Chapter Ten
The Holy Flame
‘A most sacred stitch, reserved only for altar cloths and the robes of the High Priests. Though simple, its very simplicity marks it as one of the patterns most favored by the One-Eyed God.’
—An Exhaustive Compendium of Stitches
Smoke?
I stopped dead. None of the stray revelers on the street paid it any mind. Why wouldn’t a crematorium be smoking? But they didn’t know it was dormant, a mere front for the Book Man’s establishment.
I increased my pace, almost running to the door the Book Man had bade me use.
It felt warm to the touch. As soon as I opened it, something large and dark flew at my face, and I yelped.
It was Baldbeak, clearly in a panic, his feathers askew.
He fell against me heavily, actually burying his head in the crook of my neck.
Fire, was all he said, and I could feel the deep, primal horror in the shiver of his voice. Fire, when he was trapped and could not outfly it, was the ultimate predator.
No. No, the bookshop was warded against fire. The Book Man had told me so.
But wards were not unbreakable.
If the door was hot, the flames might be just behind it.
I went instead to the crematorium entrance through which I had first entered the bookshop.
I held Baldbeak tight, but looked beyond him to the hatch leading into the oven.
I thanked my lucky stars that it was open, or Baldbeak and the Book Man would have been trapped inside.
I could not see the orange light of flames, nor any smoke—although I supposed the chimney was designed to siphon it up and out, so that might not mean much.
The Book Man.
“Baldbeak,” I said urgently. “The Book Man. Did he get out?”
Baldbeak sent me a succession of images, wavering at the edges and even harder to discern than usual through his panic. He seemed to have been roosting on a shelf when the fire started, and he shot out of the passage into the exterior room as soon as he smelled the smoke. He had not seen the fire.
“Wait out here, Baldbeak,” I whispered.
You must not go in! He snapped at my finger. If I hadn’t moved quickly enough, it would have drawn blood.
“I have to see if the Book Man is in there.” I scratched his head. “I’ll be all right, I promise. I won’t keep going if it’s too dangerous.”
I left the porcupine mask outside the crematorium door, and Baldbeak perched on it.
The sight of the gigantic black bird perched on the leering skull was enough to give anyone nightmares, but perhaps that was a good thing—I would have to leave the door open behind me this time, and no one would be likely to follow me in.
I plunged into the blackness of the passage.
The metal did not feel warm on my hands, and although, as before, it was difficult to breathe through the soot and bone dust, I smelled only a little smoke.
When I emerged at the other end, the bookstore looked just as usual.
I called for the Book Man, but heard no response.
My voice sounded odd and flat in the silence.
Somehow I could tell that there was no one else in the building with me—the air felt dead.
I followed the scent of smoke through the store.
The smell and the haze in the air grew stronger as I approached the round metal door that led to the basement.
Once I was close enough, I could see a thin line of smoke, like a curling blue ribbon, winding from the very edge of the door.
I pressed my hands to the metal and felt that it was warm.
I fumbled with the doorknob, hoping it was not locked from the inside, and … it swung open.
The basement was on fire. The magical wards were clearly fighting it, because the flames hadn’t yet taken over, despite the plentiful supply of kindling—instead they flared up in different parts of the room before dying down, only to blaze into life again a moment later.
The spellbooks in this room were chained to the wall and appeared to be trying to break free of their shackles.
They sparked and spat like sausages in a pan, the magic inside them reacting to both the fire that was attempting to consume them and the wards that were desperately trying to douse it.
The air thrummed with the tension between them all.
And in the center of the room—a puddle of blood.
I felt dizzy. No body. Nothing but this little pool of deep red, the dancing reflections of the many-colored flames flashing in it like bright fish in a dark pond.
“Book Man!” I called. Of course there was no answer. There was no human life in this room.
I looked down and noticed for the first time the five small, pale shapes that were scattered on the bottom stair, gleaming like pearls. I knelt, and the breath of air from my swaying skirt stirred them, and they made a clattering sound on the tile.
A complete set of fingernails, bloody at the roots.
Fingernails?
Before I could touch them, there was a great whoomph, and the flames roared up a thousandfold.
The wards. Whatever magic had started this fire had finally defeated the wards, and they had failed, and the flames had taken root in earnest. I looked around at the priceless volumes on the shelves.
The Book Man would have wanted me to save them if I could, I knew, but there was no time.
Already the room was filling with choking black smoke.
I ripped a length of cloth from my skirt hem to cover my mouth and nose, and ran up the stairs, slamming the basement door behind me.
The door would buy me only a little time—I knew the flames would make their way through it soon.
I fought my way through the stacks of books, through the tunnel, through the crematorium, back to the front door, and emerged gasping onto the street.
Baldbeak flew up to my shoulder, cawing urgently in my ear, scolding me for going inside in the first place.
Mieka. I had to find Mieka and tell her what had happened. If she were indeed still my ally. I hoped against hope that she was.
The courtyard beyond was quiet and relatively empty.
I broke into a run, sliding a little on the cobblestones, putting as much distance between me and the shop as I could.
I swung into an alleyway, stumbled, and clutched at something that turned out to be an elbow beneath a rough sleeve. Baldbeak snapped at its owner.
“Oi! Watch it!”
I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
I did not know if I had spoken aloud. The stranger shook me off, and I fell against a stone wall, feeling its rough scrape all along my side.
I leaned there for a moment, panting. My vision threatened to turn white, and panic clawed at my throat.
I felt, rather than saw, the strange looks I was getting.
“You all right, love?” said someone. A woman. I blinked, and a kindly face came into focus, stained with colored sugar.
“Yes. I am fine. Thank you. I am fine.”
I had to get off the streets.
“You don’t look all right,” said the woman.
More people were gathering as they caught sight of the fire that was now taking hold of the whole shop and crematorium in its blazing fist. I heard the Watch’s rattle sound in the distance, and forced myself to stand up and stumble on, aware now of curious eyes on my back.
Eyes, eyes all around me, the eyes of the Watch and the Temple among them—if not now, then soon.
I heard cries of “Fire!” behind me. The bookshop would be soon be laid open by the flames, picked over and investigated.
My legs could hold me no longer. I found a doorway from which I could still see the shop and crouched within the little shelter it offered, shivering and shocked, watching the ashes steam in the soft but relentless rain that had started to fall again.
The drizzle had little effect on the blaze.
Baldbeak nibbled at my ear, trying to comfort me.
Was this my fault? Had someone come to the Book Man’s shop to find me and, failing that, destroyed him instead? And, selfishly—how was I to find Mother and her spellbook now? I would have to make my own way to Spire without his help. It was no more than I deserved, I told myself.
Footsteps clicked their way over the damp cobblestones and stopped beside me.
My head was resting on my knees, so at first all I could see were the shoes—an unusually beautiful pair, hand-painted with a pastoral scene and laced with gold ribbon.
My exhausted mind, glad to be distracted from the destruction and my desolate future prospects, lingered on the beauty of the shoes for long enough that one of the feet tapped impatiently, finally making me look up. It was Milady.
“My dear,” she said, her beautiful face a picture of concern. “What happened here?”
To my shame, I burst into loud sobs, my nose streaming with the cold, the rain, and my own tears. Milady crouched beside me and patted my shoulder.
“You poor thing.” The ribbon of her voice, smooth and smoky, wound around me, quieting me a little.
She rocked back on her heels and looked behind me to the flames and smoke, now clearly visible even from blocks away.
“I just saw … What a shame. I am so sorry, my dear. What a terrible thing.” She sighed.
“Really such a tragedy. He was a very special man. Do you have somewhere to go, my dear?”
This was my fault, somehow, I knew. All this destruction. All this death.
Milady helped me to my feet. “Here, my carriage is just across the street. I was actually on my way to the bookshop anyway, to speak with you, when I saw what happened. Fortuitous, in a way.”
“To speak with me?” I managed to say through the fog of guilt and despair.
She placed her gloved hand on mine. “I had meant to tell you under different circumstances,” she said, her voice softening. “I suspected when I first saw you, and now I am certain. Your mother is Margotte Edevane, is she not?”
I nodded slowly, not speaking.
“Netta, my dear,” she said. “I am your aunt. Your mother is my sister.”
Your flock? said Baldbeak, with an air of deep skepticism. He had been busy grooming his ash-smeared feathers, but now he cocked his head to eye Milady sidelong.
It took a moment for my mind to comprehend the words.
My thoughts felt obscured, choked by the rising smoke from the bookshop.
I peered at her, the revelation sinking in slowly.
How had I not noticed before? Her features were Mother’s, painted by a flattering portraitist: the edges softer; the eyes bluer; the cheeks touched with rose petals where Mother’s were wan; the curve of her mouth sweet and pink where Mother’s was a hard, firm line.
Lost in examining her face, I reached out without thinking to touch the tendril of hair that curled over her shoulder. She smiled. I snatched my hand back.
“My dear, I have been searching for you for longer than you know.” She folded me in a perfumed embrace, her cheek silky against mine, and I breathed in the scent of her hair, heady and floral.
I did not quite know what to do with my arms, so they stayed uselessly at my sides.
My Hair shrank from the unfamiliar touch, but something deep in me responded to it.
She looked so much like Mother, after all.
“I am so glad to have found you,” she said. She clapped her hands together. “Now, you must come with me, you poor thing.”
“Wait—did the Book Man know? That you’re my aunt, I mean.”
“He may have suspected,” she said. “Poor man.” Her eyes glistened prettily.
“He had many enemies, I’m afraid. It was inevitable in his line of work.
But we must put all that behind us. Come, let us go to the carriage.
” She cast a slightly disapproving glance at Baldbeak. “Your raven may ride on the roof.”
A spark of hope in the swirling smoke of my thoughts.
“Are you going to help me find my mother?”
“Of course, my dear. I have been looking for her for twenty years, and I’m certainly not going to stop now. Having you is a wonderful gift, and I feel sure that together we will be able to find her now—and her book.” Her lips curved. “We are going to have such a marvelous time.”