Authors: C.N. Crawford
Celia peeked back at the tunnel covering. Her chest tightened as a memory flashed through her mind—her mother’s head was hacked off just on top of the Lilitu Fountain, and the blood had spewed into this very drain.
“Celia!” Oswald tugged her arm, trying to snap her out of her trance. “Let’s go!”
She shook her head, trying to lock the image into a dark recess of her mind where it wouldn’t haunt her waking hours. She turned to focus on the storefronts across the square. Odile circled her head, fully visible. “Not now,” she whispered to her mother’s familiar.
A few lanterns lit the square, and the night was so silent that she could just hear the ocean’s waves on the other side of the fortress. She squinted her eyes in the darkness, searching for the temple among the cramped shops that stood across from the fortress.
“There,” whispered Oswald.
Celia recognized the circular sign above one of the doors of a timber-framed building. The sign was painted with the Theurgeon’s symbol: a snake curling around a wooden staff.
Still carrying Thomas, Oswald’s breathing was labored as they crossed the square, and the sounds of his struggles traveled with her all the way to the temple’s door. They crept up to the front steps, and she glanced back at the gate with a shiver of joy.
I’m almost free.
Oswald whispered close to her ear, “After I unlatch the door, we must slip in quietly. There are two guards inside. Stay with Thomas while I take care of them.”
Take care of them?
She wasn’t sure what that meant, but it wasn’t the time to argue.
The sound of jangling keys seemed to fill the quiet square, and Celia cringed. Oswald slipped a long key into the keyhole, and it clunked against the lock. Her pulse raced as he slipped it out again and tried the next.
What if none of these keys actually opens the door?
By the sixth and final key, she was ready to run back into the storm drain to live forever underground like a mole person—until the lock clicked open at last.
“Ready?” he said softly.
She nodded before realizing he couldn’t see her. “Yes,” she whispered.
He edged the door open, dragging Thomas inside. Odile fluttered in with them, circling to the vaulted ceilings high above, before Celia had the chance to shut the door. Colored lanterns lit the cavernous hall, casting garish light onto a long table. Vines hung from the ceiling to the floor, their curling tendrils gripping books and potions.
Dazzled for a moment, she almost didn’t notice the two enormous guards barreling toward them.
Celia’s heart skipped a beat as she took in the two muscular men bounding toward them on either side of a long table, chanting something in unison. There was a
thud
—Oswald dropping Thomas—before a vine on the right began to move. The vine knocked into another vine as an invisible Oswald swung from one to another. Bottles gripped in their tendrils clanked together.
Celia’s pulse raced.
He’s trying to lure the guards from the door—from Thomas and me.
The guards pivoted, distracted from their chant. Pikes readied, their attention darted to a vine that swung over the table. A guard leapt onto the table, pike in hand, and whirled around, searching for the invisible intruder. The other froze, hand over chest. He hunched forward. Blood poured from his mouth and through the fingers over his heart before he slumped to the floor.
His companion was frantic now, muttering a spell, but even with her limited knowledge of Angelic, Celia could tell he was stumbling over the words.
Her legs faltered as Oswald’s unseen knife ripped open the guard’s throat, and blood sprayed in a wide arc over the table, drenching the books and tablecloth. There was no scream, just a gurgling sound before the man dropped to the ground. Celia’s mouth was dry.
Who have I allied myself with?
After the man’s gurgling fell silent, she heard nothing but Oswald’s heavy breathing coming closer. Her hands shaking, she groped around on the floor until she felt Thomas’s shoulder.
At least Thomas is sane. Sort of.
“Celia?” Oswald rasped.
She worked to steady her voice. “I’m here. I have Thomas.” She pulled him up, propping him against the wall before turning to face Oswald. “Did you have to murder them?”
“What was your plan? Giggle at them until they gave you the spell?”
White hot fury blazed through her, and she would have shoved him if she knew where he was. “Just because I don’t go around slitting people’s throats doesn’t mean I’m some kind of airhead. They weren’t here because they’re evil. They were here because they have families to support and they work for my father. You could have knocked them unconscious.”
The anger in her voice must have surprised him, because he fell silent for a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was softer. “When they saw the door swing open, they started chanting a spell to raise the alarm. In any case, I’m not exactly trained in gently subduing people.”
She was surprised that he felt the need to explain himself to her.
Guilt, maybe.
The edges of his shoulders were glimmering back into view, squared with tension.
She ran a hand through her hair. For the first time, she noticed the statues of her mother and stepfather at the other end of the hall. “Fine. Anyway, we need to find the plague spell, right?” She gazed around the room at the towering walls of books and potions. Where were they supposed to start?
She could just make out Oswald’s blond curls as he turned back to the hall. “Thomas figured it out earlier. Everything is coded with the zodiac. Do you see the paintings on the ceiling?”
She glanced up at the vaulted ceiling painted with astrological signs. “Yes. But I have no idea what they mean.”
“Leo.” He pointed to the dais, where a swooping, gold symbol adorned the ceiling above the statues of Balthazar and Bathsheba. “It’s a code for the fire goddess. And the fire goddess gave birth to the demon of healing.”
“There’s a demon of
healing
?” She shook her head. “Never mind. You can explain later. Just get on with it.”
Thomas croaked from the floor, “Water.” His bloodshot eyes opened, and he grasped his throat, wincing.
Oswald stepped over and crouched down, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Can you stand?”
Thomas nodded.
“I’ll take you to the cure.” He slipped an arm around Thomas’s back and hoisted him up, leading him to the dais. “You’ll be better in a hummingbird’s heartbeat.”
This nursemaid attitude was a dizzying contrast from the brutal warrior he’d been a moment ago. She followed the shambling pair, wincing as she passed the guard with the slit throat. His eyes stared up in shock, and a shudder ran through her. She forced herself to look away, surveying the walls. Statues of Bathsheba’s platinum-haired family stood in the alcoves on the right wall, and her father’s family
on the left. Her chubby cousin Godfrey frowned beside a statue of the imposing Lady Sybill.
What would they have done with the statue of my mother?
Demolished, probably. Discarded like trash. The thought made her teeth clench with anger.
Oswald lowered Thomas to the platform. The guards’ blood soaked the white robe. Even his blond curls were drenched, giving him the appearance of a bloody avenging angel. He stopped to glance thoughtfully at a marble bowl resting on a golden stand between the thrones before moving on to the stacks of books that stood behind them. His lips moved as he scanned the titles.
Celia watched him. “How good is your Angelic?”
“I can read what’s in front of me.”
Better than Tobias’s, then.
She stared at the towers of books lining the shelves, nearly reaching the ceiling, and her chest tightened. Even the most learned philosopher would need hours to sort through this.
Jack lay on his back on the cold stone floor, his hands bound behind him with iron shackles. Each breath was an agony, opening the wound on his chest. The athame had narrowly missed his heart, and the only thing distracting him from the pain in his chest was the red dust that coated his face and neck, eating into his skin like acid.
He’d been so close—not just to Fiona, but to completing his Great Work. Alexandria had left a message on his phone: she’d cracked the code. But now those plans lay in ruins, too. Papillon had delivered the news just before his arrival at Winderbellow. That filthy, wretched succubus had drained Alexandria of her life and stolen the hard drive. Why, he didn’t know. Likely she was going to use it as a bargaining chip to gain favor with her fire god.
I liked her, too. She was beautiful, and she wanted me. What a waste.
The sounds of his own breathing echoed through the cell, his eyes pressed shut as he tried to manage the pain.
And what has happened to Fiona?
He’d been tossed in a cell with her friend, the wolverine, but she was nowhere to be seen.
His body began to tremble.
Is it the blood loss?
He couldn’t use Angelic to heal himself while the dust coated him, and no doubt the Purgators would spray him with more as soon as he uttered the first magical syllable. Still, Druloch’s power should heal him soon.
He moaned, the dust searing him, until he felt a wet cloth on his forehead. He opened his eyes. It was the wolverine boy, using his shirt as a cloth.
Is his name Alan?
Relief flooded him as Alan wiped the dust off his face.
“Are you using your own shirt?” He managed. Druloch’s magic soothed his chest.
Alan nodded.
“And where did the water come from?”
“You don’t want to know.” He finished washing the dust off Jack’s neck and shuffled back to the other side of the cell.
Jack pushed himself up to stare at Fiona’s friend, shirtless under his jacket. Alan leaned against the wall. Unlike Jack, he was unshackled, and he held his head in his hands. He looked physically strong, his torso lean and muscled. Jack hadn’t really noticed him before.
“Alan, right?”
“Yep.” Alan didn’t look up.
“The dust isn’t burning you.”
“I hadn’t finished chanting the spell when they cracked me over the head. I had no aura to burn.”
The unexpected gesture of kindness suggested that—just maybe—they could work together.
I’ll be damned if I’m going to die in a Purgator sewer.
“They didn’t shackle you.”
“Apparently they don’t see me as a threat.”
“No doubt your friend Tobias is shackled. The Purgators could see by our power that we’re bonded with gods.”
Alan lifted his head. “Gods?”
“The earthly gods. The Purgators call them demons. The Purgators call
us
demons.”
Alan rubbed a hand across his mouth but didn’t respond. Jack continued to examine him. Alan’s shoulders looked
relaxed
.
Jack raised an eyebrow. “You do know that we’re probably going to die painful deaths in the near future, don’t you?”
“The thought had crossed my mind.”
He flexed his wrists. The irons were tight around them. “You seem awfully calm about it.”
Alan glared at him. “I still hear my classmates screaming in my dreams every night, still see Eric writhing with a flaming arrow in his stomach. I still feel a Harvester’s blood on my hands. Why do I get to live, when they didn’t?” The disgust in his voice was palpable. “It was just luck. And my luck has run out.”
“So why did you help me?”
Alan leaned forward, his jaw clenching. “Because I’m not like you. I killed someone when I had to, but I don’t take pleasure in other people’s suffering. Even if they deserve it.”
He scoffed. “You think I enjoy murdering people?”
“Are you honestly going to tell me that you don’t?” His face was a mask of revulsion.
“I killed for survival just like you did.” Staring at the novice philosopher across from him, something unfamiliar welled up in him. A sudden impulse to tell the truth. It was a reckless feeling, like standing at the edge of a platform, compelled to jump in the path of an oncoming train. “At least, that’s how it started. After hundreds of years…” He trailed off, edging back from the ledge. “Anyway, I’m not murdering just for the sake of it.
My father may have been a sadist, but I am not. It’s for the greater good.”
Alan snorted, unconvinced.
“Your friend Tobias doesn’t know what he’s done. The gods don’t give their power for free. I know that better than anyone.”
The boy tilted back his head. “What do you mean?”
“I’ll tell you all about it after we get out of here.”
Alan glanced at the ceiling. “And how do you propose we do that? There are sprinklers above to douse us with red dust as soon as an aura is detected. Any magic would burn away, and we’d be too incapacitated to escape.”
Jack looked at the ceiling, spying the brass nozzles that threatened to spray them should they utter a spell. His mouth went dry.
That certainly makes things more difficult.
The sound of approaching footsteps interrupted his thoughts. A guard wearing a black mask jammed a key into the lock. Around him stood five more guards, their faces concealed by highwayman masks. Alan rose, but three guards descended upon him, punching him the head. Another crossed to Jack, hauling him to his feet. The shackles dug into his wrists.