Chapter 1

“Well,” she muttered, dragging her single suitcase over the threshold, “this is just great. My inheritance comes with a spectral roommate who’s clearly not paying rent.”

She’d expected decay. The lawyer’s letter had warned her Blackwood Manor was “a property in significant disrepair.” What she hadn’t expected was the cold. Not the ordinary chill of an unheated house, but a deep, clinging cold that settled into her bones as she stepped further inside. The air smelled of old roses and something metallic, like rust or blood.

Eleanor dropped her suitcase with a thud. The sound echoed through the empty rooms. She was alone. That was the point. After the divorce, after the pitying looks from colleagues, she’d needed a place where no one could find her. A crumbling mansion in the middle of nowhere, inherited from a great-aunt she’d never met, seemed perfect.

She wandered into what must have been a drawing room. A grand piano stood in the corner, its keys yellowed and silent. A portrait hung above the fireplace, but the face had been scratched out, leaving only a dark, gouged oval. Eleanor frowned, her fingers brushing the torn canvas. The paint was fresh beneath her touch, not old. Someone—or something—had done this recently.

A floorboard creaked behind her.

She spun. Nothing. Just shadows pooling in the corners, stretching longer than the dim light warranted.

“Okay,” she said aloud, her voice too loud in the silence. “Just an old house. Settling. That’s all.”

She went to the window to let in some light, but the glass was so grimy it barely made a difference. As she turned, her elbow caught a small table. A hand mirror, tarnished and delicate, wobbled and fell. She snatched for it, but it slipped through her fingers and shattered on the floorboards.

The shards lay like stars, and in their fractured surfaces, Eleanor saw something move. A reflection that wasn’t her own. A pale face, a blur of dark hair, and eyes that burned with ancient sorrow.

She stumbled back, her heart hammering. “Just a trick of the light,” she whispered. “Old houses play tricks.”

But the cold deepened, and the air thickened, pressing against her ears. A voice, soft as silk and sharp as a blade, drifted from the shadows behind her.

“You should not have come here.”

Eleanor turned slowly. A man stood in the doorway, but he wasn't solid. She could see the wallpaper through his chest, his form wavering like heat haze. He was handsome in a tragic, Byronic way, dressed in a dark coat and cravat, his dark hair falling across a pale brow. His eyes, however, were not tragic. They were furious.

“You’re the ghost,” Eleanor said, her voice steadier than she felt. “Silas Blackwood, I presume. The lawyer mentioned you. Said the house was haunted. I thought he was being dramatic.”

“I am no mere story to amuse tourists,” Silas said, his voice resonating with a low thrum that vibrated in her chest. “This is my home. My grief. You have no right to it.”

“Actually, I do.” Eleanor crossed her arms, a defense mechanism that felt flimsy against a specter. “Legally, it belongs to me now. Great-aunt Matilda’s will was very clear.”

“Legality means nothing to the dead.” He stepped closer, and the cold intensified. “I have waited decades. I will not share my vigil with an intruder.”

“Your vigil for Isabella?” Eleanor asked, remembering the name from a yellowed letter she’d found among the legal papers.

Silas’s form flickered, and for a moment, his face twisted with such raw pain that Eleanor almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

“You know nothing of her,” he said. “Of what we had. Of what was taken.”

“I know she’s dead,” Eleanor said bluntly. “And that you’re dead. And that haunting a crumbling house for a century isn’t really a healthy way to grieve.”

His eyes flared. The temperature plummeted. Eleanor’s breath misted in front of her face.

“You are a fool,” he hissed. “And you will leave. Or I will make you leave.”

He vanished, dissolving into the shadows like smoke. The cold receded, and Eleanor was left alone in the dusty drawing room, her heart pounding, the broken mirror at her feet.

She let out a shaky breath. “Well,” she said to the empty room, “that went about as well as expected.”

She picked up a piece of the shattered mirror. In its reflection, she saw not her own face, but a woman with dark hair and sorrowful eyes, watching from the corner.

Eleanor dropped the shard with a sharp gasp. When she looked again, the corner was empty.

The house groaned around her, settling, waiting.