Chapter Twenty-Nine Viola
Resurrection is a complex ritual that requires a personal sacrifice from the Mortemagi. When his human lover died, Damas, the God of Luck and Treachery, begged the God of Death for a favor. In exchange for half of Damas’s soul, Death brought her back as the first Mortemagi.
twenty-nine | viola
My mood is as dark as the angry clouds outside. They remind me of Sylas’s eyes, even when I should forget he exists.
I fiddle with my now-cold honeyfig bread, my ears reaching for any news of Firstline. It’s been three days since Sylas left for Riverview, and I’ve seen neither Lyria nor Beau. We share one botany class at the House of Death, and they’ve skipped all three sessions.
Are they avoiding me because of Sylas? Then again, why should I care? What happens with them does not concern me anymore. Now that I am not safe anywhere, I might as well use my time at Gorhail to find more clues about the murderer.
“May I sit?” Sierra, the girl with golden-brown hair who bumped into me on my first day at Gorhail, approaches with a plate.
“It’s a big table,” I reply, looking down the length of the table that takes up the majority of the dining hall.
That was not very kind, says the ghost. She chooses the most random times to speak, surprisingly never when I’m by myself.
I wonder if she fears that I will take up Priya’s request of expelling her, which would be pointless.
Why would I damn a ghost to wander around aimlessly when I don’t have long to live anyway?
I don’t mean to be rude, but I want to be alone. Breakfast is the only breathing time I have before Lorne takes up every second I’m not in class with his extra lessons. We only started three days ago, and I now know the full history of death magic, starting with the first Mortemagi.
“I owe you an apology.” She slides her plate opposite where I sit. “I didn’t know Olivia had a sister.”
This stings. Hearing it over and over doesn’t ease the hurt that Olivia erased me from her life. She didn’t have to tell them our secret, but why did she not mention she had a sister at all? Was she ashamed of me?
“Oh.” The word, feeble and raw, escapes my lips.
“Olivia was my best friend.” She swirls a spoon in her steaming cup of tea, then gives me the smallest smile. I know who she is. I’ve heard all about her. Olivia used to tell me how Sierra would break curfew to help her study when they were at the academy.
“I’m sorry about Fable.” It’s the only thing I think to reply; I don’t have any particular feelings toward her, not when she was the reason my sister walked to her death that fateful night. Still, Olivia told me they were all friends, and it’s never easy losing friends.
Fable’s death is an ominous indicator that danger is now within the walls of Gorhail, no matter how much Rhodes tries to deny it.
And no matter how much I try to push back the thought, I know I could be next at any moment.
Yet here we are, carrying on with lessons as usual, throwing nervous glances and smiles when we cross one another in the halls.
“Don’t you think it’s suspicious? Their deaths…” she trails off, looking both ways, as if she’s afraid of someone overhearing.
“I do, but no one else seems concerned.” I push my plate away.
“My mother used to say Gorhail only cares about producing Firstline officers, and DOTS measures their aptitude in how many poachers they kill.” She sighs.
“When my mother died, I told them I wanted an investigation. She was young, healthy… it didn’t make sense.
They denied me, of course, saying her heart gave out. ”
“I’m sorry about your mother.” This feels too personal a conversation to have with someone I just met.
But my sister cherished Sierra, so I listen in silence as she tells me how Firstline pauses any investigation that paints DOTS in a bad light.
After a short while, I ask, “Were you with Olivia on her last day?”
“I was.” Sierra’s eyes water, and I hate myself for asking. “Fable overheard when I told Olivia I knew her secret and wanted to help. They fought, and in a fit of rage, Fable spilled everything about how she was seeing Lorne behind Olivia’s back. Olivia stormed out, and Fable followed her.”
I clutch my neck.
“The next day, she was dead.” She bites her lips, blinking a few times. “The irony is Fable had lied. She was enamored with Lorne, but he was only meeting her to buy dust recipes.”
Nothing she can say about Lorne will redeem him to me.
I sigh, thinking about how no one believed Victor.
He didn’t lie. Fable was the reason Olivia ran away to her death.
And no one told Fable Olivia’s secret. She overheard, and she still chose to threaten her; Sylas never said anything.
Sure, he shared something he shouldn’t have, even if I know in my heart that Sierra would never have used it against Olivia.
But Fable did, and because of her, Olivia died that night.
“Thank you for telling me,” I tell her sincerely. “Did you… did you notice anything odd about my sister in the days leading to her death?”
“No,” she answers immediately before frantically looking both ways.
What is she afraid of? “Find Victor Carver,” she whispers.
“He’s been around her since she joined the academy.
In the weeks leading to her death, they were meeting several times a week, and Olivia was always flustered after those meetings. ”
This doesn’t help me. Victor is in prison, and he tricked me. But if he’s hiding Olivia’s secrets, I need to know. Visiting prison seems like an unsurmountable obstacle, with curfew and Lorne suffocating me with his presence. “How would I—”
“Beau will know where to get passes,” she says. “Lyria told me about what you did for him and Victor, and after all you’ve given up, he can’t refuse.”
“I appreciate it.”
“Let’s have tea together one day,” Sierra offers, her eyes crinkling when she smiles at me. For a heartbeat, I let myself believe that her kindness is true. But I know that all she sees when she looks at me is Olivia, and I will never fill her shoes.
“Should we reschedule?” Lorne pulls his hand away from the blackboard.
We’ve been holed up in his office for hours now—it’s so cramped there’s barely any space to think.
I sit at the only desk in the middle, facing the board.
The rest of the walls are covered in bookcases filled with books about death magic.
I shift my focus to what he’s writing, and he’s in the middle of drawing a dead bird. Gross.
“You are a fast learner, Viola, but it doesn’t mean you don’t have to pay attention,” he says.
He’s teaching me so many of the theories I’ve already studied from Nan’s books, and I wish he’d focus on showing me how to use my magic instead.
Knowledge is great until monsters like Mara try to murder you.
Instead, Lorne seems to think that we can bore the undead with facts.
My eyes drift to the single window overlooking Death Spire. From here, I see the top so clearly, the intricate metalwork of the railing and the lone bench.
I think of the ghost I anchored to. Did she jump? Was she pushed? Did Gorhail try to pin the blame on her, the victim, as they did with Olivia?
“Viola,” Lorne snaps.
I jump. “Yes?”
“Why are you looking out the window?” he asks. “Death Spire is a bad omen. You already have one foot in the Underworld. Do you want to expedite your death?”
I glower at him. He’s getting far too comfortable. “Do you think I want to die?”
The hard lines of his face soften into sympathy as he takes the seat next to mine.
He glances at the door, then lowers his voice.
“No, and I don’t want you to die either.
” Then he turns a golden key into the third desk drawer, and, from a small hidden compartment, he pulls an old cloth-bound book with a muted blue raven embroidered on the front.
“What is this?”
His eyes meet mine, and I curse myself for thinking of how different they are from Sylas’s eyes. Not only in color, but in the way they perceive me. Lorne looks at me like I’m an opportunity; Sylas looks at me like… I shouldn’t be thinking about him.
“What if I told you, I could give you your years back…” He trails off, hesitant, waiting for any reaction from me.
“That’s impossible,” I say. Since I came back from Priya’s house, I’ve scoured countless books from the library. They all said the same thing— resurrection is irreversible.
He smirks, and my skin tingles with fear.
He doesn’t have to say it. Of course, none of the books in the library would hold any information.
He’s talking about the blood arts—of magic so ancient and so morbid I refuse to even think about it.
This is what should be a bad omen, not glancing at Death Spire.
“Today’s lesson is about lifedrain.” He flips the book open to a page with a dead bird, the same one he drew on the board. “Just like the blood arts drain lifeblood from the Mortemagi, they can also give it back through lifedrain.”
I look at him in horror. Nothing about this sounds good, especially when a bird’s lifeless body stares at me from his book. The drawing is so graphic, I can see the guts spilling out of its open stomach.
Lorne creeps closer to me, his long fingers reaching for my face, brushing my hair behind my ear. “I see potential in you, Viola. It would be a waste… to lose you.” His voice is soft, enticing; it wraps around me like the tendrils of death.
Something tells me he doesn’t speak of my potential as a student. “How?” I gulp, leaning into his darkness. As much as I despise Lorne, I don’t want to die. At least not before I’ve solved my sister’s murder.