Darting a glance up the stairs to the door, I consider.
Carrying this bag and Arlette will be difficult, but I might need that elixir. I can’t count on being able to find someone to drain every time I need the strength. And maybe I could get these vials to Emeric somehow. Restore some of what I took away. It wouldn’t come close to replacing it all, but it would be a start.
Boots stomp closer to the cellar door, and I crouch to set Arlette down, grasp the bag, and tie it to my belt. With elixir still pumping in my veins, it’s not difficult for me to lift, but I know that when I run out, it’ll be extraordinarily heavy.
Once it’s secure, I stack a few crates on top of each other, then I lift Arlette again and climb to the window. It takes a few tries to get it open, but eventually the rusted latch breaks free and the pane swings outward into a small window well. Gritting my teeth against the icy bite of the outside air, I clamber out as the cellar door clicks open and footsteps creak on the stairs.
Clutching Arlette’s waist, I snake my way up the wall of the window well and push her over the edge before pulling myself the rest of the way up.
Wind claws at us from every direction. All is white and cold. Snow stings against my face, into my cloak, up my sleeves.
With a grunt of frustration, I yank my cloak off and wrap it around Arlette’s shivering, tiny form, pull her back into my arms, and run.
I cannot see, cannot even think through the cold and the scream of the wind. My ears ache with numbness. The last of the chef’s elixir is slowly pumping away as I make out the hulking form of Cyril’s back wall and stagger toward it. With every step, the bag of vials drags me back, my hand’s throbbing returns, and the quaking in my legs increases.
“No,” I growl through gritted teeth. “Not again.”
I reach the base of the wall. Lead drops in my stomach.
There is no way I’ll be able to climb it, even if I weren’t carrying a girl and a bag of elixir. The wind is too strong, my left hand too injured, and my right one too numb.
I dig into the bag at my hip and pull out a vial, uncork it with my teeth, and down the contents. My blood sings to life, and warmth floods my body. It’s only a fraction of what I got from the chef earlier, but hopefully it’ll be enough to get me over this wall.
Adjusting my grip on Arlette, I begin to climb. My progress is slow, and the bag sways against my leg with every movement, threatening to make me lose my balance and topple backward into the snow.
I focus on Emeric. On his laugh, on his smile, on his voice.
I have found Arlette. Once we make it out of here, I’ll finally be able to ask her where to get a catalyseur and how to use it. After I’ve acquired one for myself, I’ll take the opera house by storm. I’ll drain every soul in this Memory-forsaken city and fill Emeric up. I will make him whole again.
But I need to get over this wall first.
For Emeric. For Arlette. For me.
I climb until my fingers curl over the top of the fence. Maneuvering myself and the girl over it, I grit my teeth and jump. We tumble into the snow, and I lose my grip on Arlette. She thuds into the white powder next to me, still unconscious.
“Sorry,” I gasp as the last of that vial of elixir drains away and my body turns frigid once again. “I’ve got you.” Arms straining, I struggle to get her over my shoulder, and then I stumble blindly through the wind until I find the horse near the birdbath where I left him.
I use one more vial of elixir to get Arlette onto his back and climb up behind her. Then I kick the gelding into a run and spend the rest of the gold in my veins keeping us both in the saddle as the wind and the snow threaten to tear us away and drag us both into the hungry, violent sky.
Chapter Thirty-Two
I push the horse to gallop as fast as it can until we reach the outskirts of Channe. A little church sits on a hill, its humble spires reaching toward the snow-blown sky. I might have continued on past it had I not noticed the windows all boarded up. An abandoned chapel seems as good a place as any to wait out this storm.
We ride up its front path, and I slide from the saddle, cringing when I hit the ground and the force of the impact jars through my frozen limbs. I run my good hand along the boards nailed across the main entrance. They’re soft with rot. I wrench them off one by one, wincing when my shoulder starts to ache.
Once the doorway is clear, I ease the still-unconscious Arlette out of the saddle and shoulder her inside, leading the horse along.
The howl of the wind cuts away to near silence when I kick the door shut behind us. I half drag the tiny girl down a row of pews, dropping the horse’s reins to let him rest in the chapel as I heave Arlette into a back room that looks like it might have once been the residence of a priest of some sort. A threadbare, worn couch slumps in the corner, and I lay Arlette on its lumpy cushions. I scan the area for linens but only come up with a set of moth-eaten curtains, so I yank the fabric down and drape it over Arlette’s shivering form. Her lips look terribly blue. I need to warm her up somehow.
The priest’s quarters are small, but thankfully there’s a fireplace with a stack of old, dried wood next to it, so I set about building a fire. Once a crackling lick of flame is burning on the hearth, I rummage through the cupboards at the other end of the room.
The only bit of food I find is a stale, inedible hunk of bread so hard that it sounds like a rock when I knock it against the counter. I toss it aside.
“Water. We need water,” I mutter, scanning the area. A small, cracked pot sits on the counter in the corner, and I carry it outside to fill it with snow, then return to set it near the fire.
As the pot’s contents begin to melt, Arlette bucks against the couch, screaming.
“Don’t! Please don’t hurt me! I promise I’ll try harder!” She thrashes as though the curtains are trying to strangle her.
I move to her side. “Arlette.” I try to make my tone as soothing as possible. “You’re okay. You’re safe. He’s not here.”
Her shrieking intensifies, and she flails at me, digging her fingernails so deeply into my neck that I cry out.
“Arlette!” I try a bit firmer. “Shhh! It’s okay!”
Her cries echo in the room, sharp and scared.
Thinking back to how Emeric’s lullaby calmed her in Cyril’s cellar, I begin singing again, as loudly as I can while still attempting to sound calm and gentle.
Her sobs slow, and she stares at me, her brows furrowed and her eyes sparking with fear.
Then her expression breaks, and she buries her face in her hands. “I can’t see this one’s memories either, monsieur,” she whimpers. “I’m so sorry...” She curls in on herself as though awaiting a blow.
“Of course you can’t see my memories,” I whisper. “That’s not your fault.”
She lowers her hands. Her glassy, tear-filled eyes register on mine for the first time.
I offer her the pot of water, and she accepts it, bringing it cautiously to her lips before eagerly gulping the liquid down.
Once the water is gone, she lowers the pot and wipes her mouth on the back of her bony hand.
“You sing like my brother,” she says after a long moment, her voice high-pitched and not quite steady. “He loves that song.”
I clear my throat, trying to calm the jumpy feeling zinging through my body.
“Are you a fendoir?” she asks.
“Me? No. I’m like you.” I reach behind my head with my good hand to untie the mask and let it fall from my face.
She sucks in a breath. “What’s your name?”
“I’m Isda.”
Her calm expression cracks into a look of wild fear. She jerks away from me, tumbling to the floor in a knot of fabric and limbs. With a screech, she yanks herself out from the curtains and bolts for the door.
“Arlette!” I shout, dashing after her.
> My cloak slips off her shoulders as she flees, and her threadbare nightgown whips between her spindly legs.
The horse stamps its feet in the corner.
Arlette halts, staring at the beast. Her whole body begins to tremble.
“Arlette,” I say as softly as I can. “You’re going to catch your death. Please come back by the fire and warm up.”
She turns to look at me. Her whole body shivers.
“Please.” I reach a hand out to her.
“I promise I’ll try harder next time,” she says, weeping, before stumbling back into the priest’s quarters.
I follow her and pull the door closed. Arlette cowers behind the couch with the curtains pulled up to her chin. When our gazes meet, she ducks her face behind the fabric.
I sink back against the door and press my good hand to my forehead.
How am I supposed to get any sort of useful information about catalyseurs or how to compound my power out of her while she’s in this state? I glance at her. She’s still shivering. Her face is hidden, but her mass of oily hair hangs in clumps over the curtain.
“Here. This might help.” I untie my bag, pull out a couple vials, and roll them across the floor to her. “Drink those.”
With her eyes never leaving my face, she sneaks a trembling hand out to snatch them up. She gulps them down ravenously, and in moments her whole demeanor is transformed. Her cheeks pink up, her eyes lose some of their glassiness, and her shaking slows to a stop.
But she does not regard me with any less fear.
Her stomach growls so audibly it makes me wince, and she tucks the curtain closer around herself.
Maybe if I can get her some food, she won’t see me as the enemy anymore. Maybe she’ll be willing to talk.
I lift the pocket watch from my dress. Six thirty-seven. Barely more than thirteen hours left before Emeric’s memories are gone for good.
I don’t have time to come up with any other plans. If I’m going out to get Arlette some food, I’d better do it quickly. And if giving her a meal doesn’t help things, then I’ll have to head back to the opera house without a catalyseur and pray to Memory I’ll be able to figure something out.
“I’ll be back in a little while,” I say as slowly and succinctly as I can. Arlette shrinks farther behind the couch. “I’m going to try to find food. Please stay here.”
She does not nod or respond or give me any sort of indication that she has understood me, so I turn and duck out through the chapel, pausing only to untie the bag of elixir vials from my waist. As I do, I reach for the pistol at my belt, only to find it missing. I must have lost the gun at some point during the trek from Cyril’s house. Cursing, I wrap my cloak around myself and slip out into the wind.
It takes me nearly an hour to drag my frigid legs through snow that is already to my knees to reach the nearest neighborhood. I take shelter for a moment from the wind in the shadow of a small cottage, and as I blow on my hand to thaw my fingers, a sound rides out to me—the first sound I’ve heard out here other than the wind. It’s coming from the house on the other side of the road.
Pulling my hood down over my face, I sprint across the street and crouch under a window. Once I’ve caught my breath, I ease upward until I can see through the glass.
A woman is sawing through what looks like a freshly baked baguette on her counter. She’s singing as she works, belting a song I recognize from one of the shows the opera house put on last year so loudly it can be heard easily through the windowpane. Her hips bob back and forth to the melody.
Both the skin on my ankle where the Manipulation Mark used to be and the Extraction Mark on my thigh prickle to life, reaching out to her music for the memories that ripple beneath.
I could drain this woman in a moment. It would be easier this time than it was with the chef or the prison guard because she’s already singing. My mouth waters, and my limbs quake with longing.
I plunge into the woman’s past, treading through the gray and white images to where her elixir streams pure and delicious as nectar. As I paw through, however, my attention snags on a flash of a little boy with mop-like brown hair clutching a stuffed animal. Though the boy’s face is pale, his cheeks free of dimples, and his eyes a bright blue, my breath catches in my throat. Visions of Emeric as a child singing for a dozen toys in a kitchen much like this one flash across my mind.
With trembling hands, I pull my influence away from the golden elixir.
The woman continues her trilling, dropping slice after slice of bread into a brown paper bag with exaggerated flourishes that vaguely resemble the bowing of ballerinas onstage.
I tread through her memories to that place where the tide of thoughts burbles out of the present. Gripping the windowsill, I push in an echo of a child’s voice.
“Maman!” I make him say. “Maman, come here!”
The lady stops singing, and my grasp on her memories vanishes. The beast in my chest protests, but I swallow it down and watch.
“Edouard? Was that you?” She sets the knife down next to the brown paper bag on the counter and makes her way out of the room. “Are you okay?”
Bracing my frozen fingers against the window, I push the pane upward. The wind roars into the room, blowing the curtains sideways and knocking papers from the kitchen table.
Not even bothering to make sure the woman didn’t hear the ruckus, I bolt to the kitchen, snatch up the brown paper bag, and fling myself back into the snow. Clutching the bread close to my chest, I dash away from the cottage without closing the window behind me.
Time continues to trickle away, and as I push back against the onslaught of snow and wind toward the church, I can’t help but imagine a giant hourglass pulling every moment away from me, one after the other, in a steady drumbeat. But instead of sand, this hourglass is full of elixir. Emeric’s elixir. Each time a bead of it slides through the narrow tube in the middle, it drops to the bottom of the glass and sizzles, boiling away to nothing but a wisp of steam.
Chapter Thirty-Three
When I try to open the church’s front door, the wind rips it from my hands and bangs it against the wall. I drag it closed, praying the sound didn’t startle Arlette.
She’s sitting on the couch when I enter the priest’s quarters, the moth-eaten curtains still wrapped around her body, but the elixir I gave her seems to have done its job because her shivering has stopped completely and her lips have returned to a much healthier pink.
As I pull my hood away from my face, she watches me warily with eyes that seem much too pained, much too haunted to belong to a girl of only eleven years.
“I brought you some food.” I toss the bag to her.
She jerks away from it as though it might bite her.
“It’s bread.” I move close to the fire to let its warmth ease some of the feeling back into my hands and feet.
She nudges the bag open with a finger. Once she glimpses what’s within, she plunges both fists inside and shoves slice after slice into her mouth.
As she eats, I retrieve the pot from where she left it on the floor and fill it with more snow. This time when I return, she barely even glances at me, so intent is she on the bread. Once the snow has liquefied, I hand it to her. She accepts it and guzzles noisily as crumbs flake away from her chin and hands.
I pull my pendant from my neckline and pop it open once more. The music is sweet and gentle as a kiss, and I close my eyes for a moment, imagining Emeric’s voice along with it.
When I open my eyes again, Arlette is staring at me, the brown bag empty in her lap, chunks of crust littering the curtains and couch around her.
I reach up to push hair away from my face and remember I still haven’t put my mask back on.
“I’ve never seen another one before,” Arlette says quietly.
“Another what?”
She points to her face.
“Someone like me.”
“Me neither. Not in real life.” I am afraid to breathe, terrified she might scream or attack me again.
“Have you come to kill me?” She asks it as though it is an ordinary question, as though that is the most logical reason I would be here.
“Of course not. Why on earth would I do that?”
“He used to talk about you.” Her dark eyes—eyes so similar to Emeric’s and yet still so different—bore straight through me as though they can pin me to the wall.
“Who did?”
“Him.”
“Cyril?”
She flinches, shrinking into the couch.
I soften my expression as much as I can and try to keep from making any sudden movements. “Sorry.”
After a moment, she nods. “Yes. Him.”
I lick my lips. “What—what did he tell you about me?”
“Nothing.” She pauses, considering me. “He used to mutter your name under his breath. I once heard him say something like, ‘if the runt can’t do it, then Isda definitely won’t be able to.’”
It’s as though the words are a blow to my gut, a sudden, stark reminder that I was nothing but a pawn to him.
“What was he trying to get you to do?” I ask.
The girl furrows her brow. “He tried to get me to do lots of things.”
“Like what?”
“Extract elixir from fendoirs. Torture people with my power. Kill them. Confuse them.”
“Did he ever say why?”
“No.” Her eyes rove over my face, pausing on my misshapen lips, my twisted nose, my sunken cheeks. After a moment, she asks, “Why did you come?”
“Cyril—sorry, he—is looking for me. But I can’t fight him unless...” I knot my hands together. “Unless I figure out how to use my powers better. I hoped you might be able to help me.” I consider telling her about Emeric, but I’m not sure if she’s stable enough to handle hearing about the danger he’s in.
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