Midnight
Twenty-four hours in the Great Library is enough to drive anyone to the brink of hysteria. And I am feeling the drain, an exhaustion settling in my muscles that no amount of caffeine, sleep nor sustenance is getting rid of.
Verrill, bless her demonic soul, even deigned to let us have a takeout in her office at one point because she couldn’t get us to leave.
“Hey, did you know moths—entropy ones, specifically—will eat literally anything? Like even a wraith or a person under certain circumstances.”
I chuck another book about Veilwalking on the table and get up.
“I’m done,” I announce.
Bastien leans back in his chair and scans me up and down. “This should be good.”
“You can’t be done. We don’t have a plan.”
“Then I’m going into the underworld without a plan. What I know is that I can’t sit here for another minute, I’m going to crawl out of my skin if I do.”
Lex puts her head in her hands. “Midnight, hun. Be real. Lucy doesn’t have a soul. How do you plan to get her through a Veil tear?”
I point an accusing finger at her about to tell her to stop being such a pessimist when I stop and cock my head at her.
“What did you just say?”
She frowns. “Lucy doesn’t have a soul?”
“No. The other bit.”
“Umm. How do you plan to get her through a Veil tear?”
My eyes bug out of my head. I throw myself over the table, grab Lex’s face and drop a giant smooch on her forehead. “You little fucking genius, you.”
I scramble off the table and break into a run.
“WAIT,” Bastien says.
I throw a glance over my shoulder and the pair of them are tidying the books.
Lex flings her hands in the air and throws all the scrolls and books in a pile.
“I’ll clean it when we get back, Prof. Sorry!” she bellows in the general direction of Verrill’s office.
The professor sticks her head out of her room and scowls at us. “Come back here at once!”.
I am long gone, letting the library door swing shut behind me as I power walk to Finis Tower.
Lex and Bastien have just about caught up to me as I stride through the foyer.
“The hell, Midnight? You wanna share the tea?” Bastien says, slapping me on the arm.
We descend the tower. Making our way down the floors: Theoretical Death studies first. Then Business dealers. Minus three floor is the Memory Magic student’s floor. Then Lex’s Etyomancy on floor three. The lower we descend, the tighter we huddle together.
“We’ve been thinking about this all wrong,” I start.
“Going to need more information,” Lex mutters, a distinctly grumpy tone in her voice.
“We were assuming there was only one way to cross from the underworld to Ora.”
Bastien pulls up short. “The doors?”
“Exactly. We just have to convince the goyles.”
The tower seems to grow darker and cooler the further we descend. I quietly pray to the seven devils that it’s not an omen. Level five is one of the floors I’m on regularly, Fabric Weaving. We pass minus six for Bastien, Resurrection Magic. Last, is my most used floor: Veilwalkers.
Tonight, though, we have to go lower still. Beneath the foundation of the tower and into the basement. The place none of us are meant to go, or not without permissions.
I figure, given Ignatius wants me to bring Lucy back, he’s not going to resent me this.
The stairs spiral on and on for what seems like eternity, descending us into a faux hell. Designed as such to put wandering students off. The steps become less and less smooth and more and more raw, like they’ve been carved out of the stones of hell itself.
The walls grow coarse and craggy, cement replaced by cliff rock and haggard stones. The sconces struggle to stay alight this deep underground, the arid whip of breeze from the underworld cooled by the depths of Ora City and the chilled stone.
It’s a heady mix that makes me dizzy. Finally, we slip off the staircase and find ourselves in a darkened hallway.
Gardon sits above the arched stone gateway to the underworld.
“Hey,” I say, hoping he wakes up.
He opens a solitary eye and blinks at me, but closes it again, making no move to reveal the Veil.
I clear my throat. “Gardon? If you might be kind enough to talk to us…”
He huffs out a stony breath through his nostrils before peeling both his eyes open and glaring at us. “What do you want? Don’t you realise everyone has gone? All vanished. Shouldn’t you have gone with them?”
And I see the problem. He thinks everyone abandoned him. A few stone crumbles remain on the frame around his head. No one came to check on him after the Veil tore and Architecti put the tower back together. No wonder he’s feeling stroppy.
“They’re not gone. The campus is still here.” I reach up and flick the stone chips from the top of his frame. He growls as my hands sweep around his head, but I brush my fingertips against his cold little horns and stroke a finger down his cheek.
He huffs at me again. So I reach up and tickle under his chin. “I apologise on behalf of the campus that no one came to tell you what had happened.”
This makes the pout on his plump lips loosen. Bastien and Lex both side-eye me, so I continue.
“The Veil tore beyond any kind of rip we’ve experienced. Architecti has returned, Interitus is on the loose and a professor—Corvine—had her soul reaped. She’s stuck in the underworld.”
Lex is nodding along and adds, “And a lot of lives were lost. We’re sorry no one came to check on you.”
“The tower crumbled, I was hanging off the arch. All on my own, I was. Then the stone resealed itself, and I was back hanging the right way.”
“That must have been scary,” I say.
Bastien purses his lips. “You know what, you’re right, that was shitty on our behalf. We were only thinking about ourselves and how we were doing, I don’t think I’ve checked on any of the goyles. I apologise, Gardon.” Bastien lowers his head in deference to the goyle.
Gardon ruffles a little, seeming to fill with life a bit more so I follow suit.
“You, and your brothers, are the keepers of our campus, and I, too, apologise for not having thought of you. I hope you will accept my apology?” I also lower my head.
Lex is last. “Yeah. I was a jerk, man. I’m sorry.” But instead of lowering her head, she nudges a fallen boulder brick underneath him and steps onto it. She leans up to give Gardon a real kiss on his cheek.
Oh, that was smooth, Lex. Well played, my friend.
He blusters so much that I peek at him and swear his stony cheeks actually turn pink. I squeeze my lips shut tight to save myself snickering and ruining the moment.
“Oh, get up you bunch of sycophants. You’re forgiven. Lest you forget that the goyles are an integral part of the campus again, then so help you demons, there will be consequences. Now, what do you want? You’re clearly here for a reason, spill it…”
“How do shades get through?” I ask.
“They’re called. Either by a student, professor or Finis itself.”
“Right, but the wraiths, they get through without being summoned.”
“Correct, where are you going with this?” he says, flecks of stone dust floating to the floor.
“What if we wanted to bring someone back without a soul?” I tread carefully, hoping I can coax him around.
He narrows his eyes at me. “Not possible.”
Bastien nudges Lex. She pipes up, “Not possible because it literally can’t happen or because it’s against the rules?”
His stony expression thins further. “Technically, a being could exist in Ora without a soul. Getting through is against the rules.”
“But for someone of your rank guarding a door of such importance, surely that’s up to your discretion…”
He chews on the inside of his cheek, his features growing harder. We’re going to lose him.
I swore I wouldn’t use Lucy’s magic but I’m not sure what other choice I have. I do as Vetch said and imagine all other possibilities are gone. There is only Gardon accepting our compliment and letting us bring Lucy through.
My body stiffens, the scent of coffee freshly brewed and the crackling warmth of burning wood drift through my senses. A thin thread of ruby-coloured magic protrudes from my chest.
It tingles and simmers just under the surface, but I can feel it. It’s working—or it’s kind of working. It’s the thinnest most pathetic ribbon I’ve ever seen, but it darts to Gardon and vanishes into the stone.
He shivers. “Mmm, I suppose you are the only ones who came to check on me. I’ll consider it.”
Lex scrunches her face. Consideration isn’t exactly a win, but it’s better than a no. It’s also the best we have.
“We’ll take it,” Bastien says.
“Let us through, sir,” I say, feeling rather faint, like all my insides have been jumbled up and shaken. Nothing quite fits in the right place anymore.
“Where do you want to go?” Gardon says.
“Wherever Lucy is,” I answer and the door shimmers to life.
I glance up at him.
“Well, go on then…” he says and the three of us step into the underworld.