Books & Bone

by Victoria Corva

  All the while, Ree’s chest grew tighter at the thought of what awaited them. Daylight, which she hadn’t been properly exposed to in months. Fresh air. Magic, she hoped. Failure, she feared.

  They finally rounded a corner into a narrow stone doorway, the walls carved with sprawling constellations. The Lovers, the Paladin, the Gentle Beast. All images that she knew better from books than from the sky.

  ‘This is it,’ she said. She looked over her shoulder at Smythe, who had Larry’s arm and was helping him up the step.

  Larry tripped up onto the landing and Smythe dusted his hands. His eyebrows pinched as he took in the doorway. ‘This is the tower, is it?’ He walked over and ran his hands gently along the carvings, his fingers following the grooves. ‘Ethian stonework,’ he murmured. He raised an eyebrow at Ree. ‘Was it a temple? Or — perhaps an observatory of some kind?’

  Ree held in a smile. ‘You’re the historian.’

  ‘I AM the historian, aren’t I?’ Smythe held nothing back. Sometimes she wondered how he didn’t actually light up whatever room he was in. His smiles could surely be harvested as an energy source. ‘But you’re the clever one. Well — the cleverer one, obviously I’m rather impressive myself.’ He chortled in a way that was only half self-deprecating.

  Something loosened inside Ree. He was always saying things like that: that she was clever, that she probably knew better than he did. He was a highly qualified scholar (as he never failed to mention) but he still thought so highly of her. Nobody had ever had this level of confidence in her. It made her feel more confident in herself.

  ‘Well, I don’t really know,’ she said. ‘The furnishings were plundered years ago, and the upper levels have mostly crumbled. If I had to guess — observatory.’

  ‘Because it must have been at least somewhat open to the sky to have crumbled in a few hundred years?’

  Ree smiled. ‘That, and I want it to be.’

  Smythe laughed and straightened his glasses.

  The interior of the tower was sparse. Some wood mulch that might have been from broken chairs and tables, bare stone floors, and a tight spiral staircase. ‘Stay here, Larry.’ She took the minion by the shoulders and stood him against the wall.

  Larry grunted questioningly.

  ‘There’s daylight up there.’ Maybe whatever strange magic the Lich had imbued Larry with would protect him from sunlight, but she’d seen too many minions stripped of their unlife under those harsh rays to take the risk. ‘Just — stay here, all right?’

  As she stepped away, Larry started to follow. She pushed him back. ‘No. Stay.’ She waved her finger, her expression stern.

  Smythe clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Cheer up, old chap! We’ll be back before you know it. Hey! Enough of that!’ He snatched his hand away before Larry could bite it.

  And then they were up the staircase, following a tight, claustrophobic spiral. She could feel the air warm as they ascended. A bubble of anticipation popped in her chest. She didn’t know how to feel. She only knew that it felt like something big was happening.

  And then, she felt her darkvision fading. Colour seeped back into the world and she squinted her eyes against the brightness of it. Behind her, she heard Smythe heave a sigh.

  The staircase ended on a wide platform. There were a few semi-destroyed columns of stacked stone; brightly coloured shards of glass littered the floor. But for Ree, her eyes immediately trended up, beyond the rocky mountainside, beyond the horizon and the distant hills, and up to a sky that was blue and cloudy and so bright it hurt.

  Smythe stepped up beside her. She could hear his breath catch. He shaded his eyes, gazing at the long view of the upworld shrinking into the distance. ‘Beautiful,’ he murmured. Then he closed his eyes and turned up his face to the sky. His curls tumbled back from his face. ‘I’d almost forgotten the feeling of sunlight. There’s nothing quite like it.’

  ‘No,’ said Ree. Since he couldn’t see, she set her smile free. They stood together a moment, just feeling the sunlight and studying the sky. It made Ree’s eyes water, but she didn’t much mind.

  ‘I can see what you mean,’ Smythe said. ‘About wanting this to be an observatory. I mean — it’s terrible scholarly method, but I see what you mean.’

  Ree nodded and bit her lip in thought. She chased around for the words she needed. ‘It’s a place where the whole sky is cracked open. The perfect place to watch.’

  Smythe glanced at her. ‘And you’ve a natural bent to observation.’

  ‘Do I?’

  ‘Well, I did catch you spying on me, the first time we met.’

  Ree shook her head. ‘I’m pretty sure I caught you misidentifying organs.’

  He smiled, then turned serious. ‘I suppose I owe you an apology.’

  Ree turned her head slightly. ‘It’s fine, I didn’t really mind.’

  ‘No — not for the organs. For calling you an undead creature.’

  He was looking at her so earnestly now. Ree’s cheeks were burning; she thanked the gods for the hundredth time that her blushes didn’t show. How many times had she obsessed over him mistaking her for a minion?

  ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘It’s not. I was surprised and — well, more than a little scared. But even then I thought you seemed — I mean, you were much more, um, attractive than I thought an undead would —’

  ‘Smythe.’ Ree’s face was actually on fire. Surely no amount of necromancy could hide this blush.

  ‘Right, right.’ He was blushing now, too, a faint pinkish-grey rising in his cheeks. ‘That … didn’t really come out right. I just felt I owed you an apology.’

  Ree nodded, not sure whether it would be better or worse to meet his eyes. ‘Well, thank you. Apology accepted.’

  ‘Excellent.’

  ‘Great.’

  Ree smoothed her robes and looked up and around. ‘So, according to our notes we need an animal.’ And now, up here, they had the entire upworld to search for one.

  Smythe cleared his throat. ‘A bird.’ He gave her a slightly embarrassed smile. ‘You said you wanted to fly.’

  She tried to keep her smile inside, but judging by the warmth in his eyes, she didn’t think she managed it. ‘You take the south east. I’ll take the north west.’

  And they began their watch. Ree had thought her eyes would adjust to the sunlight, but it was so much brighter than even a torchlit room that she found her eyes still watering an hour later. She saw many specks of movement — distant birds of prey circling, and scurrying animals among the rocky brush, but for a long time, nothing really came close.

  But animals were skittish. In the crypt, the only animals she’d really encountered were rats, spiders, and sometimes fish, but stillness seemed to be key in getting them to approach. So, like she was trying to coax a rat with a handful of millet, she sat very still, let her breath come deep and slow, and waited.

  Surprisingly, Smythe didn’t speak. Whether he, too, knew to wait in stillness or he was deep in thought, she didn’t know. She resisted the urge to look over at him; staring at the back of his head would do very little to change the situation. But she wondered what he was thinking. She wondered if he was thinking of her.

  ‘You were much more attractive than I thought an undead would be.’

  The words still made her blush, though whether more from pleasure or horror, she found it hard to tell. Certainly, it had embarrassed her, and yet she couldn’t stop reliving the conversation in her head.

  Then: ‘Ree!’ The words were barely more than a whisper. He didn’t look at her; his eyes were fixed on a point in the sky. Ree followed his gaze up to a bird with a long beak and sweeping black wings.

  The crow circled above them. It appeared to be alone, though she’d thought crows usually flocked together. It was a beautiful creature, glossy-feathered and sleek in build with splayed wingtips. It dodged and played in the air, looking down at them with beady eyes, so at ease in its element that Ree’s heart ached at the thought of
killing it.

  Not that she really knew how they might kill it, but before Ree could put that concern into words, the crow swooped in low to alight on one of the crumbling columns and Smythe threw out his arm. A flash of red-and-black magic arced from his hand to hit the crow in the chest. It immediately went limp and fell from its perch.

  They both scrambled over to it. ‘It’s dead.’ Smythe looked up at her with wide eyes.

  Ree held in a sigh. ‘Yes. You killed it.’

  Smythe crouched down by the fallen bird. ‘I mean, I know that but — well, I’ve never killed anything before.’ He reached trembling fingers over to the fallen bird. ‘Still warm.’ He quickly retracted his hand. He looked greyer than usual, even as his power drained from him.

  Ree hesitated, not sure what to say. He looked … smaller. Frailer, somehow. His shoulders sharp and pulled in, his eyes bleak as he studied the lifeless body of feather and bone on the ground. She settled for: ‘Are you alright?’ She studied him closely, anxiety pecking at her. ‘It can be a harrowing thing, to take a life. Some necromancers never do, not even animals.’

  ‘No, it’s — look, I’m fine. Really.’ He took a shuddering breath, meeting her eyes for the first time since the bird fell. ‘I just didn’t expect it, is all. Its life was sacrificed for a good cause.’ He smoothed the feathers on its wing. ‘What now?’

  He didn’t look fine. He looked … she wasn’t sure. Shaken, perhaps. Alert. But if he wanted to move on, then they would move on. There was little enough time as it was.

  ‘Now, we skin it,’ she said. ‘I think my mother has a skinning knife. We can start with that.’

  I repaired my hawkskin again today. I know that it is old, and that it is inefficient to use it now, but I cannot bear to replace it. Every time I wear it, I remember that first time. The moment I became a therianthrope, with a song in my throat and a knife in my hand.

  There is nothing in the world like that first moment. It is a unique act of worship.

  ~from the journal of Wylandriah Witch-feather

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  STEALING FROM THE FUTURE

  Ree had never known what it was like to practice the Craft, but she wondered if this was like it. This reverent feeling as she followed her mother’s instructions, gently snicking the ties between the skin and the flesh, separating hide and feathers from fat and muscles.

  ‘Keep it whole,’ her mother warned. ‘It won’t do much good if you slice it full of holes.’

  Her mother had been a hunter’s daughter, long ago. Before Tombtown, before even Ree’s father. She’d told Ree of it once, when she was a little girl. Of the feeling of goose feather fletching scratching her cheek, and hot, sticky flesh under her hands, and blood soaking the ground black. She hadn’t known Morrin then, but she’d felt her priestess all the same, thanking nature itself for the life it provided that she might use its death.

  Ree could see how her mother found this holy. Her hands found every part of the body, peeling away strings of fat, weighing the organs in her palm. The heart, as small and weighted as a lead pellet, she could just pinch between her fingers, and feel the strength that had been there once.

  Smythe hovered anxiously as she worked, and she could practically see him biting his tongue every time her hand wavered, every time the tip of the small, curved knife threatened to puncture the skin. But he held himself in check; she wondered if he knew how important this was to her, how deeply she felt the quiet in her bones.

  ‘Then we stretch it and dry it,’ said her mother. ‘Careful of the feathers.’

  Ree picked up the skin, so loose and limp in her hands, the feathers like silk against her fingertips. Under her mother’s instruction, they stretched and pegged the skin, careful not to stretch it far enough to dislodge the feathers. As she worked, Ree sang an incantation from the book written by Wylandriah herself. She could feel the power rising in her chest and curling around her tongue. As she passed her hand over the skin, the feathers straightened and steadied, cohering to the skin. An answering prickle ran across her arms and down her spine.

  That would speed the drying process, but it would still be maybe eight hours before the skin was ready for the next stage. Ree looked around at her family home, now caked in blood and scattered eviscera, as it was before her father had been elected to the council and given access to his own workshop in the town. ‘I need to stay with it,’ she said, looking up at her mother. ‘Is that all right?’

  Her mother looked down at her, her eyes dark through her priestess paint, her hair a wiry storm cloud about her head. ‘I’ll tend the chapel. And I don’t think your father will be back for some time. Morrin’s eye upon your work; her hand in your success.’

  ‘My heart in her hand,’ Ree replied, finishing the blessing. Her mother straightened; her priestess’ robes were splattered with gore, making her look as if she’d been savaged by some wild animal, but her poise was such that she appeared more like a queen in royal garb. She inclined her head to Ree, and swept from the house, gently clicking the door closed behind her.

  ‘And now we wait,’ Smythe said. The sound of his voice, after so long of silence, made her heart leap in her chest.

  ‘And now we wait,’ she agreed.

  The hours passed, slow and stiff. She sat with her legs crossed and her hands flat on her thighs. Smythe came and went from her side, but never left the room, often touching her shoulder in silent solidarity.

  She wondered if he could see her anxiety in the ramrod straightness of her back or in the tight lines of her shoulders. She wondered if he knew how afraid she was that this wouldn’t work. That after all they had done and all they had sacrificed, therianthropy was really dead and she would never become anyone of note.

  Maybe her father had instilled more necromantic principals in her than he’d realised. Ree was very afraid of dying unknown and unremembered. She wanted to be immortal. She wanted at least for her name to be immortal.

  She knew the very moment the skin was ready. She could feel it like a hook in her gut, pulling her toward it.

  Smythe stirred sleepily as she rose. At some point, he’d fallen asleep, propped against the wall. Her movements were stiff, her muscles screaming protest at this sudden and awkward use, but she took the skin gently in her hands. Cold radiated from it, as icy and sharp as any necromancer’s Craft.

  She took it and smoothed it, and oiled it in a special concoction her mother had helped her make, following the directions of her notes. She sang as she oiled it, and sang more still as she sewed it tight using her own hair as thread. Though no song was required, she continued to hum as she painted the ancient runes on it as instructed in Wylandriah’s guide, her hands trembling from such slow and deliberate strokes. Where her physical skills failed, her magic took up the slack, sealing and smoothing and stitching. She could feel it seeping out of her, like blood squeezed from a cut. It left her skin chill and her lungs icy and at times almost faint. But it was magic, her magic. And if this didn’t work, it might be the only magic she ever did.

  When it was done, she held in her hands a small hollow crow, as if it had been made of cloth and never stuffed. She looked up and met Smythe’s eyes. He pushed his hair out of his eyes and looked a question at her.

  She took a deep breath. If her notes were correct, this was all she needed. Therianthropy was a sister to the Craft, the art of reshaping death into a new form. Necromancy was a chant, but therianthropy was a song, and she had sung it as well as she knew.

  The memory of her failed attempts still weighed on her. She didn’t know if she could face that kind of disappointment now, after all that she had learned and all she had gone through.

  But the skin felt right in her hands. Surely this time it would work.

  She drew her magic around her, closing her eyes against the whirlpool that closed in and cocooned her. The crow skin in her hands fluttered and filled. All the energy in her body focused into a cold pool in her chest. She could sense Smythe hovering,
feel the awe rolling off him.

  The door crashed open. Ree lost concentration; her magic fell in tatters around her, splashing onto the floor and dispersing. She stared as Usther lowered her boot and stepped smoothly into the room.

  ‘I just saw Emberlon leaving the archives.’ Her eyes swept from Ree to Smythe, taking in the gore and mess of the room, to settle on the small bundle of hide and feathers in Ree’s hands. She sniffed. ‘Am I interrupting something?’

  Ree stared at the skin in her hands, no longer filled with magic, just a limp stretch of hide and feathers. For a moment, she struggled with herself. The pool in her chest was gone, as was the sense of her entire self being concentrated into one tight place. She had been on the very cusp of shifting. Or failing.

  But every minute wasted sent her closer to her death.

  She drew a shuddering breath. ‘Nothing that can’t wait until our lives aren’t in danger.’

  They found Emberlon at his house. It didn’t take long to convince him of the danger they were in once they showed him their marks, but it did take a little longer to explain how it had all come about.

  ‘Time travel,’ he murmured, sitting back in his lone rickety chair while he digested all they had told him. He looked thinner than usual — his dark skin under a thicker sheen of grey, his eyes and cheeks more hollow. Likely, he’d had a fight on his hands during his travels, but he didn’t seem to feel the need to bring it up. ‘In all my time here, you’d think I’d have seen it all by now, but this town never ceases to surprise me.’

  ‘It’s rather urgent that we get a look at this tablet so we can decide how best to defuse this curse,’ said Smythe. His eyes had the mad shine they got when he was summoning — he really did think he would find a way out of it for them.

  Emberlon gave Smythe a long look. ‘I swore when I found it that I would put it away where nobody would find it.’

  ‘But it might be the only chance we have of breaking the curse,’ said Ree.