by Caitlin Seal
Imagining what sort of tests the necromancer might subject her to made Naya’s skin crawl. She looked away, but there was nowhere safe to cast her eyes that didn’t remind her of what this place was—and of what she’d become. “Very well, Madame Laroke,” she said softly. Her throat closed around the words, but if she had to get used to pretending to be this woman’s servant, better to start now.
“Please, just Lucia is fine.” Lucia wrinkled her nose. “I don’t know what’s usual for an indentured servant, but I’m not fond of formal titles. It will only draw more attention if people hear you calling me that.”
Naya nodded. “Very well, Miss Lucia.” Back in Talmir, no servant, indentured or otherwise, would ever call her employer by their first name. Were things different in Ceramor, or was Lucia just eccentric?
Lucia pressed her lips together like she’d just tasted something bitter. “Close enough I suppose. I need a few hours to recover from the singing. Until then I suggest you stay inside.” She rubbed the bridge of her nose, and her mouth stretched in a half-suppressed yawn. “You’re welcome to look through any of the books while you wait, but please don’t touch anything else. Wake me if you experience any sudden changes. Oh, and your personal effects are in that pouch on the counter.”
Naya’s eyes widened at the mention of the pouch. Her fingers darted to her throat in search of her mother’s pendant and found nothing. How could she not have noticed its absence? Naya snatched the bag off the counter. She turned it over and sifted through the more ordinary objects—coins, pens, ink, and a small knife—before she spotted the gleam of the pendant.
“Would you like help?” Lucia asked.
“No!” Naya fumbled the clasp in her haste to open it. Finally her fingers found the latch and she closed the chain around her neck. Her shoulders relaxed as the familiar weight of the pendant settled just below her collarbone. She glanced up to see Lucia watching her. Lucia looked like she was going to ask something, but instead she rubbed her eyes.
“Well, it seems we’re in this together now. As I said, wake me if you experience any sudden changes.”
Naya kept her eyes fixed on Lucia as the necromancer shuffled toward a door in the side of the workroom. She waited in tense silence until she could no longer hear the creak of the stairs. When all was still, she wrapped her fingers tight around the pendant. She closed her eyes and let the sound of the rain wash over her, trying to make sense of the strange nightmare she had fallen into.
As the steady drum of rain filled her ears, her thoughts wandered back to the first voyage she’d made with her father. It had been the summer just after her fifteenth birthday and her father had finally agreed to pull her from the academy and begin her apprenticeship. They’d sailed into a storm two days out, one strong enough to make the Gallant rock as it plunged into the troughs of the waves. Each flash of lightning had exposed new shapes in the churning clouds. Naya had ignored her father’s warnings and sneaked from the cabin. She’d strapped her safety line to the mast and stood grinning into the sheets of rain. The pitch of the deck had made her heart leap, and the thunder had sung in her bones. She knew she should have been afraid. But after years of bowing her head and learning to navigate between the nobles’ heirs, who knew she didn’t belong, and the tutors, who only tolerated her because they feared her father, she couldn’t be scared of a little storm. Naya opened her eyes and felt her smile fade as the empty workroom replaced the memory of the storm.
She walked toward the window. It was dark out—a few hours from dawn, if the clock on the wall told true. The window’s rain-washed glass only showed her wavering reflection. The face that looked back was hers: hazel eyes, thin lips, expression tight with fear. The hair framing that face was the same curly brown mess it’d always been. She wrinkled her nose and saw the reflected monster do the same.
Naya shuddered and turned away. It wasn’t right. Monsters should look like monsters.
She looked back at the workroom, with its shelves stuffed full of jars of who-knew-what and black-bound books. She paced the length of the room, her steps making no sound against the stone. Even just walking, she could feel the grace in her strange new limbs. Her skin buzzed with power that begged to be unleashed. It made her want to scream. It made her want to run laughing through the rain. All her life she’d heard stories about the twisted creatures the necromancers of Ceramor spawned from the remains of their countrymen. The stories varied, but one fact remained the same: the undead weren’t human anymore, no matter how well they faked it.
Naya still felt human. She didn’t feel consumed by monstrous urges, but would she even be able to tell if she was?
She bit her lip, then turned to face the door. The smart thing to do would be to wait here until morning. But as convincing as Valn’s story had seemed, a part of her still couldn’t believe it. She imagined her father waiting for her on the deck of the Gallant, staring out through the rain and wondering where she’d gone. Naya glanced again at the monster reflected in the window. If she stayed here with nothing to distract her save the unanswered questions darting through her mind like swallows, she’d go mad.
No. Lucia had trapped her soul in this form, but she wouldn’t stay trapped in this room, waiting on the necromancer’s pleasure. She would go to the docks and see for herself if the Gallant had truly sailed. With one final glance at the stairs, she hurried for the door.
The rain hit her, soaking her clothes and running off her skin. Naya breathed deep, savoring the smell of wet wood and stone. Between the pouring drops and the steady blue-white light of the rune lamps lining the street, the city looked almost like it had been plunged underwater. She hesitated on the doorstep, fear creeping up her throat as she stared out at the darkened streets of the strange city.
Then she laughed, the sound perilously close to a sob. She was already dead, already resurrected as a monster. What more could this place do to her? She shot a defiant glare back at the necromancer’s shop, then hurried out into the night. Little streams gurgled in the gutters and Naya followed them. Finding the docks would be simpler than her search for Selleno’s house. She needed only follow the water downhill, until she reached the coast.
The rain and dark dimmed Belavine’s brilliant colors, and the houses loomed over her. Naya could barely see a dozen steps ahead. As she left the hills, the road got wider and flatter. The buildings here were bigger, but still mostly constructed from wood and coated in peeling paint. Many had iron grates shaped like vines or flowers covering the lower windows. Music and tipsy laughter rang out from an open door, and here or there she saw a slumped and swaying figure hurrying through the rain. She felt their eyes following her as she passed them. She shivered, quickening her pace.
Relief flooded through her when she finally heard the rumble of the tide grinding against the pebbled shore. She came to a wide road hemmed in on one side by what looked like warehouses, and on the other by the sea. Up ahead the bay curved gently. The lights of the docks and the ship lanterns floated above the water just a little ways ahead. In the dark she couldn’t guess if any one of them was the Gallant. She broke into a run. For an instant her hopes soared. Maybe Valn had been wrong. Maybe the Gallant hadn’t left yet.
As soon as she reached the glow of the dock lamps, though, she knew it wasn’t so. A few small fishing boats huddled behind the seawall surrounding the docks. Farther out, four vessels sat at anchor. One was a big trading ship with three masts, a wide hull, and a high stern. But even from here the fat shape looked nothing like her father’s narrow Gallant.
A sob escaped her lips. No. She ran toward the nearest dock.
“Hey, what the—?” someone shouted behind her in Ceramoran.
Naya spun, struggling to keep her footing on the wet ground. The speaker, a man almost entirely covered by an oilskin cloak, hurried toward her. He held a lantern in one hand. Bright light seeped from the runes carved in the metal plates behind the glass
. When he got close, Naya saw a sailor’s craggy face with a drooping black mustache peeking out from under the cloak’s hood. “What do you think you’re doing out here, girl?”
“There was a ship here from Talmir, the Gallant. Do you know when it sailed?”
The man’s bushy eyebrows came together. “Aye, sure, just yesterday. They left in quite a hurry.” He frowned. “Why’re you asking ’bout the Gallant?” His eyes trailed up her sodden skirts to the too-thin vest and blouse plastered against her breasts.
Naya took a step back. “Yesterday? You’re sure?”
“Course. Now listen here, I think you’d better be coming with me. Little thing like you shouldn’t be out here on your own.” He reached for Naya’s wrist. Her mind flashed back to the alley, and she leapt away.
“Wait,” the man called, but Naya was already sprinting back along the coast. When the light of the docks was far behind her, she glanced over her shoulder. Nothing. The man hadn’t followed. In the distance she could still just make out the dark shapes of the ships at anchor. The sight of them wrenched at her chest.
A full day had passed since the Gallant had left for Talmir. So it was true, then. Her father had sailed without her. Abandoned her.
Naya wasn’t sure how long she stood staring at the ships. Cold rain soaked her clothes, but she didn’t feel chilled. Numbness crept through her and this time she welcomed it. Her shoes squelched as she turned toward the necromancer-infested shore. Valn must have spoken true. Even if she’d failed to return to the ship on time, her father wouldn’t have left without trying to learn her fate. His leaving was a message, and this business with Valn was her real test. Naya focused all her energy on that thought as she trudged back up the hill.
By the time Naya found her way back to the necromancer’s shop, the rain had worn itself down to a drizzle and dawn’s glow shone through the clouds above the eastern mountains. Her steps had grown sluggish during the last half hour of walking. She wasn’t winded. Her legs didn’t burn, nor did her pulse pound. But a steady ache radiated from her left hand. The necromancer had said something about that hand, some nonsense about bones and bindings. Still, why should running make her hand hurt?
She’d examined her conversation with Valn a dozen times on the walk back up the hill, but it still didn’t feel real. She was in Ceramor. Her father had abandoned her. She was dead. Naya reached for her necklace. As her fingers traced the design, a memory surfaced, worn around the edges like the pages of an old book, but still strong enough to make her chest ache.
It had been just a few weeks after her seventh birthday. Her mother lay in a narrow bed, covered up to her chest in rough wool blankets even though the air in the room was hot and stuffy. Naya sat on a stool by the bed, watching the incremental rise and fall of the blankets as her mother struggled for breath. “I don’t understand,” Naya whispered as she rubbed one finger along the withered flesh of her mother’s thumb.
Her mother smiled. “Everything’s going to be fine, little bird. Your father will—”
“He’s not my father.”
Little wrinkles appeared in her mother’s brow. “He is. I know he hasn’t been here, but he knows about you now and—” Her words were cut off by a fit of coughing. Naya scrambled for the water pitcher. When she returned with a wooden cup, fresh red dots speckled her mother’s lips. Naya held her mother’s head as she took the water in tiny sips. When she’d finished, she continued talking as though nothing had happened. “You’re going to love the new house, little bird. You’ll have your own room and the very best tutors and all the rhubarb jam you can eat.”
“But why aren’t you coming with me?”
Her mother lifted one hand to run her fingers over Naya’s curls. “You heard the doctor. I can’t be moving right now. But I’ll see you again. I promise.”
She’d died two days later, while Naya slept on silk sheets in a new house even bigger than the tavern where her mother had worked. The Dawning keepers had promised that if Naya was good, she’d see her mother again on the other side of death. The keepers spent their lives studying and preaching the Creator’s word. They ought to have known as much as any mortal could about the afterlife. But Naya had seen death. There’d been only blackness and cold tides and the irresistible pull of the necromancer’s song.
Naya closed her eyes and willed the memory away. The pendant dug into her hand as she imagined folding her fears into a tiny square, then placing that square inside a box. The box she locked and shoved deep under the big canopied bed in her room back in Lith Lor. Her father was the one who’d taught her the trick. He’d said once that bad memories could make you strong. They could burn inside and keep you warm when it seemed like the rest of the world had gone cold. But not all bad memories could be so used. Some were more like broken glass buried in your heel, bringing pain with every step. Those you had to lock away until time could grind them down and make them safe to touch.
Her father couldn’t have known the dangers when he sent her into the city alone. He’d given her a task, and the only thing to do was finish it. She could not let the truth of what she had become be a spike of glass in her heel. She would lock it away and she would do what needed to be done.
Naya let herself back into Lucia’s shop as quietly as she could. She passed through the shop’s small front room, empty save for a desk and a few uncomfortable-looking chairs pushed against the walls. The workroom beyond was dark and quiet. Naya stood in the doorway, listening to the slow drip of rainwater from her soaked clothes. If she were to masquerade as the necromancer’s servant, she would probably have to live here. That was not a comforting thought.
Suddenly desperate for light, Naya ran to the room’s single window and jerked the curtain open. The heavy fabric caught the edge of a jar and knocked it over. Before Naya could catch it, the jar rolled off the edge of the counter and smashed against the floor. Naya winced at the sudden noise. The pale morning light showed glass shards and dried herbs scattered all across the floor. She’d just begun searching for a broom to sweep up the mess when she heard the creak of footsteps on the stairs.
Lucia came into the room, wearing a sleeping robe and a worried expression. Her eyes widened as she seemed to take in Naya’s dripping clothes and the broken jar. “Why are your clothes wet?” the necromancer asked after several agonizing seconds of silence.
“I went to the docks,” Naya muttered.
“The docks.” Lucia repeated the word as though she were sounding it out, as though she’d never heard anything so absurd. She took a deep breath. “What in the Creator’s name were you thinking going out there? And what were you doing at…no, wait, never mind. I don’t want to know.”
Naya frowned. How much did Lucia know about her identity? Last night she’d seemed afraid of Valn. She’d followed his orders, but it was hard to believe a necromancer would willingly serve a Talmiran spy.
Lucia turned from Naya’s scrutiny. “I’ll find you something dry to wear,” Lucia said before disappearing up the stairs.
She returned a few minutes later, wearing a fresh dress and carrying another bundle of clothes for Naya. Naya dressed while Lucia cleaned up the broken glass, and a few minutes later they departed for the embassy. Lucia locked the door behind them with a heavy iron key. As she did, Naya saw a faint blue glow shimmer between the door and the frame. It reminded her of the bluish tint she’d seen around her fingers earlier. She shuddered. Could it be that even the door was tainted by the necromancer’s touch?
“This way,” Lucia said as she turned west, down the hill, and toward the lower city. She’d spoken little since Naya’s return. That was a relief, since Naya had no idea what to say to Lucia. Would the necromancer expect gratitude for what she’d done? Obedience? She would have to speak to Valn. There had to be another way for her to help that didn’t involve masquerading as the servant of someone who made her livelihood damning souls. Naya tried to keep
her expression even as Lucia led her out onto a wide street with tram tracks running through the middle. They joined a small crowd waiting at the corner.
Naya’s eyes wandered over the people standing nearby as they waited for the tram. The man next to her was another walking corpse, his wrists and neck banded with runic tattoos. Naya stared at the flowing black lines and wondered what her father had thought when he learned his daughter had become a wraith. Had it been shame that drove him from the city?
She locked the horrible possibility away. If she let herself dwell on what might be, or on what she’d become, she’d go mad. Searching for a distraction, she noticed something strange about the undead man’s tattoos. Blue light leaked out around their edges, like the light she’d seen on the door. She opened her mouth to say something, but her words were cut off by the rattle and screech of an approaching tram. The sounds of the wheels braking against the track set the humid air vibrating. As the tram approached, Naya was nearly overcome by the bizarre impression that something was pulling on her—draining energy from her limbs. Her vision blurred and her hand throbbed.
She started to slump, but Lucia grabbed her and pulled her up the steps into the seating area. Naya jerked her arm away as Lucia dropped two tin bits into the conductor’s collection box. Her legs wobbled, but at least the draining sensation wasn’t as strong inside the tram.
She couldn’t help but gawk as they settled onto the wooden bench. They had rune-powered trains back in Talmir—huge steel constructions that rumbled through the countryside hauling coal, produce, and people toward the cities. The lines still didn’t extend more than fifty miles from the capital, but the royal engineers had promised that soon any citizen would be able to ride from the northern coast to the Ceramoran border. Naya remembered watching the first of the big trains pulling into the new station in Lith Lor as a child. Compared with those, the boxy single-car trams of Belavine looked almost delicate.
