Chapter 29：The visitor

Her eyebrows furrowed in concentration to see what was the shadow if it was the shadow of the leaves and the trees around which was making it look like there was someone who stood right behind her.

Belle's feet moved to the edge and Lucas who had caught her looking at him now saw her looking at the maid as if she had spotted something there. His own eyes went to look at the maid when he noticed what or who stood behind the maid.

Belle on the other hand noticed there was indeed someone hovering over the maid, like a shadow trying to mesh with her.

Without another thought, she jumped from her patio to land on the ground without much trouble. It had distinct red eyes that made her skin crawl uncomfortably. She started to walk towards the maid and called the girl,

"Marie!"

The girl who was going to head closer into the orchard stopped to turn around and come out for the shadow to disappear right away when Belle's eyes met its eyes, "Yes, milady?" Belle could feel her heart beating continuously, her eyes wide looking at the orchard where the shadow had disappeared.

"Are there any good apples in there?" Belle asked, her eyes still looking behind the maid who turned around to see what the lady was looking at. Seeing nothing there, the maid turned back around to answer,

"There are some of them which are good, milady. Would you want me to pick them?" the maid asked politely.

Belle turned to look at the maid with a smile on her face, "No. That's alright. I will get them. You know how I love fetching them myself," the maid returned her words with a smile before she looked back to see the butler who was still around.

The maid got closer and whispered, "It would be better if you took it out when the butler is not here," the maid was worried where the stoic butler would report Miss Belle's actions to her mother.

Belle gave her a nod, smiling warmly to see the maid bow at her before she was on her way to continue her work. The smile went down and Belle walked towards the orchard and Lucas who had noticed the shadow too followed right behind her. He saw her look around the trees and then up in the branches as if she were searching for something.

Did she notice it too? This wasn't the first time Belle had spoken about. He remembered very well that she had mentioned about black vapors or flames that were at the man's back before he had flicked his soul out of his body.

Belle was nowhere to be a grim reaper but to possess an ability where she could see the vapors meant she was special but there was another possibility to it.

Most of her soul was eaten by the scavengers leaving only some of it. Though his watch didn't show her time of death it didn't mean she was near it or had been close enough to stand at the border before the watch's hand could start spinning to show when she was going to die. The reason she might have been able to see could be because of her body containing only half of the soul in her body.

It was a law that stated that if a person had to be part of the living, a body or a vessel needed to be filled and when it was time to move to the land of the dead, the soul would step in there. And right now, it seemed that her soul was halved to be placed in two different places.

He still didn't understand why the scavengers had eaten her soul little by little without eating all of it one go.

As if he knew nothing, Lucas asked, "Is something the matter?"

Belle was still looking when she said, "I thought I saw someone."

"Allow me," Lucas said stepping forward and looking carefully with his eyes.

Lucas knew who was here with the maid a while ago or who was still here right with them. It was a grim reaper, who went by the assignment name fourth card who was similar to a scavenger but instead of eating the souls, it infected the souls. The reaper would infect the vessel until it would fall sick and wither which was when the reaper would take away the soul along with it. Some souls were unfortunate as their death was marked by certain death reapers to lead them to the path of death.

Though Belle couldn't see the person, Lucas could see where the reaper was who stood behind a tree with only half of its hood visible at the far left.

But he didn't look at the hooded creature.

For the past eleven years, Lucas had gone missing without a word or whisper to anyone from the land of the dead while concealing who he really was as he camouflaged himself as a butler in the Adams mansion. Looking at the man would mean to say that he was a grim reaper himself but Belle had caught sight of him. The reaper was visible earlier as he was about to latch on to the maid but now he had gone invisible to her where she couldn't see but she did spot an apple that was on the ground.

Walking towards it, she picked it up to see someone had taken a bite from it, "You don't suppose this one was eaten by the maid, do you?" Belle asked Lucas. It was a house rule where the servants were not supposed to eat any fruit or not spoil any plant unless it was told by the owners of this mansion. Belle gave another look before she stepped away from the orchard along with him.

"Don't think so," came the short answer from Lucas. He didn't turn back to look at the creature who had appeared in the mansion's garden who was waiting to pick on the maid again.