Chapter Fourteen
Blessed are those who hold chaos in their hearts and bright molten fury in their bones. Gatekeepers of divine intention. Keeping the world as it was always meant to be. Following the glory of Kysillia, who battled the endless night and put the Old Gods to rest.
Who purged the world of the endless night.
Reimor.
– Kysillian Hymns for the Fallen – Unknown
The Death of Kings. Fragments of the story haunted what little sleep I managed to have. Wearily I pulled my exhausted limbs out of bed, only to realise my walking skirt was still being laundered by William, leaving me no option but a smart navy dress suit I’d never worn.
I laced up my walking boots, attached my belt with my bag, before twisting my hair into a smart bun and adding a ribbon, foolishly hoping it would behave.
After stumbling about the room to make sure I hadn’t forgotten anything, Alma still didn’t appear. Disturbed about what she could be up to or if she’d wandered into a trap, I went to the kitchen, where the large cooking pots were at work scrubbing themselves in the sink as bread continued to be kneaded by invisible hands at the table and a broom had gotten itself stuck in a corner bashing into the bricks as it attempted to sweep the floors.
A small plate of breakfast biscuits and milk were on the table. I took the opportunity to take my fill before freeing the broom from its stuck position and continuing my search.
‘Alma?’ I waited for the squeak of reply, but there wasn’t one. I moved to the larder, pushing a barrel out the way to see the large rolls of sealed cheese, expecting to see her feasting, but she wasn’t there.
‘Kat?’ a concerned William asked, a basket full of mud-covered vegetables in his arms as he came to a stop at the bottom of the kitchen stairs.
‘Morning, William. You haven’t seen Alma, have you?’ I put the barrel back and dusted down my skirts.
‘She was down earlier,’ he said, frowning, his eyes moving about the corners of the room.
‘I wonder what she’s found to occupy herself with.’
‘She’ll show up.’ William smiled, placing the basket on the worn kitchen table. ‘It must be hard to keep track of time as a mouse.’
Despite his sound reasoning, the feeling I was missing something remained.
‘I’d better turn my efforts to locating the study instead,’ I sighed, gathering up my skirts to make my way back up the stairs.
‘Good luck with that,’ he replied with a grin, sorting through the vegetables. Something about his cheery blissful nature seemed so strange compared to last night. The horror that anthrux bite revealed. The thought of it reminding me of that story. Reimor.
‘William, you couldn’t get me a copy of the saints’ teachings, or a holy book, could you?’
‘You can have mine if you want,’ he said with a shrug and an easy smile. ‘Little use it’s done me.’
‘I didn’t know you were a believer.’
‘I’m not. My father said it might save me from my own depravity, so I tried. However, I found trying to be something other than yourself is far too painful. So I’ll stay strange and immoral. To strange to be cured, perhaps’
The reminder of William’s cruel past sat uneasy in my gut.
‘I’ll bring it to you.’ He smiled, getting up and disappearing up the stairs before I could respond.
I followed, eyes on the floor for any sign of Alma, when a large worn wooden door with a beautiful gold handle creaked open – expecting me. I slipped inside, anticipating the familiarity of the study, only to stumble to a stop.
The room was large, with beautiful floral curtains, tightly closed and draped in cobwebs, the light barely able to stream through the gaps.
I could smell sage, rose oil and the bitter earthy scent of dead magic, and saw withered brown flowers still in their vases. Desks were pushed together, trunks stacked high with dresses and belongings piled on top. Healing cases and journals piled on the dusty floor. Abandoned personal objects hidden in the darkness by someone desperate to forget. Paintings leant against each other. The first was a portrait – the woman from the stairs, a man behind her with greying dark hair and an imposing nature in the silver uniform of a king’s commander. On the woman’s knee was a boy with black hair and crystalline eyes – Emrys. A teenage girl was stood to the side with her mother’s striking blonde hair and blue eyes.
The Blackthorn family.
‘Oh.’ A soft sound came from behind me. I turned to find William in the doorway, hands gathered before him, sadness heavy in his usually bright eyes.
‘I’m sorry, William,’ I admitted shamefully, quickly making my way back to the door. ‘I was looking for the study.’
‘The house must have thought you’d find it interesting,’ he said with a soft smile, but it faltered as he considered the sorrow in the room beyond us.
Memories of a family, a life and a world that didn’t exist anymore. All crammed into one tiny space, allowing time to devour them, but I knew it didn’t stop that pain. Grief was a monster all its own and there wasn’t a blade sharp enough or a spell eloquent enough to kill it.
It remained. Unaffected by time. Endless in the worst way.
‘The study is further down the hall; the door just nearly took me out.’ He smiled, glancing once more at the painful darkness in the room before reaching into his apron and pulling out a small book. ‘Here.’
The telling red cover of the Saint’s holy book. I took it carefully, emotion welling painfully in my throat at the ease of his help.
‘Thank you, William.’
He smiled, turning to leave me there but I reached for his arm. Those warm brown surprised eyes meeting my own.
‘You’re not strange, William.’ I smiled, hating he thought that for even a moment. ‘I think you’re quite wonderful.
His smile wobbled on his lips before he nodded, sipping from my grip and leaving me in the hallway. Ashamed of my nosiness, I closed the door, allowing my palm to press against the wood as the house softly creaked in response.
The house missed them too.
I found the study in the direction William had pointed, positioning itself where I’d last seen a storeroom to be. There was no sign of Emrys, just a cup of tea, abandoned on his desk.
Although perched next to it like a dust sprite requiring my attention was a small doll made of the rough fabric from farmers’ sacks, thread and straw. At the centre of its chest was a dark smear.
Gingerly, I picked it up, trying not to disturb the delicate stitching as I examined the smear more closely. It was blood.
Be wary of spells made with blood. They are desperation given purpose, and the Verr like nothing more than desperation. Master Hale’s teaching came back to me. How beings only made promises in blood if they had no other choice.
It was a Nox offering, a small doll used to protect creatures from the dark. An offering to the ancestors. A level of desperation that made me furious and sad all at once. Relying on ancient tactics because the Council were deaf to their pleas for help.
Such desperation alongside an anthrux bite made my blood run cold, too many horrible thoughts trying to crash into my mind. This was worse than even my nightmares could predict.
Reimor . An ancient tale, and an ancient charm to protect against a darker type of magic.
‘ Lagnor .’ I whispered the command, an old spell that rested somewhere between a prayer and incantation. To protect.
‘I didn’t know persistent snooping was part of the partnership deal.’ Emrys’ voice came from over my shoulder.
He stood behind me, somehow effortlessly manoeuvring silently around all the clutter in the study, his hands slotted in his pockets. He was dressed in a smart long grey coat, his cravat missing, and dark trousers to match his boots. His hair was still wet and brushed back from his face.
‘A saints’ book? I wouldn’t put that on my desk. It might combust.’ He frowned down at the abandoned book.
‘Where did you get this offering?’ I asked.
‘In Mr Thrombi’s belongings,’ he replied conversationally, seeming more alert and interested than usual. ‘He was on his way to a reporting centre when he was struck down with the illness.’
‘Or something wanted to strike him down,’ I corrected. Anthrux were created from curses, after all. Someone had intentionally made a bad bargain and there was nothing to say one hadn’t been set after Mr Thrombi on purpose.
‘How is he?’ I asked, shaking my head in an effort to be free from my dark thoughts.
‘No change, but we’ll see how he heals,’ Emrys replied.
‘Beings don’t make Nox offerings for no reason,’ I pressed.
‘Nox. That’s a Kysillian offering is it not?’ He surprised me again by knowing Kysillian myths.
I nodded absently, looking at the slumped doll. ‘The guardian of the dead. Protection against a darkness where it dwells.’
‘You should keep it with you. Such things are dangerous in the hands of those who don’t respect them,’ Emrys offered gently, noticing my interest, but I was caught by his words.
‘You’re going somewhere?’ I asked as he straightened the sleeve of his jacket.
‘Paxton Fields. I need to see where it began if there is a chance in containing it.’ He leant past me, the warmth of him brushing against my arm as he picked a battered pocket watch from his desk and stuffed it into his pocket.
I frowned. ‘You really suspect it will be that severe?’
He pulled back slightly, close enough I could see the dark flecks in his light eyes. ‘I’m not a fan of surprises, so I like to expect the worst.’
I couldn’t help the soft laugh that left me at those words. He didn’t like surprises and I seemed to be the worst kind. First the Council’s wrath and then the ghoul.
‘Speaking of surprises.’ He reached into his interior coat pocket with a pensive expression. ‘I think this belongs to you.’
There, contained gently in his fist, was a small brown familiar mouse squeaking away in annoyance at being caught.
‘Alma !’ I lunged for his hand, my fingers wrapping around his own as she crawled free.
‘She was in my dresser,’ he replied dryly, a dark brow raised. I almost dropped her with my shock, my face burning with the scandal of it.
Why on earth would she be running about his underthings?
‘She … she gets confused sometimes in such small forms,’ I lied, refusing to look at him as I dropped to my haunches, skirts spilling carelessly across the wood floor.
‘Stay out of trouble, and out of other people’s rooms,’ I hissed under my breath, watching as she sat back on her hind legs, ears flat. ‘I’ve left you papers on the desk to study, pages eight to thirty-five.’
She released a chorus of squeaks in protest, but I held out my hand to silence her and got back to my feet, planting my hands on my hips in my best Alma-annoyed impression.
‘It’s what you get for being nosey,’ I warned, watching her nose twitch once before she darted off between two bookcases.
A dry laugh came from behind me, making my heart jump, but as I turned, Emrys’s expression had returned to its usual impassive mask.
‘Thank you for helping her.’ I tucked the stray strands of hair behind my ears.
‘Much like you, Kat, I don’t do things for thanks,’ he corrected softly.
No, maybe not, but he did it for some reason and the cavernous grief in that room came sharply to the forefront of my mind.
‘Why this?’ I asked. ‘Of all the things to do, why this?’
Master Hale always made it seem impossible. That change or working to help the fey like this was nothing but an impossible, cursed task. I’d believed him, and maybe that was my greatest shame.
Emrys went still at my words. Something crossed his expression, making me fearful he wouldn’t answer. Maybe it was his own surprise of never being asked before.
‘You could say it comes naturally to me,’ he said, and shrugged, only there was some heavier emotion lingering in his gaze. Guarded. ‘I wasn’t allowed to be a healer. Heir’s are born to serve their house, even if it leads them down a wrong path. So I suppose, this is some feeble attempt to fix things. Even the unfixable. A fools, attempt to save his soul, perhaps,’ he finished with a self-mocking smile.
Only those words resonated too deeply with me. The regret and grief trapped in the small spaces between them.
‘We find ourselves being many versions of what we once wished to be,’ I countered. ‘And there is no harsher critic than ourselves the further we go down a path we never wished to walk.’
I knew that better than anyone.
A silence came between us, nothing but the distant ticking of the clock as he considered me carefully for a long breathless moment before simply nodding, as if to shake a thought from his mind.
‘Here.’ He reached past me to pull a large file from his desk. ‘They’ve been validated. If the contents give you any trouble, I’ll send them back for a second verification.’
I opened the creased cover and there inside were the pox records from four fey villages. All authorised by the registrar. The pox evidence I needed to finish my paper.
My heart pounded with a confusing swell of emotion. Not even Master Hale had helped me like that. So effortlessly.
The retreating of his footsteps made my head shoot up, seeing him ready to leave once more. Remembering something else I shouldn’t have forgotten.
Loneliness was the worst curse of all, and the last thing I ever wanted to be was alone. Yet, here I remained.
‘I should come with you,’ I blurted out, making him stop and turn. ‘It’s no good writing a paper on the pox when there are beings at risk from something far worse.’
His face remained guarded, but there was a hidden softness to his features.
Make the bastards pay, Katherine, Master Hale’s words came back to me. The reminder that I had a choice in this too.
‘I’d … I want to help. That’s the point of a partnership after all.’ No matter how much it scared me, or how ill prepared I was. There was no point healing curses, only to let another destroy the lands fey needed. ‘I can’t very well expect my papers to help if I don’t see things for myself.’
‘Very well.’ He cleared his throat and held out his arm for me to follow as he headed through the back shelves towards the room with the portal door. I stuffed the papers in my bag and hurried to follow, watching the bookcases shift in response to his arrival, revealing the hidden portal chamber, the door already aglow and crystal in place.
‘How familiar are you with Paxton Fields?’ I asked.
‘Not very, but most fey settlements have the same structure.’ He fixed his jacket once more, crystalline eyes dipping to the sharp creases in my skirt and following the delicate stitching all the way up to the high collar of my jacket before meeting my eye.
‘That colour suits you,’ he observed, before turning sharply and stepping through the portal. Leaving me to blink in confusion, wondering if I’d heard him right, before I followed him.