CHAPTER 34
Julius 1786
SHE NOTICED THE STREAKS OF SILVER WHILE treating Kaine’s back. They were just barely visible at his temple, glimmers of silver-white threaded through his dark hair.
She stopped and leaned closer, inspecting them. “Did this just start?”
He reached up, brushing the spot with his fingers. “I noticed it this
morning.”
“I thought you couldn’t change.”
“Well, I am an experiment now,” he said dryly. “It’s not as if anyone knows what will happen. That’s why people perform experiments.”
She leaned in closer, trying to convince herself that he was simply going grey, and that it was not the exact shade of silver-white the stone had been.
He swivelled his head to face her, their faces a breath apart. “Do you mind?”
She blushed, drawing back quickly. “Sorry.”
He spoke again as she was applying the bandages. “Apparently I’m being
gifted a chimaera.”
“Gifted?”
The casual way he said it made it sound like he’d been given an unwanted house pet rather than a rabid monster that had a tendency towards decomposing while still alive.
“So far, they’ve all been savage, but a tameable chimaera would be ideal.”
He stood up. “Those of us with the ‘resources’ to raise one are being ‘given’ a chimaera to train. It’s a test, obviously.”
She stepped around him, helping him put his shirt on. The haggard bruising under his eyes had almost faded entirely. “But you’re injured. It’s not fair to expect you to tame something like that when you can’t heal properly or raise your arms.”
He looked condescendingly down at her. “Marino, this may be a shocking revelation for you, but the High Necromancer does not care about fairness.
It’s his opinion that anyone without the wits and will to survive deserves to suffer and die. Ideally for his amusement.”
She could tell he was baiting her. “Do you know what kind of chimaera it will be?”
“Well, given the use of the word ‘train,’ I imagine it will be at least part dog. But I’m not Bennet’s favourite person. Whatever it is, I’m sure to get the worst one.”
The idea of a chimaera that could be trained was horrifying. More and more of them kept appearing. They died quickly, but the deaths associated
with them were slowly increasing.
“Could you—kill it?”
He raised an eyebrow. “You think I should kill my gift that I’m being tested with?”
She went hot and cold all over, not sure how to reply.
He was already injured. If the chimaera he was entrusted with were to die, he’d undoubtedly be punished, but— He caught her chin, tilting her head back until her eyes met his. There was a vaguely silver gleam in them. “If you were me, what would you do?”
“I—” she stammered. “I would see if I could make it loyal.”
“And if you couldn’t? If a monster can’t be made loyal, what would you do then?”
Their faces were close. Helena’s throat tightened, her heart beating too fast.
“I’d look for flaws in the transmutation,” she said. “The splicing isn’t very good, so there are mistakes that could be aggravated to accelerate deterioration. You wouldn’t have to kill it outright, you’d just—speed up the inevitable.”
He leaned forward, so close she could feel his breath. For a moment she thought he was going to kiss her.
“You’re so pragmatic.” The words brushed against her lips.
He released her chin abruptly and stepped away, eyes glittering.
Her cheeks were still hot as she packed up all her supplies, refusing to look
at him again.
He spoke just as she was leaving.
“Don’t die, Marino. I might miss you.”
VANYA GETTLICH WAS A STUBBY-LIMBED spinster with small eyes, a large round nose, and sharp ears. The combination, she’d always said, that was the secret to her success as one of the best scouts in the Resistance. No one ever noticed a homely woman.
Generally, scouts didn’t live very long. Months was considered impressive.
For many it was far less. Vanya had been a scout for years, crossing in and ure to get theout of enemy territory collecting intelligence and information that no one else dared obtain.
But when she vanished, everyone knew that she wouldn’t come back. She was marked missing for two weeks before being listed among the presumed dead.
It was a shock when Helena received an emergency summons to the gatehouse after one of the patrols radioed in, claiming to have found her.
Gettlich was grievously wounded. They’d verified that she wasn’t a necrothrall, but it was harder to be sure that it wasn’t a lich trying to infiltrate Headquarters using her wounded corpse.
When she was checked for any signs of a talisman, they’d found anomalous forms of metal distributed through her body, including detectable lumithium.
There were no exceptions to the rules. Anyone found with lumithium would you doinside their body could not enter Headquarters without full restraints.
They strapped Gettlich down while she screamed, begging them not to, promising it was her, but Helena was not allowed to treat her otherwise.
Helena had just stepped forward when the doors burst open and Luc entered, threatening to put his own guards in the ground if they tried to stop him.
Lila stood beside him, weapons ready, conflict written across her face as Luc leaned over Gettlich, indifferent to the danger.
“Gettlich,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I’m so sorry.”
Gettlich calmed then. Luc had that effect on people. She hushed his apologies, called him a silly boy. While Helena worked, unnoticed, she gave her final report. using to lookShe’d been caught while investigating the new lab near the West Port. The Undying had used her as a test subject there, trying to suppress her alchemy.
They’d injected her with metal over the course of days. The experiment was deemed a failure when her organs started to shut down.
The guards ordered to dispose of her had decided to make use of the dying prisoner. They’d taken her out of the building for privacy and left her for dead once they were done.
As Gettlich told Luc all this, Helena verified it. The metal in the blood interfered with Helena’s own resonance, making it blur like static. Her arms and legs were mottled with old bruises from restraints. She was slick withd impressive. blood from the waist down. She would have died from metal poisoning her blood, but the internal damage was going to kill her first.at no one else All the metal interfered with Helena’s vivimancy too much for her to do anything. She had to keep shaking her head each time Luc begged.
Laudanum was all Helena could offer. Relief until it was over.
Gettlich’s heart kept trying to rally whenever Luc spoke, promising that the Eternal Flame would never forget her, that he’d find everyone who’d hurt her. He’d make them all pay.
The Council had to lock Luc in his quarters to keep him from trying to take his battalion and find the lab. The Gettlichs were an old family. Luc hadg to infiltrate known Vanya his entire life.
Because of the circumstances of the death, the traditional mourning and cremation processes were suspended. The body was placed in a secure room, still strapped to the gurney, covered with a sheet.
Helena was summoned to Falcon Matias’s office, a drab little room with no decorations except one very large painting of the sun. She always felt cold in any room that Matias occupied.
“The Council has determined that an autopsy on Gettlich is necessary,”
Matias said without preamble, his face puckering as he looked at Helena.
“You have been selected to perform it.”
“I’m not trained—”
“There are books on the matter. You can ask Surgeon Maier for them,”
Matias said, waving his hand.
“Then shouldn’t Maier be the one to—”
“I am told the state of Gettlich is deeply disturbing. You have already seen it, it will do you no harm to see it again,” he said, cutting her off once more.
“You will be observed throughout to ensure you take no untoward actions.”
His watery blue eyes narrowed. “If you are suspected of any violation of that body, I will have your hands cut off and your soul cursed to sink into the dark fires of the earth. Do I make myself clear?”
He glared at her, sticky strings of saliva visible in his mouth as he spoke.
He only imbibed enough water to survive, considering the demands of the flesh as something to conquer. It was a common idea among those of faith, although Matias took it further than anyone else Helena had ever met.
Helena stood, her stomach knotted in dread. She’d never performed an autopsy.
Gettlich had taught introductory alchemy, one of Helena’s first instructors.
She knew her.
But nothing from Matias was ever a request. His word was law for Helena.
She gave a slow nod.
“The procedure will take place tomorrow, when Sol is at his zenith.”
Matias’s tongue smacked again. “Go purify yourself in preparation.” e who’d hurtHelena left, her head hollow, but there was nothing she could do. She couldn’t bring Luc into this. He was already shattered by the death and trying to takewouldn’t want an autopsy at all, but the Council was right: They needed to know what had been done.
She spent her evening researching autopsy methods until it was time to head to the Outpost. She felt almost comatose with dread and was grateful for a routine to escape to.
Ferron was in his usual place, a tumbler dangling from his fingers, but the furniture in the room had all been shoved to one side. His expression was ways felt coldlanguorous, eyelids lowered, but a sharp, almost silver gleam glittered beneath his lashes.
Helena didn’t ask. She had her own preoccupations.
It was undeniable that he was in one of his moods. There was an edge to him, a strange quality in the way his eyes landed on her when she arrived.
Not his typical resentment.
Helena feigned obliviousness, removing the bandages without a word and studying the wounds. His colouring was almost back to normal, and there was no sign of rot or infection anywhere. Only tiny traces of dead tissue in the immediate area around the symbols.
In a week or so, she might try closing the incisions. Survivable or not, it wasn’t sustainable for him to have a perpetually open injury. As much as he tried to hide behind a routine, she knew he could barely move without into the darkexcruciating pain. She didn’t trust Crowther’s or Ilva’s charity lasting much longer if Kaine was unable to resume spying.
She rested her hand briefly on his shoulder. He shifted but didn’t flinch at all.
“You’re done,” she said quietly as she finished wrapping the bandages and helped him with his shirt.
He said nothing, just stood and poured himself another drink.
She packed up her bag, heading for the door. Usually the necrothrall t instructors.opened it as soon as she was near, but tonight it remained closed.
She stood waiting for a moment before finally looking back towards w for Helena.Kaine, standing by the bar. “I never got around to training you, did I, Marino?”
Her mouth went dry. The room around her was suddenly very present.
She’d known that once Kaine began to feel better, he’d find it necessary to remind her that he was in charge. He so obviously hated feeling vulnerable around anyone. He’d feel the need to put her back in her place.
She’d known, and filed it away as a future concern.
She took a step back.
“Come here.” s grateful forShe shook her head. “I have—I have a procedure tomorrow. You can’t hurt me t-tonight.”
He stilled, and then his knuckles gripped the tumbler, turning white as his expression darkened. “I realise you consider me a complete monster,” he bit out. “But I do generally keep my word. I’m not planning to hurt you. Come here. I want you to try attacking me, so I can see what you know.”
“What?” She stared at him, incredulous.
“You’re travelling at night, outside of Resistance territory.” He was speaking through clenched teeth. “We’ve already established you’re shit at defence. Let’s see your offence. Come. Here.”
She glanced around the cleared space in disbelief. “I’m not going to attack you when you’re injured.”
He stared at her in confusion. “It’s not like I can die.”
She wanted to tell him he was insane but tried to be tactful about it. “Look, Ferron—Kaine—I appreciate the concern, but I’m a vivimancer. I’ll be fine.”
“Will you?”
She gave a sharp nod. “Yes. I might not be the best at defence, but I’ve always got that. So my fighting abilities aren’t something you need to worry about. But”—she drew a deep breath—“I appreciate that you did.”
“I suppose you have a point,” he said slowly, his eyes sliding out of focus.
She heard the door behind her open and gave him one last nod as she turned to go. andages andIn the doorway, instead of the one necrothrall waiting for her, the passage was crowded with them. There were a dozen at least, some old and grey,
others new, their wounds still red.
The blood drained from her head.
“Don’t worry, they’re all mine,” she dimly heard Ferron say. “Now then, let’s see you fight with vivimancy.”
He said something else but she couldn’t hear him anymore. Her eyes were trapped on the necrothralls that were all shuffling into the room towards her.
Their faces blank.
There were so many.
They crowded towards her. She was trapped. Trapped with them. She
couldn’t escape.
They’d all close in.
“You call yourself a vivimancer. Show me.”
She barely heard his words. ou can’t hurtIt’s not the hospital. You’re not in the hospital, she told herself, but every time she tried to breathe, her chest clenched tighter. She managed to step back.
She held one hand out, to ward them off, but it shook violently.
“Marino.” Kaine’s voice was annoyed. “Are you more afraid of thralls than you are of me? I’m actually offended.”
“F-Ferron, call them off,” she said, a tremor in her voice. She couldn’t tear
her eyes away from the necrothralls.
“No. I want to see you fight.”
“I don’t want to fight,” she said, backing away farther. “Stop it. You said I
could say no to things. I’m saying no.”
Her voice was rising.
“They’re corpses. You said you can protect yourself. Show me!” out it. “Look,Her stomach clenched, her legs threatening to give out.
I’ll be fine.”“Let them go.” Her voice shook.
“You take any out, and I’ll burn them.” His tone was sardonic, as if the whole thing were funny. “Come on now. Show me what you’ve got.”
The necrothralls fanned out, backing her into the corner. Her shoulders hit a wall.
“Ferron!” Her voice was sharp, a note of hysteria in it. “Call them off. I don’t want to do this!”
“This is war.” His voice came from somewhere beyond the bodies crowding around her. “You don’t get to want; you get to live or die.”
She shrank back, making herself as small as she could. Her throat was closing, as if fingers were already wrapped around it. They’d slit her wide
open.
She screamed and shoved her hands out.
Everything turned red.
Everything.
She blinked and couldn’t see anything but the dark coagulating blood dripping down her face. It covered her skin, sticking to her lashes. There were no necrothralls now, just bits and pieces of bodies.
Her knees gave out, and she slid down the wall to the floor, gripping the strap of her satchel.
She could taste the blood in her mouth. The scent of decomposition was thick in the air. She was still suffocating, choking on blood and viscera as she
tried to breathe.
Two hard hands gripped her shoulders.
She shoved outwards with her resonance, but it was met and shoved back in so violently that it was like a cannon going off inside her head. of thralls thanHer vision went white, and when it returned Ferron’s face swam before her, except he was glowing. His eyes had gone bright silver. couldn’t tear“What the fuck, Marino?”
Her head was ringing, and she couldn’t form words. She just knelt there, staring at his living face.
“I told you—I didn’t want to,” she finally said. Then her face crumpled,
and she burst into tears.
There was a pause.
“Perhaps I did slightly underestimate you.” He pulled a handkerchief out and wiped her face until there was no more blood clotted in her lashes.
She sat, numb, until he dragged her up from the floor, his arms nearly giving out as he pulled her along to the bathroom.
He pushed her in, twisting a tap to turn on the shower before opening a cabinet and pulling out several towels and some fresh clothes.
“Clean up,” he said.
Helena looked down at herself. She was covered in viscera. It smelled worse than the hospital. All the decomposition. Her throat convulsed.
She stepped into the shower with her clothes on, fingers trembling as she forced herself to remove them, peeling off the wet layers like skin.
It was as if Ferron had found a festering wound and jabbed his fingers into it. Cocooned under the water, she could barely bring herself to step out.
She knew she was only delaying the inevitable as she slowly dried and rebraided her hair, pinning it carefully back into place before looking at the clothes Ferron had left. They were his. Trousers and a shirt.
Did he live here? She pulled them on slowly.
As she stood, carefully fastening the familiar buttons, her shock thinned, her mind resurfacing raw with anger.
When she emerged from the bathroom, she braced herself for the nightmare of blood and gore, but the room had been cleaned. She’d been in the bathroom longer than she’d realised.
The floor had been mopped. Even the furniture had been put back. The viscera as shescent lingered, but visual traces were all gone.
Ferron was seated backwards on the chair, the fingers of one hand pressed against his forehead as if he was dealing with an intense migraine.
She hoped he was.
He looked up, hand dropping languidly away.
“Well,” he said slowly, his enunciation precise. His eyes still had a strange silver gleam to them. “You really are full of surprises.”
The sight of him so unapologetic only added to her brewing rage.
She went over to the bar, pouring herself a generous amount of something from a very fancy-looking bottle.
She sipped it. It was sharp and bitter. She wished she’d chosen something else; she’d always preferred wine, but Ferron didn’t appear to keep any.
Likely not strong enough for his taste.
She braced herself and gulped it, not caring at all about the way it curdled her tongue, burning down her throat and into her empty stomach.
She squeezed her eyes shut and then poured more, drinking it almost as quickly.
She wanted to get drunk as fast as possible. She swirled her fingers, feeling her own body with her resonance, prompting her digestive system to absorb the alcohol a little faster, to get it into her blood before she did something like throwing every single bottle on the wall at Ferron’s head.
She closed her eyes, sinking hard into the warm, blurring relief.
She rarely drank alcohol, and now she was reminded why. It felt so much better to feel like this than the way she actually felt all the time: like a raw nerve.
She gripped the glass, pouring herself a bit more.
“I think that’s enough,” Ferron said behind her. “I don’t believe your liver regenerates.”
She’d only intended to add a little, but at those words she upended the bottle, pouring all the rest into her glass. It sloshed over the side, spilling onto
the rug.
“Fuck off,” she said.
“I didn’t know you could swear.” He sounded amused.
Her jaw clenched, and she turned and told him to fuck off in three more languages.
He arched an eyebrow. “Am I supposed to take you more seriously now?”
“I hate you.”
He gave a strained laugh. “I am aware.”
She looked down at the drink. She wanted to leave—she was tired, jittery, and knocked completely off kilter—but the door was closed again. Ferron clearly intended to keep her. She went over and curled up at the end of the sofa, as far from him as she could get. had a strange“I hate you,” she said again.
“I hate you, too.”
The alcohol had set her tongue loose. “This war is your fault. Everyone who’s died. It’s on your head. And now, because of you, even when it’s over, I’ll still have nothing.”
“Am I supposed to care? Do you think that ruining your life is the worst
thing I’ve ever done?”
She looked away.
“When did you find out you were a vivimancer?” he asked.
She was not drunk enough for that conversation. She gulped more of her drink. She was going to have the most blistering hangover tomorrow.
“I should’ve wondered that sooner, shouldn’t I?” feelingShe said nothing so he kept talking.
“Vivimancy is often a late-onset ability. Mid to late adulthood. Young omething likepeople tend to manifest it as a reaction to a traumatic event. You weren’t surprised at what you did to those thralls, which tells me that wasn’t the first
time you’ve done that. So what did it? What happened to set you off like a bomb?”
Helena tilted her head back, staring at the ceiling. Everything inside her went soft when she was this drunk.
“We thought at the beginning that the usual rules of war would apply. We set up field hospitals so that people wouldn’t have to travel through combat
zones to reach a hospital.”
“The massacres.” spilling ontoShe nodded.
The hospital massacres had been the first major atrocity in the war.
Apollo’s assassination had been devastating, but the massacres were when it all became irrevocably real.
The Undying followed no rules. It was not an “honourable” war. Morrough wanted people to be afraid or dead.
The Guild Assembly defended the attacks, saying that the hospitals were run by the Eternal Flame as covers for military bases, and the surrounding countries swallowed the lie, because it was easier than involving themselves in Paladia’s conflict.
“My father was a Khemish surgeon. Here in Paladia, manual surgery is considered antiquated, so he didn’t have much luck getting a job.” Helena swallowed hard, staring across the room. “When the war started, he wanted to go back to Etras, but I’d promised Luc that I’d stay. When I wouldn’t go, he didn’t, either. The Resistance was setting up the field hospitals. It was my idea—him working there. I thought he’d be safe, and if the people saw how hen it’s over,talented he was, he’d have opportunities—afterwards.”
She gulped more from her drink. The room was swaying.
“I was going to be a combat medic, so I’d volunteer at the hospital while we were training for dispatch. That day—we thought it was poison. All these people came in with fevers. We couldn’t bring them down. One of them, he kept getting hotter and hotter, screaming, ‘Get him out’—and he got violent.
My father sent me to look for someone, and the patient was dead when I got back. They were trying to find a cause of death, and the patient suddenly sat up.” She hiccoughed. “We knew about the Undying regenerating, but we didn’t know about the liches then.”
Her voice was barely more than a whisper.
“They blocked the doors and started killing and reanimating everyone. The necrothralls they made helped them kill faster.” She swallowed. “The hospital
wasn’t equipped. My father—he’d never—he’d only heard about necrothralls. These were colleagues. Patients. I told him they weren’t people anymore, but he still didn’t fight back when they caught him.”
She reached up, pressing her palm against her throat for a moment, her fingers curled, following the thin scar just below her left ear that swept towards her throat.
“He was so gentle. He had this deep voice that would rumble in your chest when he hugged you. He would never have hurt me …”
“The reports said there were no survivors.” Ferron’s voice seemed to come from somewhere far off.
“They didn’t find me right away,” she said dully.
She squeezed the glass in her hand. “All the field hospitals. In one day. ar. MorroughThey killed everyone, nurses, doctors, surgeons, all the patients. And we found out about the liches. And what I was.”
“The liches who infiltrated the hospitals were a failed experiment, I’m told,” Ferron said quietly. “Morrough and Bennet were trying to see if placing talismans inside other living bodies would let the Undying take over and remain alive. But the host bodies always went into shock.”
“Oh,” was all Helena could think to say. Her intoxication had struck; even stringing words together felt arduous, but she struggled through, Gettlich’s he wanted toface floating in her mind. “Do you know what they’re working on now?”
His eyes narrowed. “I don’t hear much beyond rumours presently. Why?”
She looked away. “No reason.”
“Why’d they make you a healer?”
She blinked. “Healing’s efficient. Things that can take weeks or months to recover from, can be fixed in minutes or hours with vivimancy. They needed
someone who could save people.”
Ferron gave a derisive scoff.
Her anger reignited. “You have no idea how hard it is to save someone, to fix all the ways the people like you break them.” She glared at him. “I hope someday you have to try. See how little you think of it then.”
He looked away.
She felt an odd spark of satisfaction.
There was a long silence. Ferron seemed completely lost in his thoughts, and Helena was so drunk she could barely see straight. She closed her eyes, veryone. Thedrifting. When she reopened them, he was staring at her.
“The hospitalShe looked back and couldn’t help but think he looked different now.
Older. Or perhaps she was incredibly intoxicated.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asked, struggling against dizziness. “Do you feel the array? Can you tell it’s affecting you?”
“Yes,” he said with a faint nod. “I didn’t think I could change, but it’s like being cold-forged. I’m gradually being beaten into a new iteration of myself.
It doesn’t countermand who I am, but I feel certain things less than I did. It’s easier to be ruthless and focused, harder to dissuade myself from impulses that align with what I want.” med to comeShe squinted at him. “Why that design? What was Bennet trying to turn
you into?”
“I designed it,” he said quietly.
That information was shocking enough to sober Helena. She sat up.
“It was my punishment,” he said. “I expected it would kill me, but if I survived, I didn’t want them to choose what I became. So I asked to design it, as proof of my penance.”
She sat forward, studying him. She wasn’t imagining it; he was different. It was like witnessing a slow metamorphosis. The effect of the array was likely exacerbated by the delay in healing, the deterioration making him more malleable.
His features had grown more defined, still gaunt from sickness, but it had carved the boyishness from his face. He actually looked like an adult now.
She tilted her head to the side. If she saw him, without the context of who he was, she might find him rather handsome.
The thought made her blink so hard, the room went out of focus.
She stood quickly. “I need to go back; the checkpoints close soon.”
Older. Or perhaps she was incredibly intoxicated.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asked, struggling against dizziness. “Do you feel the array? Can you tell it’s affecting you?”
“Yes,” he said with a faint nod. “I didn’t think I could change, but it’s like being cold-forged. I’m gradually being beaten into a new iteration of myself.
It doesn’t countermand who I am, but I feel certain things less than I did. It’s easier to be ruthless and focused, harder to dissuade myself from impulses that align with what I want.”
She squinted at him. “Why that design? What was Bennet trying to turn
you into?”
“I designed it,” he said quietly.
That information was shocking enough to sober Helena. She sat up.
“It was my punishment,” he said. “I expected it would kill me, but if I survived, I didn’t want them to choose what I became. So I asked to design it, as proof of my penance.”
She sat forward, studying him. She wasn’t imagining it; he was different. It was like witnessing a slow metamorphosis. The effect of the array was likely exacerbated by the delay in healing, the deterioration making him more malleable.
His features had grown more defined, still gaunt from sickness, but it had carved the boyishness from his face. He actually looked like an adult now.
She tilted her head to the side. If she saw him, without the context of who he was, she might find him rather handsome.
The thought made her blink so hard, the room went out of focus.
She stood quickly. “I need to go back; the checkpoints close soon.”