The Fire and the Earth: Glenncailty Castle, Book 2 by Lila Dubois Page A

light that cut across the floor was more silver than gold.
    Metal screamed, and she looked over to see Seamus and Séan opening the other windows, starting with those closest to the door.
    Bit by bit, the room was revealed with more clarity than the harsh light and shadow of the emergency lamps had allowed. Sorcha pressed shaking fingers over her lips as she looked at the walls. There were framed panes of glass with pressed flowers between them, shadow boxes opaque with dust, and delicate illustrations of Bible stories suitable for a nursery—Noah’s Ark, Jonah and the whale, and Christ kneeling among the children.
    A tipped-over rocking horse lay on a rug in the center of the room. A small table waited there, a vase that might have held flowers sitting atop it, strangely untouched by the chaos around it. There were other, smaller beds next to the first one they’d seen. The larger bed must have been for the nurse. Shredded white cloth hung from the ceiling over each of the bed frames—the remnants of pretty canopies. The scrolled sleigh-style bedframes were beautiful, though obscured by the mattresses, which were pulled off, one of which was ripped open and leaking horsehair. Whatever had happened in here had nearly destroyed the room.
    “I don’t see any valuables,” Seamus was saying. “It may have been looted at some point.”
    “All this destruction for some silver spoons?” Séan was tugging at a particularly stubborn window. When it was open, he turned around. “It’s a waste, you can see that whoever was here was loved.”
    Sorcha smiled. He was such a good man. He was right, this was clearly the nursery of the master of Glenncailty’s children. And yet there was still a terrible knot of dread and fear in her belly. Maybe those feelings had nothing to do with the room, but with her, and what she’d lost.
    She looked over the debris again, and this time a dollhouse caught her eye. She could just see the roof of it between two of the beds. Ignoring the men, who were examining what they thought might be a mouse nest, she went to the beds. She used her sleeve to wipe away the dust that obscured the carvings on the foot of the bed. Her fingers traced the seashells and mermaids carved there.
    One of the mattresses blocked her from the dollhouse, and considering that Séan seemed to think there were mice, she wasn’t thinking she wanted to touch it. From what she could see, it was a delicate Victorian mansion in an English style.
    She rubbed a hand over her belly, wishing the feelings of wrongness would go away.
    Stepping back, she caught her heel on something and stumbled, falling to her hands and knees.
    It didn’t matter anymore, he could do whatever he wanted to her, he couldn’t hurt her more than he already had. He’d taken everything from her—and she’d taken everything from him.
    “You bloody witch.”
    Pain exploded in her sides as his boot connected with her ribs. He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her up, slapping her across the face with his other hand.
    “You murdering Irish whore.”
    Her head hit the floor as he threw her down.
    Murderer. He called her a murderer, and God and the saints forgiver her, it was the truth. But her sins were nothing to his.
    She pushed to her hands and knees, wanting to rise up and look at him but she couldn’t, he’d broken one of her legs, and there was no strength in her. He’d beat her to death, but her strength had fled long before his fists fell. What light was left in her was gone after the terrible thing she’d done.
    “I’ll burn in Satan’s Hell for my sins,” she said, watching the blood drops fall to the floor, “and I’ll see you there beside me.”
    Sorcha screamed.
    The sound of it brought her back to herself, as if she’d been sleeping, having a nightmare, and by crying out woken herself.
    “Sorcha, did you hurt yourself?” Séan was there beside her, his hands warm and strong on her arms. He drew her up, hugging her to