Chapter 22
I held the bloody suture needle between my fingers as Nin ended his story.
I didn’t know what to say, or even where to start.
So I just knotted the catgut string and carefully cut it, completing my stitches on the back of his shoulder.
The first set in the front was already done.
I treated both with carbolic acid spray to disinfect, inhaling its pungent odor as I considered everything Nin had just told me.
“You are quiet,” he observed.
“I’m thinking.”
“Have I upset you?”
“Why should I be upset?” I murmured. “I mean, a god of death has been spying on me my entire life and thinks I’m some kind of mistake that shouldn’t exist. And because I happen to be in the same place as him, he’s worried he’s about to die.”
“You aren’t a mistake.”
“And if you think I’m going to have sex with your corpse because my mammy was a working girl—”
His head whipped around, and he speared me with a black look. “I never implied that.”
“She did the best she could, okay? She wasn’t educated, and my grandfather is a bum who wouldn’t provide.”
“Molly—”
“She was a good woman!”
“Molly,” he repeated more firmly, and began to stand. But his balance was off, and after woozily swaying, he plopped back down onto the seat.
“I just gave you twelve stitches. Don’t overextend yourself.”
He grunted loudly in frustration, then said, “I make no moral judgement about your mother’s profession.
But if you wanted me to do so, then I would say that Cat O’Rinn had merely been trying to survive and keep her child alive, and she harmed no one deliberately.
Therefore, what she did was more honest work than many other occupations. ”
“Exactly!” I plunged my bloodied hands into the basin of water I’d brought over from the washroom and began cleaning myself up. “She didn’t deserve her fate, like so many of our neighbors said. If you have those memories etched on your bracelets, I wish you’d just erase them.”
The lines around his eyes softened. “I cannot. But if it makes you feel any better, I etched many stories about her kindness, courage, and good sense of humor. Just because people say something out loud, that doesn’t mean it’s what is in their hearts.”
That actually did make me feel better. As the defensive anger drained from me, I realized I shouldn’t have made assumptions. “It’s a touchy subject for me. I spent half my life defending her against busybodies and the other half taking care of her when she got sick.”
“It was a large burden for a small girl. Someone should’ve helped out—your grandfather, or your father before he died.”
I shook my head. “He didn’t deserve to be in the same room with her. The only good he did was to wake her up to the lie of love.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t follow…”
“There’s no such thing. Mammy didn’t realize that until he came along.”
He squinted at my face, unable to understand. “No such thing… as love?”
“Mammy said there wasn’t. That two people could never feel the same thing for each other. It’s always one-sided, and it always breaks your heart.”
Nin looked at me seriously. “Again I say, just because people say something out loud, that doesn’t mean it’s what is in their hearts. Cat O’Rinn had her heart broken by your father, but she didn’t give up on love.”
This floored me. I started to ask for proof but wasn’t sure I really wanted to see it. Why had she made me promise never to marry? Had she merely wished to spare me heartbreak? I didn’t know, and my feelings were too raw to be on display in front of Nin. They always were when it came to my mother.
I finished cleaning my hands and sanitized the curved suture needle before putting it back into its box, trying to distract myself while I thought about other parts of his story.
“You made it sound like you thought my presence here means trouble for you. Do you think I’ve been brought here…
on purpose? How? How would anyone know about my ‘sight’?
The only person I’ve ever told was my mother. ”
He sighed heavily. “I fear that it’s my fault. There’s one thing I neglected to mention. When I told my sister Mercy about you back in the Nightlands, I have reason to believe that my brother Kesh overheard us.”
“Kesh…? But it was Voss who brought me here, not your brother. It was merely accidental that I met Voss at the hospital the night Agnes died.”
Images of that night blurred inside my head, and I felt a frantic nervousness, trying to piece events together.
“Maybe it was just coincidence,” Nin said, but he didn’t seem convinced. “Or did Kesh have a hand in it? I’ve been wondering, and I just don’t know. My family has a long history of betrayal, and Kesh, I’m told, was very close to the last Grief.”
“Where did the last Grief go when he left the Nightlands with his mother?”
Nin shook his head and shrugged. “No one knows. Our kingdom is isolated, far from many other gods’ territories. Even the other gods fear Death.”
“Except Chaos?”
“Except Chaos,” he agreed.
“But Kesh is haunting the border of this estate, trying to get you out—at least, that’s what he claims. Do you think he has some nefarious reason for wanting to free you? Like, maybe Kesh is… trying to repeat what happened to your father? You mentioned him trying to drown you as a child.”
Nin sighed heavily. “I’ve considered it, but Kesh is concerned with give-and-take.
He wouldn’t do something simply for pleasure.
He’s bound by duty, just like me, and part of that duty is protection of the Nightlands and my family.
If he were to betray me…” Nin shook his head.
“No, I don’t think he would. He needs to get something out of it, a reason that will benefit him.
And why would my death benefit him? We never see each other anymore.
I’m not a nuisance to him, nor is he to me. ”
I considered this. “Maybe he is getting something out of it. Maybe someone’s collaborating with him. Have you made any other gods angry? Slept with anyone’s wives?”
A dark brow shot up. “Are you teasing me again, Molly O’Rinn?”
“You didn’t answer.”
Nin chuckled darkly. “No, Molly. I’m not in the habit of cheating. It goes against my vow of honesty. Besides, most of the major gods don’t even know I exist. I’m nothing to them, powerless and weak. The gods of love and beauty are not knocking down my door to propose romantic liaisons.”
I laughed. I just couldn’t help it. I felt lighter for his answer, and it was good to see the sparkle return to his eyes. “Well, then. Perhaps there are no gods itching for a chance to take you down. But your brother is here for a reason, and my gut says not to trust him.”
“That is wise. I’ll continue to ponder Kesh’s motivations, but right now, I just don’t know.”
Fair enough. I briefly wondered how I could help, but my mind wandered to something else Nin had mentioned during his story.
“Hey, another thing,” I said as I put away my tools in the medical bag, feeling Nin’s gaze upon me as I worked. “When you were first trapped here, you talked about a ballroom and seeing Voss’s body separated from his spirit. I don’t understand what that means?”
“It means that there’s been a breach of order in your world.”
“And that means…?” I glanced back at him. “Come on, now. Give a girl some context, please and thank you.”
“You already know. You have the Sight, and you certainly know how to make friends with lost souls. If I could see Charles Voss’s soul, it means—”
“Bejaysus!” I exclaimed, suddenly realizing what he was trying to say. “Charles Voss is dead.”
Nin nodded slowly.
“But if he’s dead, then how is his body walking around?”
“His body has a rider, another soul.”
“Whose?”
“Could be a lost soul, like your friend Bethany. But an occultist drew me here, someone with very rare knowledge and a great deal of talent. And that leads me to think that the soul inside Voss is the soul of the person who killed him.”
“The soul of an occultist…?”
“A very powerful one. I’ve been trying to figure out who that could be, using my memories of all the deaths around here. Charles Voss had plenty of enemies, but none that dabbled in the occult.”
I paced the room as my pulse sped. “I don’t understand.
That night at the woodpile, when you were”—holding me—“preventing me from moving, I saw the souls inside this house. Now, granted, I was overwhelmed and didn’t focus on Voss.
But you can see him, surely—see who is inside his body? You said you know all names.”
Nin shook his head. “That’s the problem. Whoever is riding Voss’s body has cloaked their soul in magic. I cannot identify him. I… have a lot of blind spots inside this aegis border. I cannot even see Charles Voss’s soul anymore—not since I left the ballroom.”
“What ballroom?”
Nin loosely rubbed the muscles of his arm below my stitches, lost in thought. “I wasn’t paying attention when I escaped the first trap. But I’ve never seen it since. He’s got some kind of spell blocking it, perhaps.”
“Holy shite,” I murmured as my chest tightened with anxiety and my stomach knotted. How does one fight an unknown enemy who does not show their face? One with a powerful set of skills that the average human wouldn’t understand. Or even a demigod.
I covered my face with one hand, trying to calm myself down… trying to think. A moment later, unexpectedly, I felt warm fingers gently tugging my hand away from my face. Nin pulled my hand down and—so very delicately—clasped my fingers with his.
Goose bumps rushed across my skin.
We stared at each other for several heartbeats, holding on to each other, until he finally murmured, “Do not fear, Molly O’Rinn.
Knowing that there is something wrong is half the task of making it right.
And I have known something was wrong since the moment I was drawn into your world against my will. ”
“Nin,” I whispered, gripping his hand harder.
“Molly,” he whispered back. “Listen to me. I pledge to you that if you are ever in danger, I will break my chain and come to you. I may not have all my strength, but what I do have is yours. I will defend you and keep you safe as best I can. You have my promise.”
No one had ever made a vow to me like this. No one but my mother. I was overwhelmed by his promise. His touch. Everything. I felt a terrible urge to do something about it, but I didn’t know…
How.
I just knew that anyone who would pledge a serious vow to me deserved the same in return.
“You must be careful,” Nin said. “But if you can find Voss’s soul, he may be able to tell us who killed him.”
I hoped so.
Because right then I sure wanted to have a conversation with the real Charles Voss.