Chapter 43
Ihold a knife in each hand as Finnian pours a trail of salt around the dais. Desmond kneels at the top, arms outstretched as he murmurs in fae.
“What is he doing?” I ask Auri. We’re standing a few steps back from the dais.
Auri’s bowstring is pulled taut, an arrow already waiting to fly. “That sarcophagus is wrapped with magic like a moth in a web. Only a necromancer can open it.”
Desmond shouts and claps. I know the magic seal breaks because I can feel the waves of malevolence wash over me. Finnian grimaces, just as perturbed as I am. Auri’s lips are set in a grim frown, but Desmond doesn’t hesitate. He shoves the sarcophagus’s lid aside, stone grinding against stone.
Curse is repeated in every painted line on the lid, a bad omen if I’ve ever seen one.
The skeletal revenant inside sits up. Its desiccated head swivels toward me, a crown perched atop its straggly gray hair as though held by magic. One spectral, glowing blue eye blinks at me. The other socket is empty.
King Olin. He has the same ghastly hollowness as other draugr, but his clothes are carefully preserved, grand purple robes with golden thread woven in intricate patterns. Pinched between the fingers of his bony hand is the arrow the fae desire. Its shaft shimmers, tiny runes inked across it.
Auri shifts to shoot, but Desmond throws his arm out. “Wait,” he says, watching Olin intently.
“Those who awaken my infernal sleep, heed my warning,” King Olin rasps.
Black smoke snakes from his mouth, billowing around him.
“You have broken the wards that sealed the Curse of Ages inside this tomb, inside this very body. Five centuries ago, the divine goddess Elowyn punished my people for tampering with death, for worshipping Osian over herself. The gods do not take kindly to the betrayal of their order.”
His head cocks sideways as he hisses out a longer trail of smoke.
“Some called it a plague, others a blight, but our diviners called it a drain of magic. Elowyn’s curse made our land wither, and our Gifts weakened.
Only siphoners like those of my line could remove this stain on the land, but that tainted magic cannot be destroyed—only contained.
I siphoned part of the curse, but my sacrifice consumed me.
I lost control, forcing my own people to orchestrate my death.
They buried me in the very necropolis we were punished for erecting, our necromancers awakening me as one final sin so I may heed this warning to you.
You must not let a siphon release this power back upon the land. ”
Goosebumps crawl down my arms. The smoke curls around my ankles and winds up my body, tickling my skin.
“There are only two known bloodlines of siphons,” Desmond murmurs. “King Olin’s descendants are one, and the other is fomorian.”
Olin’s descendants? That would be Avedor’s royal family. So Queen Orla, Eldon, Ronan, Cara, any one of them could be a siphon?
King Olin’s neck creaks as he turns to look at Desmond.
“They will come for me soon, now that the wards are broken. Then they will come for the others like me, the cursed revenants scattered throughout the continent. If they release this power with no siphons left to contain it, you will be doomed. Be warned.”
“Who are they?” I ask, fearing the answer.
The ghastly skin around Olin’s teeth pulls taut in a smile. “It will drain the land until there is nothing left.”
He extends the arrow to Desmond, bones clacking as he waits. Desmond slowly takes it, like he expects Olin to lash out at any moment.
Olin’s all-teeth grin widens. “Prince of Death. I have long looked forward to meeting you. Do not be unwise with this arrow, or you spell your own doom.” The glint in his luminous eye is wicked, as if he’s wishing that very fate upon Desmond.
I gulp, those words as unsettling as Olin himself.
“My duty has been fulfilled.” With one final breath, Olin disintegrates. His flesh and bone turn to ash that rains down like sand on his robes. The crown falls atop it all.
“Well, that was far from pleasant,” Finnian quips. “Swell that we get to keep the crown, though.” He darts through the smoke up the dais and grabs it, then holds it over his own head. “How’s it look?”
“Finnian, step away from the coffin,” Desmond warns. He draws his sword as the smoke billows, swarming the coffin. My skin prickles as the mage lights overhead dim, their glow streaking toward the smoke as if being consumed by it.
We back away. Desmond swears as he tracks the smoke’s serpentine crawl down the dais. “Olin’s soul has moved on, and his death has released the curse,” he says, each word as heavy as a death knell.
Gods, I want him to be wrong, but the well of magic inside of me trembles. Pain throbs in my chest, stuttering my pulse so hard I gasp. It feels like my magic is being ripped out of me.
“We have to run,” Auri gasps out, her chest heaving like she feels it, too.
“But the treasure!” I argue. “We can’t just leave it!” Yet even I know how vain that sounds as we all struggle to back away from the coffin, gasping and staggering in agony.
“We’re getting out,” Desmond orders. “Now!”
I fumble my knives into their sheaths, then reach around my back to grab the enchanted rucksack. My hands tremble as I pull the cinched opening wider.
“Cynthia!” Desmond yells. “Go!”
I don’t make him say it again. My feet pound against the marble as I run, weaving through the maze of treasure.
Holding the sack wide open, I strain my magic to its breaking point, untethering the goblets and vases and jewels that I pass.
They clink one after another into the sack, and I don’t stop.
Not even as my head throbs so hard that my vision edges with black.
Not even when I trip, catch myself on one hand, and let Desmond pull me back onto my feet.
This can’t all be for nothing. Everything I take is another meal for my family, another coin to pay for a healer so Evie won’t suffer from my mistakes.
Glass baubles pop. Marble cracks. The cavernous ceiling above us shudders, banners knocked free and fluttering down.
Auri and Finnian watch us from the doorway of the nobility’s chamber, their eyes wide with terror. “Hurry!” Auri shouts.
Smoke brushes against my neck, cold as a winter squall. Desmond runs behind me as though he can protect me from it. I reach the nobility’s chamber, a cloud billowing around my chest, and Auri shoves me toward Finnian, away from the door. Her palms crackle with lightning.
“Don’t!” Desmond shouts. “We don’t know what magic does to it.” To my horror, he faces the king’s chamber and stands inside the doorway. Black pillars of smoke swirl before him. As we all stare at the indomitable, dark energy, there’s no denying it.
This is the power of the gods. And none of us can stop it.
Desmond grabs the door and tries to shut it, but the force of the cursed magic fights him. The smoke swells faster. Tendrils that are colder than ice snake around my feet, and a hissing scream fills my ears.
I throw my body against the door to help him. Auri and Finnian join us, and we move step by strained step. “Almost there!” Auri yells, her voice echoing over the shriek of the curse.
With one final shove, we slam the door shut.
Silence snuffs out the scream as though it was never there. The only trace is the ringing in my ears.
We pant for breath as we watch the curls of smoke slink toward cracks in the walls, spiral into them, and vanish. Our gazes meet, a thousand questions jumping between us. Not one of us expected the curse to be real.
“I don’t know why. . .” Desmond smooths his curls out of his eyes. He scans the Old Avedoran writings in the chamber again and again, as if he can’t fathom what he’s reading. “The warnings are here, but why do ghosts never speak of it? Why didn’t I know about this?”
He paces, his words as quick as his steps, more talking to himself than us.
“Does Olin expect us to believe that the Avedoran monarchy created an army of undead to guard the very curse inflicted upon them for creating the undead? Then, to hide any evidence, they execute all the necromancers, but let the siphons live. Because of course the royalty wouldn’t execute themselves, despite having the power to control the curse for their own use. ”
“The siphons are needed if the curse ever needs to be contained again,” I add.
Desmond whips around to face me, and I catch a flash of pain that he quickly masks.
“But they shouldn’t have killed all the necromancers,” I tell him, both meaning it and hoping that’s what he needs to hear. Gods, even though I’m still pissed at him, at all of them, I still care what he thinks of himself.
“Should we have second thoughts about killing a siphon?” Finnian asks. “Assuming that is Queen Orla’s Gift.”
“No,” Desmond says, too quickly, and my anger instantly throttles my concern.
“You got what you wanted.” I glare at the arrow Desmond holds as if my gaze could disintegrate it. Then I look at him, my frown no less severe. “So if you don’t mind, I’d like to go home.”
Desmond nods. No amount of reticence can hide the sorrow in his eyes. “Finnian, give her the crown.”
“But it looks so swell on me,” he pouts.
“I promised her everything in the tomb except for the arrow. It’s hers.”
Finnian snorts. “Seriously, Dez? You didn’t leave a single thing in your vow for me?
If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you didn’t love me.
” He hands me Olin’s crown with a reluctantly strong grip at the end.
I shove it into the rucksack, along with every piece of jewelry he takes off and every coin from his pockets.
When he notices my anguished frown, he falters, guilt pinching his face. I want to throw his own words back at him—everything he said at the guild about friendship and trust. How could he smile and ask for my trust when he never intended to give me his?
I can’t bring myself to speak. Neither can Finnian. He looks away first, dipping his head in a silent apology. I almost reach out to comfort him. Almost.
Despite knowing she’ll have nothing, I look at Auri.
She huffs. “Freedom is a greater treasure than anything inside this tomb. The moment Queen Orla’s heart stops beating, we’ll have it.”
“Perhaps, but at the cost of Desmond’s heart stopping, too.
” I force my shoulders to rise in a blithe shrug, but I feel so far from cheerful that it’s laughable.
I heft my pack over my shoulder and stride toward the doorway that leads to the chasm, leaving them behind me.
I won’t stop them from using the bridge when I fix it, but the sooner I can go home, the better.
Everything hurts. My head, my body, and worst of all, my heart.