Chapter 9
HIDDEN
SAERIS
SHE WAS AS beautiful as ever.
Her thick blond hair fanned across the pillow beneath her head.
Cheeks as pale as porcelain, lips a blush pink, Everlayne didn’t look as though she was still battling the remnants of Malcolm’s venom.
But I knew better. Along her jawline, fine black tendrils of poison marred her perfect skin.
Her hands had been stacked one on top of the other over her stomach—a restful pose—but her fingernails were too long. Tinged black.
Onyx lay sleeping at her feet by the bottom of the bed.
I’d assumed he was darting off to hunt last night when Fisher carried me into his room, but it was nice to know that he’d ended up here with Everlayne.
She didn’t deserve to be alone . . . though it seemed Onyx hadn’t been the only one keeping watch over my mate’s sister.
The seat Ren had been occupying when I’d entered Layne’s room earlier still sat pushed back from the bed, abandoned.
The general probably had a room of his own here at Cahlish.
I sincerely doubted that he’d slept in it at all since Everlayne had fallen through that shadow gate and come crashing down onto the table in the library, though.
I had a feeling that he’d spent quite a few long nights dozing uncomfortably in that chair, waiting for the female in the bed to wake up.
The white fox had fallen asleep right after I’d settled in to keep Layne company. Now, the soft sounds of his snoring filled the bedroom. He kicked his legs fitfully, running in his dreams.
The room that had been prepared for Everlayne’s recovery was beautiful.
The windows overlooked a sweeping snowy field that dipped down a shallow hill to meet the tree line of a sprawling evergreen forest. The trees were dressed in white, their boughs bent under the weight of fresh snow.
Beyond, the mountain ridge scraped the sky.
The sleeping giant, Omnamerrin, with his sheer face turned toward Cahlish, glittered as the first light of dawn crept over the crest of his peak.
A thrill of mild discomfort hit me as those very same pale rays washed the walls of Everlayne’s bedroom, painting them orange. The light held no warmth this early in the morning, but a rising heat grew in my hands as I watched it dapple my skin. I would need to retreat from it soon. But not yet.
“I owe you an apology,” I said softly, lifting Layne’s topmost hand from her stomach and taking it in my own.
Her skin felt cool to the touch—a little too cool.
“I didn’t mean to leave without saying goodbye, y’know.
But there were extenuating circumstances,” I said dryly.
“Your brother wasn’t exactly the easiest to deal with.
I wound up having the choice taken from me, I’m afraid.
We’ve moved on from that now, but . . . still.
It didn’t feel good, going without thanking you, at least. You took care of me, Layne.
You watched out for me. If it hadn’t been for you then, the gods only know who would have been charged with watching over me at the palace.
I’m sure it would have been a much scarier experie—”
She hears you. She feels you. Open the gate. The gate . . . The gate . . . The gate. Open it. Open the gate.
I jerked back into my seat, tipping my head to one side.
The susurrus of sound was very familiar.
It was the quicksilver. I knew the cadence of its voice.
Was used to being bossed around by it now.
It had spoken to me . . . but there was no one here with me.
I didn’t have Solace with me. Ren didn’t even have a god sword, and he hadn’t left anything behind, anyway.
It was just me and Everlayne, and Layne didn’t have a weapon on her.
Nothing that could possibly contain any quicksilver. Not that I—
My mind stilled.
Oh.
By the gods, but she did have quicksilver on her body. I hadn’t noticed it before, but her tiny earrings flashed in the pre-dawn light, didn’t they? Simple. Plain. The metal was cast into flowers, their petals pointed upward like tiny daggers.
“You aren’t supposed to be here.” I leaned closer to inspect the earrings.
We are, we are, we are, came the quicksilver’s indignant response. Always have been.
“And how am I supposed to open a gate when there’s so little of you?” I asked.
I reached for the metal in Layne’s earlobe, but as soon as my fingers touched it, the earring liquified and dripped into my palm.
“Fuck.” I hadn’t willed it to change. I wasn’t wearing a relic, and it was touching me.
Panic rose up, ready to come crashing down on me, but before that could happen, a droplet of the quicksilver landed on Layne’s shoulder.
As soon as the liquid metal touched her skin, her eyelids flew open, and Fisher’s sister drew in a wheezing breath.
It is done, then. Done, done, done, the quicksilver chanted excitedly.
Only this time, the layered voices of the quicksilver came out of Everlayne’s mouth.
Her eyes were green. Unfocused. She blinked, and when she opened them again, they were a perfect white.
Her head snapped to the left, facing me, her jaw working from side to side.
“At last,” she sighed. “You’re here.” The voice was a lot like Everlayne’s, but it didn’t belong to her.
It was deeper than it should have been. Richer.
A tremulous smile spread across her face as she stared at me with those white eyes.
“I’ve been waiting a long, long time to speak with you, Saeris Fane. ”
Her hand snapped out and closed around my wrist, her grip unnaturally strong.
“Everlayne?” Her name was a question on my lips, but I already knew that this wasn’t Fisher’s sister. The thing that was occupying Layne’s body blinked at me slowly, as if it had forgotten how to blink, shaking its head.
“No. Everlayne isn’t here, I’m afraid. I don’t—I don’t know if she will be strong enough to return.” I tried to pull my hand back, fear climbing my spine, but the thing inside Layne’s body held on tight. “Now, now, now . . .” Layne’s teeth chattered.
“Let me go!” I didn’t want to have to break Everlayne’s fingers, but I would if I had to.
The thing puppeting Layne released me. “At last,” it sighed. “I’ve . . . waited so . . . long. Waited for cen-cen-centuries.”
I leaped up. The chair fell. It crashed to the floor, but Onyx, still lying in a huddle of blankets by Everlayne’s feet, didn’t even stir. Whatever fell magic this was, I didn’t fucking like it. “What are you talking about?” I hissed. “What are you? Why are you here?”
“Ed-Edina,” the thing stuttered. “Edina. Edina. I am Edina.”
The name was so familiar to me. I’d heard someone speak it recently, hadn’t I? Seen it written down somewhere. “What are you doing to Layne?” I demanded. “Release her body. Let her wake up.”
The thing—Edina—slowly closed her eyes, and tears chased down Everlayne’s cheeks. “Sh-she is . . . beyond my reach. I am . . . not keeping her from this . . . body.”
“Then where is she?”
Edina’s answer caught in Everlayne’s throat. She could hardly speak as it was, but these words seemed especially difficult for her to say. “She is in sha-sha-shadow. I cannot see.”
“You’re scaring me.”
“Fear is not . . . real, Saeris Fane,” she croaked.
I took a giant step back from the bed. “How the fuck do you know my name?”
“You must g-g-go.”
“Yeah, no shit.”
“The library. Go to the library,” she said, her teeth chattering even harder. “There, you will fi-find a b-b-book.”
“Libraries are full of books,” I whispered.
This wasn’t right. It was unnatural. Honestly, it was freaking me the hell out.
A voice in the back of my head urged me not to run, though.
It was the same voice that had told me to steal that guardian’s gauntlet.
The same one that had made me fight and kill two of Madra’s men outside the Mirage.
It couldn’t be trusted, but I was nothing if not a creature of habit.
“What kind of book?” I demanded. “And why do I need it?”
“Sm-small,” she wheezed. “But thick. Blue. There is a butterfly . . .”
“A butterfly? On the cover?”
Edina couldn’t manipulate Layne’s facial features too much, it seemed. Her pale eyes were full of pain. I could feel it, feel her confusion, all underpinned by a sorrow that made me want to weep. “It’s hidden,” she rasped, “among the stars.”
“What does that mean?”
“The stars . . .” Edina’s eyes rolled back into her head.
“Hey!”
“Hundreds and . . . hundreds of . . . stars.”
“Edina!” Why was I suddenly choking on panic? It suffocated me, shoving me back to the bed. I picked up Layne’s hand and clasped it tight, fighting for air. “Edina, what’s in the book? Why is it so important? Tell me!”
An eerie calm settled over the visitor in Layne’s body.
Her sightless gaze found mine, and for a second, her confusion slipped away.
“They told you. About the rot,” she said in a clear voice.
“They told you it would come. It’s here, now.
You must find the book in order to stop it.
Without it, the decay will spread until it swallows this realm and millions more with it.
I have seen it, Saeris. Find the book. Stop the spread. It’s the only way.”
“Edina—”
She squeezed my hand tighter than tight. “Find it. But do not tell him about it. I mean it. It’s important. He can’t know about the book. Only you. Do you understand?”
I didn’t. Not even a little bit, but I heard the desperation in her tone and the lie came easily. “Yes. I understand.”
“Thank you. Make sure he knows how much I loved him, Saeris,” she said. “At the end, make sure he knows that I’d do it all again.”
What did that mean? The question was there, ready to be asked, but it wouldn’t come out.
Layne’s—Edina’s—grip on my hand had tightened, and it was beginning to hurt.
Not my hand. But . . . the ink that marked it.
The runes on my fingers, the backs of my hands, chaining my wrists and spiraling up my forearms—suddenly it felt as though the runes were on fire.
Were they glowing? No. Oh, gods, they were burning.
A wisp of smoke curled away from my skin, and Edina’s milk-white eyes went wide. “You haven’t sealed them?” she gasped.
“Sealed them? What does that mean? I don’t understand.”
“An Alchemist must seal her runes,” she rasped. “You are a well that runs deep. When you were marked with your runes, their magic began pouring into you. It flows and it flows. It will not . . . stop . . .”
“Edina!” She was drifting. Her eyes were still clouded, but I sensed that they’d lost focus.
The pain around my wrists and up my arms had intensified, almost unbearable.
I tried to pull my hand back, ready to claw away my own skin if it meant escaping the burn, but Edina suddenly seemed to return.
Her grip held little strength, but I could not let go of her hand.
“Seal them, Saeris. If you do not . . .”
“What? What’ll happen if I don’t?” The pain was too much now.
Acrid smoke rose from the runes on the back of my right hand; my flesh was burning.
I watched in horror as the marks glowed like a brand, sinking deeper and deeper into my skin.
Blisters rose, angry, spreading up my arm.
This was worse than a sword in the stomach.
It was agony. Tears welled in my eyes, streaming down my cheeks. “Edina! What are you doing?”
“Not me, not me. I did what I could.” She sighed regretfully. “Now the rest . . . is up to you.”
“Edina, help me!”
“Find the book. The book . . .” The white of her eyes started to clear, like silt settling to the bottom of a canister, leaving behind clear water. She was fading.
“Edina? Edina! ”
The bedroom door crashed open.
The pain vanished. My hand . . . it was fine. The runes no longer formed raw burns. The blisters were gone. My God Bindings looked normal.
“Osha?”
I dropped Layne’s lifeless hand, spinning to face my mate. Fisher stood by the door, his face white as a sheet, his leathers spattered with mud.
His voice was rough when he said, “Why were you calling my mother’s name?”