19. Chapter 19
Willow
“This is not a good idea,” Liam whispered under his breath as he followed me across the busy haberdashery filled with ladies of all kinds doing a bit of Sunday shopping.
“Like I warned you about that skilamalink. Your husband’s going to lock me in your cellar again.
And only feed me rabbit blood until I start vomiting it all up. ”
A small smile lingered on my lips when I spotted the woman I’d been trailing for nearly three hours. She was a hard person to track down. I’d enlisted Theodora to meet with her maid and slowly get all the information regarding her mistress’s schedule.
Sybil faltered when she noticed me approach her from a distance, turning her back to me as she inspected the ribbons laid out on the display shelf.
“It did wonders for your skin. You look great!” I said to Liam, waving my fingers over my shoulder at him as I quickly tiptoed to Sybil’s side, grabbing one of the many colourful ribbons she’d had her hands on just a second ago.
“Willow Duncan, was it not?” she asked, running her fingers down the length of the lace ribbon, trying her best to fight off the irritation.
“Your husband is the clergy secretary, right?” I asked, cutting to the chase before we were noticed by others. “It must be difficult to be married to the people actively advocating for our dissolution. But, quite the advantage to be so close to the innards of the Basilica. Is it not?”
She only looked at me, her eyes narrowing in warning.
“What is happening in those tunnels?” I asked, shuffling through the many ribbons while keeping my polite smile steady.
“I’m pretty convinced it was you who suggested to them that they burn the flowers.
The ground was covered in black salt and soot.
The clergy wouldn’t know the first thing about hiding the signs of dark chaos.
Which brings me to the question, why would they need to burn the flowers, Sybil?
What is even there to hide? And why on this earthly realm would you want to help them hide it? ”
The funniest thing happened when I’d soaked the scabiosa I'd collected that day in salt. The white grain had absorbed every inch of colour from the petals, leaving them a pale pink colour. An anomaly of chaos could of course cause nature to alter itself, but the alchemical reaction required reagents to meet a catalyst. The most important question was: who had brought in the catalyst that had changed chaos? Humans looking for revenge? Vampires in their quests to suppress chaos? Witches ordered to mess with vampires? Lycans? The Fae? The Eastern Continent? Too many motives, and yet a very narrow approach. Whoever had done it, had known how to reach the highest outcome by adding this catalyst into the Basilica well water which was used for every Tuesday mass, baptisms, ceremonies, and all other kinds of rituals, virtually poisoning every vampire who’d come in contact with it.
Wrapping a ribbon around my waist, I turned to her guard—a man who I was very familiar with.
Mostly internally considering I’d spent a good few hours acquainting myself with his organs.
“Hello, Simon. I’d say it’s good to see you again, but I am not quite so sure you’re feeling like yourself lately.
” Leaning in, I whispered to Sybil, “Considering he was dead only a few months back.”
I’d checked another one of the marked profiles in my notebook.
How the Hell had Ethel come across this?
The fact that she’d not replied to any of my other letters wasn’t making all my questions feel any easier.
And at this very moment, I wasn’t sure whether Ethel was safer in Crimson Weaver or being left to fend for herself in the Fair Isles.
If I sold all my jewels, I’d have enough to provide her safe passage through to the Eastern Continent.
So, I’d risked sending Thomas over to Meridian one final time.
I needed some proof of life or I was going to grab the nearest broom and teach myself to fly back over there.
I just hoped my familiar would stay clear of Agnes’s path.
Sybil’s fingers grasped tightly around a bunch of ribbons. Her mouth was set in a tight line as she gritted out, “What do you want?”
“What do I want?” I asked, stepping close enough to her she was forced to back away.
“What I want is to know why Agnes sent me here when she herself has been sentencing our coven sister to death. Threatening statesmen. Destroying food depots. Burning little children. Helping the Basilica hide proof of dark chaos. What I want to know is why is it that all witches are dying, not just those from Meridian. What I need to know is what have we done to cause this Madness since I am more than certain a witch has a hand in it because only a master of the dark arts knows how to manipulate chaos, how to poison it to slowly kill you. And why, Sybil? Is this the Basilica’s attempt to overthrow Ulric?
Or are we helping Morngate manufacture it?
But why now? How much are they paying us?
What are they threatening us with? Which they better be if we’re aiding them, because nothing else justifies the crimes we’ve been ordered to commit here. ”
Her pupils trembled just like the rest of her. “I told you, your friend cannot be saved. Live your last days in peace and stay away from this. There’s nothing to be done about it,” she hissed, her words fading as they left her lips and her eyes flitting to Simon.
“Peace,” I mused. “Twenty-three children are dead. A thousand more witches are dead, and who knows, maybe a thousand more will die by next week. I don’t think I can find any fucking peace anymore.
I close my eyes and all I can see is them.
All I can smell is their flesh burning. All I can taste is magic seeping into their pores, peeling back their skins.
It’s stuck to my tongue. Glued to my lungs.
This isn’t just about my friend anymore.
I will find out what has caused this, and it will be the last thing I do.
And if I find out you had any hand in it, which I suspect you do, I hope you’ll at least be sorry because I won’t be,” I said, wrapping my hair around a curly blond lock and tugging until it tore right off her skull.
“The last thing I will breathe before I die will be your pain.”
Her gaze flitted to her undead guard again, and she stumbled a step back.
I sighed, finally defeated by the realisation I might have been right all this time to assume what I’d already assumed.
None of this was her doing. She was just another pawn.
“Agnes sent them, didn’t she?” I asked, glancing at Simon standing stiffly behind her.
“The Blood Chalice—it’s the Ewer of Life the Chronicle talks about, isn’t it?
That’s how she’s brought these people back from the dead. She’s used the Chalice.”
Everything about Fredrick had connected that day, when Logan had read me that passage in the Chronicles.
About Sankta Katarina and Lamuel. It was too similar for comfort to the story of Katya Lovegood and her human lover who’d stolen the chalice.
The Blood Chalice was the Ewer of Life. And there were no saints.
Sankta Katerina was Katya Lovegood. A witch had created the vampire race.
And Agnes had created Fredrick and Simon and the other red-tagged corpses by feeding them from the chalice.
Horror filled her wide eyes. “Just stop, please.”
“And then I thought about the curse,” I said, suddenly terrified at the possibility I was right about it all.
“What happens to the curse if she’s using the blood drained during the Bloodletting?
If she’s feeding the dead from the Blood Chalice, siring vampires she can control, what’s happened to the Sunstead curse? ”
At first, I’d thought maybe…maybe that’s what had started killing the witches now that Agnes had been using up the blood drained for the chalice to create these new vampires she could use to infiltrate into Mortdale. Until Logan’s words had played back in my mind.
His…curse, let’s call it, lived on even if he didn’t.
“The chalice curse has never gone away, has it? The Bloodletting is just a hoax,” I said.
“Because vampires carry the curse with them every second of their existence. Their existence is the curse—the constant need to feed on life. But why? Why would Crimson Weaver manufacture the Bloodletting and carry it for so long?”
Thousands of years and thousands of people slaughtered, exsanguinated. How many corpses were lining the walls of the Blood Tombs where the chalice was locked? So many souls sacrificed over the years…and for what?
She flinched when a hand rested on her shoulder. Simon’s grey-skinned fingers tightened on her shoulder as he slowly pulled her away from me, pushing her towards the door.
“You’re Sybil Fortuna,” I called after her. “What happened to you?”
She paused by the door, throwing a teary-eyed glance back at me before she left.
I sighed, tired and worn out.
Goddess, what in the Hell even was this mess?
What was Agnes doing, for Hell’s sake?
The questions accruing with every passing second were starting to terrify me more than the answers.
A ribbon slid over my eyes, pulling my head back against a shoulder. My body relaxed against his, my lungs finally expanding fully. “I leave for a day and this is what I come back to? More scheming and plotting.”
I could feel my heartbeat down in my stomach, my skin growing warmer and uncomfortable against the silk fabric that was suddenly pressing too firmly against my breasts. “You didn’t even wake me up to say goodbye.”
“I took other liberties,” he murmured against my ear.
“Such as?”
The ribbon was still wrapped around my eyes as he spun me around until my chest was pressed against his. I tasted the scent of cloves on my tongue before he captured my lips in a sharp, possessive, wet kiss that sent shivers down to the tip of my toes.