Chapter 37 Wake Up
WAKE UP
He who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.
Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Claudia stays up until dawn trying to decipher what effect Odette was trying to cause with her spells.
The first one she ever found spells out PROTECT ME FROM HIM in the shape of the Hydra constellation.
The second is more confusing—it’s the Lyra constellation, but Claudia isn’t sure how it should read.
There are two lines running into each other, converging in two places: death and mercy.
You are a lyre which charms death to defy its nature with mercy.
You are no siren. There is no death in your song—only mercy.
It must be about Marcherie. Was Odette trying to protect her?
The last one is the strangest: I am the raven who thirsts for you. You are both the figs and the wine, always out of reach. The god and his monsters punish us for our wanting but still I want to feast upon you.
This is in the shape of Corvus, Crater, and the Hydra. I want to feast upon you… always out of reach…
Odette wrote this one after she attacked Marcherie. Maybe she was trying to create distance around them, ensuring Marcherie was kept safe and out of reach.
Claudia isn’t sure of her interpretations, nor does she know if this mix of magic works. But it’s promising. Could it be the solution to freeing herself from Sidarphion?
It must be. What better way to undo a cosmic bargain than to unite the powers of language and stars?
Imagining what constellations could break this bargain, she tries Andromeda—representing the trap—and Vulpecula, the fox, representing her escape. For hours, she fiddles with words until a simple poem emerges.
She reads it aloud:
When forced, the lady becomes a fox,
Her heart an orange flame.
She escapes the starry locks,
And icy, god-touched chains.
Nothing happens. No brilliant flash of light, no trembling stars. Should she write it in blood? Should she add another constellation?
Her concentration breaks when she hears a key sliding into the handle of her door and shaking, though no one is getting in here, even with the right key. Claudia locked it with celestial magic.
The person behind the door fights with the key and the handle, scraping them against each other. Swiveling her chair, Claudia faces the door and watches the handle struggle against the lock.
It must be Marcherie. She never returned her key.
“Marcherie? Is that you?” Claudia asks over the sound of clanging metal.
The noise stops.
Claudia stands, taking two slow steps toward the door. “March?”
There is one more beat of silence, and then comes a loud, forceful bang as if the person behind the door is slamming all their weight into it.
Over and over again, the sound bangs through the room.
It makes the walls shake. Claudia covers her ears and cowers where she stands.
Books fall from the shelves. Lightweight chairs stumble over the vibration in the floor.
High-pitched clawing sounds over the booms like they’re trying to dig through the wood of the door. Bishop winces and curls into his hide.
Is this real? Did her spell cause it?
Hands pressed to her ears, Claudia yells out, “STOP.”
Just as suddenly as it began, the incessant noise ceases. Claudia remains crouched on the floor, her chin to her knees. Keeping her eyes on the door, she doesn’t make a sound. The seam of light at the bottom of the frame is interrupted by two shadows where someone still stands.
“Who’s there?”
There is no response and no movement—only a scratching sound, like a dull pencil on expensive paper.
Seconds later, a small note is slipped under the door.
The shadows disappear as the person walks away.
Stiff with fear, Claudia takes a long time to untangle her limbs.
Breathless, she crawls across the floor and picks up the note. The front reads:
WAKE UP.
She flips it over.
SHE DID NOT.
Tear-stained and terrified, Claudia yanks open her door and looks for any evidence of who left this, but the hall is dark and empty of all people. She closes it behind her and locks it again with her spell.
Is she in a nightmare now? Is that what this means?
Heart racing, she finds her linguistic celestial spell and checks for any tricky words that could’ve caused such a reaction.
Back pressed to the door, she rereads the note over and over and over. WAKE UP. SHE DID NOT. WAKE UP. SHE DID NOT. WAKE UP.
She does this until it all makes sense.
Until she remembers the first time she heard this phrase.
This is the answer to the question she asked Malevimus: How did Odette Dufort die?
He’d said, “She did not wake up.”
Only, he hadn’t said that at all. Claudia hadn’t been listening close enough.
The answer was not “She did not wake up.”
There was a pause.
How did Odette Dufort die?
She did not.
Wake up.
The answer, all this time, was “She did not. Wake up.”
Odette isn’t dead. The bargain didn’t kill her, which means that Claudia’s bargain won’t kill her, either.
Claudia is certain of this because she recognizes the handwriting on this note.
It was written by Odette herself.
She doesn’t believe a damn thing now from Sidarphion.
He lied about who he is. He lied about the bargain killing her.
He tried to trick her into killing Cassius by hinging her own life on it, when that was never the case.
He won’t protect her, won’t love her, won’t make her a god.
She has never hated anyone or anything as much as she hates him right now.
With Odette’s note and the diary in her hands, she charges through the halls and crashes into Lamour’s classroom.
The room is just beginning to brighten with morning light.
As she pants in the doorway, her eyes meet his.
He’s hunched over at his desk, quill in hand, ink bleeding onto the page where he’s paused his lettering.
“Claudia?”
With a heaving breath between each word, Claudia lifts her trembling hands and says, “Odette is not dead.”
Lamour’s face loses all color. “You’ve seen her, too?”
Claudia eagerly pulls up a chair and sits across from him at his desk.
They spend the next hour going over everything, and Claudia doesn’t hold back one bit.
Once she starts, she can’t stop. She tells him about the bargain, her father, the rivalry, the diary, the nightmares, the snakes, the bite, all of it.
She asks him about the diary entry in his desk, and he claims he never knew it was there.
It makes sense—the diary mysteriously appeared in her room.
Odette must’ve been placing it in their paths, waiting for it to be found.
Claudia tells him about Cassius, Dolericym, detention, Auridolace, tasting desire, and turning constellations into poetry.
There is not a single secret she keeps from him.
He listens intently and takes notes. Somewhere in the middle of her monologue, she wonders if she’s making a mistake, if she’s confessing to the wrong person, if her big mouth is making everything worse.
“I killed to be here, and he wants to force me to kill again,” she murmurs, wary that regret will overtake her immediately.
But it feels so good. So fucking good to just say it, to finally relieve herself of all these heavy, horrible secrets that have been rotting inside her.
When she finishes, he offers her a glass of water from a crystal carafe on the edge of his desk. She swallows it down in one gulp.
“Where do you think Odette is right now?” Claudia asks.
“It’s complicated. She may not be here at all.”
She tilts her head. “What do you mean? She wrote me this note. You’ve been seeing her. Of course she’s here.”
“New ghosts are quite strong.”
“Ghosts? That sounds ridiculous.” She holds up the note. “Ghosts can’t do this. There’s no way. You should’ve been in that room when she slammed herself into my door. She has to be corporeal.”
Eyes softening, he says, “Claudia, I don’t think—”
“No. She’s alive. I can feel it.” She presses her hand to the space between her ribs and her belly. “In here. In my soul.” Claudia needs Odette to be alive. She needs the fatal destiny of the bargain to be another one of Sidarphion’s lies.
She needs to believe she can survive.
“If she’s truly alive, ask yourself why Odette hasn’t come to speak to us directly. Why communicate in these cryptic ways, unless she has no choice?”
“But Malevimus told me—”
“You said it yourself that you misheard him initially. And that was months ago. You could be misremembering, or Malevimus could’ve meant something else. We cannot guarantee your interpretation of his message is correct.”
“Why are you so against this? I thought you would be thrilled.”
“I saw Odette’s body. I watched them lower her into the ground.
I saw a death that was just like all the others.
” As his words ring in Claudia’s ears, he leans back and holds his face in his hands for a moment.
“I knew in my bones that Sidarphion was not dead. I just can’t believe how many of us he’s killed. ”
“You think he made bargains with all the members of the Eyes of Andromeda? And did the same routine every time?”
“I’m sure he mirrored his promises to their individual ambitions, but yes. I think he killed them all.”
She’s silent as the realization burrows into her bones. “So, that’s it. I’m next.”
Lamour doesn’t say anything in response. He stares blankly at the far corner of the room. His quill taps rhythmically on the papers that litter his desk. Hope fades from Claudia’s heart when she sees a tear slip down Lamour’s hollow cheek.
“I’m sorry. I never should’ve sent you away. I had no idea how much you needed me. I let you down.”
“I let you down,” she argues. “I deserve it.”
He nearly leaps across the desk and grabs her hands.
“No, you do not. Absolutely not. Don’t ever think that you deserve to die for this.
You are a good, bright young woman and you deserve a long, happy life.
” He wipes his tears with the backs of his hands.
“And we’re going to get that for you. Do you hear me?
We are not going to give up. We are going to use the time we have left to fight. ”
“How?” Her voice breaks over the word.
Wind howls outside, making the windows shake. “You could free him.”
A wave of icy terror runs through her blood. “And kill Cassius? I refuse.”
“He is going to keep killing until he’s free. He’s already killed nearly every natural-born celestial witch. You could stop that cycle.”
“You sound mad! Who knows what Sidarphion will be like when all his power is restored. He isn’t good, Lamour. Freedom and power will only make him worse.”
“You know how maddening the Realm of Nightmares can be. Once he’s free, he will soften. I promise.”
“You’re not listening to me. The only way to free Sidarphion is to kill Cassius, and I will not do it. I will not let him die.” Through gritted teeth, she says, “I would kill for Cassius if it came down to it. So long as I’m still breathing, no one is going to hurt him.”
“All right. I understand.” He stares off again, tapping his quill, pondering.
Standing abruptly, he drops his quill and mumbles, “Let me try something.” He moves to the blackboard behind his desk and picks up a piece of chalk.
He writes, erases, rewrites, and redraws different celestial spells for half an hour.
The chalk wears down to a nub. Once the board is covered in circles and stars and dust, Lamour turns around with bloodshot eyes and a wide, toothy smile.
“I have a plan.” He draws arrows between different constellations, but the board is so cloudy that Claudia can’t deduce what he’s discovered.
He motions for her to come stand beside him while he murmurs inaudibly to himself before saying, “If I’m right—and I believe that I am—you don’t need to kill Cassius.
You don’t even need to destroy the constellation of Dracoemagyl, nor do you need to break your bargain.
” With his hands braced on her shoulders, he says, “All you need to do is unbind Sidarphion from the constellation that keeps him trapped.”
Warmth spreads in her chest when she stares into his wild eyes. She can’t help but smile.
This is perfect. This will save her. “You mean I’ll be able to get out of this whole thing without anyone dying?”
His lips curl over his teeth, and he shakes his head. “That’s not what I said.”
She stiffens in his grasp. “What do you—”
Someone knocks on the classroom door. Wide-eyed, they hurriedly erase the board before Lamour opens it.
“Hello there,” High Sage Triche says cheerily as he bumbles into the classroom. “I was hoping to discuss your—oh, hello, Miss Jolicoeur. Am I interrupting something?”
Lamour turns fast on his heels. “No, we were going over some questions regarding the sublime.”
“Ah, is this how Miss Jolicoeur has advanced so quickly? You’ve been helping her after hours?”
“I answer her questions, yes.”
The High Sage beams at both of them. “You’re a good one, Lamour.” He steps toward the desk, his face eager, his voice gossipy. “I have some sensitive information to discuss. Miss Jolicoeur, if you could please excuse us?”
Her wide eyes swing to Lamour. They can’t stop now. They’re so close.
“Professor, I still have questions to ask,” she protests, standing firm. The High Sage narrows his eyes at her, curiously.
Lamour nods. “Go on, Claudia. I’ll answer all your questions in the next lesson.” He drags out the last word.
Lesson. Not class—lesson.
Tonight at midnight. In the observatory.
It’s time for their training to begin again.