The sound of her voice in our heads is so precious, so innocent, so childlike—I turn back to Niklaus, sticking my bottom lip out with round, gushing eyes at how cute she is.
“God,” he groans, but his smile bleeds through his annoyance.
“So sweet!” I prattle. But as I peer back again, the small black wolf is gone. Vanished in a puff of black sand, back into the Nightlung.
“Mmm-hmm. Are you going to take off your dress for me and finish what you started or are we going to keep moving?”
Even though that statement sends a rush of unwanted heat between my legs, I practically levitate off of him.
“We need to get new clothes. We draw too much attention like this,” he says, as if his suggestion moments before didn’t punch me in the gut.
But I agree quietly, replaying him asking me to remove my dress with disgust at myself for allowing my toes to curl at the thought of that ever happening.
Our walk to the city is agonizing. This dress is comfortable and light…until you walk miles wearing it. My bare feet are covered in splinters and sliced with thorns. The corset waist is cutting off the circulation to my ribs and stomach. And fuck, it’s so heavy I might collapse.
But the amber glow of the streetlamps peek over the horizon. And the world of the Chandelier City returns in full view. The scent of essential oils, buggy exhaust, freshly laundered cotton, and newspaper ink. Feminine clusters of laughter, heels clacking against the cobblestone, and the hollow ring of a church bell.
It’s all familiar, except…
“Is that…?” Niklaus trails off in shock.
He sees what I see. It’s hard not to. We’re standing in its shadow. A piece of architecture that we’ve only ever seen in history books. It’s bigger than I imagined. A monolith of human suffering. And this shadow, this cloud of eerie stillness away from the sun—long and unyielding, like it has a mind of its own. Like it’s decided it wants to claim me too.
Niklaus and I hold our breath, crank our necks, and stare up at the towers piercing the stormy clouds. We have no words. No commentary. No way to express the feelings that fall over us.
Because we are standing in the shadow of…
The Emerald Lake Asylum.
33. Folded Between Decades
Niles
Twenty-One Years in the Past
Timeline: The Year of Dessin and Skylenna’s Vexamen Imprisonment
I know better than tospeak in my native tongue.
The language of Old Alkadonian is being used everywhere. The Vexamen Breed uniforms are here. The Meat Carnivals are back. And there is no sign Ruth has ever laid claim to her right to rule this country.
I can only guess Sapphire finally came into her own.
She claimed an ability like her parents.
I am collateral damage.
I have been left back in time, haven’t I?
The other captives call this place Draèmth Voryth. The boy next to me speaks my language and says it is called the Blackspire Ward of the North. It’s not associated with the Vexamen Prison. It’s an in-between. It’s a holding cell until they figure out where to put you. Prison, or working in servitude for life. It’s a waiting room of quiet despair to be sorted like livestock.
I sit on the cold granite floor, speckled with brown, black, and the occasion stain of blood. My back rests against an onyx pillar connected to a rib vault ceiling. There are nooses up there. It’s one of the first things I’ve noticed after arriving.Nooses. I counted them my first night. Thirteen. The boy told me they leave them up there to scare us. To show us that is the only means of escape.
Yes, nooses and cobwebs.
Crusted blood splatters.
Oddly the occasional claw marks.
