Chapter 4 #2
“No, but my mother’s sedatives are,” I explained, pointing to a kit on my bedside table.
I kept my coat on, despite the heat from the furnace, hiding the pouch of money I was sure she’d be curious about.
“But it’s not just about affording rent and meds.
I don’t want to be stuck here forever, Bria. I have real plans.”
“Like what? What could be better than the Fissures?” She smiled in jest.
I hesitated, wondering if it was worth mentioning. In my mind, my dreams were watertight—until opinions came, sharp as needles, poking holes into my ideas until the whole thing sank.
“There’s a place across the sea…” I told her.
“Somewhere in the Freelands. I’m not sure if it even exists.
They call it Sanctuary. Apparently, the original bloodlines fled there after the fall of the Architect.
Wielders who didn’t bend the knee to the Magister, who let magic pass down through generations naturally, without intervention. ”
I slouched, leaning against the peeling wallpaper. “If it really does exist, if they are all as powerful as the legends say, maybe they could heal my mother. Maybe untangle the confusion in her mind. I’d get some real help for her. Maybe even the chance to just… start over.”
A new beginning would mean the choice to live beyond the means of a surgeon’s assistant.
A second chance for Mother. A moment to breathe.
If there was a place where magic wasn’t a death sentence for people like us, perhaps I could make it in this world without smuggling bodies, stealing relics from the dead.
I’d be someone my mother could be proud of.
Maybe even someone I could be proud of.
Bria frowned. “Sanctuary is a drunkard’s fable, Nina. Foolish whispers of a floating city.”
“You don’t know that,” I countered. “There’s a bit of truth in every myth.”
A voice cried out on the other side of my bedroom wall.
Bria winced at the shrill sound. Her lips pinched in a tight line before she replied.
“If it were true, and that’s a big if… It would be worth trying to find.
” She shook her head, dismissing the idea.
“Well, I’m glad you’re alright. I should head home soon myself, before that outsider remembers I know you. ”
A sick feeling coiled in my belly. “What happened after I got away? Did he leave?”
She shrugged. “The outsider returned for his clothes and disappeared. Everyone was long gone by the time the Watch showed up to investigate the gunshots. The police are on extra alert with the Governor still missing. Did you hear the announcement? Rumor has it he was killed by the Cursed.”
It seemed like a baseless claim to me. The Cursed were a part of plenty underhanded activity in the New City. Money laundering, trafficking, fraud, murder—their vices were plenty, but they weren’t known for interfering with government officials. Nothing that anyone knew about, anyway.
“Why would the Cursed care about the Governor? Everyone knows he’s just a puppet for the Council, and the Council only votes the way the Magister leans.”
This was the way of power here in Valveron.
The Council was a group of four, the heads of the merchant families.
The Magister represented the Academy. Elite families were unlikely to disagree with the Magister, especially if they received sponsorships and scholarships for their children to attend the privileged university.
“The new guy is even worse,” she said quietly. “This deputy Governor, Pierre Dupont, he’s a nobody. No ties to the Council families, not from the city, as far as I can gather. He hasn’t even served in a government position before this. His only connection—he’s an engineer.”
“An engineer as Governor?” I scoffed. “I’m sure he got his position thanks to a strong recommendation from the Academy.”
She shrugged, smiling. “I have no doubts the Magister saw an opening and filled it with someone he could influence. The Council was desperate to fill the seat—even if it’s just temporary, of course.”
Mother shrieked again, a nightmare disturbing her normally peaceful rest. “Therell is probably just hiding until he can find a way to secure the votes for another term. He’ll show up eventually.
” I glanced toward the bedroom door with a sigh.
“Would you mind grabbing her dinner from the stove before you go?”
“Sure, no problem.”
“Thanks.” She went to the kitchen as I prepared my mother’s sedative. Bernard didn’t like giving her medications—not unless it was necessary—opting to settle her mind with his Archetype. But I found the serum soothed even her worst fits and helped us all get some sleep in the process.
These noisy awakenings, however, meant she might be building a tolerance to her usual dose. I’d need to see the chemist first thing in the morning.
Her room was next to mine, and I slowly cracked open her door, taking in the mess of her sheets entangling her thrashing form in the bed.
“Mother, it’s me,” I said softly as I approached. There was no recognition in her stare as she looked up at me. Only wide, light green eyes, taking me in like I was a threat. Her body tensed, pushing away until she was pressed into the corner where the headboard met the wall.
Wind wrapped the room, stirring the curtains from their rest against the window. She reached with thin arms and long fingers, clawing the air, wide eyes searching for something in the dark.
Not good.
“Mother, it’s me.” I tried to hide the shake in my voice, to be her rock in the storm. I let my Siphon absorb some of her wrath, softening the storm into a gentle stir. The gas lamps flickered.
“It’s alright, Mom. It’s Nina. I’m your daughter. I just want to sit with you.” I gradually lowered myself to sit on the mattress, giving her the space she needed.
“Nina,” she murmured. One of the only words she had left in her mind.
I didn’t pay attention to what she said, though, and instead focused on her eyes.
They glowed bright green but faded as I took her hand.
I waited until the bright light in them dissolved and the memory of her only daughter flickered there.
“It’s Nina, your daughter.”
“Nina,” she whispered again. A crack in the crazy, reminding me of the mother she used to be. A bitter relief strangled my heart.
“That’s right. You had a bad dream, is all. Let’s fix these sheets.”
Her breathing slowed, body uncoiling, and her knees fell from her chest enough that I could pull the blanket from around her thinning waist. She had aged quickly in the last few years, concerningly so. Even Bernard couldn’t explain why she was deteriorating so fast.
Mother slunk from the headboard, and I retrieved the pillow she’d thrown across the room to make her comfortable again. Bria appeared in the doorway, carrying the soup I’d forgotten on the stove. “Is everything okay—”
Mother startled at her sudden entrance. Wind swirled in the room again, the lights flared to a blinding white-gold before flickering dead. A crack like thunder shook the boards of the apartment, shaking the glass of the window, of the light fixtures.
In her bed, Mother went stiff, eyes bright once more, staring at Bria.
“What in hell…” Bria gasped as her necklace lifted from its rest across her chest, staring down at the glowing relic.
I pulled a full syringe from her bedside table and moved quickly, forcing my mother’s sleeve up to inject the sedative into her system. As soon as it broke her skin, she relaxed, as did the chaos in the room.
I cursed to myself, searching for a match to relight the gas lamp. “Are you alright, Bria?”
“Fine,” she replied shakily. “What just happened?”
By the time I relit the lamps and the room was illuminated once more, Mother was curled up in her bed. Her empty stare resumed as Bria entered. I took the tray from her hands and placed it near the bed.
“It’s just a fit,” I offered.
“That was not just a fit, Nina.” She bent low, muttering in my ear as if the constables were in the walls. “Your mother has an Archetype? I’ve never seen any bloodline work like that.”
“Bria—”
“Why didn’t you tell me? All this time, I never knew.” Bria appeared offended, her dark brows furrowing. “I mean, I suspected something, seeing the way you kept her private.”
“It’s not something I’ve told anyone,” I said, pulling up a chair next to her bed. She still needed to eat before I let her rest for the night. “You can’t breathe a word of this. This stays between us. Promise me!”
She nodded once. “I won’t tell a soul.”
“Thank you.” I tossed the half-empty syringe on the bedside table. “It’s just her medication. The dosage is off, perhaps. I planned to take her to the chemist tomorrow.”
Bria watched me as I fed Mother the soup.
It was the only thing she’d swallow these days besides the warm tea I left her in the mornings.
It was a tedious task, one that wore both of us down.
By the last mouthful, Mother was falling asleep.
Her eyes rolled to the side of her head in a weary defiance.
“I get it now,” Bria whispered.
“Get what?”
“Why you’re looking for Sanctuary. If the Academy found out…”
I didn’t respond, instead brushing my mother’s gray hair to the side of the pillow until her eyes fluttered shut and her breathing went steady. “They’d take her from me if they knew.”
We both knew whom I spoke of… the enforcers, loyal to the Academy and the Magister.
They were different than the constables who patrolled the streets, overseeing only magical crime and Archetypes.
They were the Magister’s personal police force, and they were merciless when it came to bloodlines and their regulation.
All were carefully legalized and overseen—for the good of the city, of course.
“Nina….” Mother murmured.