Chapter Twelve Sylas
Dear Uncle Rodric, if you figure out how I can break this bond with the Mortemagi, I will never break a single rule again.
twelve | sylas
Corvi smells like roses. I hate roses. They remind me of the sickly sweet innocence of nonmagi, always so curious, always so careless, and they die just as quick. Or maybe they remind me of Mom’s funeral, where all I remember is the nauseating smell of the flowers.
As I lean over the balustrade on the first story of Hollow Tree, I wonder why mages flock to the dining hall instead of eating in their respective Houses—it’s always so…
crowded. Railesza sits at my wrist, her head resting between my thumb and index finger.
Her eyes follow Corvi’s every step until she sits at the long dining table, mindlessly tearing apart a fresh loaf of honeyfig bread—an odd choice for dinner.
My aspier has no business being this invested in a Mortemagi, just like I had no business intervening into Mortemagi matters yesterday morning.
“You’re back.” My sister tackles me with a side hug. I wrap my arms around her, grateful to Paltro for getting me out of the correctional facility. I thought I’d never see Lyria again.
“I’ve been back for a couple of days now.” I give her a pointed look.
“Paltro sent me home,” she reminds me. My smile falters. Paltro did mention sending her to Iserine, but if he was with me the whole time, who went with my sister?
“Alone? With poachers in every corner?”
“Gryff was with me.” She sighs.
I frown. Even with him, it’s risky traveling to a different province with poacher camps along the borders.
“I thought Gryff was in the middle of an investigation,” I say.
“He was, I mean, he is. He had to go to Iserine anyway, to retrieve Beau’s birth certificate and adoption papers.”
I don’t press further. “How is he? And did someone tell Grayson?” Gryff’s brother, Grayson, and Beau were close.
“Angry, sad. In a way, he lost a brother, too. And Gray is on assignment in Imglen. He doesn’t know yet.” She pokes her cheek with her tongue and looks up with tears in her eyes. “Sometimes I forget he’s gone, you know? How are you holding up?”
I shake my head. I don’t want to talk about my feelings right now. I’ll grieve when we find Beau’s body. She nods, giving me a small smile. Then she narrows her eyes at my black aspier. “Why did Raiku try to kill the Mortemagi?”
Raiku remains still at my wrist. He was almost sent back to death row after he bit Corvi.
I had to convince PGM Parrish that he was only putting her back to sleep so she could heal.
An obvious lie. I briefly flirted with the idea of letting her die, and Raiku acted on it.
“Uncle Rodric told me to keep you in line,” she says lightheartedly.
“Did he also tell you that they forced me to bond with her?” I scoff. “A Mortemagi.”
“Sylas.” Her tone drops in a long sigh, as if she’s speaking to a child. I prepare myself for the same old lecture. “The House of Death didn’t kill Mom. She didn’t kill Mom.”
“Death magic killed Mom, Lyria,” I correct her. “Perhaps it wasn’t Corvi magic, but it’s all the same.”
My sister huffs, but she knows I’m right.
Dad told us the story countless times. How Mom was surrounded by the undead—bony creatures, oozing darkness, with the sickly sharp stench of death, the ones Mortemagi summon.
How he tried to help her, but she died saving him with Raiek. Our entire world upended in one moment.
“This girl didn’t kill Mom.” She locks me in a death stare. “Your prejudice can’t play the God of Death.”
“If I wanted her dead, she’d already be dead,” I say.
What I do not say is that I lost control.
After Raiku’s biting incident, Paltro threatened to send me back to the correctional facility if I so much as touch a single hair of the Mortemagi.
“You don’t want to know what Parrish is capable of,” he’d said.
If she’s even half as deadly as her sister, the Deathbringer, no, I don’t want to know.
My answer weighs between us, then her lips pull into a smirk. “You threatened Lorne. It was all everyone was talking about yesterday.”
For half a breath, I see Beau beside her, his boyish grin adding to her teasing. Grief hits in stages. Sometimes, it forgets and goes quiet for hours, days. And sometimes, it comes barreling into your chest, punches through your heart, and knots your throat. It must show on my face.
“Don’t,” Lyria says. “Don’t, or I’ll start crying.”
I blow out a breath, looking away. That we even have to mourn our brother mere months after our father’s murder is cruel. Somehow, we have to stay afloat in a sea of grief that’s constantly trying to drown us. I shake my head, turning my gaze back to my sister. I need to be strong. For her.
“Lorne told the Mortemagi that he didn’t know Olivia.” I make a poor attempt at a conversation change.
She throws her head back, laughing. “Lorne? Didn’t know Olivia? Lorne?”
“Railesza wouldn’t stop hissing until I intervened.” It’s only been a few days, and this bond is insufferable. Railesza makes it her duty to watch over the Mortemagi, and Raiku hisses at me every time I glance her way.
“Did you tell her Olivia was Lorne’s girlfriend?”
“Lorne is grieving.” Sierra sighs as she joins us in the nook overlooking the dining hall. She traded her usual cornflower-blue shirts for our standard black ones today. The bags under her eyes betray the quick smile she flashes. “It’s hard for us to see her around.”
I forget that Sierra lost her best friend, that she, too, is grieving.
But it’s unfair to blame Corvi for kindling their pain.
I look down at the Mortemagi. She looks nothing like her sister: other than their shared height, they could be strangers.
Her eyes are brown to Olivia’s green, her nose smaller, her face softer, her cheekbones higher, her hair is layered black waves that fall to her midback, and her skin a golden brown that reminds me of the Wanoran sands.
Her lips are drawn in a pained expression, as if she’s never smiled in her life. I catch myself wondering if she’s ever had any reason to. The way she fades into the shadows when she walks; how she uses the fewest words to say anything at all; how she sits alone at the table, avoiding the world.
“Lorne shouldn’t have lied.” Sierra squints at the girl as she leans on the rail next to us. “But maybe he has his reasons.”
Lyria snorts. “Sure.”
What reason would Lorne have for lying? Other than his being a predator. First, it was Olivia, and now her sister. I’m about to argue, but Sierra’s expression keeps me quiet.
“I have a trade.” Sierra’s eyes darken to deep blue, her relic glowing. “About the girl, like you asked.”
Lyria gives me a scathing look. She doesn’t understand the real dangers of Mortemagi, that their outer calm masks death at the tips of their fingers. The best way to guard against one is to know the root of their magic, so I asked Sierra to find out about Viola’s.
“I didn’t ask for a trade, I asked for a favor,” I snap, but my irritation only makes me look like a fool. Sierra cannot trade a secret if one isn’t traded to her in exchange. I lower my tone. “I don’t have a secret, Sier. I’m sorry.”
“I don’t want secrets; I need help.” Sierra turns her gaze to the Mortemagi again.
“Olivia was my best friend, and I don’t think she fell, Sy.
In all her years here, she’s never broken curfew, not even once.
Isn’t it suspicious that Olivia dies, and she shows up?
Olivia never mentioned having a sister. I’ve known her for twelve years, Sylas, and she wouldn’t have lied to me. ”
Railesza violently hisses at Sierra, as if insulting the new Corvi personally harmed her.
Raiku shakes his head, and I stifle a laugh.
First, the idea of this small woman killing Olivia to take her place is preposterous; unlike her sister, she’s a mage, and Gorhail is her birthright.
Second, Olivia lied her way through Gorhail; I would never say this to Sierra, but it’s embarrassing for a reader to miss that Olivia was a nonmagi.
“Promise you’ll help uncover Olivia’s murderer, too,” Sierra pleads when I don’t say anything. I could use this as leverage with the Mortemagi.
“A trade is a trade,” I say, scrambling for a secret I can share. “I don’t think Olivia’s death was an accident.”
“Viola Corvi is a whisperer,” she returns with a grateful nod.
A whisperer. How pathetic. Whisperers are like Death’s least favorite minions. They run around like hollow fools, following ghosts that either drive them mad or lead them to their deaths. But they can also be useful, especially when they can be a direct line between Beau and me.
“No.” Lyria pulls on my sleeve, but I’m already halfway down the stairs.
Whisperers are rare, functioning ones at least. Most of them become trapped in their own minds from ghost paralysis.
Before that can happen, the majority end up sealing their magic, choosing to live as nonmagi.
That we have an untouched one wandering the halls of Gorhail is Damas smiling down on us.
Someone bumps into me on the landing between the first and second flight of stairs. I pull back and Corvi grimaces, rubbing her forehead. When she realizes it’s me, she backs away, her arms folded around her middle. I saved her life. Why is she looking at me like I’m going to eat her alive?
“You’re never going to survive here,” I mutter with a sigh.
“Is that what you said to Olivia before you killed her?” She lifts her chin and holds my gaze with defiance. Good. She shouldn’t bow for anyone, not even me. But out of everything that could come out of her mouth, I never expected those words. Bold, I’ll give her that, but also foolish.
“I would never”—I lift my hand, and Raiku gladly stretches along my forefinger in a threat—“ever lay hands on a nonmagi.”