Chapter 2 The Devil Beneath the Floorboards

The next morning, the city bled silence.

Birdsong vanished. The vendors who once hollered over bread loaves and oysters stood mute, casting nervous glances toward the Bellerose estate. No one dared speak her name aloud, but it buzzed in their throats like a mosquito trapped behind their teeth.

The witch is back.

Inside the manor, the air had thickened overnight. The rooms were not merely cold-they were occupied. Isadora walked through the corridor barefoot now, blood still crusted in the cracks of her palm. Her eyes had changed. Where once there had been softness, grief, perhaps even sorrow, now rested the hollow calm of a soul who had looked into the abyss-and found it wanting.

She stopped in the great hall.

Before her lay the remnants of her family's library. The walls were scorched black from the fire that tried to erase them. Charred spines poked out like ribs from the shelves, half-devoured by flame. One book, however, remained whole.

Bound in pale leather. Marked with a lock of human hair.

It had not been there yesterday.

Isadora approached it with reverence and disgust. She had seen this tome once before, in the hands of her grandmother-a woman rumored to have been half serpent, half woman, and all death to the men who bedded her.

As her fingers brushed the cover, the lock of hair curled-alive. It slithered beneath her fingers and vanished into the pages.

She opened it.

And the house moaned.

Pages turned on their own, flicking like wings in the dark. Symbols screamed from the parchment-letters that were more curse than language. The scent of sulfur bled out into the room.

Then the book stilled.

And on the open page, written in a language no living tongue should know, were the words:

"Blood remembers. Betrayal feeds. The door must open."

Isadora's throat dried. She knew what it meant.

Beneath this house, older than its bricks, older than its foundations, lay something sealed in by her ancestors. Something fed by the blood of the Bellerose line. A creature not born, but bound-a forgotten god, a sleeping curse.

And it was no longer asleep.

She dropped the book and rushed to the cellar again, heart pounding not with fear, but with terrible purpose.

This time, the circle had changed.

No longer idle lines. It now glowed red, bleeding warmth into the stone. Vines writhed at its edges, their thorns twitching. The air trembled.

A voice rose from the floor, deep and female and ancient.

"The First Must Die."

Isadora tilted her head. "Which one?"

"The General who spilled your father's blood. The one who smiled as your mother screamed. He dines in the house of justice. He fears no judgment but mine."

Her eyes narrowed.

General Toussaint Duclerc.

A man of medals and myths. A pillar of society. He had once toasted with her father, danced with her mother, and turned his back when the mob came to burn them alive. It was he who denied Isadora asylum, locking the gates as she banged and bled outside them.

"I accept," she whispered.

The floor split open with a sound like bone snapping. From its depths, a hand emerged-a weapon placed in hers. It was a blade, thin as breath, made not of metal but bone and sorrow. Runes spiraled down its length, and her blood drank into it eagerly.

She left the house at twilight.

Wrapped in mourning lace, her veil drawn over her face like the shadow of death. She did not walk-she floated. Every step distorted the air around her, as though the city bent slightly to her path.

Duclerc's mansion stood in the upper quarter. Marble steps. A hundred candles in every window. Laughter from inside-unaware of what walked beneath their roof.

She entered through the wall. Not around it. Through it.

Stone parted like butter to her touch. She moved down the hallway unseen, unheard. Her presence passed like a gust of cemetery air-cold, unfamiliar, disturbing.

She found him in his parlor, surrounded by courtiers. Laughing. Drinking. Wearing the same ring he stole from her father's corpse.

"May I offer a toast?" she said aloud.

The room fell silent.

All heads turned toward her. A few gasped. One man dropped his glass. The general stood slowly, face whitening.

"isadora?" he breathed. "But you're-"

"Dead?" She lifted her veil.

Her face was untouched by age. Beautiful. But her eyes-her eyes were tombs.

"No, General. I'm awakened."

He reached for a sword. She moved faster.

The blade in her hand whispered as it cut through the air. She didn't swing it like a woman. She wielded it like judgment. The first slice took his hand. The second, his tongue.

He screamed-but only for a moment.

Then the blade entered his chest, and the symbols along it glowed. Red. Then black. Then... nothing.

He collapsed, but his soul did not go with him. It hovered there-visible only to her. She smiled at it, a soft, terrible smile.

"I'm not done with you yet," she whispered.

And she fed his soul to the thing beneath her house.