by Sara Wolf
I know there’s no talking her down. She’s not going to budge—but I’m worried. Staying so strong must be taking a toll on her. She hasn’t shed a tear, or shown much emotion at all, since the village on fire. And I’m worried. She was such a tender thing when I first met her. She had—and still has—that backbone of steel. I’m worried she’s using it like armor against the world, and herself. But how can I even say that? How can I bring it up? Everyone has a different way of dealing with this, and who am I to tell her hers is wrong?
“Rations,” Malachite says, tossing Lucien an armful of flatbread and seed tack. “Enough fuckin’ cheese to last a lifetime, still.”
“We’ll take a quarter wheel,” Lucien says. “Not much room else—we need to move light. Be sure to refill your waterskins, too.”
“You gonna be okay to do magic, Luc?” Malachite asks.
“Fione, what do you know about the Glass Tree?” The prince ignores him.
“Glass…” Fione trails off, taking mental inventory. Gods know how many books she’s read in her lifetime, and she must be scouring them all. “There’s a mention of a Glass Tree in the Hymn of the Forest, of course, but we all know that. ‘The tree of bone and the tree of glass will sit together as family at last.’”
“And there’s the stuff Varia told me,” I add. “The glass splinters in the Heartless bags—those are from the Glass Tree. That’s the key ingredient to making us Heartless.”
Next to me, Lucien reaches into his covering and pulls out the small sack stitched with gold thread and the word Heart. “You mean like this?”
I suck a sharp breath in when I see the sack move. “My heart.”
ours, the hunger oozes out of my ears. ours, ours ours. not his. take it. take it now.
I fight every scrap of human memory that comes clawing back, faint and fuzzy and smelling of cinnamon and feeling of home and calling hard and fast to me, like a key to a keyhole, a polymath machine piece to another, begging to be made whole, to work again, to become what we were meant to be all along, our natural state, our true self—
Lucien reaches into the bag and presses out the tip of a sharp, long glass shard. Not raw, refined. Transparent, not cloudy. Thin, but real.
“How did you get that, Lucien?” Fione asks. “That particular shard?”
“I woke up with it in my hand,” he says. “When I had that dream of the single dark tree, when it whispered my witch name to me. I woke up with magic in my veins and this glass shard clutched in my hand.”
“So it was given to you,” Fione muses. “By whom? The High Witches?”
“No. The tree gave me my witch name, and it gave me this shard. I’m sure of it.”
“So it was the Glass Tree, then.”
He shakes his head. “Neither glass nor bone. It was just a tree, glowing a little rainbow.”
The room goes quiet, all of us thinking.
Malachite rubs his white hair frustratedly. “Thinking’s my least favorite thing.”
“Likewise,” I say.
“I’ve heard it implied,” Lucien starts, flickering eyes over to me, “that the Glass Tree needs to feed. Would that make any sense, Fione?”
She muses it over, slowly folding a pair of fresh trousers into her bag. “If the Bone Tree needs a strong witch to feed off once every century, as the High Witches said…and if the Glass Tree is a replica made of the Bone Tree by the witches, then—yes. It’s not unlikely the Glass Tree needs to feed off magic, too. Witches, to be precise.”
“Seven of them,” Lucien says. “Encased in glass.”
“Is that why the High Witches were missing parts?” I ask. “Did the Glass Tree…eat them?”
Malachite groans. “Being eaten slowly is my least least favorite thing, I just decided.”
“They feed the Glass Tree seven powerful witches to keep it working,” Lucien muses. “To keep the Heartless production line working. Without that Tree—”
“There are no Heartless,” I finish for him. Our glances at each other are nothing if not grim.
“Is this Glass Tree thing here?” Malachite stresses. “Like, in Windonhigh? Or is it like the Bone Tree, and it moves around a lot?”
“Without access to the witch library, I have no clue,” Fione says. She slowly looks to Lucien. “Is that—”
We all look to the prince, but he ignores us still, wrapping the flatbreads and putting them into his pouch with great care and a few clipped words.
“Refill your damned waterskins, for gods’ sakes. It’s going to be a walk.”
We do as we’re told, and we walk as we’re told, down the spiral ramps of the living towers, then to the dewy grass and prettily kept road. Windonhigh at night is nothing compared to Vetris at night, with its many thousands of gemlike lights all stacked on one another. But it has its charms. The glass beasts in Crow quarter gleam even brighter against the darkness, traipsing through the grass like illuminated dreams. The glass birds flicker through the trees, flirting with shadow—there one moment and gone the next and back again—all pink and yellow and orange light bouncing off one another. Like captured stars, like captured magic. The wind rustles leaf against leaf, the whisper following us as we skirt the art installments, the massive sapphire mushroom radiating light doing us no concealing favors.
“Never there when I want to find you,” Malachite mumbles at it. “And here when I absolutely don’t want you.”
“Are you looking to get married soon, then?” I breezily ask as we follow Lucien’s strides into a small copse of ash trees, his hand lit with witchfire.
Malachite rolls his eyes. “To my work.”
“Or a nice beneather lady.”
“Or man,” he counters.
“Or man,” I agree. “Anyone particular you have in mind?”
“Someone who doesn’t ask annoying questions all the time.”
“Ah.” I nod knowingly, ducking around a tree branch. “The strong silent type. I understand.”
He leaps over a root nimbly. “You wouldn’t know silence if it dueled you in the streets.”
I look at him with mock offense. “Who gave you permission to be so right and so rude at the same time?”
“Who do you think?” He jerks his white-haired head at Lucien’s back, and I snicker. It’s short-lived, though. Malachite pulls ahead and astride with the prince, and Fione and I shore up the rear. She’s bundled in so many furs I can barely see her little pink nose sticking out, her blue eyes darting this way and that for threats.
What she said before we left still haunts me. The realization that the seven High Witches are being eaten by the Glass Tree haunts me worse, mostly because of what Crav said. Lucien’s hand, and eye—it’s similar to the High Witches. What really happens when a witch uses magic beyond their physical stamina? Does the magic truly overwhelm their body, rendering parts of it inert? Or does…does the Glass Tree eat them?
I shake my head—the High Witches’ bodies were gone. Fully and truly gone. If Lucien were being eaten in the same way, surely his affected parts would disappear entirely, too. But they haven’t. If he keeps using magic recklessly…if he doesn’t get enough rest…
“Zera.”
Lucien’s voice shakes me out of it. We’ve stopped walking, pausing on the edge of the copse and just beneath the boughs of a massive ash tree. His midnight eyes glimmer out at me, catching the light of the witchflames licking his hand harmlessly. It’s his left hand, hard to see in the black fire. Too hard. It’s a moment—just a moment, between the dancing flames, I swear his hand disappears entirely and reappears again. I rub my eyes—I must be projecting. Insinuating things that aren’t there. Worried—far too much—about him disappearing, bit by bit.
I make a smile and bounce up to him. “Yes, Your Highness?”
He’s in no mood to play, or kiss, or playfully kiss. Brows drawn tight, he mot
ions to the tree above us. “Can you move this?”
My eyes widen, and I consider it. “This whole tree?”
“The whole tree,” he agrees. “We need to uproot it.”
“Why not just use magic?” Malachite frowns. “It’d be easier.”
“He can’t, obviously,” Fione sighs. “Or it’d be detected.”
“Pretty certain I can’t lift it all by myself,” I finally say. “Mal?”
The beneather shrugs his sword off his back, rolling his sleeves up. “Worth a shot.”
He moves to the trunk, digging his heels in and finding a good grip.
I look up at Lucien. “It’s really heavy. And all those roots…I might need the hunger.”
“If you want to Weep—” Fione steps up, fingering the white mercury dagger on her hip, the bejeweled hilt sparkling.
“Can I?”
“It’s not as if it’d be detected,” Fione says. “It isn’t magic—it defies magic. Right?”
She looks to Lucien, but he shakes his head. “I’m not sure. But if that’s what will get this tree moved, then we must do it.” He pauses and looks at me. “It’s…it’s not painful, is it?”
I smirk. “I mean, traditionally being stabbed isn’t a pleasant experience.”
He flinches. “Yes. Of course.”
“Hey,” I reach my hand out, cupping his strong cheekbone. “I’ll be fine.”
“Someone told me once that sacrifice shouldn’t be celebrated,” he says quietly, leaning in to my hand and closing his eyes.
“Look at you”—I laugh softly—“using my words against me. It’s almost like we’re a real couple now.”
His eyes go tender on the edges, black water instead of black stone. “Zera—”
“Weeping is mine, Lucien. I made it real. It’s my weapon against the world, and no one else’s. I choose.”
The black water in his eyes swirls, thinking, worrying, struggling with being my witch, with orders and well-being and control and then…becoming my lover. Becoming proud.
“Yes. You choose.”
I turn to Fione and hold out my arm. “If you love me, you’ll make it quick.”
“Good thing I don’t, then,” Fione drawls, unsheathing the dagger on her hip. She holds it to my skin, her fingers trembling around the hilt. Over the pearls of her and Varia’s love.
“When did she give it to you?” I ask softly. Fione stares woodenly down at the veins in my wrist. Our embrace in Breych’s tower seems so distant now. This isn’t our first time in this position, her readying to stab me as she did on the mountaintop. To free me.
“Before she left,” Fione answers, lost in a time I can’t see. “Five years ago. ‘To cut through the horseshit of the world.’”
“Sounds like something she’d say.” I laugh a little. Fione’s apple-cheeked face doesn’t move, frozen. We both know Varia in different ways. Me as a witch and her as a lover. Lucien knows her, too, but not like we do. He knows only a sister, but we know her secrets. Her heart.
I put my hand over the hilt with her and press harder, blood pooling and acid fire rippling through my nerves.
“We’re going to get her back, Fione. Together.”
This makes her come round to the present, to Windonhigh again, and she looks at me. Really looks. The sort of look that feels like a tattoo. And then she cuts. She cuts with memories, and pain, and hope for the future—hope for the right future—and I can feel it. I can feel it twisting like the white mercury twisting through my veins, beneath my skin, writhing invisibly with wildfire, with the poisonous curl of burning, consuming, destroying.
I hold on.
This time, I hold on.
It’s not a whole sword of white mercury. It’s a dagger. It’s enough to weaken the magical tie between Lucien and me so that I can Weep, but it’s not powerful enough to knock me out. Not like the duel. Or maybe I’m stronger.
I’m stronger this time.
Maybe, despite everything, it’s possible for a Heartless to change after all.
I stagger, Fione gripping my elbow for support. Touching me again, trusting me again, and my unheart in my empty chest and my real heart in Lucien’s bag shudder as one, in pain and in joy.
they hate you.
They’re relying on me.
they’re waiting for you to let your guard down.
They trust me.
how could they forgive you for what you’ve done?
I forgive myself.
The hunger disappears, clear and cold, and the world splits six times.
Between Malachite and me, we manage to uproot the tree with much swearing and straining and blood tears on my part. My claws dig deep into bark, the roots peeling up and away with angry groans and cracks, until the whole thing finally gives, and Malachite and I shove the trunk aside before it can keel over on the humans.
“Not bad, Six-Eyes.” The beneather pants, wiping mud and bark off his sweaty face. “You practice?”
I catch my breath, the Weeping peaceful and silent and easy, like slipping into an old glove now. “No. You?”
“Always.” He smirks, and then puts his hand over his nose, his eyes flashing with a red glow. “Spirits. You really smell like one of ’em.”
“One of who?” Fione asks as she walks over.
“Valkerax. She stinks like ’em.”
I sniff my armpits warily—bracing for the rotting meat stench I know so well from training Evlorasin. But even with my heightened Weeping senses, all I get is sweat and me.
“I can’t smell anything,” Lucien says, eyeing the hole in the ground where the tree used to be.
“Right, well.” Malachite straps his sword on his back again. “Who’s the one whose ancestors have been hunting them for a thousand years, huh? Not you, that’s for spiritsdamn sure. If I say she stinks, she stinks.” He looks over at me with a crooked smirk. “You stink.”
“Thank you.” I smile back at him with all my teeth.
Fione looks me up and down. “Curious indeed. I have no clue how valkerax blood promises work, but it seems this one has lasting effects.”
“For the rest of my life, Yorl said,” I agree.
“So you’re basically one of ’em,” Malachite groans. “Great.”
“It’s not like Varia can control her with the Bone Tree,” Fione snipes back.
“You don’t know that, Big-Brain,” the beneather scoffs.
“Neither do you,” she argues.
“If I get any compelling inklings to run off and start breathing fire, I’ll be sure to let you all know.” I cut the tension and look over at Lucien, who’s still riveted to the ground. “What now, Your Highness?”
“It’s beneath.” He points down at the soft earth collapsing in on itself. The last bit finally sloughs away with encouragement from his boot and reveals a perfect set of stairs.
“Whaddya know.” Malachite frowns. “A nice staircase leading down into the earth. Well, uh, not-earth. Sky-island earth.” He pauses. “Hey, what happens if we fall through and die?”
“We fall through and die,” Fione deadpans.
“At least it’s an interesting way to go,” I encourage him with a thump on the back.
Lucien’s the first to walk in, and Fione and I move in after him, Malachite on uneasy rear point.
Just past the mouth of the stairs, the dirt quickly becomes curved stone, perfectly round, as if a tower’s been pressed down into the earth and excavated on the inside. No doubt made by magic, though Malachite comments it’s very good stonework. And coming from his Dark-Below-dwelling arse, that means something.
“Old Vetrisian,” Fione murmurs, running a hand along the granite. “All of it.”
The Weeping leaves me in increments—the blood tears of resistance growing cold and then stopping all at once. The clear, p
erfect clarity in my head grows the fuzz of emotion and thought again. The world comes back to being just two—left eye and right eye—and I wipe my red-streaked face on my sleeve.
Torches dot the walls down here every so often—black fire with no color to it at all. Which I find odd, considering every variation of witchfire I’ve seen so far has had a different hue to it, based on the witch. Or so I think. Lucien’s is faintly purple. His black-purple flames engulfed South Gate weeks ago. It battled Varia and the Bone Tree’s white light on the mountain peak. Varia’s witchfire was faintly green. Nightsinger’s was gray on the edges. The only time I’ve seen pure black fire was when Gavik made that fake witchfire to scare the populace of Vetris. But this fire is no fake—it sputters and gouts, eating no fuel at all considering the torch heads are completely bare and made of metal.
Actually, now that I think about it, it’s the same pure black witchfire that lit up Y’shennria’s apartments, and I begin to feel uneasy. What witch is powerful enough to keep so many torches burning, over such a distance? The High Witches, maybe?
Can they keep an eye on us through their fire?
“Where are we going, Lucien?” Fione asks suddenly. “This place—it hasn’t been touched in a long time.”
She’s right. There’s no dust, but the feel of the air is stale and heavy. The prince suddenly freezes on the steps, his head darting up, up to the stone steps above us and the surface beyond that.
“Something knows we’re here,” he says.
“Well, we did destroy their possibly magic door-tree,” I hum.
“Something?” Malachite asks. “Or someone?”
Lucien doesn’t answer. He grabs my hand instead, pulling me farther down the dark depths of the stairs.
“Come. Quickly. Ready your weapons. Malachite, watch the walls.”
“The walls?” Fione frowns, the mechanical cacophony of her cane transforming into a crossbow echoing precisely. “Lucien, what’s going on?”
“I don’t know,” he admits, squeezing my hand as if for support. “We have to hurry.”
The stairs blur, the walls blurring faster, and we finally level out to the floor. Except…there is no floor. It’s glass, all of it, clear and fine and yawning into the sky. Clouds shuffle below the glass floor, slow and lazy and heavy with gray rain, night birds cutting double V’s before disappearing into the water mist of the clouds and dipping back out again. Faintly, I can see green fields below, marked pale for wheat and roads.