Lucy
Midnight holds a broken thing inside her. I can’t place exactly what it is, but her shoulders are a little too tight and her gaze leaves mine too quickly.
I am too thankful for the fact she’s here to place much importance on the whats of whatever secret she harbours.
And yet, it nestles in the back of my mind like a subclause in a contract you skirt over too quickly and know it will come back to bite you.
The door to Prima Tower swings open and Lex, Bastien and Mortem barrel in, a mass of seething darkness behind them.
Wraiths.
“Incoming,” she shrieks as she slams the door shut. Lex’s fingers work at a thousand miles per hour as she casts necromantic runes around the door’s frame. Thick black ribbons of magic peel from the walls and seal us in.
“I think that’s just about enough time down here, let’s get back to Gardon,” Bastien says and shimmies us towards the staircase.
“Yeah, especially because Interitus is hunting me,” I add.
We find ourselves in a long corridor containing several doors and offshoots into various places in the tower.
But the important part is that we’re on the reverse side of the Veil arch Interitus shoved me through in the Finis dungeons.
Nodrag is the goyle sitting atop the arch, and on the other side, in Finis, is Gardon, his twin.
“Okay, let’s go,” Midnight says and hustles everyone through the Veil.
“Wait. Lex, take these, I stole them from the demonic library.” I pull the now very squashed and dented books from my robe pockets and hand them to her. She squeals in delight and Midnight shoves her through the shimmering Veil. Bastien goes right after her.
“You next,” Midnight says and nudges my bum.
I step to the edge of the Veil and the shimmering fabric turns to stone.
“Don’t think so,” Nodrag says, taking one look at me and shaking his stone head.
Midnight steps beside me pointing an accusing finger at Nodrag. “I think you’ll find if you speak to your brother, Gardon made a deal with me to let us back through.”
Nodrag barks out a laugh so violent, he flings a stone tooth right out of his mouth.
“Is that a no?” she asks, her shoulders slumping.
“Useless mortals. Let me handle this,” Mortem huffs and saunters up to the Veil arch which promptly shimmers back to life as he pounces into Finis. He comes back moments later looking rather grim.
“He’s gone back on his word, hasn’t he?” Midnight asks.
“He says you intentionally withheld information…”
“I mean… I didn’t not do that. But also, that traitorous bastard made a deal,” Midnight says.
She closes her eyes and frowns. Some wisps of ruby red demon magic sprout from her chest and dart towards Nodrag, but they fizzle out before getting to him.
“You used the demon magic?” I ask, my voice quiet.
“Tried. We knew we wouldn’t be able to get you out without a soul, so I tried to bargain with Gardon.”
Nodrag tuts. “Not under my watch. She’s too dangerous to be let loose in Ora.”
“Oh, that is a shame,” a familiar voice says, and my blood turns to ice.
“Interitus,” Midnight says. “RUN.”
I don’t wait, I grab her hand and dart down the corridor and into the first door I find. But it’s just a room of doors.
“Fuck,” I say and yank Midnight with me. We wrench open another door, as a blast of thick, dark ribbony magic obliterates everything but the handle I’m holding.
Midnight shoves me inside and drags me across the room so fast I stumble over my feet.
Another blast of magic shoots over my head missing me by a millimetre. My arms flare to life, the runes sensing danger.
“Oh gods! Midnight, you need to get to safety. I blew two wraiths to pieces.”
“Not leaving you.”
I scramble up, and we race through the next door. There’s a table just inside this one, and Midnight shoves it against the door under the handle.
“It won’t hold for long. Better than nothing.”
She nudges me down this corridor and we find ourselves back in the central staircase. Gods, this fucking tower is one endless déjà vu.
I think we’re clear when Interitus walks out onto the opposite side of the spiralling staircase two floors up.
“Fuck me,” Midnight says.
Interitus flings a half dozen threads of magic, all of them with loops on the end. Nooses. She’s making god-damned nooses.
I poke at my arms, prodding the runes, but they remain quiet. Not even a fucking flicker of power. I can’t seem to make them work. Why can’t I control them? They fucking worked when the wraiths were after me, and now what? They just abandon me?
Midnight dives in front of the ribbons, slashing and swiping at them with her scythe. But Interitus is too quick and one of the ribbons slides between Midnight’s legs and coils around my ankle.
I’m dragged up and over the bannister by my foot, screaming and yanking at the ribbons. I can’t get the magic off me, and the harder I fight, the tighter the loop cinches around my leg. I’m whisked into the middle of the staircase’s spiral. There’s nothing but free fall below me.
I stop fighting the magic.
That thread is the only thing holding me up and away from a thousand-foot drop to concrete.
“Let her go, motherfucker,” Midnight says, brandishing her scythe as she leans over the bannister to try and reach me.
I’m dead centre of the stairwell; there’s no way she will get to me.
“No… I don’t think so,” Interitus says, a note of triumph in her voice.
There’s a speck below me in the darkness, it moves and undulates and rapidly grows bigger and bigger. What the hell is—
I’m launched up, up, up.
Arms clasp me. Enormous wings flap, making wind rush around my ears. I’m thrown back over the bannister and clatter to the stairs.
Architecti.
The floor rumbles, an enormous cut in the Veil appears. There’s shrieking.
Thunderous booms as two sets of wings careen into each other.
Midnight appears, her hands sliding under my arms and scooping me up. “Go,” she hisses, and we run down the staircase as fast as we can.
Above us, the angels battle. Circling the enormous gash in the Veil that hovers mid-air in the stairwell.
Fists crunch into jaws and ribs.
Feet into wings.
The angels bounce off the walls and clatter into the bannister.
Architecti catches her sister’s foot, swings her round and hurls her through the Veil tear. Her moth darts around the cut, flying up and down in rapid, jerking movements and then it settles.
The tear is gone.
And so is Interitus.
But the way Architecti is staring at me, I’m not sure that’s any better.
She flaps her wings, descending through the spiral until she reaches our level. She raises her hands, palms out, at us.
“I mean you no harm,” she says.
Midnight pushes me behind her. “What do you want?”
“To help.”
Midnight folds her arms, the scepticism rolling off her.
“What do you really want?” I say and gesture for her to come and talk to us in the corridor of the floor we’re on.
She lands gracefully and shrugs her wings away.
“What I really desire is to put a stop to my sister.”
“You took her moth, you left her powerless, what more do you need?” Midnight says, taking my hand and pushing me behind her.
Architecti smiles. It’s sad, and my chest hurts looking at her. “If you think that is enough to stop her, you are mistaken. Especially not when Lucy exists,” she says.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
“It means that you are a weapon. One that I created knowing you would have the power to defeat Interitus if the time came.”
“Why should I help you?”
“Because I am assuming you’ve not been able to get back to Ora?”
I shake my head.
Architecti nods, knowingly. “Then I am willing to give you a piece of my soul. You can return home, live your life with your… love.” She glances at Midnight, leaving those words hanging in the air so much heavier than they should be.
Midnight swallows hard. I file away her response for later.
“And all I have to do is help you stop your sister?” I ask.
Architecti shrugs. “It’s a little more complex than that. You need to learn to control your power, and then perhaps you can help me, yes.”
Midnight squeezes my wrist. “I don’t like it. If it sounds too good to be true…”
“I’m an angel, Midnight, what could you have to fear from me?”
“Tell that to Interitus.”
“She is fallen. I was pushed. I just want to help,” she shrugs.
I nudge Midnight. “We don’t have a choice. If I stay here, Interitus will keep hunting me. This is a win-win. Architecti wants rid of her, and so do we.”
Architecti’s smile broadens so much it lights up her entire face. She radiates light and warmth and yet, there is still a hardness beneath her gaze. I can’t quite pinpoint what, but there is something about her that unsettles me.
Midnight is shaking her head. “We can find another way.”
“Not quickly and not without serious risk. This solution is right here, we can be home tonight. We will have access to more magic. More guards. We could buy time for me to learn to control my magic.”
Architecti nods. “Exactly. I will help train you.”
“Wait,” Midnight says. “You owe me. I reaped Lucy. Give her a piece of your soul instead of saving mine.”
I run a thumb over the back of her hand. “It doesn’t work like that. Contracts and deals and covenants don’t exchange.”
“Only sacrifice,” Architecti adds.
Midnight’s expression hardens; she trembles with unspent fury.
“Thank you for trying,” I whisper.
“Ready?” Architecti says.
“Ready,” I confirm.
Her moth flutters between us. Architecti’s face fills with lines, her neck cords. The atmosphere around us wrinkles and sizzles hot. Unlike Finis’s magic, hers smells clean, like spring blooms and ocean waves and a sprinkling of pine trees, a scent I could drink forever.
I sense the hitch the same way I would the Veil, though I’m not as good at that as Midnight or Alistair.
The moth twists and contorts in the air close to her chest. There’s a high-pitched keening and then a glistening shower of sparkles emanates from her.
It’s stunning, I can see every spectrum of light all at once.
Architecti swoops her hands around, forming the light into a ball and then she flings it right at my chest.
I’m flung back and crash into the corridor wall with the impact. My body erupts, every rune lighting on fire simultaneously. I slide down the wall, a hollow scream ringing out.
Midnight’s expression is distraught as she flits between me and Architecti. She lunges for me, but Architecti grabs her, holding her back.
“Lucy,” she screams.
But the searing heat filling my body is already making my vision spot.
My insides tear and jumble and reassemble.
The heat grows so hot sweat pools over my skin.
I pull at my arms and chest, tearing at the clothes.
“Get the fuck off me!” Midnight shrieks at Architecti.
But my mind is filling with the strangest visions. Only they’re not really visions at all, but memories.
So many memories, and none of them are mine.