The Earl and The Enchantress by Paullett Golden

Author:Paullett Golden [Golden, Paullett]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Paullett Golden
Published: 2018-10-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 20

In the growing darkness of night, Sebastian could see the child silhouetted against the rising moonlight. A full moon hung low in the sky, filling his world with a bright glow. She waded into the ocean, splashing her hands in the knee-deep water.

“Come swim, ‘Bastian! The water is so cold I have gooseflesh!”

“We need to go home, or he’ll find out,” he called back.

“Come play, ‘Bastian!”

Long, black hair flowed around her, trailing in the water that now lapped at her waist. She slipped in deeper, her hair fanning about her body.

As he turned his back, the night air shattered with the sound of a blood-curdling scream. He looked back to see the child dangling from the mouth of a tentacled beast with flaming eyes.

He ran to fight the beast, but his legs wouldn’t move. Sand sunk around him, pulling him under. He screamed to the child as the sand swallowed him whole.

Sebastian woke to find himself wading in a pool of sweat. His bed sheets were soaked, his body drenched.

Devoid of the transitional confusion between sleep and wakefulness, he knew instantly where he was and that he had been dreaming. This was the first time he had dreamt of a giant squid, he thought wryly, but not the first time of the child he couldn’t save.

He wouldn’t stay in a soggy bed and doubted he could fall back to sleep, so he fumbled for the bedside candle, lit it, and reached for his pocket clock on the nightstand to check if it were a decent hour to wake his butler to arrange for fresh sheets and a bath. He paid his staff well enough to wake them any damn time he pleased, but on principle, he refused to be a grouchy lord of the manor in the wee hours.

The dials read four in the morning. The sheets could wait. The bath could wait. He untangled his legs from the wet mop of bedcovers and escaped his newly sweated in-home swimming pool. It only took his purposeful stride a handful of minutes to bring him downstairs, outside the curtain wall, and down the slope to the beach.

The night air, autumn cool, whirled around him, trying to push him left, then right, back, then forward. It tickled the beads of sweat still clinging to his skin.

He pulled off his nightshirt, letting the wind breeze through his legs and across his stomach. The last thing he needed was his shirt escaping for an airborne adventure through all of Northumberland, so he tucked it under a rock. The grassy dunes met black, basalt rock before the ground transformed into sweeping honeyed sand.

Despite the wind, the sea remained calm, gently lapping at his feet as he stepped, bare as the day he was born, into the frigid waters. His body shivered at the icy touch until he dived into the depths, letting the undertow pull him into the waves before rocking him back to shore.

No sea monsters. He wouldn’t mind pitting his wits against one.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.