Daud nodded. “I do trust you. And you can trust me. I won’t say anything.”
The cold ache continued to spread up his arm. He lifted his hand and flexed the fingers. The bones of his hand felt like dry twigs. Something was broken. Wincing with effort, he propped himself up again and he carefully pulled his heavy glove off with his other hand. Then he turned his naked hand over, rolling his knuckles as he examined his skin.
The Mark of the Outsider was there, the familiar dull black symbol. But that wasn’t the only mark. His skin was covered with a tracery of black lines, as though his veins were filled with ink. He turned his hand over, the fingers of his other hand running over the marks as he traced them up his wrist. He pulled back his sleeve as far as it would go. The marks went up his arm. It looked like the skeletal structure of a leaf tattooed into his flesh.
Billie pulled at the pouch on her belt. She extracted a vial of light-blue liquid and handed it to Daud. “Here.”
Daud took it from her and examined the vial. “Piero’s?”
“Addermire Solution. Does the same. More, even. Take it, and rest. No one will disturb you here for a while. Your strength will return, in time.”
“But not completely.”
Billie looked at the floor.
“Where will you go now?” asked Daud. “Back to your own time?”
She looked up and nodded. “I have a lot of work to do,” she said, then she turned around and moved to the center of the room.
A blue light appeared, small at first, then growing larger, until a swirling elliptical vortex formed in the room. Daud could only stare as Billie looked over her shoulder at him, then turned and stepped into the vortex.
And then she was gone, and the room was dark, and Daud was alone.
Alone… and sick. It was a strange feeling—the Mark of the Outsider granted him a supernatural constitution, sparing him illness. This new feeling was disconcerting. Alarming.
Feeling the panic build, he screwed his eyes shut and concentrated to center himself.
Then he opened his eyes, twisted the cap off the vial of Addermire Solution, and drained it in a single draft. It tasted sweet and clean, and he felt his mind clear and the strange, cold creep along his arm fade.
He lay back on the couch and let his fatigue claim him. Before he closed his eyes, he felt inside his tunic and pulled out the black mirror shard. He held it in front of his face, and looked at his own reflection in the lantern light. He looked old and tired. As he tilted the mirror, he thought he saw a light, orange and red, and heard the roar of a fire, echoing down the ages.
And then he was asleep.
29
UPPER AVENTA DISTRICT, KARNACA
24th Day, Month of Harvest, 1852
“Spending two years in the company of heretics, the insane, and those rare, black-hearted villains who were truly practitioners of magic, I can say with truth that I have seen such things as to break the minds of most. While the trials and burnings weigh heavily upon my heart, I must chronicle what has been a unique opportunity to witness the multifarious perversions that the Outsider bestows upon those who seek his black council.”
—THE GREAT TRIALS
Excerpt from an Overseer’s findings, by High Overseer Tynan Wallace
“Is it ready?”
The witch’s servant turned to his mistress, Lucinda, and bowed low to the ground, his ragged black cloak pooling out around him. Still bent over, he looked up into her face. He hesitated, afraid perhaps that he had somehow displeased her. He wrung his hands and nodded vigorously.
“All is prepared, my lady,” he said. Almost crawling on the ground, he turned around and pointed toward themansion that clung to the edge of the mountain on the other side of the chasm. “Daud sleeps in the old house. We have but to wake him and the trap is set.”
Lucinda cocked her head, looking at the mansion. The sun was rising, the sky above bruised purple and orange.
A new day. A new beginning.
“I hope it was worth it,” said Caitlin. She was leaning against a low white wall, her arms folded. She stared at her feet, not willing to meet Lucinda’s gaze.
Lucinda padded over to her, then reached down and lifted her head with a finger. Caitlin tried to keep her eyes away from her sister’s, but then she looked up.
“I regret their deaths as much as you do,” said Lucinda.
Caitlin’s lips were pressed firmly together. Lucinda knew the pain she felt—they’d lost two of their number at the Royal Conservatory, a substantial loss considering the coven had scattered after the capture of Breanna Ashworth. Caitlin had fled—Lucinda knew her sister felt guilt over that, but it had been a wise decision. Because yes, it had been worth it. Caitlin had found and recovered some of the lenses of the Oraculum, the Void-touched machine crafted by Breanna, working alongside none other than Kirin Jindosh.
And two fewer witches actually made things easier. With each hour, Lucinda could feel the power slipping away from her. Sharing what little remained among the others was a serious drain, but now she felt she could hold onto the power just a little longer. The lines of ink across her body—more of Breanna’s work—burned and pulsed.
She would need to. The trap would require every last scintilla of power she could summon.
But she didn’t say that to Caitlin. She had not only lost two friends, but a lover, too. Killed by the man who was sleeping so close.
She pointed at the mansion. “But we will have our revenge, believe me. When Daud wakes, he will be ours. It is only a matter of time.”
Caitlin stared up at Lucinda, and then she smiled. She glanced at the prostrate form of Lucinda’s familiar, the twisted little man nothing more than a bundle of rags on the ground.
“What about the final part?”
Lucinda turned
