Give the Dark My Love

by Beth Revis

  This room. My eyes scanned the iron walls. It would provide protection, yes, but it could also be a prison. Wellebourne’s incarceration was proof of that.

  The Emperor looked like a prisoner. He held his hands up pitifully as Master Ostrum advanced, his blade glimmering in the oil lamp’s light.

  “Please,” the Emperor whimpered. “I’ve been trapped here for weeks . . . months . . .”

  Grey had described a puppet-lord, pulling strings from the protection of this tower.

  “I’ve been hiding from—”

  Master Ostrum kicked the Emperor in the jaw, his teeth clattering and blood spraying up. His eyes closed as he blacked out, but he wasn’t dead. Not yet.

  Hiding from . . .

  The Emperor was a coward, but a smart one. He knew the plague was caused by necromancy, and he hid here, in the one place that might protect him, the tower Wellebourne himself had made. He wasn’t the necromancer; he’d been hiding from the necromancer.

  Master Ostrum’s lips curved up in a smile as the blade came rushing down to the Emperor’s chest.

  No, I thought. Then I said aloud, “No.”

  Without thinking, I rushed forward. I slammed my left shoulder against Master Ostrum’s back, and he stumbled, the blade sliding along the black iron wall instead of into the Emperor’s chest.

  “Nedra?” Grey asked.

  “It’s him!” I shouted, pointing at Master Ostrum. Master Ostrum had never liked the Emperor; he’d been Lord Anton’s friend. They’d plotted treason together.

  Ernesta! I shouted in my mind. The last guard was taken care of. Her soft footsteps echoed up the steps. She burst through the door, moving between me and Master Ostrum. Behind Grey, I saw Governor Adelaide, frail and sick.

  Master Ostrum had hated her, too.

  “Why?” I asked, my voice breaking over the word. “I trusted you.”

  “And look at what you became.” Master Ostrum’s voice rang with pride.

  I tugged my crucible out, holding it in the palm of the only hand I had left. “You?” I asked again, incredulous. “You started the plague? You were the necromancer all along?”

  He had been my mentor, my ally, my partner against the plague. But now he stood there, beaming at me as if everything he’d done had been honorable.

  “Where’s your crucible?” I asked.

  “In your hand,” he said.

  My eyes widened as I realized what he meant. He’d used Grey to lure me here, corner me against the iron walls.

  “You told the Emperor’s Guard,” I said, my voice catching up with my thoughts. The Emperor was a prisoner used as bait to lure me here. Master Ostrum had taken control of the Guard and used them to occupy my revenants and separate me from them. I had no protection. Just Nessie—who was strong, true, but perhaps not enough against another necromancer.

  “I will take that crucible, girl,” Master Ostrum said, stepping closer.

  Attack, I thought desperately to my sister.

  Nessie had just single-handedly defeated more than a dozen guards, but she showed no strain. She moved silently and quickly against Master Ostrum. He countered her initial attack, but Ernesta slammed her arm against his. He dropped the knife from numb fingers, and Nessie swooped down, spinning the blade in her hand and plunging it into his chest.

  He looked down at the hilt sticking out over his heart.

  Then he looked up, meeting my eyes. He pulled the knife out of his body.

  There was no blood.

  “You cannot kill what is already dead,” he whispered.

  SIXTY-SIX

  Nedra

  “This has not gone according to my plan, but things rarely do.” Governor Adelaide’s clear, strong voice cut through the room.

  I turned slowly—still keeping an eye on Master Ostrum—as the governor straightened, rolling back her shoulders. She was still sick, just not as ill as she had seemed moments before. She rolled Bennum Wellebourne’s crucible in the palm of her hand.

  Noticing my gaze, Governor Adelaide held the iron bead up, looking at the cracked surface. “It belonged to a master,” she said, admiration in her voice, “but its time has passed. I’d hoped for something better when I raided the treasury.”

  “It was enough to cause the plague, though,” I said. My eyes darted to Grey. He was closer to the door, but I knew he couldn’t escape.

  The governor beamed. “The plague was already in the crucible. I just released it from its slumber.”

  “Is that what you want?” I asked, spitting out the words. “To follow in Wellebourne’s footsteps?”

  “To succeed where he failed,” Governor Adelaide said, as if it were obvious. “All of this, from the very start.” When I looked at her blankly, she added, “There would be no change without rebellion. Even Lord Anton, my opposition, knew that. But he had been a fool. Of course the boy Emperor would veto any election that elevated someone like Lord Anton as governor. If we want our island to be free, we have to take it. And we need an army that cannot fall.”

  I pushed aside what I had believed about the governor—that she was good and kind and generous—and forced myself to instead see her actions as part of a plan.

  She had entered politics in order to gain access to Wellebourne’s crucible, protected in the treasury.

  She had released the plague. Her opponents—like Lord Anton—had died. The poor had been fodder, supplies created in advance for an undead army to lead against the Emperor.

  But the plague had been more than that. It had made her into the people’s hero. She had been the only government official to serve the sick. She had fed stories to the news sheets about the weak Emperor, and those articles had run beside glowing editorials of her own generosity.

  She had already gained the trust of the people, and ensured that even in the remote villages, everyone thought the Emperor was a feeble coward. I glanced at him now, still passed out on the floor from Master Ostrum’s blow to his head. Perhaps that part had been true.

  “He put himself in the tower,” Governor Adelaide said. “After the inauguration. I’d hoped to starve him out, but he had help somehow. And Wellebourne’s runes protected him.”

  “But you have the crucible,” I said. “Why didn’t you—oh.”

  Governor Adelaide nodded grimly. She had Wellebourne’s crucible, but it was old and cracked. It could call forth the plague it had already developed once, but it would not have been strong enough against the door to the Emperor’s room. It could raise some dead—like Master Ostrum—but I doubted the governor would be able to raise and control an entire army.

  Master Ostrum . . . My heart ached for him. He had never been my enemy. I felt such bitter sorrow for his fate. He’d been arrested, killed without trial, just so the governor could use him. I could do that, I realized. I could control my revenants the way Governor Adelaide controlled Master Ostrum, stripping him of his personality and forcing him to bend to her will. It had just never occurred to me to be that cruel.

  My eyes roved over Governor Adelaide’s body. Her frailty wasn’t an act. Using Wellebourne’s crucible drained her.

  My hand clutched my own crucible. It was new and strong. That’s why she wanted it.

  I wondered why she didn’t make her own crucible. Perhaps she was not strong enough. Perhaps she was a selfish coward—not afraid to kill her people, but too scared of sacrifice to make her own crucible. Or perhaps it was simply that she had no one to love or any who loved her that she could sacrifice.

  Regardless, she wasn’t getting mine.

  To me! I called for my revenants.

  Through the narrow door, golden light swirled—but it was not under my command. The bodies of the dead Emperor’s Guard stood and moved to the entrance, blocking us inside the room. I had no doubt that all the dead guards we’d fought were standing—and fighting my revenants. N
either side could die again, but they could be hacked to pieces.

  Bright light crackled through the crucible in Governor Adelaide’s hands. She was barely able to control the power of this broken crucible. She stumbled as she struggled to maintain a connection—but maintain it she did.

  “The guards won’t strike,” Governor Adelaide told me. Unspoken was the threat, yet.

  My panicked eyes met Grey’s. The Emperor could do nothing for us. Nessie would be able to hold off Master Ostrum, but the raised guards would eviscerate my revenants. We were far too outnumbered.

  “What do you want?” I asked. My knuckles were white as I clutched my crucible. That I could not give her.

  But her answer surprised me. “Freedom,” she said. “It’s what our people want—need. We’ve struggled as a colony for nearly two centuries. Look at him,” she added, her lips sneering in disgust at the Emperor. “He’s a pathetic child. Why should he take our trade routes and pocket our profits? Why should we bend to his laws rather than make our own?”

  Growing up in the north, I had never cared about politics. Who took what throne . . . none of that had mattered in my village. We would still pay taxes; what did we care who they went to?

  “You killed your citizens to free them?” I asked. I almost didn’t recognize my cold voice.

  “No,” the governor said. “I will immortalize them. They will be the greatest heroes in the legends that will come.”

  I thought of the grave in the forest. Governor Adelaide had paid for barges to take us from the city so that we could pay our respects. While we mourned and prayed, she had planned a revolution with the soldiers that would claw their way up through the packed red earth.

  “You understand, don’t you?” Governor Adelaide said. There was sincere pleading in her voice, but when I glanced behind her, I could still see the dead guards, trapping us within the cell. “This was worth it. Our nation, free at last. It will all be worth it.”

  I looked down at the crucible in my hand. Made from the ash of my parents, the soul of my sister.

  “No,” I said, but my voice was barely audible.

  “You know I’m right,” the governor continued, taking a step closer to me. I did not move back. “I remember you. The girl from the hospital. You were working your fingers to the bone to save the sick.”

  “You made them sick.”

  “But I cared about them,” she said, and I remembered the way she walked the halls, giving comfort and hope to the patients. “Even if he hadn’t been here in this cell, do you think the Emperor would have cared about the plague victims?”

  The news sheets had mocked the Emperor’s cowardice, true, but no one had been surprised by it. No one expected him to care about the dying poor.

  “You’re from the north,” the governor pressed. “You know firsthand how unfair life is in the villages. I couldn’t stop that as governor. I want to help every citizen of Lunar Island. But the laws are twisted and unfair, tipped to balance in the Emperor’s favor. The rich stay rich. And your people . . .”

  “Stay poor,” I said, finishing the sentence in a whisper.

  “You see, don’t you?” Governor Adelaide said.

  Maybe in the past, I would have believed what she wanted me to believe. But my eyes saw more now. My eyes saw the golden glow of my family’s souls imbued within the metal of the crucible in my palm. My eyes saw the shell of my sister, fighting to protect me even now, even after she had died.

  My eyes saw right through the governor. This wasn’t about Lunar Island being a free nation. This was about her taking the Emperor’s place.

  She must have realized she was losing me. “Please,” she said, her voice cracking.

  “I have heard that word so many times in the last year,” I snarled. “Mothers holding babies dead from the plague. Fathers watching their families wither to nothing but black and twisted limbs. Lovers pleading with Death. I am done with please.”

  “If you stand with me,” Governor Adelaide said, “we would be unstoppable. I can give you this island’s freedom. I can give you the whole Empire.”

  “You’ll give me nothing,” I spat. “I’ll take what I want.”

  Something slammed into me from the back, making me hit the ground so forcefully that the breath was knocked out of me. Metal clanged against wood. I turned as Ernesta threw away the pieces of chair that Master Ostrum had splintered under the force of his sword after she had knocked me out of his range. She stopped the next blow with her shoulder, a sickening squelch filling the room as steel met flesh. I clutched my crucible, and white light stitched the gaping wound back together again as I healed Ernesta as quickly as I could. It drained me to use necromancy for healing, and I feared the moment she would be too far gone to save.

  I turned to Governor Adelaide as she backed away from me. Her eyes tracked the battle; she relished in it. Master Ostrum and Nessie were both revenants, and while my sister was stronger, Master Ostrum was armed.

  Master Ostrum lunged—not at Nessie, but at me. I scrambled back as Ernesta jumped between us.

  If Governor Adelaide could not convince me to join her in her revolution, she would simply kill me and take my crucible—strong and powerful—for herself.

  SIXTY-SEVEN

  Grey

  Master Ostrum and Ernesta battled, but Master Ostrum’s focus was on killing Nedra, putting him in the more powerful offensive position. Ernesta could only defend.

  Horror washed over Nedra’s face as she realized the governor’s plan. Master Ostrum had been more than just Nedra’s teacher; he had been her mentor. Her friend. And now he was trying to plunge a sword through her heart.

  The governor stood with her back to the Emperor and me. There was no escape from the small room, thanks to the undead guards. Governor Adelaide clearly believed the Emperor was nothing more than a weak child—and I couldn’t much argue with that now—but she underestimated me.

  I looked around me for a weapon, turning my back to her as I ran my fingers along the dark floor, hoping for a rock or something sharp. Before I could uncover anything, though, I felt the cold, sharp edge of a blade against my neck. I swallowed, my Adam’s apple brushing against the knife, my skin scraped raw. Governor Adelaide yanked me up, forcing me around without removing the knife from my throat.

  “Choose, girl!” the governor shouted. “Will you raise this boy after I kill him? Will it be the same to you?”

  Nedra’s eyes grew wide with terror. And Ernesta—whose actions were tied to Nedra’s will—hesitated in her battle against Ostrum.

  Master Ostrum struck immediately, swiping his sword against Nedra’s back. Ernesta spun around, knocking the blade away. Nedra fell, cascades of blood soaking through her ripped tunic, but the cut had been superficial, thanks to Ernesta.

  The knife bit into my skin. I was afraid to swallow, afraid to move at all.

  Nedra watched us both as Governor Adelaide raised her arm, holding up Wellebourne’s crucible. I marveled that such a tiny bead had caused so much death and war.

  I felt Governor Adelaide suck in a breath—she was going to offer Nedra one last chance to join her or she was going to order Master Ostrum and the Emperor’s guards to kill us both. But before she could speak—before I could think—I yanked my arm up and knocked my hand against the governor’s wrist.

  The iron bead flew into the air.

  Cursing, Governor Adelaide shoved me aside, the knife sliding across my throat up to my jaw, thankfully avoiding my arteries. I clutched my neck and watched as Wellebourne’s crucible soared into the air. Nedra stretched up her residual limb, as if she could catch the iron bead with the hand that wasn’t there.

  SIXTY-EIGHT

  Nedra

  My shadow arm could touch nothing but blood iron and souls. Fortunately, that was exactly what Governor Adelaide’s crucible was made of. I snatched it from the air and wrap
ped my incorporeal fingers around the cold metal.

  Governor Adelaide screamed at me, but Grey lurched up, grabbing her around the knees and knocking her to the floor. They struggled, giving me time to inspect the crucible.

  I could see the golden threads of souls woven into the iron. Now that I held the crucible, I could feel them. It reminded me of my first night as a necromancer, when I’d dipped into my own crucible searching for Nessie’s soul. I had pulled at the golden threads of light, and it had hurt my revenants. Their souls were linked to the iron.

  I knew exactly what needed to be done.

  “What are you doing?” Governor Adelaide screamed at me as she threw Grey off her.

  I wrapped my shadow fingers around the golden threads of the souls in Wellebourne’s crucible. And I pulled.

  Cold washed over me. Wisps of my black hair had fallen free from my braids, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw them turn white as I struggled to wrench the souls of the dead out of Wellebourne’s crucible. If it had been my crucible, I could have let the souls go with no effort at all. But I had not bound these souls to this iron, and breaking a connection I had not forged was far more difficult than I had imagined.

  My shadow arm tensed. It felt stronger now, and I knew it was because I was letting my own life force drain in order to maintain a ghostly connection to souls that were not my own.

  The souls swarmed inside the tiny crucible, reaching for me. They had not been given a choice. They wanted to be free. I strained harder.

  The blood trickling down my back slowed. My heartbeat stilled. I was too weak even to shiver, despite the ice that seemed to engulf me.

  My vision faded. The golden light disappeared. I still felt it, but all I could see was darkness.

  The darkness moved like a living thing. It took a shape I almost recognized.

  Deep, deep within me, I felt a hunger grow, a hunger I had almost been able to suppress. My mouth salivated, and something primal roared within my soul.