Chapter 26
Chapter twenty-six
Lux leaned over her balcony.
Night had come early, and all she could see were shades of grey. She listened to the waves crash upon the cliffsides, a hauntingly beautiful melody. She brought her chin down to rest on her arms where they lay folded atop The Risen on the balcony’s edge.
To the sea air, she said, “I’m thinking it was a mistake, coming all this way alone.” In response, the wind whipped against her, dragging her hair across her eyes. She pushed back to right the strands.
A flutter of wings jolted her, and Lux turned to see the crow from the fence.
It landed on the railing and, in a single hop, neared her side.
Lux knew it was not the crow from her old life.
She reached out anyway. The animal didn’t bolt or twitch, allowing her forefinger to run along its sleek crown.
“What do I do about the hallucinations?” she asked the bird and the world both.
“I won’t allow that lunatic to carve anything out of me.
Does this mean I’m meant to live out my days as the necromancer who faints with her revivals and speaks to the nightmare haunting her even while awake? That didn’t work out well for Riselda.”
She hissed a sudden breath of pain.
“What was that for?” Lux lifted her hand to see. A red streak marred the back of it. “You bit me, you cruel bird!”
She sank down to the floor, the book in her clutches.
Between the sharp pain in her hand, and the hollowness of her heart, she suddenly had no strength left to stand.
She glared out at the cliffside. The barest gleam of pale stone could be seen around the manor’s onyx tower: the edges of Grimrook House she now knew.
The crow hopped onto her lap. Lux froze. The bird tilted its head, its beady eye searing her own. If ever an animal could look disappointed, this bird managed it.
Her teeth clacked together. Her jaw grew hard. She breathed a deep breath, and at its end, her face relaxed. “I won’t give up so easily,” she explained to the animal. “I was only grousing.”
Again, she picked apart that conversation in the workroom bit by bit. From the treatment of the girl to their cryptic talk of Lux herself. Disgust filled her over their eager words. “Who in the saintforsaken hell is that overlord? I’m sure I have no idea.”
This time, the bird pecked at her thigh.
“Devil—get away!” Lux shoved the bird off, where it immediately took flight and was gone. She hauled her skirt into her hands until the mark was revealed.
It didn’t bleed, but it was certainly an ugly scratch. Beast, she seethed. She’d been told they were clever birds, but it seemed this one was just awful.
Her skirt pooled around her at the same time a knock came upon her door.
“Lux?” said the muffled voice.
Devil below. Corvin. Lux shoved to her feet and called, “Just a moment.”
She’d told Hildred to invite him to dinner. She’d forgotten to also tell the woman to report back on his answer. The attendant was the most literal person she’d ever met.
Lux hurried from the balcony to deposit The Risen.
She ran then to the mirror, and when she neared it, saw that though she’d become disheveled from the breeze, she wasn’t entirely unpresentable.
Her fingers worked quickly to twist windswept strands from her face, securing them with clips she’d purchased in Loxlen.
Not for the first time, Lux felt relief over her shorter locks. She could well imagine the state of her hair by this point had she kept its length. She wiped at the space beneath her eyes and admired the new pink in her skin.
She returned to the door and opened it.
Her joints stiffened.
Corvin held out a gloved hand. And following that gloved hand was a black shirt and black trousers. He’d changed into a similar ensemble as their first meeting.
He also had that familiar half-smile on his mouth, the coy one, and her eyes narrowed upon seeing it. His smile bloomed fully. “I’ve come to escort you to dinner. Thank you, of course, for your invitation, but I’d something else in mind than the small tables these rooms allow.”
Lux raised an eyebrow. “Is there an evening room?”
His hand further bridged the distance. “Better. Please, allow me to distract you. I understand you’ve had the roughest of days, and I won’t pretend you haven’t. But the night is perfect, and I know you love the sea.”
Distract her? Her perusal began at the top of his light head and didn’t finish until she’d dragged it down to his well-crafted shoes. When she met his eyes again, she found his cheekbones tinged with color. No, she thought. I will not be distracted.
“All right,” she said, offering a coy smile to match. “If you insist.”
Mothlock Manor possessed a secret terrace. One Lux hadn’t been able to view from her balcony’s position, jutting from the building’s side. Attendants held the doors wide, and once outside them, she lost her breath.
“This is almost too beautiful to be real,” she whispered.
Lux felt Corvin’s glance for a moment before he proceeded to follow her gaze.
From the intimate seating to the lit lampposts and all around the extended intricate railing.
The lamplight wasn’t blue, but warming and soft and in pleasant contrast to the moon.
The sea’s lullaby haunted her in a delicious way.
Now you are being distracted, admonished her head.
She snapped free of the trance.
“I’ve begun to relish seeing Mothlock through your eyes. It reminds me to be grateful for everything the Saints have bestowed upon me.”
Lux sucked at her teeth. “I’d noticed the Saints seem to be a main feature of the manor.” Even now she found them. Taller than the garden statues, they rose pale and stark on either side of the doors. “I didn’t realize Mothlock was so devout.”
His attention carried to where she looked. “We are. In a sense.”
“In a sense,” she repeated and noted him fidget. “Something your overlord commissioned then?”
Corvin glanced down at her. “Yes, actually. A long time ago.”
“Because he died a long time ago.”
He huffed a laugh, his stare turning bemused. “Precisely.”
Hmm. She allowed him to lead her to the table, where he didn’t have an attendant pull out her chair but did so himself. She sat. “Did you say who took over his position? At his death, I mean.”
“No, I didn’t.” He pulled out his own chair and sat, beckoning at the doors with two fingers. An attendant swooped in. “Mothlock has had no leader since. We are all known as ‘lords’ and our voices carry equal weight. Everyone matters here.”
Lux’s goblet was filled with a deep red liquid, and once Corvin’s was, too, she lifted hers.
She ran her nail up and down its side and noticed when his eyes latched onto the movement and held there.
So. Either he does not know of this nightmarish overlord…
or he’s lying. She chewed her lip as she assessed him.
“Is this wine?” she asked. And waited. “Corvin?”
“Mm, what? Wine? Yes. Verdinia.”
She nodded like she knew of it and pretended to take a sip. Her eyes hooded now, she watched him as he watched her. His gaze dipped.
She couldn’t blame him. The gown she’d dressed in was the color of emeralds and cut to her form exact. Kent, for all that she didn’t like about him, was indeed brilliant in fabrics and threads. She’d stared at herself in the mirror for far longer than she ever had before.
Lux set down the goblet in time for their meals to arrive. Same as breakfast, the dishes were covered, and she waited until the attendant removed it with a silent flourish before she said, “You didn’t tell me the garden is really a graveyard.”
He stiffened with surprise in his seat. “Can it not be both?”
Maybe. If there were anything other than blood-sucking brambles occupying it. “Are the prior collectors also buried on the grounds?”
“Collectors, investors, and attendants. All our given rest here on Mothlock grounds when their time comes.” He drank from his goblet. “Are you looking forward to the banquet tomorrow? I’m eager for you to experience it.”
Attendants. Even the attendants are entombed below? But he’d changed the subject purposefully, and she didn’t know how to steer it back. “I’m not sure I can stomach a crowd. I was never inclined to begin with, but after the healer’s diagnosis…I would rather be left alone.”
“Yet you sought out my company tonight.”
“Well.” Lux worried her lower lip. “You are different. I…feel different. Around you.”
Like I might get you to tell me exactly what I need to know. His eyes were truly an unbelievable color. She watched them dilate beneath her scrutiny. His nostrils flared.
“I’ve come to realize the same thing,” he said.
He hadn’t touched his food. Nor had Lux, for that matter. She raised her fork now and made a slow show of selecting a bite and bringing it to her lips. She let it slide gently behind her teeth and did not speak.
He cleared his throat. “Kent will be disappointed.”
“Kent? Whatever for?”
“He told me of the gown he had in mind for you. And now I feel robbed of seeing you in it.”
Lux pressed her tongue sharply to her canine. “Maybe I will wear it. After the banquet is over.”
But he didn’t leap at the suggestive invitation.
“That would be very late, indeed,” he said. “I didn’t tell you before, but Hallowed Eve is a twofold celebration, really. One part is for our guests. The banquet, and the honoring. The second is a ceremony—for the collectors.”
“A ceremony for Collectors only?”
“It’s a sacred ritual. We call it the Hallowed Harvest—in respect to the season, the Saints, and all the abundance we’ve gathered and shared.
” He leaned forward conspiratorially. “Lux, Artemis didn’t mention a third route you might take.
Truthfully, maybe I shouldn’t be mentioning it either.
But after your adamance in saving your brilliance—to choose your gift over your sanity—it proved how serious you are in being your best version.
If you’d participate in the Harvest with us—well, I believe you could be cured. ”
Lux lips parted; she needed to physically restrain herself from allowing her jaw to swing wide. This she did not expect. Another way? A way that would allow her to keep her brilliance but expunge the madness?
“How would a ritual fix me?”
The lamplight flickered behind him, highlighting the near-ivory strands of his hair. A breeze whistled up through the railings, and the hollowness in Lux’s chest carved itself wide. You’re alone. You’re alone. You’re alone.
She mentally shook herself free of the feel, then lifted her thumb to her mouth to lick the sauce from her skin. Corvin noticeably swallowed.
“Are you not religious, Lux?”
“Not overly.”
His gaze left her to focus on the darkened sea. “Riselda Grimrook is said to have been a heretic.”
Of course she was.
Lux knew of all ranges of beliefs in Ghadra, but the mayor had prayed over his spiked tea every morning. She did not think it mattered.
“Is that why she disappeared?” She pretended to take another sip of wine.
“So they say. Riselda wanted the benefits of the Harvest, but without any of the society’s guidance.
It’s said she strived to master brilliance without yearning for the greatest destination of all: perfection.
And that’s the problem, isn’t it? Someone cannot achieve anything close if they’re also a heretic.
Personally, I think that’s why she ran.”
Lux’s eyebrows rose nearly to her hairline. “No one can achieve that.”
Corvin’s responding smile was soft. He traced the rim of his goblet with one gloved finger. “What do you believe in?”
Lie or tell the truth?
“I believe in the Beyond. I believe in people—in that we all have a brilliance embedded within each of us whether we choose to do anything with it or not. I believe in myself sometimes.”
The truth. For what it was worth.
“You believe in all those things but not that there’s something greater?”
She shrugged. “Maybe there is. Ghadra’s mayor prayed over his drink for prosperity without fail, and he did die awfully rich.”
Corvin’s laugh didn’t sound especially kind. In fact, it was almost smug. “That could have some correlation, for certain.”
No, it couldn’t. She’d said it with sarcasm, but Corvin had missed it. The mayor was self-serving and immoral. There was nothing holy about him. He certainly wasn’t saintlike.
“What is it you pray for?” she asked.
“Enlightenment,” he answered immediately. “The purge of mortal failings. Every Invocation, we pray for the mastery of brilliance.”
“You—” Lux blinked incredibly slow. “Unless you’re some sort of saint yourself, you can’t be rid of failings.”
“Precisely.” An underlying current of confrontation propped up the word.
Her own reared to match. “Corvin.” She stared at him hard. “Be serious.”
“Lux.” He returned her stare. “I am.”
She continued to watch him, wide-eyed, until the statue from the balcony corner beckoned her attention. Faceless. Looming. All of them.
So anyone might imagine themselves in its place…
Devil below. This was not religion as she’d heard it. This was something…beyond. She huffed a worried laugh and muttered under her breath, “Well, this has gotten out of hand.”
Corvin continued, “Your way of thinking isn’t isolated, of course.
But it’s another facet of what Mothlock is trying to achieve with its resources.
Our books are distributed widely, and it’s the spreading of that knowledge in which we place the hope of achieving further enlightenment of the country. ”
“I don’t understand.”
“The original works. They offer nothing about the true basis of Saints and the Devil. Real mastery isn’t always about becoming the most competent in your brilliance—it’s about knowing when to choose subservience.
To realize there’s a chance you may be called to kneel before those who’ve been blessed to become greater.
It’s a long, arduous journey for a collective achievement.
Sometimes, I cannot believe I’ve been allowed a part in the cause. ”
Subservience! Lux had to duck her head so he’d not see her unpleasant reaction. The lending libraries. The bookshops. They’d tampered with them all?
“Corvin,” she began once she could. “There are saints, if you believe in them, and then there are plain, mortal people. You can’t be both.”
He dipped his head. “You’re right. You cannot be both.”