“He’s going to tear you apart.”
“Wonderful. Thanks.”
“I’m just preparing you for what’s coming. I’m not the bad guy here. I’m trying to do you a favor.”
“Well, don’t.”
“All right,” he says, leading the way down the hall. “I won’t. But if I was—”
“You’re not.”
“—I’d tell you that this isn’t just about you missing some chores or whatever. He didn’t say what it was, but I could tell it was big.”
I squeeze my eyes shut and rub my temples. I wonder if Father Moors is mad about the wizards accusing the Church of murder. Does he think it was my fault? And if he does, why didn’t he call me in yesterday or the day before?
I mull that over as we make our way out of the school, across the grounds, and over to the church. When we get to Father Moors’s office, Bran knocks on the door and waits until he hears a “Come in” before turning the knob and making a big show of gesturing me inside. As if I haven’t been here a thousand times before.
It smells like old soup and woodsmoke in here, just like it always does. The room is small and cramped, the walls lined with dusty books. The fireplace is lit, but it’s burned down to coals. Just a few glowing embers clinging to the last traces of life.
Father Moors is pacing in front of the fire, and when the door opens, he turns and glares at me, like I’ve committed an unforgivable crime. Which of course I have, but he’s never had any complaints about it before.
“Leave us,” he tells Bran.
Bran smirks at me and then dashes out the door.
“Sit,” Father Moors growls, pointing to the chair in front of his desk.
I don’t move. I’m so tired of people telling me what to do. “If it’s all the same to you, Father—”
“It’s not. Sit. Down.”
I look at the chair waiting for me. My palms sweat, and a wave of fear prickles in my chest and claws its way down my back. I pretend like I didn’t hear him and slouch against the wall. Instinctively choosing a spot where I can see both him and the door.
He frowns, muttering something to himself. I don’t catch the words, only that he sounds upset. “This isn’t going to be easy,” he mumbles at the wall, and I can’t tell if he’s talking to me or to himself.
Maybe Father Gratch has already convinced the Council to do their reevaluation of me. It seems awfully fast, but . . .
You have twenty-four hours.
Father Gratch couldn’t have called a Council meeting this fast, but the High Priest could have. I stare down at the dark-green rug in front of the fireplace, counting where sparks from the fire have burnt little holes in it over the years. There are five of them. I don’t look at Father Moors’s face, afraid that if I do, I’ll see it in his eyes. The Council’s decided I’m out of here, and they’ve made it his job to tell me.
I don’t want to leave. If I was out on the streets, if I wasn’t part of the Church, or near Leora, then . . . then it feels like I’d only be one step away from ending up in that chair again. But if this is the High Priest’s way of forcing me to become his apprentice, he underestimated me. Because if it comes down to leaving the Church or letting him put his hands on me, I’ll take my chances on the streets any day.
Even so, my voice shakes, already pleading for Father Moors to tell me this isn’t happening. And he hasn’t even given me the bad news yet. “I—I don’t want to go. Whatever case Father Gratch made . . . I’ll do extra chores! I’ll make up what I missed, I promise, just—”
“This isn’t about what you missed. And no amount of chores could ever make up for it.”
A horror that sits heavy in his words passes from him to me, sliding across my skin. Coating me like oil. “I was careful. I don’t know how the High Guild found out about the Church’s involvement, but it wasn’t me.”
He shakes his head. “I know you were out late last night. Well after curfew. And you were seen leaving the girls’ dorms over at the school.”
Words stick in my throat. I have too many things to say, and none of them make it out.
“I see you don’t deny it,” Father Moors says, the anger and frustration draining from his voice so that he just sounds tired. And disappointed. “You paid a visit to Leora last night, didn’t you?”
Of all the things I’ve done, this is what they’re going to use against me? Spending the night with a girl—the one crime I should have committed, but didn’t? “It’s not what you think. I didn’t . . . We didn’t . . . Nothing happened.” Something could have, if I’d stayed. “I know I broke curfew, and I know I was in Leora’s room when I shouldn’t have been. But I swear, nothing happened.”
“But something did.” Father Moors crosses over to me. He grabs my shoulders, making me look at him. “Something monstrous happened! And you were there. Tell me you didn’t . . . By the Fire, I knew when I took you in that this might happen. I keep telling myself it couldn’t have been you, despite the evidence. Because if it was, I’ve failed you. So tell me you didn’t.”
I feel sick. Like there are stones settling at the bottom of my stomach. “Didn’t what?”
“She’s covered in burns, Azeril. Burns shaped like a knife. And the worst of it . . . the charred stab wound in her chest . . . It looks like the work of obsidian. And you were seen leaving the dorms last night.”
The room suddenly feels ten times smaller and about a hundred times larger, all at the same time. His words swim in my head, separate from each other, not making any sense. Burns. Knife. Her. Acid burns the back of my throat. My head feels too light. This isn’t really happening. “No. No. You’re lying. You’re making that up!” I sound hysterical. My voice is too high, too unstable. “Leora wasn’t—”
Stabbed in the chest. My own personal brand of vengeance. Of murder.
I tear away from him, twisting out of his grip so hard, my shoulders hurt. I bang my head back against the wall, where it hits with a jarring thud.
“You didn’t know . . .” Father Moors lets out a deep sigh. Both relieved and burdened. Relieved that it wasn’t me, that his attack dog stayed on the leash, and burdened now with the task of giving me the worst news of my life. “I’m sorry, Azeril. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not her. Because if it was, there’s no way you could ask me that. It’s someone else. Some other girl.” My jaw trembles, my teeth chattering. She can’t be dead.
I left. Why did I leave? By the Fire, why did I leave her?!
This is why she wasn’t in class. It had nothing to do with me. Nothing and everything.
But it’s not her. So it’s okay. Because it can’t be her. I can’t exist in a world where something that awful could happen to her, and I’m still here.
Father Moors hesitates. “I’m sorry,” he says again, but the words have no meaning. I wish he’d stop saying them. “I know you were close to her.”
I laugh. I can’t help it. I can’t comprehend any of this. “And you think what? That I hurt her? That I—” My throat closes up, unable to say it out loud. Hot tears sting my eyes and streak down my face. I hardly feel them. I can’t breathe. The world is suffocating me. If she’s gone, then so is all the air.
“No,” he says, but I know part of him wasn’t sure. “You could never— You wouldn’t. Not to someone who didn’t deserve it.”
I press the back of my arm against my eyes. He still hasn’t said her name. Not directly. It could be someone else. It could.
But I know it’s not.
Every part of me feels raw. Each breath feels like sucking broken glass into my lungs. Maybe existing always hurt this much, and I just never noticed. I’ve been living in some kind of dream. Some kind of haze where being alive isn’t excruciating. This pain—this is the reality.
I force myself to choke out the words. Because I have to say them. I have to, at least once. “I didn’t kill her.”
“Azeril, I never said—”
“I know what you think! I know what it l
ooks like!” I didn’t do it, but I know who would have. Who would have hurt her to get to me. My hand falls on the knife hilt, the obsidian’s heat igniting my blood. I’ll give myself to it completely this time. I won’t hold any part of myself back.
I am the knife. We are one and the same.
Unbreakable.
Father Moors takes a step back, fear washing across his face. “Azeril, I didn’t say—”
“I’ll kill him. It’ll be slow. High Priest Endeil will find out what it’s like to burn. He can conjure fire, but he’s met his match this time because that won’t stop me.”
“Azeril!” Father Moors shouts, as if I’m not standing two feet in front of him. As if I’m very, very far away. Perhaps it’s too much, seeing his trained dog in action. Apart from that first time, when he found me, he’s never watched.
“You can’t stop me. And if you try—”
“Azeril, please, listen to me! I never said she was dead!”
Time stops. My thoughts shatter into a million pieces. She’s alive.
I blink, fighting the heat of the knife. I’d already resigned myself to giving in to it. To not holding back. Now I have to struggle to think clearly. “Leora’s still alive,” I say tentatively, testing out the words.
Father Moors nods. “Barely, but . . . the knife missed her heart.”
And there it is. Proof that I didn’t do it.
I would never have missed.
CHAPTER TEN
Her room in the infirmary is dark, except for the light of one dim candle. Just enough light to throw shadows across her face. Black drapes already hang over the walls, waiting to fit her for her burial shroud. Because the physicians are so sure she’s going to die. They told Father Moors it’s only a matter of time. A very short time. She’s the one lurking in the shadows now.
I creep into the dark room. A broken boy, even without the chair. The scent of her blood hangs heavy and metallic in the air—even though the wound has been tended to and bandaged, the burns treated with a pungent salve that stings my nose when I get close. I kneel next to her bed, tears springing to my eyes. But I hold them back. She’s still there, hanging on somewhere between the darkness and the shallow rise and fall of her breathing, and letting myself cry here would be like admitting this is her deathbed. That this is the final time I will ever see her.
I find her hand, lifeless and cold, and hold it with both of mine, pressing it to my forehead. There isn’t anything I can say that won’t sound like a good-bye, so for a while I say nothing at all.
Endeil did this to her. Because I defied him. He took a knife and lit it on fire with his hands. It wasn’t obsidian. If it was, there wouldn’t be so many burn marks on her. There’d be only one, right where it counted, and she would be dead. The knife likes flesh. It doesn’t play around.
I bring her hand to my lips. I kiss her knuckles. My chest feels like it’s folding in on itself. Maybe I’m a monster, but I’m her monster, and I would have done anything to protect her. I still would.
Leora’s breathing becomes more ragged, her struggling more obvious. There are a few endless moments where I stay perfectly still, afraid that if I move I won’t be able to hear if her next breath is her last. I hold my own breath, as if I can give her my air. My lungs. If she can’t breathe, then neither can I.
I don’t know how much time passes before the fit stops. But when it does, her breathing isn’t as steady as it was.
Tears fill my eyes again, and I can’t stop them this time. If she dies, I’ll die with her. Her death is my death. She’ll become one of the dark shadows haunting my mind. And then she’ll see all my secrets, all the things I’ve done, and then what was the point of fleeing last night?
A choking sob wracks my body. I let go of her hand, covering my face. Trying to stay silent, to pretend this isn’t the end and that I’m not totally losing it.
But there’s no pretending, not anymore. And there’s no holding back. I cry at her bedside, until my breathing sounds almost as ragged and strained as hers.
A whimper escapes her throat. She stirs, just a little, and even that’s a struggle for her. “Az,” she murmurs, though her eyes are closed and I can’t tell if she’s awake. She moves her arm, as if to reach for me, but it flops down at her side.
There are voices outside her room, physicians discussing her fate in hushed tones. Telling one of the nurses to expect her bed to be free by tomorrow morning.
They can’t know that. They can’t.
No one asked me if she was allowed to die.
Leora’s arm slips off the edge of the bed, her fingers grazing the inside of my left arm. There’s a twinge in my chest, a raw, hollow ache, remembering how worried she was when she saw my scar. She was worried about me, and now here we are. Another painful sob escapes me, threatening to rip me apart, to turn me completely inside out, and I press my face into the side of her bed to stifle it.
By the Fire, it’s not fair. I stupidly slice my own arm open with obsidian and wake up the next morning with hardly a scratch on me. She’s never done anything to anyone. She’s never even held a weapon, and yet the High Priest sticks an ordinary knife in her chest and takes her away from me.
She’s not dead yet. It’s not too late. The thought breaks through the cloud of pain, and I’m so numb, already feeling like I’m dying along with her, that at first it doesn’t mean anything.
But maybe whatever saved me the other night could save her, too. If I knew who did it or what it was.
Hadrin might not have been the one to heal me, but he knows exactly what happened that night.
He’ll tell me, at a cost. If I agree to be a weapon for him. I thought crawling back to him was the last thing I’d ever do, but it turns out it’s not. Not if it will save her.
I get to my feet. I rub my eyes dry with the back of my hand. My knees are sore from kneeling too long, and I pretend that’s why I feel so shaky. Not because I have to face a wizard who knows all my deep, dark secrets. Not because I’ll owe him everything for this.
Leora’s hand twitches. “Az,” she mutters, her voice barely there. She reaches out for me and tries to speak, to tell me something, but it comes out a moan. Her mouth moves but can’t form the words.
I wince. Her weak hand finds mine, trying to squeeze it. And I don’t need to hear her words to know she doesn’t want me to leave. It’s last night all over again, the same mistake repeated.
But no. This is different.
“I’m coming back, Leora.” I won’t let her die. And Chasm take me, I won’t let her die alone.
I hesitate, holding on to her hand a moment longer, pressing her palm to my heart. “Please watch over her,” I whisper, praying to the Fire. Maybe the Fire favors me, maybe it condemns me for my sins, but it can’t have anything against her. “Please keep her safe.”
Protect her from all the monsters.
Because I’m going to be back as soon as possible. I’m going to save her life.
I just have to sell my soul first.
Endeil’s waiting for me in the hallway outside the infirmary. He stands in my way, arms folded. “I thought I might find you here.” He says it so casually, as if he found me lighting candles over the altar. As if he’s someone I would ever want to run into.
But today, it’s the other way around. He’s the one who should be avoiding me.
My hand hovers over my obsidian. It’s killing me not to touch it, but if I do, if even one finger grazes the hilt, I know I’ll kill him. I won’t be able to stop myself.
And I will kill him, one way or another, but not here and not now. Not when I could still save her.
“Move.”
“And let you flee from your crimes? It looks to me like I’ve caught a murderer. And don’t look so surprised. I warned you.”
“And I told you I’ll never be your apprentice.”
“You’d better change your mind very quickly.”
I laugh. “You’ve already taken her away from me. You think
I care about anything else?!”
“Yes.” He’s maddeningly calm. Deadly serious but calm. “You think you have nothing left to lose, but if you don’t agree to become my apprentice, if you don’t let me restore your memories, you’re going to be imprisoned for the one crime you didn’t commit. You’ll be hanged for murdering the girl you loved. Everyone will know you’re a killer, except they’ll think you’re a worse one than you already are. Maybe some of them would see making wizards disappear as justified. Illegal but justified. But creeping into her bedroom in the middle of the night, doing who knows what to her, and leaving with her life—”
“I know it was you who stabbed her, and if you touched her—”
“What kind of monster do you think I am?” He holds a hand over his heart in shock.
“The kind who’s going to get out of my way.”
“Gladly. Pledge to be my apprentice, and you can go. Otherwise, I call the guards. It’s your call, but, personally, I’d prefer if you picked the first option.”
It would feel so good to plunge the knife into his chest. To slice him open, bit by bit, sharing the obsidian’s pleasure as its heat burns away any other thought, any other feeling, except the ecstasy of making him hurt.
My thoughts must be obvious, because the blood drains from Endeil’s face. He takes a step away from me.
“You’re lucky she’s not dead,” I tell him, “because you don’t want to see who I am without her. You asked what kind of monster I thought you were. You should be more concerned with what kind of monster I am.”
“If you were going to kill me, you would have done it by now.” But he doesn’t look so sure about that. His eyes dart to the knife, and flames spread over his hands, like ethereal gloves. “The school’s borrowed a few city guards to make the students feel safe. To keep their parents from withdrawing their tuition, more like. But I happen to know that the guards are just over in the mess hall. You have three seconds before I call for them.”
I can’t let him do that. If they take me away, then there’s no chance of me saving Leora. And there will be chains. Restraints around my hands and my feet, covering the old scars and driving me insane.
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