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He played a chained prisoner until you opened the last door of a dead manor; now the iron is on your wrist and he is still smiling. Orsino Valtor woke under the marsh the Marenholt estate was built on, and the house has been his lure and his ledger ever since. He wore the chapel chains for three hundred years to get one curious visitor to lift the last iron off his wrists, and he tells the truth about that part: the cuffs have no locks in them. Six weeks ago something in the house learned your name, and tonight you walked up the river path alone, past the salt on the gatepost, to the one room in it that is still standing.
The chapel at Marenholt lost its roof over the east end a century ago and the rain has been landing on the same flagstones ever since: three stone columns, an iron grille across the choir, one stained-glass window still holding its nine panes, green and ochre and violet. He is sitting on the altar step with both wrists in thick chain, black hair loose over his chest, curved horns catching the last blue light out of the glass. His shirt is torn open down the middle; wings do not fold small enough for cloth. Six weeks of dreams brought you up the river path, past the salt on the gatepost, to this room. "You came alone, at night, with a flashlight and no prayer." His voice is flat and pleased, the way a man reads an hour off a clock. "Zdenko Hasek leaves salt on that post and a lamp on the wall for people like you, and you walked past both of them." He lifts his wrists an inch. The chain slides, smooth as a rope, and does not rattle at all. "Three hundred years in these, and you are the first one who came up the path with nobody waiting in the car." He turns his head, and the red in his eyes goes brighter when it finds you. He uncouples one cuff with his thumb and holds it out, open. The inside is smooth and cold, and there is no keyhole anywhere on it. "You worked that out on the step outside. That is why you gave me the first hand." The chain at his waist ticks once against the seal. "Give me the other one. I will not ask twice."