Jane of Fire Read online

  Jessica Penot

  www.jessicapenot.com

  Published Internationally by Jessica Penot

  www.jessicapenot.com

  Copyright © 2018 Jessica Penot

  Exclusive cover © 2018 Fiona Jayde Media Designs

  Interior design by Tamara Cribley www.deliberatepage.com

  All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written consent of the author, Jessica Penot, is an infringement of the copyright law.

  PRINT ISBN

  978-1-7326928-3-1

  EBOOK ISBN

  978-1-7326928-2-4

  Editor - Joanna D’Angelo

  Copy Editor - Brenda Heald

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any person or persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book is dedicated to everyone who thinks they don’t have enough strength inside themselves.

  You do.

  Contents

  Thank You

  My books

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  About Jessica Penot

  Thank You

  Thank you to my talented publishing team - including Joanna D’Angelo, my editor and publishing coach; Tamara Cribley for her magical interior book design; and Fiona Jayde for her gorgeous cover. Thank you for helping me bring this book to fruition.

  And to my readers, thank you for having faith in me. Every time you read one of my books, you tell me how much my stories mean to you.

  Let’s keep in touch

  Sign up for my newsletter: Scary Girl News, and follow me on BookBub and Amazon for updates on my new releases and recommendations of books that I love. You can also find out more about me and my books and my spooky blog about real-life hauntings on my website: jessicapenot.com.

  My books

  The Tattooed Girl Series:

  Book 1 Jane of Air

  Book 2 Jane of Fire

  Coming Soon:

  Book 3 Jane of Water

  Book 4 Jane of Earth

  Book 5 Jane of Darkness

  Book 6 Jane of Light

  The Accidental Witch Series:

  Book 1 The Accidental Witch

  Book 2 The Darkest Art

  Single Titles:

  Circe

  Death’s Dream Kingdom

  The Monster Hunter’s Manual

  Twilight Saint Series:

  The Twilight Saint

  Haunting Series:

  Haunted Chattanooga

  Haunted North Alabama

  Chapter 1

  There are black zones of shadow close to our daily paths, and now and then some evil soul breaks a passage through.

  ~ H.P. Lovecraft

  Hope is a strange feeling. It can make you believe that the most wonderful thing you want in the world might actually be possible. But it can leave you vulnerable to that very desire you so desperately cling to.

  I held onto my hope for a couple of weeks. I didn’t dare ask Mrs. Fairfax when Edward was coming, but I watched for him on the horizon.

  Edward Rochester, Miss Adele’s grandson, and heir to Thornfield Hall.

  I waited for him. I found myself spending more time at Thornfield Hall, hoping he would walk in on me. I sat in the library at Thornfield and studied for my finals when I normally would have gone to the university library. I spent every minute I could at Thornfield, but Edward didn’t come. I returned to my usual routine. I turned in my term papers and completed my finals and Christmas Break came.

  All the other students returned home. They went back to their loving families. The campus became a ghost town. I called Helen and went to her apartment, again, but no one answered the buzzer. I didn’t bother calling Mrs. Blankenship. I’d called her just before Thanksgiving and she’d said very little on the phone. She just wished me well and told me not to come back for Christmas.

  “There’s nothing left here for you,” she said in a faint, raspy voice. “You’re better off staying where you are. Just get on with your life and leave me in peace.”

  I bit my lip. Mrs. Blankenship never wanted to see me again. We had never been close, but she was the closest thing to family I had. It was like a knife in my heart. I was used to the knife and I thought that the most tragic thing about being an orphan was that eventually, I would stop feeling anything at all. There is only so much hurt and loneliness one person can take.

  “Please understand,” she’d said. “I do care about you, Jane. I think you are a such a smart young woman and every day I’m amazed at what you’ve accomplished, but every time I see you I remember him and I remember our dream to have a baby together. I remember how that dream died and then how he died. I can’t bear it anymore. I have to let you go.”

  I’d wiped the tears from my eyes. I understood. I wanted Mrs. Blankenship to be happy. She’d been a shadow of a person for many years.

  I tried Helen again, but there was no answer. I took a deep breath. I had spent many lonely Christmases growing up. Nothing had changed that much. It was late at night and the wind howled. The howling echoed throughout Thornfield’s empty halls. The staff had put up a large Christmas tree in the foyer and a small one in the sitting room by Miss Adele’s room. I sat in that sitting room in the glow of the little tree. I hadn’t had a Christmas tree in years, not since Mr. Blankenship died. The twinkling lights lifted my spirits. It was cold outside and the night was dark. The moon was hidden by clouds, but I went to bed singing Christmas carols in my head.

  I woke up early and ate breakfast with the staff. Mrs. Fairfax, Jenna, James, and the eternally expanding nursing staff that had stayed on through the holidays. There were four nurses who took turns taking care of Miss Adele during the day, by that point. Mrs. Fairfax played Christmas carols over breakfast and Miss Adele hummed along with them as she ate her oatmeal. Her hands shook as she tried to get the spoon to her mouth and the nurse had to help her eat. Miss Adele smiled at me.

  “Edward will be here today,” Mrs. Fairfax said to Miss Adele. “That’s good news, isn’t it?”

  Miss Adele smiled broadly. “I knew he would come. I knew he would come.”

  “We’ll be working hard today to get things ready for him,” she said. “He’ll be bringing his friend, Blanche, with him.”

  My heart sank a little to hear the beautiful blonde would be with him.

  Jenna got up and dusted the crumbs off her pants. “Well, we better get to it then. The sooner we start the sooner we’ll be done. That boy eats more than a herd of buffalo.” Jenna headed over to the kitchen. I never did ask Jenna what she’d meant that night when she warned me to be careful with Edward. But after meeting Blanc
he, I’d pretty much figured it out. Edward was rich and gorgeous, and girls were drawn to him like bees to honey. He could never be with someone like me and I was foolish for letting myself even think it.

  Mrs. Fairfax got up as the doorbell rang. I had to assume it was the cleaning crew to prepare the house. I helped the nurse with Miss Adele, who was still humming even after the music was turned off. I gave the nurse a little break and took Miss Adele down to the library. She picked a book off the shelf and sat with it in her lap, but she wasn’t really reading. She was staring out the window.

  “Are you okay?” I asked her.

  “My Edward will love me, now,” she said. “He’ll love me, now, because I’m going to fix it.”

  I put my hand on Miss Adele’s. “He’s always loved you. He’s coming home for Christmas, isn’t he?”

  “No, no,” Miss Adele muttered softly. “No, no. Not my grandson. Not him. He has always loved me. No, my Edward will forgive me. My husband. Edward Rochester, X.”

  “I thought he’d passed away,” I asked.

  “People never really die here,” she said. “They just wait. They wait here forever.”

  “No,” I said. “They’ve gone to Heaven. Your Edward is waiting for you in Heaven.”

  Miss Adele shook her head. “There is no Heaven for us. We are hollow inside. There is no place for us in Heaven. We will stay on here until there is nothing left and, after that, who knows?” She began to hum and rub her hands together. “But it doesn’t matter anymore, does it, Jane? I see what you are. This will all end soon.”

  “What am I?” I asked. I felt strangely shaken. People always asked me what I was. No one had ever told me what I was. The reversal in the phrase was disturbing. I knew she was just babbling nonsense, but her words resonated with me. “What do you think I am?”

  “You are one of them. You are one of the others. You are Jane Air. You will fill us up and we won’t be hollow anymore. You will set us all free. All the doors will open and the spirits will join us, here, and there will be bright days and fairy kings and queens will dance into the night with the goblin princes. All the world will turn to magic and ghosts will become flesh. There is a door on your back and when it opens, we will all be whole. You will see.”

  She smiled like she was talking about some wonderful recipe she had found for a casserole. She had completely lost her mind. How in the world did she know about my tattoo? Had she seen it one night when I was tending her in her room? No matter. I would have to talk to Edward about putting her in a nursing home since Mrs. Fairfax wouldn’t hear of it.

  I turned away from Miss Adele and looked out the window. A fog had settled over the gardens of Thornfield and it had begun to sleet. It was dark and I could barely see the car come down the driveway. It took its time creeping down to the house. It parked in front of the house and Edward stepped out, the fog wrapping around him like it longed for his touch. The wind blew his short, black hair. He was wearing a suit, as always. His blue-green eyes looked up at Thornfield like the house was his enemy. He stood there for a while, studying Thornfield, with his hands in his pockets. Finally, Blanche emerged from the car and scampered into the house, leaving Edward alone. It took him quite a while to walk into the house. A man I didn’t know followed behind him with the luggage.

  Miss Adele stopped humming and her eyes grew moist with tears. Her book fell from her hands. She was facing away from the window, but it was as if she could see everything I was seeing. She suddenly seemed very aware and very awake. She stood up and smoothed her pants out with her hands and straightened her hair.

  Edward walked in with Blanche on his arm. He looked just as I had remembered him. I wanted to stare at him. I wanted to lose myself in him, but I looked down at my feet instead.

  Edward didn’t look at me. He just stared at his grandmother. “I’m here,” he said.

  “I need to speak with you, alone,” Miss Adele said clearly.

  “Wait here,” Edward said to Blanche.

  Blanche sat down and glared at me. She didn’t say anything. It was clear she thought I wasn’t worth her time. She just sighed and threw her leg over the arm of the chair. “What a bore,” she muttered to herself. She took her cell phone out of her purse and began texting or playing a game or doing whatever it was people did with smartphones. I didn’t really know since my phone was a prepaid phone from the grocery store that had cost me about thirty dollars. It didn’t even take pictures. I returned to my book, but I was having great difficulty focusing.

  Edward and Miss Adele were gone for what seemed like an eternity. Blanche sighed and played games and paced while she waited. Occasionally she would mutter something like, “Could this place be any more boring?” Mostly she just sighed and looked beautiful and bored.

  The nurse came in and sat with me and waited for Edward. The three of us, together, were perhaps the most uncomfortable trio in existence. The nurse occasionally attempted small talk, but Blanche just shriveled her nose in disgust and I didn’t know what to say to the nurse, so uncomfortable silence reigned.

  When Edward and Miss Adele finally did return, he deposited his grandmother in the library like a prison guard returning a prisoner to their cell and grabbed Blanche and left. I took a deep breath. He hadn’t even noticed me. The withering gaze that had once terrified and thrilled me was gone. He didn’t even know I existed. The nurse was with Miss Adele, so I wandered away. I put on my coat and walked through the cold fog. I let the freezing rain sting my cheeks. The wind cut through my cheap raincoat and I was soaked to the bone, but I kept walking. I let the cold seep in and cut through me. I wanted to feel anything but the relentless pressure that was compressing my heart like a vice. I wanted to cut my heart out and leave it in the cold so I could never feel again. What use was feeling? These many weeks that Edward had been away, I had cobbled a happy enough existence with my life. I was busy at school and with my weekly Haiti group meetings. I was even starting to accept that Helen had left and wasn’t coming back. Maybe she and Jake had eloped somewhere and she’d quit school. But now, after seeing Edward again, and being so completely ignored by him, I just felt broken. I longed for the cold to wash through me and freeze every part of me that had ever felt anything. I imagined that I was feeling what Liliana must have felt when she climbed her way up to Witching Hill to find her dark lord.

  Chapter 2

  There be those who say that things and places have souls and there be those who say they have not; I dare not say, myself.

  ~ H.P. Lovecraft

  By the time I got back, it was well past dark. The days had grown short and dinner was done. I was shaking. I couldn’t feel my nose. My teeth chattered and I stumbled upstairs with the singular goal of getting out of my wet clothes, but I never made it to my room.

  Edward was sitting in Miss Adele’s sitting room waiting for me. He jumped up when he saw me and met me in the hall.

  “Strange weather for a walk,” he commented.

  Despite the cold and the fact that I was dripping onto the hardwood floor, I managed a smile. He hadn’t forgotten about me. He went and got me a blanket and put it over my shoulders. It didn’t help much. I was still freezing, but I leaned into him as he drew the blanket around me. He was warm and his arms were strong. I stopped shaking and he let me go. I returned to my shaking.

  “Come sit by the fire with me,” he said, and I followed him into the sitting room. He put a chair by the fire for me and I put my hands near the warmth of the flames. I felt the sensation return to my fingers as warmth spread through them. My shaking began to slow.

  “You must be very committed to exercise,” he said. He was staring at me again. I had missed that. I missed the way he looked at me. It terrified me, but I loved it.

  “I just needed some fresh air.”

  He smiled. His smile was so rare. He let go of his scowl and his face lit up. “Fresh air?”

&n
bsp; I shrugged.

  He got up and brought me another blanket. He kneeled in front of me and put the blanket on my lap. His hands lingered on me as he laid the blanket over me. “You’ll catch your death out there,” he said softly. He was still in front of me. I met his eyes. His blue eyes laced with green. They were dark around the edges and light in the middle, with flecks of green. They were beautiful. He pushed a lock of wet hair out of my face.

  He got up and moved back to his chair. His shirt was wet. I was so wet that I had dripped on him. He didn’t seem to care. The firelight cast strange shadows on his face. I was happy just to sit and look at him.

  “How’s school?” he asked.

  “Wonderful,” I said. “I got all As and I joined a pre-med mission club. We’re going to Haiti, in the summer, to take care of the poor.”

  “I would expect nothing less than all As from you and the mission work sounds about right, too. How’s college life. Going to lots of parties?”

  I laughed. “Remember? Parties aren’t my thing.”

  He smiled again. His entire face lit up. “I know. I was just kidding. I can’t imagine you wasting your time with that crap.”