Chapter 9 The Diary
THE DIARY
Astrologia must be denounced. These ephemerides are composed to explain observable celestial phenomena, not to foretell the fortunes of men. Any superstitious use runs contrary to the integrity of Astronomia. Let those who seek omens look elsewhere; here we speak only of what can be measured.
Bishop is gone.
Since returning from the Treaty, Claudia has turned her entire room upside down. Her bed is undone, her robes tossed out of her wardrobe, her drawers dumped onto the floor. Bishop is nowhere to be found.
Shit. Shit! If anyone else finds him, they’ll kill him.
How did he get out? Her windows are locked.
Her doors are closed. There shouldn’t have been a way for Bishop to leave the room.
Did Marcherie report him? Did the High Sage come into her room and take him away?
Panic rises in her throat. Her hands tingle.
She paces around the room and breaks out in a cold sweat.
With deep breaths, she tries to think logically—if the High Sage had taken Bishop, surely he would’ve told Claudia.
She’d be in trouble in his office right now if he knew about her snake.
And Cassius made Marcherie promise to give Claudia time to find an enclosure; as cold as the girl is, Claudia believes her to be honest. The most likely answer is that Bishop is hiding in some uncharted nook of the room, but Claudia won’t be able to rest until she’s sure he’s all right.
Maybe if she finds him some food, she’ll be able to lure him out of wherever he is.
She’s about to head down to the condemned Astrologia wing to search for rats when she sees a little white head poke out from under the heavy wool rug.
“Bishop!” she squeals, dropping to her knees and picking him up. “Don’t scare me like that ever again.”
Her snake opens his mouth. At first, she thinks he’s hissing at her, but then he starts coughing and retching, wriggling his entire body the way he does when he tries to eat something too big.
Eventually, he hacks up a crumpled piece of slimy paper.
When he’s finished, he smacks his jaws and flicks out his tongue.
“I’m going to get you a proper house. I promise.” She looks for somewhere to place Bishop and settles for the edge of the bed. Kneeling down, she picks up the wet wad of paper and smooths it out.
“Where did you get this?” The writing is smudged but still legible.
September 10th
When I awoke for the first time at Cygnus, it was still dark out, and a man was standing over me with a knife.
It wasn’t actually a knife, I learned later, but in the moment, in the dark, it might as well have been.
I took a big breath, ready to scream, but he clasped his cold hand over my mouth and pointed the weapon—not a knife, not sharp enough, something else metal and cold—at my chest. The man kept his hand over my mouth as he pulled me out of bed.
I had this odd feeling—something that should have been fear, but wasn’t.
At least, not entirely. Sometimes danger is exciting.
When he brought us out to the corridor, the pulsing sconces on the wall washed his face in orange light, and I finally recognized him.
Professor Lamour. The flames of the candles danced in his eyes like they lived there, always burning inside.
He wore the same red robes I had seen him in as I entered the school just hours earlier.
We had locked eyes then, and it seemed like shock overcame him, like he was seeing the ghost of a dead wife or some other long-departed love.
He looked at me like I was an impossibility.
- I’m not going to hurt you. I’m here to protect you, he said.
I struggled in his grasp. I did not believe him.
- If I take away my hand, will you scream? he asked.
I nodded because I am a terrible liar. I thought about biting off one of his fingers.
He kept his hand as my muzzle and walked me like a dog through tight and twisting corridors until we came to the locked gate of the condemned Astrologia wing.
He pulled a glowing key out of his pocket and unlocked it.
Inside, we spun up the spiral staircase of the observatory.
With me still pressed against him and gagged, he unlocked the heavy door and pushed us both inside, letting it slam behind us.
The stars sparkled above us in a black sky.
The moon was full. Lamour put the not-knife down on a desk and I realized that it was a telescope, and likely not a weapon.
- Do you know why you’re here? he asked.
- At first I thought you wanted to kill me.
- Someone does, but not me. I’m here to protect you from them.
I can’t say I was surprised to hear that someone wanted me dead. I’m the top Rhetoric scholar. Most of the Cygni hate me for that alone. They want to win. They want the blessing. And unless I’m gone, they won’t get it.
But that’s not what Lamour was warning me about.
Someone else—someone we don’t know and can’t find—wants me dead.
He explained it to me as if it were a storybook: Our god is dead, died a century ago, and with him died our magic.
- Or so we thought, he added dramatically.
He says that when Sidarphion fell one hundred years ago, celestial witches at Cygnus started dying.
Their bodies littered the ground like leaves.
Thirteen of them over the course of a single week.
Years went by and all the other majors had continued receiving guidance and blessings from their gods, but Astrologia sank to the capabilities of the mortal human.
The discipline was denounced, and the wing was closed when there was no magic left.
- Until me, he said.
He was the first in a new generation of celestial witches. He and four others. They called themselves the Eyes of Andromeda—a secret society dedicated to preserving the last shreds of celestial magic.
- Where are the other members? I asked.
His face hardened.
- Killed.
Upon their deaths, he said he realized that it wasn’t Sidarphion’s disappearance that killed the celestial witches. It was something—or someone—else.
- How did they kill your friends?
- Not all at once, he said.
- Could it have been a series of unfortunate accidents?
- Could a slit throat and a body drained of blood be accidents?
- I suppose not. But why weren’t you killed?
He sighed. Shrugged. Laughed.
- If I knew, I would tell you. I have no idea. I can teach you what I know, but I cannot guarantee your survival. Unless, of course, you’re willing to leave.
- Leave? I can’t leave.
- It’s the only way I can ensure that you are completely safe. Otherwise…
- This place means everything to me. My soul would rot without it.
- Please, Odette. I am begging you to put your life first.
- Cygnus is my life. If I leave before graduation, I won’t get my blessing. The gods will take my magic away. I’d rather die.
He sighed loudly.
- Think about it and give me your final decision tomorrow. If you refuse to leave, I will train you as best I can. We can only pray it will be enough.
I should’ve asked more questions. How could it be the same person if the killings started a century ago?
How many killers have there been? And how do we even know they’re still here?
All of this, I should have said, but I was too overwhelmed to think.
By the time I wrapped my head around it all and took a breath, he said it was time for me to leave.
Deep breath. Again. Again. Claudia rereads it three more times before she lets herself believe it.
Good gods.
This is a diary entry from Odette Dufort, and someone was trying to kill her. But who? How? Claudia’s mind races. “Bishop, where did you find this?”
He doesn’t answer because he’s a snake.
Useless. Adorable but useless.
She looks around the room and spies the dark rug beneath her feet. Maybe the other diary pages are stashed under there.
Claudia overturns it to reveal nothing but solid wood.
Surveying her room, she’s surrounded by so much mess from when she was looking for Bishop.
If the rest of the diary was in here, she would’ve found it already.
As she paces, her foot catches on a swollen floorboard.
It’s warped and wobbly from water damage or something.
When she leans down, she sees where ribbons of the wood have rotted away, just enough for a sneaky snake to wiggle through.
She tries to pry up the board to no avail, so she’s not sure what’s underneath, but she knows that this leads to the diary.
Claudia desperately needs to read the rest.
She’s not safe. She’s a celestial witch, too.
That diary holds the answers to everything; if she can find out who the real killer was, not only will she clear her name from any accusations of killing Odette, but she’ll be able to protect herself from getting killed next.
Could it be Sidarphion? Maybe he’s not dead. Maybe he wants to rid the world of all that remains of his magic, and he’s killing anyone who still possesses it.
But why leave Lamour alive? Surely Sidarphion would know he’s a celestial witch, too. Why spare him?
This theory is unraveling as quickly as Claudia puts it together.
Sidarphion isn’t here. He’s been gone the entire time the witches have been being killed.
It has to be someone else—someone who needed Sidarphion gone in order to kill celestial witches who were left unprotected.
Who else has been around for so long? It couldn’t be Dorian; he’s been asleep in the Realm of Nightmares since before this began.
He has to be the only celestial witch of that generation to have survived.
Ironically, his cursed stars saved his life.
She needs to speak with Professor Lamour immediately. Why hasn’t he come to warn her like he did with Odette? It seems the professor sensed Odette’s magic and felt compelled to protect her. Why didn’t he feel the same for Claudia? She’s just as powerful, just as vulnerable. What’s she missing?
Standing, she picks up her snake and holds him at eye level.
“Bishop, I need you to bring me more of these pages from wherever you found them. Can you do that?”
Again, he doesn’t say anything, but when Claudia plops him on the floor, he heads straight for the crack and slithers down until he disappears.
“Good boy.”
The darkness creeps across the sky. Claudia strips off her robes, crawls into her bed, and waits for Bishop to return. Anxiety gnaws at her insides. She can feel her heartbeat in her teeth. The room is silent, but her mind is screaming.
Alistair was wrong—Odette’s death wasn’t natural at all. Odette was actually, truly killed. And her killer is so damn good that only two people in the entire school suspect foul play. Even then, Cassius and Marcherie are looking in the wrong direction.
Claudia squeezes her eyes shut.
This killer is smart.
This killer has been killing for a century.
And this killer is coming for her next.