Bone Crier's Dawn

by Kathryn Purdie

  My father is swept closer, along with the souls. In a blink, he’s at the edge of Elara’s Gate, then right before me. “Bastien, what’s happeni—?”

  He tears past me. I try to grab him. “Papa!”

  “Ailesse!” Sabine cries.

  My heart drops.

  I let her go.

  I spin to Tyrus’s Gate. Ailesse and my father are sucked through at the same moment.

  No! I jump after them. The black dust singes my eyes. The siren song roars in my ears. Ailesse screams my name. I reach. I catch a brief glimpse of her terrified face. Something forces me back. I slam against the soul bridge. The limestone groans and crackles. It’ll break soon. I don’t care. I shove myself back up to my feet and charge for the Gate again.

  Odiva is standing in the way. She’s on the bridge now, breathing, truly alive. She stalks toward me, driving me back with powerful strength, while my borrowed strength is gone. That doesn’t stop me. I throw my fist at her face, her stomach, her jaw.

  She deflects my punches. I rail harder, shouting, cursing her. This can’t be happening. Please, please, please, this can’t be happening.

  Impatient, Odiva flings me aside. Sabine snatches me before I fly off the bridge. I’m barely grounded on the limestone when she shrieks in pain. The sleeve by her shoulder is cut. A streak of blood spills through the tear. She turns on her mother, her mouth hanging open. Odiva holds Ailesse’s bone knife—she must have stolen it off her.

  Terrible quiet fills the cavern. I’m blind to the chazoure again, but the Unchained have to have stopped coming, or else I’d hear them with my own graceless ears. Three of the Leurress are standing at the foot of the bridge, utterly horrified, but they keep back on the far ledge. The fissures near them are the most threatening.

  “You merciless monster!” Sabine cries at Odiva. “What have you done?”

  “You will thank me in the end, child.” Odiva’s hand lashes out for the crescent-moon pendant dangling from Sabine’s antler crown. Sabine beats her hand away, but not before it closes around the grace bone lying next to the pendant—Sabine’s fire salamander skull. Odiva rips it off its cord.

  Sabine loses her balance for a moment, and then her eyes widen. “Give that back!”

  Odiva scrapes the bone knife over the skull. Sabine’s blood smears onto it. I watch, breathless and stunned. Nothing makes sense. Odiva has taken Ailesse. She sent my father to the Underworld. What more does she want?

  She holds the bloodied skull toward the Gate of dust. Rain pelts her. Wind flaps through her dress. “I have given you the child of my once amouré.” Her rich voice booms through the cavern. “I have given you thousands upon thousands more souls. It is beyond enough. Keep your promise, Tyrus. Break my soul-bond and give me back the man I love.”

  She glides closer to the Gate. “Here is my second-born daughter’s blood, and one of her grace bones. Let them give my daughter’s father back his flesh, bone, and blood. In return, I give you my oath to help you reclaim your bride.”

  The black dust stirs faster. A figure takes form behind it. A man. Let it be my father, not Sabine’s. A vain prayer to a god I hate, but I beg Tyrus all the same.

  The man’s eyes cut through the dust. They’re golden brown, not sea blue. My chest sinks.

  Sabine catches my gaze. She motions me with a subtle tilt of her head. We slowly back away from Odiva. The bridge’s fissures snake longer. A crack of lightning masks the sound.

  Past the Gate, the man’s scarlet-and-black doublet appears, then his well-trimmed beard and shoulder-length graying hair. A strong olive-skinned hand, laden with jeweled rings, reaches through the dust for Odiva.

  It isn’t until he steps through the glittering dust that I see his crown. Feathers carved of black onyx, each one embedded with a large ruby, form a heavy circle around his head.

  Sabine gasps, face pale. “It can’t be.”

  The man—a king, by all appearances—comes to Odiva’s side in the pouring rain. She strokes his face, marveling over him. Her grin is triumphant. “Godart,” she murmurs, pressing the salamander skull into his hand. Once it’s in his possession, she kisses him passionately.

  Godart? I was a small child when he died. Godart Lothaire was the last in a long line of kings who ruled South Galle from Château Creux. The people say he was cursed.

  Sabine takes another step back. The bridge grumbles like the earth before a great quake. A silver owl flies above—the same one Ailesse saw by the forest river. It sails out of the cavern through the gap in the ceiling. A split second later, lightning strikes the bridge with a deafening crack. A large chunk of the bridge breaks away at Odiva’s and Godart’s feet. They leap back just in time.

  Sabine and I turn and bolt the other way. The Ferriers at the foot of the bridge shout for us to hurry. The limestone beneath me buckles. More sections drop away behind us.

  The rain pounds heavier. Something arcs by overhead. The silver owl? No, Odiva and Godart. She’s jumped with her graces and pulled him through the air. They land on the bridge ahead of us. The stone crumbles apart. Sabine yanks my hand to speed me up.

  The foot of the bridge is twenty feet away. Odiva and Godart make it there first. The three Ferriers have their staffs raised to fight them. Odiva seizes one of the staffs and uses it to attack the Ferriers. I don’t watch the fight. I’m too busy dodging gaping cracks.

  Reality sets in, even as I race for my life. I do have vengeance in my heart. I’ll use it to keep me alive, alert, and ready. I’ll plot for justice. Kill Odiva and Godart. Punish a god.

  Sabine and I rush onto the foot of the bridge just as the rest of it crashes into the abyss. Rubble and chalky dust fill the air. I lunge through it. Search for Odiva and Godart. Two of the Ferriers are huddled on the ground. They’re bent over the third woman, with black braided hair and a bracelet of teeth. The side of her forehead is bleeding. Her brown eyes are glassy and lifeless.

  “Maurille!” Sabine falls to her knees and shakes the woman’s shoulders.

  The rubble and dust clear. Odiva and Godart are gone. The Gates at the other side of the cavern have vanished, too.

  Rain continues to pour in through the long gap in the ceiling, but there’s no bridge for it to land on.

  The water falls away into nothing but the dark and endless pit.

  23

  Sabine

  LIGHTNING ILLUMINATES THE DARK CLOUDS above the ruins of Château Creux. Half the night has passed by the time the Ferriers and I arrive home. I was forced to leave Bastien behind. He refused to leave the cavern. His eyes were hollow and he wouldn’t speak as he stared at the wall where the Gates of the Underworld once churned.

  Pernelle and Chantae carry Maurille’s body as honorably as possible on a litter we made of two staffs with our cloaks stretched between them. A third cloak covers her body and face.

  I walk beside the litter and hold Maurille’s cold, stiffening hand. It’s a comfort to her, I tell myself. Although she’s dead, her soul still remains with her body. It will rise the next time I open the Gates. On that new moon, I vow to ferry Maurille to Paradise. No more of the Unchained will be stolen to the Underworld. I’ll get them back again. I’ll get Ailesse back, too. Leaping through the Gate of dust didn’t kill my mother, so I have to believe my sister also found a way to remain alive.

  Please, Elara, I pray, although the goddess holds no power in Tyrus’s realm, let Ailesse truly be alive.

  The Ferriers and I walk down the crumbling stone staircase and enter the lower depths of the ancient castle. The engraved crow-and-rose crest of Château Creux stares back at me from the archways that seam the corridors together. I’ve always known they were symbols of King Godart. Signs of him are everywhere in this place where he once ruled. No wonder my mother chose it as our famille’s home. No wonder he gave her a necklace of a crow skull with a ruby caught in its beak. It was another representation of his crest. The ruby must have meant his red rose, and the crow skull should have been obvious. I’m suc
h a fool for not realizing Godart was my father sooner.

  The Ferriers and I travel through the tide-carved tunnels below the castle, and then walk into the courtyard. I glance up at the full moon and a few stars that pierce the thinning storm clouds. The great tower of Château Creux once rose above this open cavern, but after Godart died, a massive storm rolled in off the sea and struck it down. Much of the castle’s beauty was demolished then, and when Casimir’s father came into power, he built Beau Palais and left Château Creux to the curse of the king who worshipped the god of the Underworld more than the god of the sun, Belin. Maybe it was Belin’s wrath that destroyed this place.

  Now that I know the depths of Tyrus’s cruelty, I like to think Elara helped the sun god.

  Roxane and the other elders are waiting for us in the courtyard. Perhaps they noticed our absence, or perhaps they sensed us coming with their graces.

  Pernelle and Chantae lower the litter to the ground. Nadine and Dolssa gasp and rush closer when I pull back the cloak from Maurille’s face. Damiana and Milicent hang back with bowed heads. They are the oldest of the elders and the most acquainted with death.

  Roxane remains where she stands, claiming her position of power at the center of the courtyard, though her eyes are wet with tears. Maurille was a powerful Ferrier and a gentle friend. Everyone loved her.

  “The last time you stood among us,” Roxane says to me, “you injured Hyacinthe. And now, when you dare to return, you bring Maurille—like this.” She opens her hand, gesturing at her body. Light rainfall collects like stars in Maurille’s black hair. “What have you done, Sabine?”

  I clutch my injured arm. The cut my mother gave me is still bleeding, and I have no more salamander grace to help me close the wound. Maybe the small skull held power to mend a hurting heart as well, because there’s nothing I can do to alleviate the wrenching pain in my chest. Roxane is right to blame me for what happened to Maurille. I was warned that Ailesse would come to the bridge, and I understood my mother’s cunning. I shouldn’t have involved any other Ferriers tonight.

  Pernelle steps close and places a hand on my shoulder. “Do not accuse Sabine, Roxane. What happened was . . .” She shakes her head. “It was beyond any of us.”

  Chantae comes to my other side and faces Roxane. “It was Matrone Odiva who killed Maurille.”

  Roxane’s brows slowly draw together. “You are mistaken. Odiva is dead.”

  “She was,” Pernelle says. “But she emerged from the Gates of the Underworld tonight.”

  “It was unprecedented,” Chantae adds, “especially because she resurrected someone else, too.”

  Roxane looks between the two elders, struggling to understand what they’re saying. I shrink in on myself. All my lies have culminated to this point—all the truth I’ve kept back from my famille because I feared their anarchy, because I wanted Ailesse to bear the burden of revealing our mother’s crimes instead of me.

  “Even if resurrection were possible,” Roxane says, “who would Odiva bring back from the dead?” Her lips part. “Do you mean Ailesse?”

  No, I can’t let her believe that. Odiva would never be so selfless. “Ailesse was already alive,” I confess. I flex my hands and step away from Pernelle and Chantae. They won’t defend me after I expose everything. “She was taken captive by Prince Casimir—King Casimir—the night she tried to ferry with Odiva. His Majesty is Ailesse’s true amouré. And Odiva didn’t die; she was alive when she leapt through Tyrus’s Gate.”

  Milicent, the elder most loyal to Odiva, frowns from where she kneels beside Maurille’s body. “That can’t be true. Why would the matrone do such a thing?”

  I blow out a steadying breath and do my best to explain. About Odiva’s forbidden love with another man after she sacrificed her own amouré. About the gods cursing him anyway, killing him, and wrapping him in chains. About the terrible pact Odiva made with Tyrus, two years ago, to release her love from the Underworld at the cost of killing Ailesse, and how she resisted, ferrying thousands of Unchained to Tyrus instead. About the continuing sacrifices that happened tonight—thousands more Unchained stolen from Paradise, and Ailesse taken away with them after being tricked into finally satisfying Odiva’s pact.

  The rain falls softer, unable to hush my shame as the elders stare at me, their shock acute and silent. I’ve revealed that the greatest Leurress who ever existed among us is a traitor to her own people, but my own betrayal for keeping my mouth shut feels just as disgraceful.

  Roxane is the first to break the unbearable quiet. “Why hasn’t Odiva returned to us, then? Doesn’t she wish to rule as matrone?”

  “I don’t know.” But I do know my mother is devious and power thirsty. Resurrecting my father can’t have been the only reason she returned from the Underworld. She must have some stronger goal.

  Roxane’s teal eyes narrow as they roam over my face. “You have one more thing to confess, don’t you, Sabine? Why did Odiva really choose you as her heir?” My cheeks burn. Whatever resemblance I bear to my mother, she must see it now.

  My gaze shifts to Pernelle and Chantae, craving their support in vain; they already overheard this truth tonight. But Chantae glances away from me, her jaw tight, and Pernelle doesn’t blink as she stares back at me. She looks sickened and confused, like she doesn’t recognize me anymore.

  My eyes sting. I swallow a lump in my throat. “Because Odiva had two daughters,” I answer Roxane. “I am the child of King Godart, the man Odiva raised from the dead.”

  Aghast expressions cross the other elders’ faces. My shoulders crumple inward. I’ve always felt like an anomaly among my famille, inferior in talent and resistant about the life we lead, but now I feel inferior just for existing. I’m the offspring of Odiva’s great betrayal of us. While each of the Leurress had to kill the men they loved in order to become Ferriers, Odiva found a deeper love and hid it from everyone.

  Roxane looks down her nose at me. “We will not honor Odiva’s bloodline any longer. You will never be our matrone, Sabine.”

  My eyes grow hot from the deep blow of her words. “But I have to . . . You can’t . . .” I try to breathe, try to draw on my Light for strength. I can’t feel it. I only feel the jackal inside me, enraged and tensed to fight. I’ve worked so hard to prove myself, change myself, be more like Ailesse and less like an imposter. “You don’t even know the siren song. Many of the Chained are still loose. Not all of them were ferried tonight.”

  Roxane opens her mouth to say something as Nadine turns to the tunnel leading outside, her posture stiff. “A man is approaching the castle.”

  Milicent and Dolssa immediately bolt for the tunnel. The others grab staffs from racks along the courtyard wall. No one questions Nadine’s eel-graced sense of smell. Now that I attune myself, my golden jackal grace picks up the same masculine musk in the air. I recognize it as Bastien’s scent before Milicent and Dolssa drag him into the courtyard.

  “What are you doing here?” I gasp at him. He must know it’s a death wish to venture near Château Creux. The locals never come within miles of this place, for fear that it’s cursed, and that keeps them protected, whether or not they realize it. Some of the elders claim they wouldn’t hesitate to kill a man in order to protect the secret existence of our famille.

  Bastien flips his wet hair off his brow. There’s a flinty and dangerous look in his eyes that I haven’t seen since the night he first met Ailesse and fought her at Castelpont, determined to kill a Bone Crier to avenge his father. “What are you doing here?” he counters, seething at all of us. “You’re huntresses. You have the graces you need to track down Odiva. So track her. Threaten her. Tell her to bring back Ailesse and all the souls she stole with her.”

  Roxane stalks closer to him. “You are not Ailesse’s amouré. She is none of your concern.”

  “Like hell she isn’t,” he bites out. “I can love and fight for whoever I want. I don’t need your twisted gods telling me how to live my life, especially when they marked my fathe
r as one of your amourés.”

  Roxane tenses. Pernelle covers her mouth with her hand.

  “That’s right,” Bastien says. “And he’s in the Underworld now, thanks to Odiva. So if you’re really committed to protecting righteous souls, you’re going to get him back where he belongs.”

  Milicent gapes at him. “We can’t rebel against Odiva.”

  He glares at her. She and Dolssa still have him in their graced grip. “Are you telling me you’re going to turn a blind eye to what she’s done?”

  “I never said that.” Milicent lowers her brows. “But you don’t understand how powerful she is.”

  “She killed Maurille,” Dolssa adds.

  “I was there,” Bastien replies flatly. “And I saw her do worse than that. That doesn’t give me any excuse to cower instead of challenge her.”

  “We’re not cowering,” Roxane says. “We’re being wise.”

  “Wise?” Bastien snaps. “You’re the damn Ferriers of the dead! You’re under obligation to fix what she’s done—to demand she undo it.”

  “He’s right.” I speak up. “We can’t allow Tyrus to keep Ailesse and all the Unchained souls imprisoned in the Underworld. They don’t deserve that.”

  Roxane sharpens her gaze on me. “It is not your place to command us, Sabine.”

  My hands ball into fists, the jackal in me snarling, urging me to lunge at her. “I’m not seeking power. I’m reminding us of our sworn duty. As Ferriers, it’s our responsibility to send these souls back where they belong.”

  “And punish the woman who sent them,” Bastien adds. “I’ll gladly volunteer to be the one to slit her throat.”

  “Enough!” Roxane cuts the air with her hands. “I will consult with the elders and determine our course of action, but as things stand right now, our priority is to protect the living.”

  “Ailesse is living!” I say. “How can you—?”

  “The Chained are still loose upon the land.” She talks over me. “That is something within the realm of our control. We will herd and trap them, as we’ve done before.”