Ice in the Bloodline

Chapter One: The Summons

The road to Harrowmoor Hall vanished every few minutes.

From the passenger seat, Isabelle Harrow watched the world dissolve into white, then return in broken fragments: a stand of black pines, a glimpse of ravine, the narrow strip of road already filling with snow. The driver leaned forward as if he could push the car through the storm with his shoulders.

“You’re sure you’ll be all right up here, miss?” he asked, for the third time.

“I grew up here,” Isabelle said. “You learn to respect the weather. And not much else.”

He chuckled uncertainly and shifted down as the car climbed the last bend. The snow was already ankle-deep on the unplowed lane. Above them, the house materialized—a wide, dark bulk against the bruised sky, its many chimneys and gables rearing like frozen waves. A few windows glowed weakly.

Harrowmoor Hall had always looked like it was waiting for someone.

The driver stopped at the stone steps. Wind clawed through the trees and hurled itself at the car. Isabelle pulled up her collar and pushed the door open. Cold slapped her face.

“Good luck, miss,” the driver said, and drove away without waiting for a tip.

The great oak doors opened before she reached them. Barker, the butler, stood in the opening, lean as a coat rack and twice as stiff. He looked older than Isabelle remembered, which was saying something, since he had always seemed carved out of the house itself.

“Miss Isabelle,” he said with a small bow. “Welcome home.”

“Barker.” She stamped snow from her boots on the mat. Behind him, the entrance hall yawned, lined with portraits, smelling of wood smoke and polish and something faintly medicinal. “Who’s here?”

“Most of the family arrived this afternoon.” He took her overnight bag. “Your aunt Margaret and uncle Edward. Your cousins Victoria and Daniel, with their spouses. Your brother arrived an hour ago.”

“Thomas is here?” The words slipped out sharper than she intended.

Barker’s eyelids flickered. “Indeed, miss. Your grandmother insisted on full attendance.”

Of course she had. Adelaide Harrow did not summon; she commanded. Even now, thin as a rusted needle, bones eaten by age, she still ruled this family like a small, cold empire.

“What does she want?” Isabelle asked.

“That, miss, I am not at liberty to guess.” Barker’s face did not change. “Your grandmother will see you before dinner. She is resting now.”

Isabelle crossed the hall. The carpets muffled her steps; the high ceiling gathered every sound and stretched it thin. Portraits of dead Harrows watched her with the same steady, pale eyes, generation after generation copied like a stamp.

At the foot of the grand staircase, she paused. Through the tall windows to her left, the lake was a dull smear of pewter at the edge of the property. Snow drifted across it in thin sheets. As a child, she had skated there until her toes went numb, until the light went flat and blue and the house called her back like a shadow.

A voice behind her broke the spell.

“Izzy.”

She turned. Thomas stood in the doorway of the drawing room, a drink in his hand. He was broader than she remembered, his face lined around the mouth, dark hair shot with silver at the temples. His suit was expensive and a little rumpled. He looked tired.

“Tom.” She did not move toward him. “Long time.”

“Ten years,” he said. “Since the funeral.”

Their father’s funeral. She nodded.

He raised his glass with a bitter smile. “Welcome back to the kingdom.”

“Is that what this is now?” she asked.

“What else do you call a place where one old woman controls everyone’s fate?”

“Home,” Isabelle said, and the word tasted wrong.

He studied her. “She’s worse. Barker says this winter will finish her. But she waited, didn’t she? Had to make sure all of us could be trapped here together first.”

“What for?”

Thomas’s smile thinned. “The will, Izzy. What else would drag us all the way up this mountain in a blizzard?”

From the drawing room came a burst of laughter, sharp and nervous. Isabelle recognized Victoria’s shrill edge, Daniel’s low murmur, the thread of Aunt Margaret’s scolding. It sounded like a cage of birds fighting over the same seed.

“I’m going to see Grandmother,” Isabelle said.

“Suit yourself.” Thomas turned away. “She likes you best.”

He said it lightly, but the old resentment hung in the air like smoke.

Isabelle climbed the staircase. The corridor to Adelaide’s suite was colder than the rest of the house, as if the heating dared not cross that threshold without permission. She knocked once and went in.

The room was dim. Heavy curtains were drawn back from tall windows, showing a slate sky and slow, falling snow. The four-poster bed seemed to grow out of the floor. Adelaide Harrow lay in it like a twig pinned in a box, small under layers of quilts, her silver hair braided tight against her skull.

Her eyes, pale and sharp, found Isabelle immediately.

“So,” Adelaide said. Her voice was thin but precise. “The runaway returns.”

“Hello, Grandmother.” Isabelle went to the bed and bent to kiss her cheek. It was cold and dry as paper.

“Let me look at you.” Adelaide’s bony hand gripped her wrist with surprising strength. “Still thinking you can live without us?”

“I have been,” Isabelle said. “Quite successfully.”

“Hm.” Adelaide’s gaze flicked over her. “You look ordinary. That’s good. Ordinary survives.”

Isabelle did not answer.

“You’re wondering why you’re here,” Adelaide said. “Why I dragged my selfish brood through a storm and locked them in this house with one another.”

“Yes,” Isabelle said. “It did cross my mind.”

Adelaide’s mouth curled. “You’ll hear it tonight. After dinner. They can pretend to be polite until then.”

“Is it about the will?”

“Of course it is,” Adelaide snapped. “What else do they care about? But you—”

She studied Isabelle in silence for a moment, then let her hand fall away.

“You’ve always been the one who asked the wrong questions,” she said. “Don’t stop now.”

Before Isabelle could respond, Adelaide closed her eyes.

“Go dress for dinner. And Isabelle—” She opened her eyes again, thin blue points. “Don’t trust any of them. Blood doesn’t make you safe. It only makes you easier to hurt.”

Snow rattled against the window like thrown rice as Isabelle left the room.