The Bone Season

by Samantha Shannon

  “And if you ever disrespect your elders in that manner again, you will be sequestered on sight.”

  “The blood-sovereign would not allow it.”

  “She would not have to know. Such an accident is not too hard to conceal.” Warden towered over him. “I do not fear your Sargas name. I am the blood-consort, and I will exercise the power that befits my station. Do I make myself clear, Thuban?”

  Thuban looked up at him, his eyes roaring blue. “Yes,” he said, in a whisper, “blood-consort.”

  Warden walked past him. I had no idea what to make of their exchange, but it was fairly satisfying to see a Sargas get a verbal slating. As I followed Warden through the gate, Thuban struck Ivy across the face. Her head snapped around. Her eyes were dry, but her face was swollen and discolored, and she was thinner than before. Blood and dirt streaked her arms. She was being kept in her own filth. I remembered Seb looking at me that way, like all the hope in the world had crumbled.

  For Seb, for Ivy, for the ones who would follow, I would make this training session count.

  Port Meadow was vast. Warden took long strides, too long for me to keep up. I trudged behind him, trying to work out the dimensions of the meadow. It was difficult in the waning light, but I could see the ugly fences on either side, dividing the beaten ground into several large arenas. They were strung with thin wires, lined with icicles. The posts were curved toward the top; some bore heavy brackets, each dripping a lantern. A watchtower stood on the western side, and I could just see a human—or Reph—inside it.

  We walked past a shallow pool of water. Its frozen surface was smooth as a mirror, perfect for scrying. Come to think of it, everything about this meadow was perfect for spirit combat. The ground was solid, the air was clear and fresh—and there were spirits. I could sense them everywhere, all around me. I wondered what kind of fence enclosed this meadow. Could they have worked out a way to trap spirits?

  No. Spirits might sometimes breach meatspace, but they were not subject to physical restrictions. Only binders could trap them. Their order—the fifth order—could bend the limits between meatspace and æther.

  “The fences are not charged with electricity”—Warden saw where I was looking—“but with ethereal energy.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “Ethereal batteries. A fusion of Rephaite and human expertise, pioneered in 2045. Your scientists have been working on hybrid technology since the early twentieth century. We simply replace the chemical energy in a battery with a captive poltergeist, a spirit that can interact with the corporeal world. It creates a field of repulsion.”

  “But poltergeists can escape their bindings,” I said. “How could you capture one?”

  “Use a willing poltergeist, of course.”

  I stared at his back. The words willing and poltergeist were as opposite as war and peace.

  “Our counsel also led to the invention of Fluxion 14 and Radiesthesic Detection Technology,” he said, “the latter of which remains experimental. From our last reports, we hear Scion is close to perfecting it.”

  I clenched my fist. Of course the Rephaim were responsible for RDT. Dani had always wondered how they’d managed it.

  After a while, Warden stopped. We had come to a concrete oval, ten feet across. A gas lamp flared to life nearby.

  “Let us begin,” he said.

  I waited.

  With no warning, he aimed a mock punch at my face. I ducked. When he jabbed his other fist, I blocked it with my arm.

  “Again.”

  He was faster this time. Trying to make me defend myself quickly, from all angles. I kept my hands open and blocked each hit.

  “You learned to fight on the streets.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  “Once more. Try and stop me.”

  This time he made as if to grab my neck, placing both hands high on my décolletage. A flimp had tried this on me once. I twisted my body to the left and thrust my right arm in the same direction, cutting his hands away from my throat. I could feel the strength in those hands, but he let go. I brought my elbow against his cheek, a move that had knocked the flimp right into the gutter. He was letting me win.

  “Excellent.” Warden stepped back. “Few humans come here prepared to be part of a penal battalion. You are several steps ahead of most, but you will not be able to engage in that sort of scrap with an Emite. Your most important asset is your ability to affect the æther.”

  I spied the silver glint. There was a blade in his hand. My muscles tensed rigid. “From what I have seen, your gift is triggered by danger.” He leveled the blade at my chest. “Demonstrate.”

  My heart pounded at the tip of his blade. “I don’t know how.”

  “I see.”

  With a flick of his wrist, he brought the blade against my throat. My body hummed with adrenaline. Warden leaned in very close to me.

  “This blade has been used to draw human blood,” he said, very softly. “Blood like that of your friend Sebastian.”

  I trembled.

  “It calls for more.” The blade slid along my neck. “It has never tasted the blood of a dreamer.”

  “I’m not afraid of you.” The tremor in my voice betrayed the lie. “Don’t touch me.”

  But he did. The blade traced my throat, trailed up to my chin and touched my lips. I jerked my fist up, shoved his hand away. He dropped the blade, took my wrists in one hand, and pinned them to the concrete. His strength was incredible: I couldn’t move a muscle.

  “I wonder.” He used the knife to tip my chin up. “If I cut your throat, how long will it take for you to die?”

  “You wouldn’t,” I said, daring him.

  “Oh, but I would.”

  I tried to wrench my knee into his groin, but he grabbed my thigh, forcing my leg down. That leg was still weak; it was easy. He was making me look feeble. When I pulled a hand free. He twisted my arm behind my back. Not hard enough to hurt, but enough to immobilize me.

  “You will always lose that way,” he said against my ear. “Play to your strengths.”

  Was there no weak spot on this creature? I thought of all the vulnerable places on a human: eyes, kidneys, solar plexus, nose, groin—nothing within my reach. I would have to move and run. I pushed my weight backward, straight between his legs, and rolled back to my feet in one movement. In the instant he took to stand, I tore into a sprint across the meadow. If he wanted me, he could damn well come and get me.

  There was nowhere to run. He was gaining on me. Thinking back to my training sessions with Nick, I changed direction. Then I was running again, into the darkness, away from the watchtower. There had to be a weak point in a fence like this, somewhere I could squeeze between the wires. Then I had to deal with Thuban. But I had my spirit. I could do it. I could do it.

  For someone with excellent visual acuity, I could be incredibly short-sighted. Within a minute I was lost. Away from the concrete oval and the lamps, I was left to stumble through the vastness of the meadow. And Warden was out there, hunting me. I ran toward a gas lamp. My sixth sense quivered as I drew nearer to the fence. By the time I was six feet away I was nauseous, my limbs limp and heavy.

  But I had to try. I grabbed the frozen wire.

  I can’t fully describe the sensation that seized my body. My vision turned black, then white, then red. Goose bumps broke out all over me. A hundred memories flashed before my eyes, memories of a scream in a poppy field; and new memories, too—the ’geist’s memories. It was a murder victim. A deafening bang shook my every bone. My stomach gave an almighty heave. I hit the ground and retched.

  I must have stayed there for a minute, racked by pictures of blood on a cream carpet. This person had been killed with a shotgun. His skull had burst open, spraying brain and shattered bone. My ears rang. When I came to my senses, my body felt uncoordinated. I dragged myself along the ground, blinking away bloody visions. A silver-white burn slashed across my palm. The mark of a poltergeist.

  Something shot
past my ear. I looked up to see another watchtower, and the guard standing inside it.

  Flux dart.

  A second dart fired in my direction. I scrambled to my feet, turned east, and ran—but soon enough I came to another watchtower, and another gun had me running south. It was only when I saw the oval that I realized I was being driven back to Warden.

  The next dart hit me in the shoulder. The pain was instant and excruciating. I reached up and tore the thing out. Blood flowed from the wound, and a wave of disorienting nausea swept over me. I was fast enough to stop the drug—it took about five seconds to self-inject—but the message was clear: get back on the oval, or get shot. Warden was waiting for me.

  “Welcome back.”

  I swiped the sweat from my forehead. “So I’m not allowed to run.”

  “No. Unless you would like me to present you with a yellow tunic, which we give only to cowards.”

  I ran at him, blinded by anger, and drove my shoulder into his abdomen. Given his size, nothing happened. He just took me by the tunic and tossed me away. I landed hard on the same shoulder.

  “You cannot fight me with your bare hands.” He prowled the edge of the oval. “Nor can you run from an Emite. You are a dreamwalker, girl. You have the power to live and die as you decree. Lay waste to my dreamscape. Drive me mad!”

  A part of me tore away. My spirit flew across the space between us. It slashed through the outer ring of his mind, like a knife through taut silk. I broke through the darkest part of his dreamscape, straining against impossibly powerful barriers, aiming for the distant patch of light that was his sunlit zone, but it wasn’t as easy as it had been on the train. The center of his dreamscape was so far away, and my spirit was already being driven out. Like an elastic band stretched too far, I snapped back into my own mind. The weight of my own spirit knocking me off my feet. My head rapped against the concrete.

  The gas lamps swam back into focus. I pushed myself up on my elbows, my temples throbbing. Warden was still standing. I hadn’t brought him to his knees, as I had with Aludra, but I had tampered with his perception. He ran a hand over his face and shook his head.

  “Good,” he said. “Very good.”

  I stood. My legs shook.

  “You’re trying to make me angry,” I said. “Why?”

  “It seems to work.” He pointed the blade. “Again.”

  I looked up at him, trying to catch my breath. “Again?”

  “You can do better than that. You barely touched my defenses. I want you to make a dent.”

  “I can’t do it again.” Black spotted my vision. “It doesn’t work like that.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because it stops me breathing.”

  “Have you never gone swimming?”

  “What?”

  “The average human can hold their breath for at least thirty seconds without causing lasting damage. That is more than enough time for you to attack another mind and return to your body.”

  I’d never thought of it like that. Nick had always ensured I used life support when I sensed the æther at a distance.

  “Think of your spirit as a muscle, tearing from its natural place,” Warden said. “The more you use it, the stronger and faster it will become, and the better your body will cope with the repercussions. You will be able to jump quickly between dreamscapes—before your body hits the ground.”

  “You don’t know anything,” I said.

  “Nor do you. I suspect the incident on the train was the first time you ever walked in another dreamscape.” He didn’t move the blade. “Walk in mine. I challenge you.”

  I searched his face. He was inviting me to come into his mind, to wound his sanity.

  “You don’t really care. You’re just training me,” I said. We circled each other. “Nashira asked you to choose me. I know what she wants.”

  “No. I chose you. I laid claim to your instruction. And the last thing I want”—he stepped toward me—“is for you to embarrass me with your incompetence.” His eyes were hard as flint. “Attack me again. And do it properly this time.”

  “No.” I’d call his bluff. Let him be embarrassed. Let him be as mortified by me as my father. “I’m not going to kill myself just so you can get a gold star from Nashira.”

  “You want to hurt me,” he said, softer now. “You loathe me. You resent me.” He lifted the knife. “Destroy me.”

  At first I did nothing. Then I remembered the hours I’d spent cleaning his arm, and how he’d threatened me. I remembered how he’d stood aside and watched Seb die. I flung my spirit back at him.

  In the time we spent on that meadow, I barely fractured his dreamscape. Even when he dropped most of his defenses, I couldn’t get any further than his hadal zone—his mind was just too strong. He goaded me the whole time. He told me I was weak, that I was pathetic, that I was a disgrace to all clairvoyants. That it was no wonder humans were good for nothing but slavery. Did I want to live in a cage, like an animal? He was happy to oblige. At first the provocation did its job, but the more the night wore on, the less his insults roused me. In the end they were just frustrating, not enough to force my spirit out.

  That was when he threw a blade. He aimed well away from me, but the sight of the flying knife was enough to set my spirit loose. Each time I did it, my body fell. If my foot so much as slipped off the oval, a flux dart came whistling in my direction. I soon learned to premeditate the sound, and to duck before the needle could hit home.

  I managed five or six jumps out of my body. Each time was like having my head ripped open. Finally I could take no more. My vision went double and a migraine swelled above my left eye. I bent at the waist, hungry for air. Don’t show weakness. Don’t show weakness. My knees were going to give.

  Warden knelt in front of me and wrapped an arm around my waist. I tried to push him away, but my arms were like string.

  “Stop,” he said. “Stop resisting.”

  He lifted me into his arms. I’d never experienced this quick-fire jumping; I didn’t know if my brain would stand it. The backs of my eyes throbbed. I couldn’t look at the lantern.

  “You did well.” Warden looked down at me. “But you could do much better.”

  I couldn’t reply.

  “Paige?”

  “I’m fine.” My voice was slurred.

  He seemed to take my word for it. Still holding me, he made his way toward the gate.

  Warden set me on my feet again after a while. We walked in silence back to the entrance where Thuban had left his post. Ivy was sitting against the fence, her face in her hands, her shoulders shaking. When we approached the sally port, she stood and undid the bolt. Warden glanced at her as we passed. “Thank you, Ivy.”

  She looked up. There were tears in her eyes. When was the last time she’d been called by her real name?

  Warden kept his silence as we walked through the ghost town. I was only half-awake. Nick would have made me rest in bed for hours if I’d been with him, and scolded me for good measure.

  It was only when we walked past Amaurotic House that Warden spoke again: “Do you often try to sense the æther at a distance?”

  “None of your business,” I said.

  “Your eyes hold death. Death and ice.” He turned to face me. “Strange, when they burn so hot in your anger.”

  I met his gaze. “Your eyes change, too.”

  “Why do you think that might be?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know anything about you.”

  “That is true enough.” Warden looked me up and down. “Show me your hand.”

  After a moment, I showed him my right hand. The burn had taken on an ugly, nacreous appearance. He took out a tiny vial of liquid from his pockets, tipped it against his gloved finger, and spread its contents over the mark. Before my eyes, it melted away, leaving no trace. I pulled my hand back.

  “How did you do that?”

  “It is called amaranth.” He put the vial back, then looked at me. “Tell me, Pa
ige—are you afraid of the æther?”

  “No,” I said. My palm tingled.

  “Why not?”

  It was a lie. I was afraid of the æther. When I pushed my sixth sense too far, I ran the risk of death, or at least brain injury. Jax had told me from the beginning that if I worked for him, I was likely to cut my lifespan by about thirty years, maybe more. It all rested on luck.

  “Because the æther is perfect,” I said. “There’s no war. There’s no death, because everything there is already dead. And there’s no sound. Just silence. And safety.”

  “Nothing is safe in the æther. And even the æther is not exempt from war and death.”

  I studied his profile as he looked at the black sky. His breath didn’t cloud in the cold, not like mine. But for a moment—just the briefest moment—there was something human in his face. Something pensive, almost bitter. Then he turned to face me again, and it was gone.

  Something was amiss outside the Rookery. A group of red-jackets were crouched on the cobblestones, watched by silent harlies, talking in quick, hushed voices. I glanced up at Warden to see if he was concerned. If he was, he didn’t show it. He walked toward the group, causing most of the harlies to shrink back into their shacks.

  “What is it?”

  One of the red-jackets looked up, saw who had spoken, and flicked his gaze back down. His tunic was caked in mud. “We were in the woods,” he said, his voice hoarse. “We got lost. The Emim—they—”

  Warden’s hand strayed to his forearm.

  The red-jackets were gathered around a boy of perhaps sixteen. His entire right hand was missing, and it wasn’t just his tunic that was red. My mouth clenched up. His hand had been ripped and twisted from his arm, as if it had been caught in a machine. Warden analyzed the scene with no hint of emotion.

  “You say you were lost,” he said. “Which keeper was with you?”

  “The blood-heir.”

  Warden leveled his gaze on the street. “I should have known.”

  My eyes burned on his back. He was just standing there. The red-jacket was trembling uncontrollably, his face shining with sweat. He was going to die if someone didn’t bandage the stump, or at least get a blanket over him.