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At the top of the stairs, more destruction abounded Furniture tumbled about and smashed into pieces like match-sticks Charred walls and floor And the s sickly sweet assaulted her nose

They entered the hallway Every door was closed, and Ice put his hand on the first door’s latch Sabelle’s stomach clenched as she stood behind his broad back He swept the door open

"Oh God!" Ice bellowed before slaht be sick Still, he pushed her away from the door and tried to force her down the stairs But she was faster Shutting her out so that she didn’t know just how ruthless an eneht wasn’t an option

She ducked under Ice’s tattooed arain The odor assaulted her first Terror and blood and death In the roup of corpses, frozen in death Men staked with knifes to the walls, bleeding at wrists, ankles, and neck The women all naked, wrists bound, branded with Mathias’s syhs Evenby their crooked necks from ropes knotted to the rafters above

Sabelle slapped a hand over here and his wife, their two children The maid, the cook, the butler and his son Hu about

Ice grabbed her by the shoulders and shoved her into the hall, shutting the door behind hih tear-blurred eyes, she looked at him Fear set in, so cold and absolute, like a hard knot in her belly, she shivered "I had to know I can’t hide from reality None of us can"

His shoulders tensed, and frustration flashed across his harsh features "No one doubts your bravery"

"Then stop acting as if you do This is terrible and wretched and the worst thing I’ve ever seen in my life, but we have to move forward MacKinnett"

She couldn’t finish that sentence, and Ice didn’t force the issue "Let’s find him"

Her teeth chattered, and she wrapped her arain, squeezing it, bringing her near His heat warrateful for his presence For him Bram would have immediately ordered her away from this horrific scene Marrok, Duke, Lucan--all like overprotective brothers Shock and Tynan … the first would look out for hih to trust But Ice, he let her participate, help, even if reluctantly Again, it struck her that in the middle of madness, he was the one sane person she could rely on

Leading her to the next door, Ice tensed as he approached No sounds, no stirring of life Just the sickening smell of death and fire

Behind the second door, they found nothing but destruction Furniture, pictures, pottery, draperies--all smashed, fractured, shredded But thankfully, no more bodies

Behind a third door and a fourth, the same They’d reached the end of the hall

Which left only the cellar

"Is it possible he escaped?" Ice asked

"MacKinnett had huh his late mate He wasn’t the sort of wizard to leave his wife’s human companions to suffer their deaths alone I want to think, for ot away But"

Ice drew her cold fra her with his palain, she felt oddly comforted merely with his presence

"Let’s check the cellar, then"

She didn’t want to, God knew It was likely to be a chaickind needed heroes That had always been Bram’s role Without him, she and Ice would have to do

Silently, they trekked down the stairs, back to the foyer, then to the kitchen This room, too, lay in shambles Pans littered the floor Flour scattered over every surface of the counters and stove An apron tossed over a lamp … and the rest of a cook’s clothes scattered across the counters The Anarki had rigged ropes at each corner of the nook’s table Blood darkened one side of the ropes, and Sabelle could al

A little boy’s toy truck lay under the table in a pool of blood

She looked away, shuddering, fighting tears Ice drew her closer, kissed her cheek "Go back to the car, check Bra to spare her the horror to coive in to fear She would not leave

"Let’s go to the cellar" When Ice opened his ue, Sabelle pleaded, "Please I need to do this"

Clenching his jaw and no doubt holding in a curse, he nodded and opened the door that led down to a dark, less cavern

And opened the door immediately to the scents of charred flesh, blood, and hell A shiver shot through her again, and Sabelle took a deep breath to ward it off

"Stay here," Ice barked

"If you go, I follow Do you see a light?"

With a grim shake of his head, he started down the dark steps into the utterly black rooes of his shoulders, Sabelle followed, her legs so weak and shivery beneath her that she feared tu down the stairs But she pushed on

At the bottoroped the nearby wall for a switch He did the sa and stark And Sabelle screamed

Inches from therate, his wand broken and his body set aflame--burned away to ashes They’d stopped the fire halfway up his torso His ed wide as he witnessed the last terrible liest,Whatever her association with Shock, and his with Mathias, Lucan’s for the truth Mathias truly planned to put himself in a Council seat

God help them

CHAPTER SIX

A QUARTER HOUR LATER, Ice and Sabelle sat inside the manor’s old coach house, which squatted on a parcel of winter-dried grass behind the uest quarters These rooms were, thankfully, undisturbed Ice pressed a cup of water into her cold hands, then sat across the table, his big body and larger presence taking up most of the narrow, quaint room

Since she co properly, shadows draped her brother as he lay on the sofa Here, it felt peaceful, quiet except for the softly falling rain The appearance of serenity was both temporary and a lie Sabelle shivered as flashes of senseless murder and spilled blood tattooed her mind

"We can’t stay here," she said "We need to warn the other Councilmen, then flee"