Chapter 28 Seraphine
The door to the cloakroom was ajar when Sera arrived. Theo was alone at his bench, scribbling in his journal. There was Lightfire everywhere, half-plucked boneshade plants scattered across the shelves. More littered the far end of the workbench, where Tobias appeared to be grinding them.
When he spotted her hovering in the doorway, his face split into a grin. ‘I knew you’d come! It’s time for my making, isn’t it?’
Sera’s magic flared in response.
There is more to do, Maker.
But she was not ready. Still woozy from Paola’s making and reeling from her conversation with Val over breakfast, she couldn’t set her mind to anything else until she had spoken to Theo.
Alone.
‘She’s here to see me, Tobias.’ Theo looked up from his journal, revealing a glimpse of the designs he’d been sketching. More steelfire, arrows and bolts to fit their crossbows.
After their meeting in the vault, Theo had asked him to meet her in the cloakroom. She had come at once, dogged by Ransom’s shadows that had trailed her all the way down the hall until she’d shooed them – and him – away.
‘Go and find Fabian,’ Theo told his cousin now. ‘Tell him to deliver a message to the blacksmith, Anatoli. I’ll need the forge again tonight.’
‘So now I’m a messenger for your messenger. This is getting humiliating,’ grumbled Tobias, pointedly jumping off his stool with a thud. He stormed out, muttering under his breath.
Theo watched him go. ‘And I thought I was impatient.’
‘Paola’s making probably hasn’t helped.’
‘I’m glad it went well.’ His words were earnest but his hands were twitching in his lap. ‘I suppose Val has told you what I am.’
Sera hesitated, the word like a funeral gong in her head. Soul-eater.
Hearing it for the first time had made her retch into her porridge. Now, at least, she could pretend like the horror of his power – the guilt that she had been the one to curse him with it – wasn’t searing her to the bone.
His smile was wry. ‘You need to work on your poker face.’
‘This is my best attempt.’
‘It is not good.’
‘Do you feel well?’
‘You mean villainous?’
She huffed a laugh. ‘In a manner of speaking.’
‘I feel positively unmurderous.’
‘That’s a good start.’
His dimple returned. ‘Ironic that I spent so long coming up with steelfire when we had our very own saint-killer all along.’
‘I guess that’s the silver lining.’ She tried to match the lightness in his voice. Ransom had suspected that Theo’s magic was troublesome. If he had been right about that, then was he right to keep nurturing his suspicions about him?
Theo drummed his fingers along his notebook. ‘If my magic wants to devour another’s soul, then why not let it have Andreas?’
Sera frowned, trying to imagine it. Theo had a quick mind and a talent for theft, but he was no killer. ‘Do you think you could do it? If you got the chance?’
‘I’d like to think so.’
Hardly a resounding cry. And after what had happened at the Appoline … when Theo had had his chance to kill Andreas and squandered it. Well. She wasn’t sure she believed him.
‘I’m afraid,’ he admitted. ‘My power … it feels like a flame clamouring for air. I don’t know what will happen if I feed it. What if I can’t douse it?’
It was the way her own magic felt sometimes. ‘Your soul is your compass, Theo. It will guide you true.’
He chewed on the edge of his thumbnail. ‘What makes you so sure?’
‘Because I know you. I know your heart. I know what you stand for.’ Making a point of drawing closer, of showing him she was not afraid, she pulled up a stool.
They sat across from each other. The low lights revealed the shadows under his eyes and the grooves along his brow.
‘And I know you’re not taking care of yourself. You’re not sleeping.’
He leaned across the workbench, and said, not unkindly, ‘Are you?’
‘Maybe you’re not the only one afraid of your magic,’ she conceded.
His brows rose.
She ruminated on her words, unsure of what to say next. If she should say anything at all. The vine on her leg prickled and she shifted on her stool. Every time she thought of the thorns embedded in her skin, they stung, like they were thinking of her too.
He drew back from her. ‘I’ll make some tea.’
He busied himself at the workbench and when the tea was ready, he cupped his mug and watched her drink. ‘When you made me back in the catacombs, Ransom said it took something from you. That it hurt you.’ Guilt deepened the lines around his mouth. ‘Is it always like that?’
‘At first I didn’t notice,’ she conceded.
‘With Lark, it happened right before the Aurore fell. I fell with it. Blacked out. And with Ransom –’ she shivered at the memory of him dying in her arms – ‘I was so strung out after I pulled him from the river that the dizziness didn’t bother me.
I hardly noticed the hacking cough that came after or the weight of my own footsteps that night; I was just so relieved to have him back. ’
He nodded slowly. ‘And with me?’
‘There were no distractions, then. I meant to do it, so I was aware of it. Every breath. Every ache. When I woke up, I felt … hollow. It’s been like that ever since.’
She hadn’t come down here to talk about herself, but in hearing Theo confess his fear, she couldn’t stop her own from spilling out. Words that had once stuck like a fishbone in her throat flowed easily now, the secrets of her magic revealing themselves with ease.
She told him everything. About the headaches and the dizziness and the violent coughing fits. The yawning hollowness, as if the soft marrow of her soul had been scooped out with a spoon. The blood that came after and the sinking pull of oblivion.
He listened to every word, not moving, save for the muscle ticking in his jaw. And when she was done, and she felt like a deflated balloon, he said, ‘I think you should stop.’
Her magic revolted at his words.
There is more to do, Maker!
Time is wearing thin.
He pitched closer, like he was afraid she might float away from him. ‘Stop now, while you still can.’
She rubbed her chest, willing her heart to return to its rhythm. ‘I can’t stop, Theo. Not yet.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because fate’s will is stronger than my own.’
It was a grim truth. And the stark look on his face meant he understood only too well. There was a powerlessness to this kind of power. He reached under his workbench and pulled out a bottle of whiskey. ‘I think we need something stronger.’
She held her cup out and he filled it generously. They drank deeply, the whiskey burning all the way down.
‘Have you thought about afterwards?’ he asked her. ‘When the war is done?’
The question surprised her. Of course she had fantasized about a quiet, softer existence with Ransom.
Somewhere out in the Plains, in a cottage with white shutters and windowsills teeming with flowers.
A ring of trees to guard them and a lake to swim in when it got warm, ducks for Pip to chase, and a bowl of stars to gaze up at on summer nights.
That was the picture she’d been dreaming of, but lately it had begun to feel like a different life entirely, not one that waited for them on the other side of war.
She didn’t know how to give voice to that particular fear, and she was afraid if she did, she might carve it into fate. Instead, she admitted: ‘It scares me, to hope for something more than this.’
‘I worry for the kingdom,’ he confessed. ‘Once Andreas is dead, there’ll be no royals left. The entire Rayere dynasty will be extinguished.’
‘Is that such a bad thing?’
‘Not in and of itself. But Valterre will need someone to lead them.’
Her brows knitted. ‘I suppose I hadn’t thought that far ahead.’
‘It should be someone worthy. Someone chosen by the land.’ He paused. ‘Or by the saints.’
Her eyes narrowed over the rim of her mug. ‘What exactly do you mean?’
‘I mean you, Sera.’
She nearly spat out her drink.
His face was like stone.
‘Theo.’ She flicked a crumpled piece of paper at him. ‘Be serious.’
‘You were chosen by Oriel’s hand,’ he pressed. ‘You could lead.’
‘The kingdom? Don’t be ridiculous.’
He remained undaunted. ‘Valterre will need someone to look to, a steadying light for the age to come. A ship without a rudder is just as dangerous as a ship with a poor captain.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘All right, sailor. How much whiskey have you had? There are a thousand people more qualified than me to lead Valterre.’
He sat back, drumming his fingers.
‘Sera. If Oriel chose you, why wouldn’t your own kingdom?’
‘Because I don’t want it.’
‘Even better. The less you covet power, the better suited you are to protecting it.’
‘You’re the one with all the bright ideas,’ she shot back. ‘Why can’t it be you?’
He offered a bemused smile. ‘I’m a Versini.’
‘So?’
‘My family ruined this kingdom. With Shade and greed and murder. Hugo and Armand are still the worst murderers, the worst thieves, this country has ever known. All these years later, and people still curse them. We don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve it,’ he said, ruefully. ‘It wouldn’t be right.’
‘That’s not for you to decide.’
‘Fate has already decided. My magic is the proof.’ He stared into his mug, shame flushing his cheeks. ‘Soul-eater. Who, in their right mind, would ever look to me for anything?’
It was another uncomfortable truth. Denying it would only offend him.
He went on. ‘I believe Oriel made her choice in the storm that night. It’s you, Sera.
It has to be you.’ Conviction hardened his voice, brightened the turquoise of his eyes.
‘To survive what’s to come, Valterre will need a leader who can put peace above power.
Goodness before greed. Someone who has bled for the kingdom.
’ He gave her a knowing look. ‘You’re our best hope. You are our dove.’