Sadie Madison and the Boy in the Crimson Scarf

Epilogue | The Girl With Mismatched Eyes

Steam hissed angrily from the engine. It swirled around him like dark spirits. "You must get on the train, Serafine!"

She stared at her father with nefarious, cold eyes.

Her cold stares were nothing new. Sometimes he imagined she was trying to crush his head with her mind or attempt to read his thoughts. He smiled and stared back. "Now is not the time for your childish games, Serafine." He grabbed her arm, dragging her towards the train. "We've been travelling for five straight days. My patience is all but spent."

A horn erupted, accompanied by another torrent of steam.

"The train is leaving," he informed her, his eyebrows raised. "Like it or not, so are we."

He pushed Serafine up the steps, through the door, and into the carriage.

The wheels began to roll.

"Find a seat and get comfortable. It'll be morning before we arrive," he said, dabbing his brow with a white handkerchief.

Serafine shuffled her tiny frame down the corridor, peering through the glass panelled doors at the passengers in each compartment. There weren't many people travelling. Most were single travellers sat alone searching for sleep, the occasional couple chatting excitedly, the effects of champagne still alive in their veins.

She found an empty compartment and slipped inside. Her father, hauling their baggage, joined moments later.

"Perfect," he said, heaving their bags into the racks overhead.

Serafine failed to acknowledge him. She turned her eyes to the window and the vast canvas of mountains and stars clinging to the glass.

As they rattled along, he slipped his hand into his pocket and grasped a small disk. Cradling it in his palm, he etched his thumb over its contours, something he'd done a hundred times a day for as long as he could remember. Cast in gold, the disk surrounded an equilateral triangle with tiny words engraved along the circumference.

Something Forgotten Is Never Lost.

He muttered the words to himself as the train plunged into the western edge of Darachna Forest leaving San Cristophe and the Snake Plains in its wake. Sandarac trees rushed by—metres from the window—concealing a thousand horrors living within. He wondered what Serafine would make of this new, exciting world. She had never seen anything like it.

But the world had never seen anything quite like Serafine before either.

The girl had an ill-favoured look. Although pretty, she had heterochromia—one blue eye, one green—and a dark birthmark covering the left side of her face. Conversely, her hair was mesmerising, like gold thread. It would turn every head she passed, setting minds whirring about the reward for such a prize.

Serafine was keenly aware of this and kept her golden hair hidden from the world, wrapped beneath a worn leather flying cap, fastened under her chin with a brass buckle.

The compartment door swung open, and a ticket inspector appeared. "Sorry to disturb, I know it's late," he said. "Can I see your papers?"

Resting his briefcase onto his knees, Serafine's father retrieved the necessary information.

The inspector scanned the paperwork. "Very good, Mr Davidian."

"It's Father Davidian," he corrected, tapping The Black Moon armband encircling his right bicep. "Father Morqash Davidian."

"I see," the Inspector said. "Don't meet too many people of faith in these parts."

"Serafine Davidian," the Ticket Inspector said, turning to the girl. She too wore the armband. "What a charming, yet most unusual name."

Serafine smiled, masking the left side of her face with a pale hand.

"It means Burning One," Father Davidian told him, taking the documents from the inspector and slipping the documents back into his briefcase.

The inspector nodded, backing out of the compartment. Serafine watched him with her blue eye, the green one hidden behind her fingers. "Best get some sleep if you can, young lady," he said before closing the door. "It'll be a little over seven hours before we reach Iron Bridge." He looked at The Black Moon on Serafine's arm once more. "Be careful when you arrive. Keep yourselves to yourselves. I hear the town is crawling with Ryndai."

Father Davidian nodded in appreciation.

The inspector disappeared, sliding the door shut after him.

Serafine turned her attention back to the window.

"We're out into the world now, Serafine. A place full of distractions and temptations."

Serafine sighed, drawing a circle around the moon on the window.

"We're on a divine mission. A search for a miracle worker. A child—one not much older than yourself—who channels a power of which the world has never seen."

Serafine turned both eyes to him, revealing her dark birthmark. She opened her mouth to speak—her teeth jagged and sharp like a shark—but Father Davidian cut in, his voice resonating around the compartment.

"Sadie Madison is a descendant of the Grigori, an earth-bound angel. The world will come to know her, love her, worship her. Once her music plays in every country, in every city, in every home and heart in this world, belief will return. Her music will transcend flesh and bone, emotion and memory, time and space."

Father Morqash Davidian ran his fingers over the warm gold disk in his pocket once again. "Something Forgotten Is Never Lost," he muttered to himself, as his determined eyes scanned the starry sky above.