Chapter 38
Marlow smacked Felix in the stomach. “You’re gonna get us caught!”
But he ignored her, letting the paper fall to the floor as a tremor ran through him.
The crown and the ministry.
Hypocrites. All of them.
He’d assumed this elixir was just some strange fascination by a small portion of the nobility. But it went all the way to the top.
If they hated magic so much, why would they want it for themselves?
But he knew the answer to that. Control. They would always find ways to control the ones they saw as threats. Laws and restrictions to hold wielders back. Lies and rumors to breed hatred. And now, this.
Marlow’s hand touched his shoulder, her voice impossible to hear through the buzzing in his ears, but her face was tight and twisted with pain. She’d lost a part of herself tonight. Lost the hope that she’d see Aine again. Lost all delusions about Ashcroft.
Felix had no trouble believing it, though. He knew what nonwielders were like. He knew the horrible things they did, the depth of their hatred.
Before Marlow, his best friend had been a girl from a family just like his. A shifter, like Aine.
Elise understood the frustration of possessing illegal magic, the ever-present fear of being found out.
She and Felix had both been raised by parents who’d willingly broken the law, refusing to turn them in.
While his ma taught him to control his magic, Elise’s parents strictly forbid its use—with the exception of hiding the rings in her eyes whenever she left the house.
That was back when Felix only hid his outlawed powers. He was proud to be a wielder, and thankful to have one magic he could use openly.
When he was nine, he decided to try his luck at the night markets. His conjuring was mediocre at best, but he’d hoped the money earned would let his ma quit her awful job, let her focus on her painting.
He went back night after night, but he never made more than a couple caern. One night, he got bored—and annoyed—and he made the mistake of using Silas to scare a noblewoman. He thought it was funny. A harmless prank. But the woman’s husband disagreed.
The dueling cane blow to the side of Felix’s calf was enough to knock him down. Elise had to help him home. He hid the bruises and the swelling, even as his skin darkened and the pain became unbearable. At first, it was sharp and relentless, but then it faded into an unsettling numbness.
It wasn’t until his skin blistered that he finally told his ma. By then, it was too late to save his leg.
The doctor explained it plainly: a small fracture in the bone, damaged blood vessels, and compromised circulation.
The bruising had been a visible warning of the underlying damage.
One he’d ignored. Because he’d waited, the lack of blood flow had caused tissue and nerve death, and the damage was spreading.
It was either amputation or risk losing his life.
His ma wouldn’t tell him how much the surgery had cost, but she picked up a second job shortly after.
When Elise found out the extent of the damage, she didn’t take it well.
She stormed out to report the nobleman to the Watch.
In her haste, she’d forgotten to fix her eyes.
The violet rings where there had been none before were proof that she had been using outlawed magic for years, hiding her identity.
She was arrested, sentenced, and hanged within the week.
For simply existing.
Felix tried to swallow the memory back, but it was too late. He saw her clearly now, matted hair and tattered cream dress, wide lifeless eyes, feet dangling. It was enough to tear the breath from his lungs.
Elise had been eleven years old. A child executed for a power that hurt no one. And not one of them cared.
This elixir made a mockery of everything Felix had been through. And what could he do about it? He’d thought they could stop it, but that was when they were up against an over-ambitious criminal, not the damned crown.
What chance did they have now?
He balled his fists, throwing that thought away before it could put down roots.
No, he refused to accept that. It wasn’t over.
Marlow took up the discarded paper as he tore open cabinets, his movements growing more frantic by the second. Finally, he found what he was looking for: a font of paraffin oil meant to refill the lanterns. He poured it overtop the desk, letting the liquid slosh over the sides to pool on the floor.
“What are you doing?” August asked.
Felix pinned him with a seething glare, and August wrenched back, startled.
“Your mother is responsible for this.”
“I didn’t know. I swear it.”
Felix believed him. But it didn’t matter. August may not have known about this specific horror, but he knew about the rest, about the laws and the executions.
Not my fight.
August was just like every person who watched Elise’s execution and did nothing. Everyone who thought people like her weren’t worth fighting for.
They were wrong. She was. And Felix would fight.
“I am so sick of all of this.” He tossed the empty font aside, and the metal clattered loudly against the wooden floorboards.
“I wanted so badly to think that I could make a difference. I tried, I really did. But nothing will ever change. They’ll never let it.”
He searched the shelves and cabinets for another font, but Marlow found one first and handed it to him without a word. Supportive as ever. He stormed back to the previous room and poured the paraffin oil overtop the cot, then the floor.
He was losing his hold, and his self-control was slipping like sand through his fingers.
“They’re so threatened by us, they’ll never allow us to be anything more than animals, kicking us down whenever we try to stand.” With a sharp push, he sent the metal table crashing to the floor, its tools clanging and glass vials shattering.
“Felix, you need to calm down,” said August.
His words cleaved through the last threads of Felix’s self-control. As August stepped closer, everything Felix had been holding in erupted with enough force to make him dizzy. He shoved August forcefully back, sending him stumbling. His foot caught on the overturned table, and he went down hard.
The sharp crack of glass, was followed by a weighted silence.
August lifted a trembling hand to examine the jagged shard jutting out from his palm. Wincing, he pulled it free and dropped it beside him. Blood welled from the deep gash, spilling in dark rivers down his wrist.
With a sharp jab of his finger, Felix snarled, “Don’t ever tell me to calm down, Aesling.”
August said nothing, so Felix turned and left him there. He crossed the room to grab the matchbox he’d used to light the lantern and drew a single match, feeling disconnected from his movements, like he was watching himself from a distance.
“Stop!” August snapped as he shoved off the ground and grabbed Felix’s hand before he could strike the match.
Fury ignited in a scorching rush, a wildfire burning Felix alive from the inside out. His magic surged forward. “Let go of me.” The order was a growl barely restrained.
August’s expression dropped as the compulsion took hold, and his hand fell to his side.
“I am going to burn this place to the ground, and you’re going to do what you came here to do. Open the veil and get us out.”
August tore open a rift just as the shop door crashed open and the two Watch officers from out front stormed inside. Both skidded to a stop when they saw the swirling portal.
Felix met them with a sharp smile.
The scratch, flick, pop as he lit the match was impossibly loud in the quiet room. The officers turned and fled. Felix held the match pinched between his fingers, watching it flicker in his breath. Then he grabbed Marlow’s hand.
“Get us out.”
In one swift motion, he dropped the match onto the cot and grabbed August’s hand.
Flames erupted around them just as August pulled them through the veil, the heat vanishing in an instant, replaced by the frigid chill of the Hollow Dark.
The shop was decrepit and empty now, the table and cot gone.
Only a small black necklace lay on the floor at his feet.
As August sealed the tear, Felix bent to retrieve the object, keeping his focus narrowed on enforcing his command as he slipped it into his pocket.
When they stepped back out onto the street, he let go of August’s hand.
As the faint wave of nausea crested and ebbed, he brought his hand up to the swirling darkness, the way he had outside the pub.
From inside the Hollow Dark, it had been like glass.
Impossible to get past without August’s help.
But from here, it was cold steam. His hand slipped easily through.
Distant shouting dragged Felix’s attention back. He stepped around the corner and watched with a proud smile as dark smoke billowed from the open apothecary door.