Chapter 45
ARES
SIX WEEKS LATER
A frigid wind rattled the dry stems and leaves of the barren winter garden.
It would snow soon. The Almanac swore up and down every news feed in existence that it was about to be the darkest, snowiest winter in years.
Ember and I agreed that before the snow set in, we had to ward off Oleander Cottage.
The whispers had started the very first night on the property. At first, it was just that we’d find ourselves stuck in the kitchen, staring at the back of the cottage. Slowly, it had turned into more.
A week ago, Av found Briony at the garden gate, just about to walk through. That had spurred Ember into action. Calypso was a remarkable researcher, and she’d managed to dig up a rather clever warding that Ember and I could weave together now that she had her sword back.
The copper-haired Maere still hadn’t told us why she wanted to leave Aradios so badly, but at least from my perspective, it looked like she was fitting in well with the other Maere.
Even Max, who still had not left. She was expected to replace Calypso in Aradios before winter set in, but showed no signs of leaving.
And neither did we. While Oleander Cottage was certainly a problem, Hemlock House was the seat of Necroline power.
The spirits here were Roman’s people, and they respected me, liked Eryx, and were happy to have Av around.
It looked like we were moving in. There was space in the carriage house that we made into official Necroline offices and it was remarkable how happy our people seemed to come and go.
The necromancers of Orphium had never liked our offices in the Carlyle.
They were rightfully suspicious of the Consulate, and all its trappings.
But now that we resided here, that our headquarters were on neutral ground, they came and went frequently.
Sometimes just to say hello, other times to ask for help, which I found much easier to give these days without the Consulate ever-present, looking over my shoulder in the bureaucratic wing of the Carlyle.
I hadn’t known how much being there had stifled all of us until we were gone.
And even though winter approached, it felt like a kind of spring within the house.
It felt like we were growing, changing in ways that I probably wouldn’t understand for years.
And for the first time, that felt good. It felt right, after so many years of feeling stagnant and hopeless.
But good as things were in Hemlock House, everyone was rightfully wary of the cottage and the lingering concern about Fairchild.
He’d gotten away, and between my network and the Maere’s there was no sign of him, or whatever remained of the Chioric sect.
It was as though they’d disappeared into thin air.
All we could do was keep an eye out for them at this point. Remain vigilant and try to understand the ritual they’d performed, and figure out whether they could do it again. There were questions left open, and I hated that, but we were doing what we could.
At least Oleander Cottage and its alluring evil whispers were problems I could more easily solve. I crossed my arms over my chest, waiting for Ember. I’d already laid down the salt. I was just waiting for my coffee now.
Ember came out of the house, bundled up in a matching sweatsuit, a puffer and fluffy-looking booties.
Her honey-colored hair was plaited into two braids and her cheeks were flushed with the cold.
She looked like she’d let Briony pick out her outfit, which was probably accurate.
The teenager had more influence on us than anyone else these days.
“Ready to seal this bad boy up?” she asked, scowling at the haunted cottage.
Even now, the pull to enter it was strong, and I’d whispered the words Calypso had found for us as I salted. That should have quieted things down until we finished the wards. We had to find a more complete solution to the problem of the cottage, but until we did, this was a good temporary one.
Ember smiled a lot more these days, and as time went on, I saw her deepening into a trust that the people she loved could come and go, but that they did actually love her in return. Whenever I found her with Briony, my heart swelled with love. Somehow, I’d ended up with a family.
Ember shook the mug she’d brought out for me, her movements jerky and impatient. Something was irritating her this morning.
I took the travel mug that Ember offered me and took a long drink of warm coffee. “What’s wrong?”
Her eyes moved back towards the house, though her body stayed still. “Rhi got a call from her mysterious superior at the Consulate this morning.”
A low growl rumbled in my chest. They’d been bothering all of us since finding out that we’d moved out of the Carlyle completely. I had a theory that we’d made things worse by moving in together. And not just me and Ember, but all of us.
And Briony. The Consulate offered again and again to find her a different family.
But when we presented that idea to Briony herself, she’d thrown a very mundane teenage fit, screaming at us that we couldn’t get rid of her so easily.
It took two days to convince her that we didn’t want to get rid of her, just to respect her choices.
And, of course, both of us had told the Consulate to fuck off with their offers.
If Briony wanted us, then she was already ours.
I didn’t like that they were coming after Rhiannon next.
I glanced back at the house. My brother wasn’t going to like it either.
He was hooked on the assassin in a way I feared would end in him getting hurt.
I’d never seen him so interested in a woman.
Typically, he had short flings with people who understood that he wasn’t in it for the long haul.
I’d never once seen him pine for anyone, but all that had changed.
I took another long drink of my coffee then set it down outside the circle of salt, taking Ember’s mug from her fingers. “Let’s get this done, and then we can go sort Rhiannon out.”
“No one needs to sort me out,” the assassin in question said.
Both Ember and I nearly jumped out of our skin, twisting to find that Rhiannon had appeared behind us, as though by magic, a pile of luggage at her feet. It was still a complete mystery to me how she did that, and it had only gotten worse since she got her sword back.
“What are you doing?” Ember shouted, panic edging her voice. Her eyes were locked on the luggage.
“Eight weeks,” Rhiannon said. “They’ve called every day for eight weeks. I’ve told them and told them that I quit, that this is my job, but they insist I can do both. I can’t. And more importantly, I don’t want to.”
My brother came barreling out the back door of Hemlock House, an overnight bag slung over his shoulders. “You don’t have to,” he said.
Rhiannon stared at him. “What are you doing?”
He grinned. Eryx Necroline grinned. My brother was such a goner. “You’re going to have them lock you in when they ward, right?”
Rhiannon blinked a few times, as though she couldn’t believe he’d ferreted out her brilliant plan so easily. “Yes.”
“Then I’m coming with you. The spirits like me.”
It was true. The whispers from the house were still whispering, but they were more pleasant now, sweetly beckoning, rather ominously so, but still… less threatening. The difference was subtle, but it was there.
“No,” Ember replied, looking at Rhiannon. Then she glared at my brother, rather more severely. “No.”
Rhiannon tilted her head to one side. “Ember. Please. You can’t just lock that monstrosity up and expect for things to be okay. That’s not how warding works and you know it.”
Ember’s jaw clenched. We’d talked about this, and that’s why the warding was to be temporary. There was, technically, a risk that we could make things worse by trapping the malefic entities inside the wards.
“Let me go in and solve this. I can survive that place.” Rhiannon’s tone and words were so reasonable, so calm.
It was easy to forget that she was talking about going into the most deadly, haunted place in Orphium.
Immortal as she was, there were things worse than death, and I was fairly certain all of them were possible inside Oleander Cottage.
Eryx picked up several of her bags. “Not alone. You need a clairsentient, and I’m the best pick.”
Rhiannon rolled her eyes. And then, to my surprise, shrugged. “Fine.” She brushed a kiss to Ember’s cheek. “See you when spring comes. I’ll have this solved by then.”
“Do you… have your phone?” Ember asked.
Rhiannon shook her head. “No. It won’t work in there anyway. EMF and all that.”
Eryx, who was still piling luggage onto his back, nodded. “She’s right. But there’s a landline. It’s connected to the house. We tried it yesterday.”
“We?” Ember demanded. “The two of you have been planning this?”
Rhiannon rolled her eyes again. “No. We just…” she glanced at Eryx and frowned, almost as though she were a bit confused, “keep ending up there together.”
“Absolutely not,” Ember said, shaking her head. “No. And no again a trillion times over in eight dead languages.”
“Technically there are only—” my brother began.
Ember interrupted him. “Kindly shut the fuck up.”
Rhi pulled on Ember’s sleeve. “I’ll be okay. I need some time to process everything. Some space.”
“Great,” Ember said. “Take a vacation to Aradios, visit the beach.”
“Ember,” Rhiannon said, her voice soft. “They’ll find me anywhere I go, harass me til I come back. I need quiet.”
For a long moment, Ember was still. I knew she was considering how hard the truth of the island’s involvement in all that had happened was on Rhiannon. We’d talked about it every night since the Gallery and Myrine’s awful revelations.
Finally, Ember sighed. “Did you talk to Briony?”
Rhiannon nodded. “She’s going to dig up some Cottage history for me. I gave her all my best Consulate hacks.”
Ember groaned. “Rhi... she is a child.”
Rhiannon shrugged. “She is a genius. Let her be a genius.”
Eryx carried the rest of Rhiannon’s luggage over the line of salt. They barely disturbed it, but I reinforced it all the same. Ember’s eyes were worried as she looked up at me, but I took her hand. “They will be all right together. If anyone can solve Oleander Cottage’s problem, it’s them.”
“We can still hear you,” Rhiannon said with a sigh.
“Yes,” I replied. I sketched a door into my salt barrier, using an old sigil my mother had once used. Both Ember and Rhiannon nodded, smiling at one another. “I know. This should allow you to take things like groceries in, but you’ll have to perform the ritual in reverse if you want out.”
Eryx reached across the barrier to hug me. “See you soon,” he murmured. “We’ll be okay.”
Again, I nodded. They would be okay. We’d all dealt with worse, after all.
“Call as much as you can,” Ember said.
Rhiannon agreed and then she and Eryx disappeared through the garden gate, and into the overgrown brush that was Oleander Cottage’s garden. Ember took my hand again and we whispered the arcane words that would bring the ward up. It got quieter and quieter in the garden.
And then there was nothing but the sound of the wind, howling through the trees. There was a distinct scent in the air, one that spoke of crisp blankets of snow. Ember shivered, picking up our coffee mugs.
“That’s that,” she said, holding her free hand out to me.
I could tell she was putting a brave face on, so I took her hand, pressing a kiss to her cold fingers. “Let’s get you warmed up.”