Chapter 2
TWO
“I don’t know why I keep signing up for this,” I mumbled to Claude, our mule, who was pulling the cart and the heavy coffers behind us.
A lie. Hell knew no one was holding a knife to my back.
The trepidation and dread I was feeling were very much self-inflicted.
But if I didn’t do this, no one would—and all that extra coin would find its way elsewhere.
Besides, none of the other assistants under Bernard, the few who had come and gone over the years, had the nerve to move cadavers through the streets without a permit.
None would have the wit to change their route of passage each time to avoid the interest of the coppers, nor would they know how to avoid the main road to the ship by taking certain back alleys and private drives.
And I was—more simply—the only one desperate enough to try.
Of course, the bodies were a new addition to our smuggling side business.
Past assistants hadn’t had the pleasure of seeing Bernard’s surgery expand its practice.
For a long time, we’d snatched anything we could off the deceased: money, jewels, artifacts of all kinds.
I sent them to a vendor who sold them under the table, splitting our profits.
The bodies were never part of the plan… until Bernard received a mysterious offer with a payout too good to refuse.
I tipped my hood up and looked up at the sky, a grayscale aurora concealing the failing afternoon with layers of dark clouds and white fog.
An anxious tension tightened my fists around the reins.
The quicker I completed the run, the faster I could meet Bria at Opal’s tavern and spend my hard-earned payment on liquid oblivion.
After the excitement of the afternoon, a drink would be medicinal at this point.
Something strong to unwind the anxiety that made my nails bite into my palms.
“Damnit, Matthieu!” I cursed the idiot beneath my breath as I came to a locked gate in front of a private alley.
One of Bernard’s regular patients lived on a private canal, and I’d set up an arrangement with his son, Matthieu, to keep access to the waterway open during the evenings.
Another reason I was the only one suitable for this job.
I knew my way around the city better than most, and I made a way when there wasn’t one.
Until today, when Mattie must have forgotten to open his father’s gate.
As I waited, the sound of static filled the air. From a block over, one of the speakers in the street crackled awake, transmitting a message that would be playing throughout the city on the public announcement system.
Ladies and gentlemen of Valveron.
This is your deputy Governor, Pierre Dupont, speaking.
I will be covering for Ignace Therell until he is safely found.
As of this morning, our beloved Governor of Valveron is still missing.
His last known location was the Flooded Fissures, where he was directing a criminal investigation with the help of a unit of the Academy’s enforcers.
Neither Governor Therell nor his security detail has yet been found, and it is the duty of any citizen with information to step forward immediately.
We have reason to believe foul play may be involved.
Until then, I will continue to update you all via the PA system, maintaining the spirit of transparency that was so important to Governor Therell. Updates will follow as soon as I have more information.
Stay safe, and long reign the City of Progress.
“Is there a problem over there?” A voice down the backstreet made my body seize, caught off guard by the sudden, unwanted attention. The law around here had impeccable timing, always seeming to appear at the worst possible moments, and never when I might have need of them.
I turned my head to send a friendly wave at the constable strutting down the damp cobblestones in my direction.
He nudged aside the lapel of his navy overcoat that hung just above polished boots.
The movement revealed a waistband of weapons.
Only a single red stripe decorated the sharp structure of his shoulders; no rank insignia I could see marked the upper sleeve. A lowly street prowler.
Forcing a smile across my wet cheeks, I stepped down to the street, reluctantly turning my back on the unguarded cart and the bodies hidden inside.
“None at all, Officer. I was just looking for my key.” But the pitch of my voice was too sharp to be casual, and a subtle tremor betrayed my lack of composure.
I worked hard to avoid attention because I was, in fact, a terrible liar.
Hoping my breath wasn’t nearly as loud as it seemed to me, I reached into a deep pocket of my wool cloak in a feigned search for the key.
My fingers skimmed not metal but bone, slender as a hairpin and long as my finger.
Feeling a whisper of warmth from its dried marrow, I drew it out and slipped it into the lock, aware the guard was still advancing closer.
His focus on me was like a brand, burning at the nape of my neck.
Fighting the urge to look at the cart and make sure the spice trays were properly covering the caskets beneath, I levered the bone until the pins of the lock rolled against the bulb-shaped head, pressing against the tension of the springs, each one ticking toward my freedom.
I didn’t always walk around with the finger bone of a dead patient in my pocket, but some remains were particularly useful—even beyond their lock-picking abilities.
This one had been a rare find. The bone had come from a corpse with a bloodline from the Forge Archetype, my personal favorite, with the ability to manipulate metal.
Magic, like any other trait in the body, could be passed down through families once a code was introduced to their genetics.
Like eye color, a bad temper, a curse. When the Architect first found the essence and touched the magic carved into the marrow of the world, he discovered four codes of creation.
Four ways to bend the energy in the earth, four Archetypes, and four branches of magic.
The Architect gifted the codes of the Archetypes to influential families and powerful allies, and now, with the Architect long gone, the laws of Valveron still fought to keep those bloodlines dominant and pure—and far from people like me.
For a time, I had collected remnants of these Archetypes like some people collected painted spoons. But most of our bodies were sent to the buyer these days, and I didn’t think he’d appreciate partial deliveries.
Magic in the Fissures was rare, as most with bloodlines enjoyed the advantages of their family names, but there were always those who ran from their legacies. Sometimes they escaped… and sometimes they ended up on my table.
I had proof of it between my fingers—and in my own blood and bone.
I shoved the bone further, but the last pin refused to budge.
Boots padded so close I could hear the buckles of brass clink with each step the copper took as he moved to corner me against the gate.
The barest flick of pressure from my fingertips cracked the fragile bone in half, leaving part of it still deep inside the lock.
“Is there a problem with your key?” he asked.
It was down to my last resort, then. My back was turned away from the cart and the approaching policeman. If I fled on foot, he’d most likely catch me or run me into another guard. But I couldn’t leave the bodies behind, not when there were two of them and double the crowns to miss.
Using my magic was always a final gambit. Some were born to wield great power, but I was born to take it. I had no bloodline, no Archetype, no permission from the Academy to exist as I did, but I could siphon any power from any vessel, including the bone of the Forger.
I kept my eyes on the lock, feeling the familiar warmth of essence, raw as an electric current.
I made myself its conduit as I drew from the marrow of the bone shard, where the fragments of a Forger’s power lingered postmortem, and used the magic as my own.
The metal of the lock was malleable to my will, and the pins were no more than putty to free the spring.
The last pin pushed free with a snap.
I’d used the other bones from that hand before, draining their magic with use.
Without a body or blood to recharge the essence in the bone, it was useless after the first siphon.
But of all the Archetypes I’d manipulated, the power of Forge was the one I’d found most useful, and so the one I was most proficient in siphoning.
The lock conceded, and I could finally twist the knob and open the gate to the private street. I dropped the fragment of bone into my pocket before the copper caught sight of it.
“There,” I sighed. “Fickle locks. They corrode so easily in this weather. I’ll just be on my way now—”
“What exactly are you dragging around?”
I turned to face him as soon as the essence drained from the bone, forcing a convincing smile across my face. From his dark stare, it hadn’t helped my case. He pointed a finger at my mud-soaked boots in a silent order for me to wait where I stood.
Even in the darkening alley, I could see muscle stacked beneath his uniform, filling the double-breasted jacket.
The official guard of the Governor wore white gloves and peaked hats.
On his high collar, brass buttons reflected the gray sky, shining neatly.
One postured hand remained on his waist belt—a not-so-indirect way to communicate his threat.
“I asked you a question,” he clipped, a harsher edge to his voice. His eyes shifted to the cart, one brow raised in interest. “What’s that smell?”
Hopefully, he was scenting the layers of lemon balm Bernard stacked near the rear and not the chemicals preserving the bodies. The stench of death permeated even a tightly sealed enclosure, and it took every well-placed herb on the cart to keep it contained. The mule helped, too.