TheKlovodraised his wand, lips twisting into a mirthless smile. “Because a star god asked it of me.”
No remorse could be found in the warden’s voice or his magic. Aether poured out of the clarion crystal–tipped wand and Nathaniel breathed it in unwillingly. It tasted sickly sweet in the back of his throat, seeping into him.
Foreign magic clawed through his mind, picking apart his memories without care. The pressure from theKlovod’s intrusion became heavier and heavier until all he could do was spit it out in the shape of words.
“Stop,” Nathaniel pleaded. “Stop.”
The years spun away from him, unraveling like a skein of thread. Bit by bit, memory by memory, Nathaniel lost himself to the threads theKlovodused to stitch him up, all anew.
“He’s in love with the girl you’re after. The one who casts starfire,” theKlovodsaid.
“What else does the cog know?” Eimarille asked.
All the secrets Nathaniel had spent his life keeping came undone beneath theKlovod’s mind magic. He gave them up because it was the only way to stop the pain of the aether eating away at his mind.
When Nathaniel finally came back to himself, he was on his knees, bleeding from his nose, with Eimarille’s fingers curled over his chin. At some point, someone had removed the manacles around his wrists and ankles, but freedom was a lie, there in that underground horror.
His skin didn’t feel like his own, pulled tight over his bones, ready to split. His head ached, the room spinning around him, and it felt like someone else was looking up at Eimarille through his eyes.
“Do you know that every heart is meant to break?” Eimarille asked in a falsely gentle voice. “But we’ll mend yours into something useful. Something that will carve Caris’ into pieces and ruin the duchess’ dreams.”
Nathaniel’s breath rattled in his lungs, and the words were slow to come, but they made it past his lips somehow. “I’ll never hurt her.”
“You won’t have a say in the matter.”
Eimarille let him go, and theKlovodflicked his wand at Nathaniel in a lazy, dismissive manner. “On your feet. Get undressed.”
His body jerked itself to its feet, and Nathaniel swore he was screaming, but it was only in his mind. His hands stripped off his clothes with wooden motions, leaving everything on the floor as his body walked toward the worktable. He tried to stop himself, tried to dig in his heels, but his body didn’t listen.
It sat on the cold metal slab, smearing someone else’s blood around as he lay down beneath the gaslights. The machinery clanked and whirred when it moved around him as theKlovodworked to secure Nathaniel to the worktable and slide needles into his veins.
His body was docile beneath the disinterested touch, mind wrapped up in someone else’s control. Nathaniel stared past the gas lamps and the chemicals favored by alchemists, screaming in the cavern of his mind where no one could hear.
But at the first touch of the scalpel against his skin, cutting deep enough to nick bone, Nathaniel found his voice again. Or theKlovodlet him have it back.
Either way, Nathaniel screamed as if he were dying, but that was a blessing denied to him, even when theKlovodtook his heart.
Eleven
EIMARILLE
Eimarille’s arrival back in New Haven at the end of Eighth Month after the revenant attack in Amari was unexpected, to be sure.
She preferred it that way.
Her motor carriage came to a stop in front of the palace entrance within the inner courtyard. A servant immediately opened the door, offering his hand to help her out. Eimarille accepted the help and adjusted the fall of her gown’s skirt once she stood on the cobblestone.
She glanced back, watching as Lisandro was helped out by Terilyn. The Blade used her right arm as if no wound existed beneath the long sleeve of her suit jacket. Eimarille knew otherwise. The burn had been healed to the point that it looked months old rather than days, courtesy of a magician.
Terilyn took Lisandro by the hand and looked at Eimarille, nodding firmly. “I have him.”
“I know you do,” Eimarille said before sweeping up the stairs to greet the star god who waited for her.
Innes was dressed in a fine suit that day, of a fashion that would not be out of place amongst courtiers. His lips curved in a smile that Eimarille returned with a deep curtsy.
“My lord,” she said.
Innes offered her his hand, and she settled her fingers into his grip as she straightened up. “How fares Amari?”
