Chapter Thirty-Six Sylas
“The Rise of Rafael Grimm: An Exploration of the Rise and Fall of One of the Greatest Mages Draterra Has Known”
thirty-six | sylas
This morning, even though he’s summoned me, I avoid Paltro like the plague. Maybe, by the time I inevitably run into him, I’ll have perfected my lie.
Midday is nearly upon us, and I stare at the clock, once more wishing for time to run.
Viola left for classes two hours ago with my sister, and I have half a mind to show up at the House of Death.
Because now that the taste of her lips is forever seared on mine, any minute away from her feels like torture.
“Your death stares at the clock won’t alter the fabric of time.” Beau takes a sip of my tea, grimaces, then pushes it toward me. “This is gross. I can’t believe you drink this willingly.”
I sip on my tea, frowning. Nothing’s wrong with it.
“What did you find?” I set my teacup down on the kitchen counter and shuffle through the papers scribbled with clues, dates, and timelines.
“I’ll tell you, but first…” Beau leans forward, his eyes narrowing on the bruise on the side of my eye. “Where were you yesterday?”
My jaw clenches, and I debate walking away for a moment. I was hoping no one would ask about yesterday, but they’ll find out eventually. I bring the cup to my lips, and nod. “DOTS requested reassessment for Firstline, because Viv Rowan filed a motion to dismiss me.”
Beau’s gaze clashes with mine. His face sours. “Haal, Sylas… how many?”
“Fourteen, in less than half a day.” My gut wrenches when I think of DOTS’s reassessment trial.
They drove four other mages and me to a poacher cell on the border of Bale and Iserine and left us to fend for ourselves.
Our assessment was to dismantle the cell without losing a single member of our small unit.
“Five of us against about twenty of them.” I breathe out. Memories of ripped flesh and gouged eyes hurl up my stomach, memories that Viola’s touch pushed away even when she wasn’t aware.
“That’s…” Beau pauses. “That’s a lot…”
Even my brother can’t bring himself to say the words.
That’s a lot of bodies—especially when I killed fourteen of them.
Poacher or not, I am not the God of Death to take lives at the whim of DOTS.
And even when later on, they told me half of those poachers were the ones responsible for the murder of my unit, I still felt deplorable.
No amount of revenge brings back the dead—I would know this.
DOTS and Firstline thought retaliation was a way to redeem myself. Perhaps in their eyes, it was, but in mine, I had become the very enemies I hunted. In the end, how different are we from poachers if we all kill to further the dogma of the institutions we believe in?
Beau walks around the counter and throws his arms around me. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Did they reassign you?”
“Premier Intelligence Division, headquarters,” I reply. Being assigned to the same division as my father means nothing to me anymore. Three weeks ago, it would’ve been an honor; now it’s just a reminder of my mistakes.
“What did you find?” I nod at the black pass with St. Fabian’s logo, still hanging around his neck.
“Nothing we don’t already know,” he says uncomfortably.
“You went all the way to St. Fabian this morning, took a reader to our only lead, and came back with nothing.” I love my brother’s dedication, but I’m not in the mood for games. Viola’s life—whatever is left of it— depends on how fast we work.
“I couldn’t push it, Sy.” He levels my gaze. “You should’ve seen Victor’s mother. It’s heartbreaking. She stares out a window all day. No reaction, no movement. The only time her eyes moved was when I told her Victor wasn’t dead.”
“Take another reader.” I glare at him.
“I took one of the best.”
“Sierra doesn’t have the rank to untangle memories—”
“Grayson.” Beau interrupts me, and my head snaps toward him. Grayson is Gryff’s brother, and he is one of DOTS’s primary readers, a memory detangler. If he couldn’t read Mrs. Carver’s memories, that avenue is a dead end.
“How did you get Gray—” I cut myself off, shaking my head. Beau and Grayson have had a complicated relationship, and I prefer to stay out of it, like I do with Lyria and Gryff. “Keep trying, please.”
Beau gives me a tight smile. I’m not sure whether it’s to thank me for not pushing my question or whether he’s agreeing to try again with Mrs. Carver.
Sighing, I shuffle through the notes in front of me. “We know they want Viola’s cuff, and I’m going to guess they’re looking for a key. And from my encounter with the puppet in the woods, it’s someone who knows us… or at least knows my history.”
“The book…” Beau adds, and I scribble it down. “Olivia had The Founder’s Book of Relics, but it was never returned to her house with her other belongings. It has to be someone from Gorhail.”
As we throw theories back and forth, the door to the Poisoned Stairwell opens, and Lyria and Viola walk in laughing. My eyes momentarily drift to Viola as she sets her bag on the sofa. In two days, I leave for Firstline again, and that agonizing ache of being away from her knots my insides.
She looks up, smiles, and I forget the world.
“Please don’t mind us.” My sister inserts herself between Beau and me. I break our stare and return to the scattered pages. Viola joins me, and it takes everything in me to not pull her closer.
“You missed Beau’s findings from the library the other day.” Lyria taps a pen on the page. “Our parents and everyone who was killed attended the institute at the same time.”
“That’s hardly relevant, Lyr. Generations have walked these halls. So many other mages’ parents have attended Gorhail at the same time.”
“Maybe we’re looking at it wrong. We still can’t find a link between everyone who’s died other than the fact that they were classmates.
” Viola plucks the page from underneath my hands, her eyebrows knotted in a frown.
“The ghost did insist that we should be concerned about the lines being killed, so maybe we need to look at their deaths. What if it’s something that started years ago?
When did your parents die, Beau?” she asks, grabbing a pen.
“Right after my second birthday,” he answers quietly. “March 1919.” “Sy and Lyr?”
“Mom was killed in December 1918.” Lyria squeezes my hand.
Viola notes this down, too, then adds two more dates. “My father died at the beginning of 1919.”
Lyria shifts over next to Viola. “We’re getting somewhere. The Death-bringer went missing in early 1917. Could they all be connected?”
I slide off the chair, and step behind Viola, snaking my hand around her waist and leaning my chin on her shoulder. Her body melts into mine, this strange feeling of belonging twisting deep within me.
Beau and Lyria exchange a pointed look and a complicit smile, but they don’t breathe a word.
“Fable’s and Wren’s parents break the pattern. I scoured the records, and their parents died in the last couple of years. I don’t think it’s related, unfortunately,” I say quietly. It seems like their deaths were too spread out for there to be a connection.
Pulling away, I kiss the top of Viola’s head and walk toward my room. “We have nothing, other than the likelihood of it being someone from Gorhail.” The answer is within our grasp yet keeps sifting through our fingers like fine sand.
Out of nowhere, bells clang, jolting us from our conversation. There’s a pause, before they clang again. Lyria rushes out the front door. She comes back moments later, a frown on her face. “Rhodes has called an emergency assembly.”
Dean Rhodes stands on the balcony overlooking Hollow Tree, her usual red dress replaced by a somber black one, matching the uniforms of the faculty standing behind her. They’ve moved the dining tables, so we look like a colony of ants, stacked on top of one another.
Instead of being alarmed—as one should be about the first emergency assembly in over two decades—Hollow Tree is buzzing with theories about the murders. I swallow down my anger. Would they be this excitable if their family was targeted?
“Mages,” Rhodes says, looking down at us.
The chatter only grows louder. Rhodes claps twice, but the urgent whispers from the new Magus in front of me are incessant. In reality, most of them are so young. They shouldn’t have to worry about being killed in a place where they’re supposed to be safe.
“Silence.” The sharpness of her voice slashes through the noise. The younger mages freeze, lowering their heads in shame. Next to me, Lyria and Beau look nervous. A moment later, Viola joins us, her arms crossed, nodding at an empty space; I suppose it’s her anchored ghost.
“Where were you?” I whisper without looking at her.
“Downstairs by your safe. I was checking in on Scar,” she whispers, and Raiku gently hisses at her. In all the years I’ve had my aspier, he’s never hissed at anyone gently. He slithers to my hand and nudges Viola’s with his nose. I sigh. Even my aspiers are under her spell.
“As most of you are aware, poachers are attacking mages.” She tries to sound indifferent, but her forced smile betrays the frailty of her outer nonchalance.
“Per the request of DOTS, the school term is ending immediately, and all classes are canceled. A general Gorhail lockdown begins right away; you are not allowed outside of your respective Houses—should you require leaving Gorhail, please get approval from your overseers.”
Gasps bounce off one another until they dwindle into an uncomfortable silence, as if they weren’t just placing bets on who would be next. A couple of new Magus two rows ahead of me lock arms, fear dripping from the reassuring smiles they give each other.
“Sylas,” Lyria hisses, but it’s too late when I turn to her.
Lorne buzzes toward us like an angry wasp, his ridiculous cape-like coat billowing behind him. His eyes are locked on Viola, and I instinctively reach for her hand. But she doesn’t take it.