“Meela, how can I pay you for this?”
She pulled a handful of coins out of her pocket. It wasn’t much, but it was what she had leftover from last month’s rent.
The old woman fussed with Elysia’s cloak and touched her cheek, suddenly sweet instead of a wizened terror. “There shall be no price. I do this as a gift to my god and the women who raised me.”
Chapter 27
Curledup like a cat on the cushioned bench beneath her bedroom window, Elysia stared pensively at the sealed jar of herbs. She gave the jar a little shake. After all these months, she couldn’t imagine what it would be like to finally sink her feet into the river bank of her dreamland. To walk along its edge and follow death’s song. Again, she wondered where the song would take her.
As usual, rain dripped down the window, smearing her vision of the outside world. Lost in her thoughts, she let her forehead press against the chilled glass, staring out into the gray nothing. Rousing herself, Elysia pulled the black and gold embossed book from Mari back onto her lap. She’d been trying for over an hour to immerse herself in its text, to no avail. Filled with stories and commentary on all the undead gods her people had once known, the book was dense enough that she found herself stalling.
She’d already read all the stories about the god of the dead, but now with her tincture brewing, anxiety drove her to believe there just might be a key she hadn’t found yet within the text. Flipping to death’s pages, she began to skim, hoping to glean something new and useful for making a deal with death himself.
Her fingers traced the charcoal sketch of a man standing with his arms behind his back in a scraggy field littered with skulls and bits of bone. She frowned at the image.I really hope that’s symbolic…It was nothing like what she had seen in her dreams, but then again, she hadn’t seen much at all. Maybe there really was an old decaying field of bones and dust.
Over the weeks, the potion had grown darker and murkier, still all purples and browns. During this time, she kept waiting for fear to seize her. Wherever this realm existed, it was death. The person in charge of such a place could not possibly be someone you’d want to run into on a dark night without your wits and a good knife in your hand.Not just death, deals.As if his ability to rule over death was too simple, tooboring. He’d had to take up a second hobby: manipulating mortals into desperate deals. She supposed all gods accepted or declined petitions, some of them had simply become more active in the process.
The terror never came.
It made her wonder if some fundamental part of her had been broken by the vigilance required of her as a cursed individual being blackmailed by her own blood. Or maybe it was a latent effect of watching innumerous executions, knowing it could and should have been her. In spite of her dark thoughts, Elysia lounged on her bed comfortably, sifting through the pieces of herself as if they were cut from someone else.
She imagined that a normal person would feel a sense of revulsion at the idea of visiting the land of the dead while still very much alive. Maybe there was something irrevocably wrong with her. Either way, there wasn’t much she could do about it.
A flurry of feet sounded on the stairs, causing her to turn her head. Gage was gone, and this wasn’t a house that received visitors. Elysia rolled smoothly off the bed, landing in a crouch,dagger in hand, waiting for whoever was about to break through the door.
Chapter 28
The doorknob twisted,opening to reveal a smug but winded Beatriz panting in her doorway. Lips curled in victory, her sister nodded a breathless hello. One of Gage’s men appeared behind her, grabbing at the back of her neck, but without missing a beat, Beatriz threw her elbow back into his windpipe, never losing her smirk. The man gurgled and dropped to his knees behind her. One solid donkey kick from Beatriz and he was toppling down the stairs.
Elysia groaned and shoved her dagger back into its sheath, tossing it onto her bed. “One of these days I’m going to stab first and ask questions later, and then you’ll be sorry.”
She ducked past Beatriz, gaping at the now unconscious man sprawled awkwardly halfway down the stairs.
“Gage is going to be so pissed,” she muttered, slamming her bedroom door and leaving the man to his shame.
Beatriz just shrugged, her attention on Elysia’s dagger that she’d immediately picked up and was now sliding in and out of the sheath. “Not my fault he’s bad at his job.”
Elysia snatched her dagger back. “That’s not a toy, Beatriz.” She shoved the weapon beneath the waist of her trousers.
“My, my, you have even more secrets down there than most women.” Beatriz gave her a wink, lighting a fire in Elysia’s blood.
Hands latching onto her hips, she interrogated her older sister. “How did you even find me here?”
Beatriz flopped back onto the bed, arms going behind her head like she owned the place. Ignoring her younger sister’s question, her gaze slowly slid around the room, making obvious stops on incriminating items. The book on the undead gods. The discarded weapons casually strewn about. The juxtaposition of pretty dresses and leather leggings and training gear. Curiosity lit her gray eyes as they halted on the herbal tincture.
Elysia drew her attention back, snapping her fingers in front of Beatriz’s face. “I asked you a question. Do you even know whose house you broke into?”
Beatriz’s head rolled to the side, flashing Elysia with a grin.
Her eyebrows rose, giving Elysia a put-out look. “Of course, I know where I am. You said you trained with Kava’s Shadow. What you didn’t say was that you’re close enough with the man to sleep in his beds and eat his food. But Lily is very rarely wrong about these things. She says everyone needs people, even Parkers, and he’s yours.”
She went pensive, interlacing her fingers and looking back up at the ceiling. A hint of guilt touched her words, but she didn’t say anything else, just nodded like this Lily knew everything.
Elysia’s brow creased. “Lily? Oh, the Doorman’s name is Lily.”
Beatriz grabbed a small practice sword and swung it dangerously in Elysia’s direction, her shoulder dropping with the unexpected weight.
Elysia disarmed and admonished her sister in one smooth movement. “Stoptouching. You’re going to hurt yourself.”
