Jacqueline. And lying at her knees was Sovay.

The silver bullet had torn through Sovay's yellow bodice, but there was no blood. Her limbs splayed out brokenly, she gazed up at the millions of stars twinkling across the black expanse of the sky. Her lips did not move, but Veronica heard her voice clearly in the air.

Why did you not love me, Rafe? If only you had loved me, we could have ended this curse long ago.

"Mamma, Mamma," Jacqueline sobbed, grabbing Sovay's hand. "We loved you. Jacques and I. We did."

Veronica's heartbeat thudded in her head. She trembled with sorrow and dismay. “I never wanted to use that gun," she said to Sovay. "It’s all so sad, so tragic. Now, all I can do is pray for you.”

Sovay looked at Veronica as if she’d said something absurd. Then she laughed, her voice as hard as glass.

As if aroused by Sovay’s laughter, Rafe began moaning. He was alive! Veronica ran to him, and fell to her knees at his side.

“Oh, my darling!”

She bent over him, and peered into his face, searching for life in his sea-blue eyes. He rose up, grabbed her by the shoulders, and held her close.

"My love! My love!"
he whispered

"Oh, Rafe!" Veronica pulled him to her and held on as if at any moment, he, too, would vanish into mist.

"I can't live without you. Say you're mine, Veronica!" His blue eyes, so open and full of love, captured hers, and she fell into them. Oh, those beautiful words! How much she had longed to hear them!

She
pointed over at Jacqueline crying over a heap of yellow clothes in the snow.

"Jacqueline!"

At the sight of her father come back to life, Jacqueline jumped up and ran into his arms.

"Papa!"

Kissing the top of his daughter's head, Rafe glanced over at Sovay. Veronica followed his gaze. Smoky fumes were rising from the yellow-gowned body. Smoke billowed and swirled, then faded away.

"It's over now. It's over now," Rafe murmured into
Veronica's hair.

Jacqueline
seemed to struggle for words. It was over and yet not over, would never be entirely over now that Jacques was gone.

Rafe stood up, pulling Jacqueline with him, and drew Veronica close. Clinging together, they watched a
nother body materialize where Sovay had been, a pale, slender girl dressed in a medieval gown of costly yellow brocade with heavy embroidery. Lustrous golden hair spilled out around a face of rare beauty marred by a coy, sneering smile. There was an odd, moonlit glow to this lady in yellow, a fluidic film of dross, of blood, and of every kind of hunger. Dead she was, yet still wanton and alive with demonic power.

Her green eyes swiveled toward Veronica and Rafe. She smiled as if she thought to join them in their love. She tried to rise on one elbow, but weakness overcame her and she collapsed back onto the snow.
A spurt of blood appeared at her heart where the silver bullet had done its work.

Veronica tugged Rafe’s shirt, coaxing him to turn away. But he continued to stare at the lady in yellow twisting and turning as she burned from within. Sparks rose from the body, embers crackled. The strong smell of sulfur blew up followed by waves of smoke as yellow as the decayed medieval gown that now clung
to the long, fine bones of the wicked libertine, the werewolf.

Veronica hid her face against Rafe’s chest. He pulled her and Jacqueline
to him and held them tight. They stood together, warm in each other’s arms, until the silence was broken by the sound of a bell ringing. As it rang, another change occurred. Stretched out on the snow, dim and lightless without her birch bark hat, was Sovay, her yellowed shroud stained over the heart with blood.

“She was possessed,” said Veronica.

“She was beautiful,” he said. "But she wasn't who she should have been."

“Do we have to burn her?” Veronica said. “I couldn’t bear to burn her.”

“I’ll put her in the silver coffin,” he said. “Where she’ll be safe. And we’ll all be safe.”

Veronica felt under Rafe's hair, found the blood on his neck. "Darling, you
are
injured."

She showed Rafe the blood on her fingers.

He felt his neck and frowned at his own bloodied hand. "It's a little sore. I must have been grazed by a bullet."

"A silver bullet."

"Perhaps it was just what I needed," he said.

Veronica turned to Jacqueline who was beaming a smile through her tears. "You were very brave, my dear, to leap to our rescue like that."

"I didn't know what I was doing," Jacqueline said. "I just wanted the fighting to stop."

“Let’s get Mrs. Twig out of the tower,” Veronica said.

“In a moment,” said Rafe. He gathered Veronica close and caught her lips in a deep, slow kiss.

As Veronica felt Rafe’s very human, very male body surround her, she knew the Creation had returned to its rightful order. The spirit of the Beast was truly vanquished, dissolved into dust with the lady in yellow.

E
pilogue

T
he enchantment was over for the living.

Janet and Peggy cooked up a feast for them all. Jack chose to remain Jacqueline in honor of her other half, who had died as Jacques, and would go on, as the boy twin, to Heaven. He and Sylvie, lying in marble coffins, reverted to a state of mortal decay.

Mrs. Twig returned to her rightful self. Dropping her guard with the dissipation of the curse, her true personality emerged. Loyal and funny, still a trifle mad, Mrs. Twig went back to her housekeeping a new woman.

Sovay’s corpse was laid in the silver casket, locked in with a padlock and wound round with a chain woven with briar roses that was secured, again, with another pendant lock. Pray God they would hold her in.

Rafe's wound was deeper than he thought. The silver bullet was lodged in his shoulder. He would only allow a doctor in France to remove it, one whom, Veronica sensed, knew the family's secrets.

Veronica had a question for Jacqueline that she’d never thought to ask in all the chaos of before.

“Why did you put those dolls in the well? And sing those songs? What were you doing?”

Jacqueline laughed and then grew somber, looking at her shoes as she spoke. “Mamma killed so many children, we had to save them. We thought if we wished hard enough, they would not become werewolves.”

"Why did you sing that song?"

"Mamma dragged most of the bodies away so they wouldn't be found. We knew where they'd been buried, so we sang it." Jacqueline looked down, remembering. "Sometimes the farmers shot one of the children, but they were already
werewolves."

"So they became vampyres."

"But the children we put in the well didn't do anything bad or wrong as they would have done. They couldn't pass through the water."

"What about the adults that were killed, like the farmers?'

Jacqueline looked away as if frightened at what she had to say. "Mamma, then the others, made those. Even Papa."

Veronica closed her eyes. Rafe
was
guilty. But how could Jacqueline be sure?

“And the lilies?” she asked.

Jacqueline’s eyes glazed over as if it were too difficult, too painful to remember.

“Lilies are for everlasting life.”

Everlasting life… But not necessarily in human form.
Veronica did not voice her worries. She stroked Jacqueline’s hair.

“Will you help me stitch my wedding veil now? It needs yards and yards of lace sewn all round the edges.”

“Oh yes!” Jacqueline perked right up. “I’d love to.”

It was a job to stop Wolfgang lying on the veil. He would not leave Jacqueline's side.



Rafe and Veronica were married in France, in the wooded garden of the Chateau Villeneuve.

Once the festivities were over, Jacqueline dragged Veronica through the house, talking non-stop about Jacques and all the things they'd loved doing together, showing her all the little hidden treasures, the tucked away rooms, the library of wicked books.

The black-winged moths were gone, the lady’s hand that had once turned into a wolf's paw when the moon was full, was reduced to bones.

At last they came to the room with the murals. One was of a great, fanged beast devouring a man, and the other was meant to be that of the lady in yellow. Jacqueline was dismayed to have nothing to show, for the image had faded. There was no longer a wolf, or a lady, only a streak of bright yellow pigment on a snow white wall.



Acknowledgments

This novel owes so much to the editorial insights of Cheryl Nance who does this critical work because she loves books and supports my literary efforts out of the goodness of her heart. Thank you Cheryl!

My beta readers, Indie filmmaker Katy Plancette and author
s Helen Landalf and Jay Palmer have given great encouragement as well as spotting the many typos I was too blind to see. Thanks you as well!

Many thanks go to Paul Coleman
for his strong support and marketing suggestions. He has helped a lot.

I am grateful to Angela Holmes form Design to the Nines, as well as Joy from
Indie Author Services. Both of these amazing digital artists have contributed a lot to this book.

My family and friends---thank you for just being there. I hope it has all been justified.

Thank you for reading this story. I hope you enjoyed it.

If you are interested in the further short stories and books by me, come to my blog
http://www.alynedewinter.com
and join my Newsletter. I offer a FREE book of your choice from anything on my BOOKS page that is currently available.

If you feel moved to write a review about this book, I would love to know what you think. That way I can write better books that you will enjoy.

The Lady in Yellow

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