There was another reason it had to be Kite.
No one else cared for the assassins, and the Coven could feel intention. It was moved by want. The Coven could be rebuilt or destroyed by desire.
Bring me to her kin, thought Kite, her light flickering wildly. I need them.
The Coven revolted, throwing books at her; they burned when they fell through her essence, and came away wet and ruined. This was her punishment for daring to ask. She knew there were enchantments set to keep the prisoners in place. But no one could stop the Heir Rising.
Kite’s light glowed like a spotlight, and books rose from the shelves, floating around her core.
There was a moment of stillness as the world hung, suspended by her desire.
The thread snapped. Books fell as the staircase collapsed, the pages shrieking as they plunged past her.
Then it was just Kite, alone, hovering in an empty space. Her light didn’t mark out the edges. There were no edges. There was only space.
And then a corner. A wall. Her essence started to feel its way into cracks and crevices, casting light on a long, glittering web that hung from the ceiling, glistening with water droplets. The Coven had bent to her will and taken her somewhere new.
It had taken Kite to the graveyard of daughters.
Nineteen
THE HEALER
Eli was different today. Tav could tell. She leaned back, hands resting lightly on Tav’s shoulders. Tav would never admit it out loud, but they missed the heat of Eli’s chest against their back. Eli was stiff, too, like her balance was off. Not the fluid assassin who moved like a dancer, like mist rising over the water in the early morning light.
I’ll have to be strong enough for both of us, they thought. A small smile played at the edges of their mouth. They could feel the magic pulsing in their blood, could see it in their veins and marrow. And now they could use it. Tav leaned their head back and howled at the sky, feeling more alive than they ever had. After a moment, Eli joined in, her hands tightening on Tav’s shoulders.
The city was abandoned; only a few night-shift workers and tired parents would be awake. The Hedge-Witch had staked out a perimeter for them, setting charms and traps and enchantments to ward off any humans. There was no telling what protection would be laid on the Vortex, what guards would be disturbed from their sleep. And Tav wanted to minimize the harm done to their city. At the very least, the illusion spells would keep them from being seen.
They stopped the bike suddenly and jumped off, the obliteration-exhilaration turning into spidery twitches down their muscles and tendons. Eli followed more slowly, carefully, as if she might break.
Girls made of glass can break, thought Tav, frowning. Maybe we should have waited.
But the next moment Eli was flipping a dagger in the air, catching it, and drawing it across the back of her hand.
“Taste?” Her eyes were jet black, shimmering with the fluorescent light cast by a streetlamp.
“No, thanks.”
Eli shrugged. “Suit yourself.” She smeared the blood on the lamppost. The light immediately went dark. Eli sighed, “Much better.”
“Should you be wasting blood like that?”
“It’s mine to waste.”
Cam pulled up behind them in his car. The absence of his usual jazz playlist was conspicuous, but Tav was too nervous to comment on it. “Took you long enough,” they said.
“Not all of us feel comfortable driving on sidewalks,” he said. “Humans have eyes, you know.”
“Not tonight, they don’t. I have it covered.”
His one eyebrow arched elegantly. “You do, do you?”
Eli was licking her wound.
“Focus,” snapped Tav. Eli’s head shot up like a startled animal’s, and her eyes flickered between yellow and back before settling on one crocodile eye and one pure-black eye.
“A little tense, are we?” Cam turned from Tav and toward Eli. He reached out a hand. “Blade me.”
Her mouth twisted in a snarl.
“Sorry?” He stepped back. “I thought —”
She shook her head, the anger passing quickly. “It’s nothing. It’s fine.” She handed him the stone blade.
Tav noticed that it looked more at home in his stone-mottled hand than in hers. Tav could see the contradictory emotions flickering in Eli, as different magics competed for control.
They stood awkwardly for a moment, like a couple of teens with a can of stolen beer.
And then black like ink bled over Eli’s yellow eye. The temperature dropped, an unnatural stillness settling over their bodies. Tav’s arm hairs rose, goosebumps freckling their skin. Tav was sure that even Cam could sense the power that was coming.
Eli was summoning the Vortex. Tav watched as the tension in her muscles was mirrored by a bursting of light and colour, her magic components straining for the home of their birth.
Eli screamed.
They knew better, but Tav automatically reached for her. Cam caught their arm and pulled them back.
“Didn’t you say it’s rude to interrupt someone when they’re tearing a hole in the universe?” His tone was light, but his eyes bored into theirs. “And dangerous.”
Tav ripped their arm out of his grasp, heart racing. “Like you would know.”
His face closed like a curtain.
The magic inside Eli had turned a sickly greygreen, and was spreading like an infection. Her torso, and then neck, arms, and legs were slowly covered by this new kind of magic. The smell of decomposing gardenias filled the air and Tav found themselves retching.
“What’s wrong?”
“Don’t you smell that?” Their eyes were running with the heavy perfume that mixed with mould and dust and the faint chemical sweetness of icing sugar.
“Smell what?”
The greygreen was twisting now, turning into ribbons of light and dark, as if filtered underwater, glowing through skin and bone and granite and hawthorn. The Heart.
The made-girl’s body glowed with this new, unearthly light — the Heart waking up, reaching for its home planet.
Tav frowned. It wasn’t the Heart that would activate the Vortex, it was the fragile shell that was wrapped around it. With the brightness and energy of a small sun, the Heart could burn skin from body as easily as paper. If they reached out now, would Eli unravel onto the pavement into a collection of teeth and petals? They stepped forward again, gripping the obsidian blade.
“What are you doing?” Cam reached for them again, but they dodged his arm.
“Can’t you see it?” Tav turned to him, wide-eyed. “She’s dying.”
“I don’t see anything. But I think you should trust her.”
Tav hesitated. Ground their teeth together. Took a deep breath and tried not to gag. Kept their eyes on Eli.
“I’m not waiting much longer,” they said through gritted teeth. “This could tear her apart.”
“It could tear all of us apart. You told me that, Tav. We all know the risks.”
The scream ended abruptly, like someone slamming a door. An unnatural silence drifted in the corners and edges between their bodies, thick as fog. The ribbons of light and dark and girl and Heart were wriggling now, a mass of worms writhing with hunger.
The blades started to sing. It was a keening, wailing kind of song; it sent waves of homesickness and loneliness through Tav, who suddenly couldn’t breathe. They dropped to one knee. Cam placed a hand on their shoulder. His stones were singing, too. His eyes turned upward to the sky and for a moment Tav could see his eyes turn to two pieces of slate; but then they were human again. They wondered if they had imagined it.
The song ended, and the Vortex opened.
It was colder than Tav remembered. Before, it had felt like nothingness, like the empty space between teeth, or reaching for a hand and finding only shadow. But this time it was cold, and they could see their breath hanging, frosty and glittering with lifeforce.
Sheet lightning flashed in the distance. This wa
s wrong.
The blackness
cracked.
They were back on the street, face down, gravel embedded in their knees, a scrape on their shin oozing plasma and platelets onto the cement. The roar of thunder and hail drowned out the harmonies of the city, the sound of their own heartbeat, everything.
Tav rolled over onto their back and stared up at the sky.
It was torn open.
Through the ragged edges of the universe they could see the angry fires of the City of Eyes oozing across the gap like burning sewage. At the edges, flashes of lightning and black clouds reared up as if protecting the Earth. Rain lashed across their face. The world was ending. They were going to die. Everyone was going to die.
What had gone wrong?
This wasn’t supposed to happen.
That was the only thought Tav could hold on to as they stared into the maelstrom overhead. This wasn’t the invisible passageway between worlds, a hole punched in the fabric of space and time. This was chaos — frayed edges, a tear that was spreading across the universe.
What happened to a world when its magical Heart was gone?
A hand on their arm. Cam’s mouth moving, the sounds lost to the tempest. Tav was dragged to their feet. The smell of perfume and rot was gone, replaced by the bitter herb of fear. It took a moment for them to realize it was their own. Cam was pointing, trying to shout, the stones dark in the rain and hail.
Eli.
A small figure hunched on the ground, as if slowly being crushed by the weight of the other world, torn apart by the warring magics outside and inside her. Somehow keeping it open, keeping them in place. As they watched, a spark burst from Eli’s spine and sputtered on the wet asphalt. When the ember died, Tav could see that it had bloomed into a single perfect rosebud.
Eli’s body was breaking. She couldn’t keep this up much longer. It was up to Tav. Drawing the obsidian blade, the other hand clutching their bike keys for luck, Tav walked into the storm.
Wind clawed at their face, and stabs of lightning on the apocalyptic skyline left white lights streaking across their vision. But they could still sense the magic. They could smell it. They could taste it. They breathed it in, and it filled their lungs like a new morning hatching over the horizon.
Tav stretched their arms out, and the wind whirled around each limb, carrying dust and starving leaves and the stinging bite of gravel to burn their forearms. Still, they walked toward the hole at the centre of everything.
They faced the chasm, and through the gaping mouth that had been the Vortex they could see the fiery stars of the other universe, could see the smoky green sky of the witches’ world, could almost taste the fossils underneath the Coven.
The other world called to them.
Somewhere deep in their bones, in the graceful arc of their spine, in the cells that pumped oxygen through a body that was also a universe, the magic spoke to them. Their heart beat a little faster; their pupils dilated as if with love; their palms turned unconsciously to face the void that was also a pathway to an alien world.
This was their birthright, if only they would reach out and claim it.
A spike of pain burst through the haze. They looked down, breaking eye contact with the void. They saw a long tooth protruding from their leg. The girl clutching the tooth yanked it out again, blood dripping from ravaged gums, from where she had ripped off her own crocodile tooth to use as a weapon. Tav clutched at the wound and their hand was grabbed by another hand, wet with sweat and blood, sticky as a child’s.
“You are the Healer,” said Eli.
“I hate that name,” said Tav, allowing Eli to press their entwined hands over the wound. Tav closed their eyes and felt the skin stitch itself back together. When they opened their eyes again, a single wisp of steam curled up from smooth skin.
“I can taste the Vortex,” they said.
“Spit it out,” said Eli, still too weak to stand.
They spat, and the berry-black liquid turned to crystallized salt on the cement, killing the weeds that had managed to survive generations of toxins and human feet.
“They’re coming!” Cam stepped in front of Tav, using his body as a shield, wielding the stone blade like it was an extension of his own body.
Shrieks in the distance.
The lightning strikes were coming closer. The lamppost marked with Eli’s blood was struck, and it emitted a hissing sound as steam poured over the square.
From under the lamppost a creature emerged. It was forged from metal and brass, its hinges squeaky from decades of neglected rust. An animal? A machine? Soon, three more creatures appeared from lightning strikes, circling the trio.
Tav swallowed, eyes darting from creature to creature, looking for an escape route. Looking for allies.
They were trapped.
Twenty
THE HEIR
Then —
When she was small, her mother had called for her. “I am going to teach you a lesson,” said the Witch Lord. Kite had been curious and unafraid. “I will teach you how to shed your skin and free your essence.”
And then she had torn the flesh from Kite’s body, until only a quivering bluegreen light remained.
“Now dress yourself,” commanded the Witch Lord.
Leaving her skin had been painful, but slipping back into her body was somehow worse, making her head spin and her stomach churn. Kite had dragged herself to the Children’s Lair and collapsed on the stone floor, hugging her knees to her chest and spitting up ash. Clytemnestra had the children take turns throwing buckets of seawater over her prone form. None of them spoke to her. They, too, knew that she was marked as the Heir. She was not truly one of them.
Now —
There were no books here.
Slowly, Kite’s body unravelled itself over her essence and her feet touched a stone floor. She had learned to master the sickness of transformation. The dizziness no longer made her crawl, and the nausea no longer emptied her body. She crouched on the floor, trembling.
“Beast,” she managed, choking on her words and the dirt in her lungs. “Beast.”
His soft fur against her damp arm; his tongue on her face, licking salt crystals from her cheekbones.
After a moment she stood. They followed the rumour down narrow pathways and twisting stairs of rotted roots, down into the depths of the earth. Past walls and wards and hand-carved eyes that rolled wildly in sockets of copper and silk. And between luck and want and the lingering scent of human blood, Kite found her way into a network of tunnels that ached with unused magic.
The Beast nipped at her hand, and she stroked him gently. “We’re getting closer,” she said. “My ankles sing with sorrow.”
The air was sweet down here and smelled of lavender and sugar. Kite felt lulled by the scent. The Beast kept trying to take bites out of the air. Kite’s fingers trailed through a net of verdant lace and came away wet and sticky. She stuck her finger in her mouth and sucked. The taste was sweet as honey, but with the bitter aftertaste of soured tears — the kind held in too long, and shed years too late, raw pain fermented by regret and denial.
The Beast whined.
Sighing at his impatience, Kite offered him a handful of moss. He shied away from her outstretched hand and refused to eat it.
“Clever boy,” she whispered. “You don’t want to eat the dead.”
She ate the handful of moss and contemplated the garden of a prison. The caverns here were covered in yellowgreen vines and leaves. Blossoms the size of dinner plates studded the lush walls. It was a different world.
There were no guards down here.
She walked along, feeling the moss break down in her body. Something about ingesting it made her feel closer to the furred stone, to the damp pools of stagnant water that welled in leaves impossibly growing underground. Fed by materials no longer needed by the Coven.
Fed by the bodies of shadow assassins, failed daughters. Repurposed by violent magic and fed to the Coven, life giving life.
There was something beautiful about the cycle, even as its brutality registered like a faint feather brushing the back of her neck, or a voice whispering in her ear. My sisters …
A sudden sickness twisted her stomach, and Kite vomited the tangled mass of green. From beneath the wet, darkened strands, a single rose petal burned red as a morning sky.
Wiping the bile from her mouth, Kite’s eyes flashed with electricity and wonder. She reached down and grasped the petal, letting it rest in her palm. It glowed at her touch, as if waking up.
A smile snaked its way across Kite’s face.
Sometimes the dead don’t stay buried.
Twenty-One
THE HEART
The beasts prowled on four paws, their iron bodies creaking with age. A few sheets of metal peeled away from one’s haunches, curling into a sharp, rusted edge. Teeth like saw blades. Nails protruding from the spine. Weapons meant to harm.
Eli stumbled to her feet, releasing Tav’s hand. She could still feel the beat of their pulse — a rhythm that was dangerously compelling, that made Eli want to bite their wrist and send shivers of electricity through the boi’s body. They could be electric together.
Eli took those bright, strange feelings and channelled them into her attack. She launched herself without warning at the closest beast, her limbs rejuvenated by Tav’s touch — perhaps they had healed her, too — losing herself to the familiar bloodlust of a good fight.
“Wait!” Tav cried, but their voice was lost in the winds. Another crack of thunder rang out like an omen of death.
But Eli was lost in the dance of battle, muscle thrown against metal, hawthorn tearing at rust. The crocodile tooth, still stained with Tav’s blood, punctured the metal torso again and again as Eli wrestled with the creature, hands slippery with blood and oil. Sweat dripped into her eyes, and she could smell the stink of old iron and mouldy gears. She would tear it apart piece by piece, she would fashion a new blade from its corpse —
She was sitting in a pile of scrap metal.
Eli blinked and looked down. Blood pooled under her nails. Four had been ripped clean off. She could feel the scrape of metal in her throat and suddenly felt sick.
The Boi of Feather and Steel Page 8
