A Burning in the Bones (Waxways #3)

Chapter 9 Mercy Whitaker

9 MERCY WHITAKER

When Mercy was little, she raced her sisters.

Out in the field behind their house. They’d choose a tree, settle into their stances, and sprint breathlessly forward to see who could get there first. Dresses billowing behind them, heartbeats elevated. She remembered how they always fought afterward, arguing about who’d actually won the race. Now, Mercy was in a race against time itself.

She’d pulled herself back onto the platform, soaking wet, but with her tools in hand. There were enchantment in some of the tools that helped. She made quick work of the internal damage, sealing this and healing that. If it had just been a knife wound, Devlin would already be right as rain. The problem was the poison. It was seeping through his body and none of her tools would work as an antidote. She could limit the spread—and she did—but she could not stop it until they returned to Safe Harbor for proper treatment.

Dr. Horn had always preached the idea of using one’s environment when treating outside the walls of the hospital. She was pretty sure he’d meant using a turned-over stump as a surgeon table—rather than what she did now: searching the dead. Mercy picked over Holt’s body. Their attacker offered nothing of great use. She found another blade, sheathed down by his ankle. There was some kind of birdseed in his jacket pocket, but nothing else.

Next, she padded through Devlin’s pockets. His utility belt seemed equally useless. Until she found what he’d tucked against his back, left hip. A pair of way candles. Of course. His role as designated protector called for more than dueling. It also meant he needed to have an escape route ready, a backup plan. The wicks of both candles were damp from his plunge in the water, but not so bad that they wouldn’t light. The problem was fire. Mercy searched the bodies again, hoping to find some matches. Anything that might get the candles burning.

Halfway through her search she remembered she had magic . She was literally wearing a pair of gloves that served as a vessel. Hastily, she cast the first warming spell that came to mind. She was so nervous that she almost scorched the sleeve of her shirt—but it worked. The wicks lit. Mercy carefully leaned both candles against the first step of the staircase. After a moment’s thought, she plucked one of them back up. Crossing the space, she set the candle against the side of Devlin’s hammer instead. If a wind blew through the space, hopefully just one of them would flicker out. When she assessed the scene—the second candle’s swaying flame was barely visible in the flickering glow of the abandoned weapon.

Next, she checked Devlin’s vitals again. It seemed his heartbeat was a perfect match for the continual pulses of light in the room. He wasn’t losing blood anymore, but he was losing time. The poison would keep spreading through his body. If it infiltrated the vital organs before she could get him back to Safe Harbor, his chance of survival would drop significantly.

I will not let you die. I will not let you die.

Her stunted fingers began to itch wildly. She could feel, too, the phantom pain in her stomach. Where doctors had removed an organ during her sophomore year. A burst appendix. She ignored the feeling as she paced the platform once more. The first hour passed.

Devlin woke once. Long enough to sip water, murmur restlessly, and pass out again. Mercy noted a small dip in his heart rate. That worried her, but it was not a conclusive sign that the poison had reached any of his organs. The candles had both burned down to the three-fourths mark when she heard a sharp rattle. It was just loud enough for her to hear above the numbing churn of the water. Her eyes darted to Holt—thinking he’d somehow survived Devlin’s deadly blow. His body was motionless, though. Another rattle. It took a moment for her to place the sound.

It was coming from above.

She called out. “Hello? Is someone there?”

“Dr. Whitaker?!”

The rattle transformed into footsteps. Nance appeared on the catwalk above, though Mercy’s angle made it hard to see more than slivers of him. Their host rushed down the steps, nearly slipping as he descended. His eyes shocked wide when he saw the scene waiting on the platform.

“Holt! Good gods, look at his face!”

And then his eyes landed on the other body.

“Who the hell is that?”

Finally, he saw Devlin.

“Is he dead ?”

Mercy shook her head. “Poisoned. He’s still alive. For now. Holt attacked us.”

“Attacked?” Their host looked shocked. “He fixes gutters. Repairs doors and windows. He’s never—I’ve never seen any sign—”

“We found that other body down here,” Mercy answered. “Holt must have been involved somehow. Maybe he’s the one who killed her. She’s been down here for some time.”

But even as she spoke those words, she knew they fell short of the truth. There was something about the placement of the body, the intentional nature of what had been done here. Holt had obviously been involved, but this was no crime of passion. He hadn’t murdered the girl and dumped her body to hide the crime. The corpse’s placement was part of some larger design.

“I have to take Devlin back to Safe Harbor.”

Nance’s eyes slid from her to the way candle by the stairs.

“But what will the town do?” he asked. “What do I tell everyone about the quarantine?”

“I’m not abandoning you,” Mercy promised. “You have my word. Devlin’s been poisoned. I have no other choice. I have to get him back to Safe Harbor. Once I’m there, I’ll make a full report. They’ll send an entire team out to investigate. A squad of doctors. Soldiers, too. Enough people to figure out what really happened here.”

Nance nodded. “Of course. Yes, of course. That’s all very logical.”

There was a whisper in the air. A word she could not quite make out. Ar-kill-ar-kill-ar-kill. She could not figure out where the noise was coming from. Was it something in the water? She watched as Nance made his way back across the platform. Her host paused by the foot of the stairs. Using his boot, he knocked the way candle sideways. Mercy’s eyes widened as it rolled once along the metal platform—and then the heel of his boot came down. The flame snuffed out. Useless now. Nance looked back over one shoulder, his face half in shadow.

“I am afraid I cannot let you leave this place.”

The words slithered down her spine. His voice sounded strange. All the light was gone from it. He turned around to face her, but made no move to attack. Instead, he placed himself between Mercy and the stairs. Cutting off her only escape—or so he thought.

It took all her effort not to look to the right. The other way candle was hiding in the glow and afterglow of the hammer’s pulses. No more than two paces away from her. Instinct screamed that she should lunge for it now, now, now. She could escape easily. The hard part would be taking Devlin with her. She would have to dive in his direction, get a solid grip on him, and then physically reach back to extinguish the candle. All without Nance stopping her. And if she did succeed, it would be two people traveling on a shared candle. She would be stretching the magic to its outermost limits. Mercy’s heart pounded as she considered her options.

“I can see your thoughts,” Nance said. He tapped a finger against one temple. “Which spells to use. What magic might help you escape. Go on… try them.”

He spread his hands out. Offering himself up as an easy target. Mercy hadn’t been thinking of spells. Truly, she doubted that she possessed any magic that could actually overpower him. She’d been trained to heal people—not hurt them. Nance’s smile stretched in the silence. Mercy needed to buy herself more time.

“Why would you do this?” she asked. “I don’t understand.”

It was obvious now that Nance was involved. He and Holt had killed the girl, and then they’d intentionally set her body here. For what purpose? Did they intend to poison their own townspeople? It was incomprehensible, but she desperately hoped Nance would explain it. Anything that might give her more time to think.

“We needed to know if it worked.”

Another shiver ran down Mercy’s spine.

“If what worked?”

Nance gestured to the girl’s body. “The disease. You could call this a trial run.”

As he spoke, Mercy edged closer to Devlin. Nance noticed the movement, but made the wrong read again about what she was thinking. “Wouldn’t jump if I were you. Those water pipes run all the way to town. No access points between here and the farms. Are there any spells that would help you hold your breath for fifteen minutes?! And that’s if you’re not bludgeoned to death inside the pipes first.”

Mercy had no intentions of testing her abilities as a swimmer. She’d only been hoping to reach Devlin. Reach him, reach the candle, port away. Reach him, reach the candle, port away…

“Tell me,” Nance continued. “What did you learn? About the disease?”

The light of the hammer pulsed, spinning shadows in every direction. Mercy reached mentally back for the notes she’d taken. Anything to buy more time. Let the candle keep burning.

“Low mortality rate. Just one death so far. At first, I thought it was one of the most rapid-spreading contagions I’d ever researched—but if it was moving to them through the water, it didn’t really have to spread, did it? All of them were going to eventually get sick.”

Nance nodded. “All of them. Yes.”

“I thought you and Holt were evidence that the disease didn’t spread to every potential subject. I was wrong, though. You’ve already had the disease. Haven’t you?”

Nance tugged down the collar of his shirt. Even though his skin was darker than Holt’s, she could still see a pattern of long-faded bruises below his collarbone. “Correct again.”

“So, you intentionally spread a disease….” She still couldn’t fathom the bigger picture. “A disease you’ve already experienced. All these people. You put them in harm’s way.”

“As you just said, the mortality rate is low.”

Nance’s casual tone dug under her skin. Mercy couldn’t accept that. One casualty was too many if the disease could have been avoided. Besides, there wasn’t just one dead person.

“But this girl…”

“Volunteered,” Nance said. “She’s one of ours.”

Mercy highly doubted that. People didn’t just sacrifice their lives like that. Not when death was waiting for them. They must have forced her into this somehow. At the very least, she’d been manipulated. There was another pulse of light from the hammer. Mercy noted how the beats were continuing to slow. Devlin was running out of time. Her scarred fingers itched again. She could save Devlin—but only if she escaped first. There was another whisper in the silence. That same strange sound cutting through the air, on the very edge of hearing. Nance briefly cocked his head as if he were listening, and then his eyes fixed back on her.

“Did you hear it?”

Mercy frowned. “Did I hear what?”

“The echo. I know you were trained at Safe Harbor. Educated at Balmerick. You’ve worked with some of the very best doctors in all of Delvea. I know you heard it.”

“Yes. I heard an echo.”

Nance smiled again. “In all of them?”

Before Mercy could answer, the light of the hammer went out again. She waited for that next pulse—but this time it did not come. As the afterglow faded, the candle’s light was finally visible. Nance’s eyes briefly widened. Mercy lunged for Devlin. Her body slid across the water-slick platform and she almost overshot her mark. One arm wrapped around his neck, though, as if she were trying to choke him. Certain her grip was tight, Mercy fell backward, reaching for the candle.

Nance was coming. He shouted something, but the words tangled as Mercy’s fingers closed on that waiting flame. A quick sequence of pain followed. First, the burning. Fire pinched between both fingertips. The sound hissed in the air. Next, a sharpness in her side. Skin tearing. Muscles ripping. Something hot and sudden cutting a path toward her organs. Both of those smaller pains were followed by the full-body compression that always happened when entering the waxways. How the magic seemed to shape a person, folding briefly into some other form, so that it could ferry them through that dark world and set them down elsewhere. She heard a whisper in the shadows.

Ar-kill, ar-kill, ar-killlllllllll.

Eventually, the sound faded. Her pain multiplied. When Mercy’s feet set back down in Kathor, it felt as if someone had put their hands inside the wound in her side. Gripped the edges and pulled them wider and wider and wider. Until the entire world was pain. She blinked her eyes open to candles. She was back at Safe Harbor. Home. It would have been far more pleasant if someone wasn’t screaming. Bloodcurdling. Echoing off the walls. She could hear people scrambling to get inside the room. Bodies suddenly filling that space. Shadows and movement.

Mercy ignored them. She was looking to where Devlin should have been. Clutched in her arms. Sprawled across the floor. But there was no one else with her. She shoved to her feet, eyes searching the room. Devlin was not there.

“Gods, look at all that blood.”

“Give her space! Back the hell up and give her some space!”

The screams were getting louder. Mercy closed her eyes as the world began to spin. A small part of her mind accepted the fact that she was losing blood rapidly. That was why she was so light-headed. More importantly: Where the hell was Devlin? Why hadn’t he come through the waxways?

She couldn’t think with all the screaming. She wished the person would stop. She wanted them to shut up. PLEASE! SHUT UP!

And they did.