Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
Emmeline
After her late meeting, Emmeline opted to conduct sessions in her office rather than breaking curfew to sneak out to the sanctuary ruins on the cliffs.
She allowed the Fate to feed her mind with tales of fortunes spread across Ambrisk, all matters of friends and strangers, of territories and vast unknowns.
She saw her colleagues at the Academy with tear-streaked faces and veiled beings digging graves.
Blood-soaked battlefields and rips torn through the world, skies of rich purple plastered with stars, only for them to explode into ruin. It all left her feeling empty.
Finally, she asked about the murders, but not a single hint was divulged as to whether another killing was being planned and when they would strike again, as if the Fates were as clueless as she was.
Though it did seem her idea of ritualistic killing was supported based on the altar she repeatedly showed her, a jewel-encrusted diadem and scepter atop it, wisteria blooming all around.
Waterfalls poured from towering stones beyond, the carvings on them indeterminable from this distance, but planting a seed of belonging in her spirit, like this place was known to her.
Daringly, she asked, “What of Desmond Alvanti?”
For a moment, the entire realm seemed to pause. The air shuddered and stars winked furiously.
Sketched visions of charcoal on parchment, of abstract ink burning into flesh, and a woman she couldn’t name, lost and forlorn with paint splattering her hands.
Oil spilled upon the floor, and a forge sprang to life in the inky puddle, hammer striking a lethal blade. As the blow rang out, the slick black stain rippled.
In a blink it became crimson.
In a breath, bones filled the scene, piling up so high she thought she’d be crushed by them. That she’d die with her lungs filled with the dust of those who came before her.
Constellations whirled, spinning and cracking in the sky. From beside her, the Fate’s voice said, Bones as brushes and arrows tipped in gold, his secrets are blessed and abundant.
“What sort of secrets is Desmond keeping?” Emmeline asked as the bones rattled against the floor, her frame trembling with them.
The celestial form at her side shook her head. Those will not be your end.
“But will they be the end of others?” she whispered, because while Desmond might not draw her death, he could very well be the killer she sought.
Starfire rippled around Emmeline’s vision, and a winged figure rose from the bloody pool. Feathers drenched, eyes starry, Valyrie looked at Emmeline, and she smiled. “They have found you.”
Emmeline ripped herself from the reading, shoving her magic deep, deep down. So far away that if she tried hard enough, she could barely feel it clawing at her veins; barely notice the rippling effect around the edges of her vision; barely hear the calls from beyond iron bars.
She panted over the desk in her office, skin clammy. Low candlelight flickered across the space, and an eerie silence surrounded her.
In over twenty years, she’d become an expert at shutting things out, at being on her own and claiming that isolation as a haven. Perhaps it wasn’t healthy, but it was the best she could do.
She wouldn’t read anymore tonight. Wouldn’t give them any more power to torment her. She was done.
But even as she swore it, the image of a bloody Angel burned through her mind.
Because there was no chance of her sleeping with that nightmarish image in her mind, Emmeline did a quick patrol through the Academy halls to ensure no students were out of bed.
Her mind was peeling apart the abundance of haunting information when she rounded a corner in the History and Mythology Corridor and bumped into the Temple Master.
“Oh!” She stumbled to a halt, heart racing. “Excuse me, sir. I didn’t see you.”
Falliare placed a steadying hand to her shoulder. “No matter, Miss DeLeoste. Working late tonight?” He assessed her with a too-knowing stare that rose her jittery nerves further.
Shadows decked the stone corridors, the stained-glass windows along one wall spilling moonlit tales of an ancient battle over both her and Falliare’s bodies, like they were reenacting the depiction of a bloodied scene.
“I was just finishing up and thought I’d make sure everything was quiet. With the new curfew, you never know which students will try to be rebellious,” she answered, impressed with how level she kept her voice.
Falliare nodded in understanding, as if seeing through the illusion without her having to explain further. He was one of the few people Emmeline had ever met who knew some bounds of her magic, but even he didn’t know the full extent of it.
All those who had once known were now dead.
Regardless, he knew how much it tested her fortitude, had seen the toll the power took when she overexerted herself, and had always been supportive. For that, she was grateful.
The Temple Master may control the entire isle—including Emmeline’s own fate—but she appreciated that beneath the stern hand, he was able to be sympathetic and realistic.
Not like many rulers who preferred to live on pedestals above their people, scorning the problems of the masses in favor of their own greed.
In fact, since Emmeline had arrived here, she’d suspected Falliare not only knew her magic was strong but had his own similar well of power. Or perhaps it was just the strength of running the isle.
“Ensure you stay within the grounds,” Falliare said.
“Of course.” She nodded. “Roremar has me sticking closely to the curfew.” Much to my chagrin, she didn’t add aloud.
“As I was certain he would,” Falliare said, lips twisting into a smile.
“If it isn’t too forward, how do you know him? Is it just from his time as a student here?”
The Temple Master’s expression gave nothing away, but his three quick blinks did. He hadn’t expected that question, and he seemed unsure how to answer. Why, though?
All he offered was, “Yes, I do know Roremar from his time here, and I followed his career in the army when he left.”
“Where he made quite a reputation for himself,” Emmeline commented, another reminder of just how careful she needed to be with him.
He hadn’t shown much evidence of his infamous recklessness, but she couldn’t let her guard down if she wanted to solve this case before the Revels and get transferred to Valyn.
“Yes, he certainly did earn a name, didn’t he?” Falliare repeated, gazing up at the tapestry behind her, the threaded twin to the war legend painted into the stained glass. “But how many of our reputations tell the whole truth?”
Emmeline stiffened. “I suppose you’re right.” Her reputation—the one that spoke of her skill and abundant blessing, the one that in return earned her second glances and silent stretches every time she entered a room—certainly said very little of who she truly was.
“Anyway, I best be off to bed,” Falliare said, stepping around her.
“I have meetings with the Trade House leaders all day tomorrow, and it’s always a taxing affair.
” But he paused beside her, looking down.
Shades of red from the stained glass warped his features, and Emmeline’s pulse spiked at the icy tone of his voice, a whisper so low she wasn’t sure the Fates would even hear. “Be careful, Miss DeLeoste.”
Cold seeped through her. She forced her voice to remain steady. “Why?”
“Because in a world where magic means power and reputation births opportunity, someone of your caliber is always going to be a target.”
A target? Did he mean for the murderer? Desmond’s smile from the docks flitted through her memory—something kind but also potentially untrustworthy.
“If I’m in danger, why did you assign me this case?”
“Because sometimes those at the heart of peril are forged into the strongest weapons. And I think you have the potential to be the greatest threat of all.”
Falliare’s words were still echoing through her mind when she returned to her dormitory corridor.
Moonlight cut across the cool stones, pale arches lining her steps as they had every night for the past six years on Lyra, but over recent weeks, she couldn’t deny it felt different.
Things were shifting. She just didn’t know what form they’d take when it was over.
Were the Temple Master’s words some prophetic reading passed down to him? Since she was young, she’d worked to become a silent protector to those she loved and a comrade to the forgotten. Had she somehow, inadvertently, transformed herself into the greatest threat in this deadly game?
Or was Falliare giving her a warning? Had she perhaps not gone far enough—
“What in the Fates?” she whispered, stopping just feet from her door.
Her door that was cracked, a sliver of distorted moonlight spilling into the corridor and over her boots.
The rest of the hall was silent, all doors sealed.
Emmeline crept closer, breaths tight in her chest. A reading pressed behind her eyelids, white starfire seeping from the cage she’d stuffed it into and flickering at the edges of her vision.
She didn’t have a triple blade on her—not a single weapon. But there was one beneath the table beside the door and more in the wardrobe. If she could slip inside, it would be within reach in a matter of seconds.
Hand shaking, she gently pushed the door open until it drifted all the way against the wall. She winced at the creaking hinge.
From what she could see, the room was untouched, her wardrobe and writing desk still pristine, her books lined up beneath the windowsill.
A breeze wafted through the curtains.
She hadn’t left the balcony doors open, but they were thrown wide to the night.
Hesitantly, Emmeline stepped inside. Her hand drifted to the table beside the door in search of her dagger, but a crackle from the alcove housing her bed made her pause.
Pulse racing in her ears, she tiptoed toward it.
When she looked around the corner, her heart stopped beating.
On the wall, a deep crimson message slowly dripped toward her bed, splashed across the star maps and drawings she’d delicately pinned there, tainting the pieces of her life she’d claimed as her own.
White flames hovered above her ivory and lavender nest of blankets, freezing her—transporting her back to the only time she’d ever seen starfire outside of a reading and all that day had taken from her.
Now, they illuminated the words on her wall, turning them into glittering rubies.
TO TEMPT THE FATES, AND REALMS WILL WREST,
The iron tinging the air turned her stomach over, jolting her into action.
Emmeline grabbed the vase from the windowsill and tossed the flowers out. She spun and dumped the water over the starfire, but as soon as it extinguished, a strong arm wrapped around her waist.
And right as she tried to scream, fingers curled over her mouth.