The Risenmade the bag heavy. She’d thought of hiding it somewhere in the room, but then she didn’t know if she would return. She had no plan now other than seeing Cecily revived. After that, she would determine a new course.
The underground room’s hidden latch was much easier to find in the light. Lux flung herself along the length of the revealed passageway, stopping only for a breath at its end. Nothing shifted, and so she barreled down the remainder until she stood before the mammoth archway, starved for air beneath looming statues. Lux curved her shoulders inward to be away from them and braced herself against the wall.
With a smidgeon of strength regained, she straightened. Adjusted the bag containing all she needed for a revival. And went through.
The torches flickered and lit.
Atop the grave of ice rested a body.
Same as the one before, it was clad in only undergarments, but Lux stared at the red braid. It hung limp. More so than the pale hand beside it.
Cecily lay dead before her.
Lux rushed forward and then around—away from the archway’s opening. Grabbing hold of Cecily’s rigid arm, she dragged the girl off the bed of ice. She did not waste time in searching for slit eyes—she delved straight for the gentle lull of lifeblood.
Lux huffed a breath in relief.
It was there, pooled within her, and under Lux’s quick assessment, the body seemed to be around ten hours post mortem. She knelt beside the girl. Flinging open her pack, she dug inside. Howler canines, she had. Marsh snapper eyes, she’d pilfered from Silas’s collection in Verity. She spread out all the rest beside her and worked as quickly as she could.
All the while, she listened.
For footsteps.
For her nightmare.
So far, she remained alone.
Lux painted Cecily and did not wait. Her first words of the incantation cast her onto the road to the Beyond. Lux had been here—on this shadowy path—so many times, she hardly registered it anymore. It was a plain road with plain earth beneath her feet, and once she reached the Veil, she reached out for the soul to cross.
“May your eyes become mine—”
Lux would lead Cecily home.
And there was no evil darkness to be found in it.
A human soul was light. Filled with energy. It seeped into Lux so she might carry it—the dead could not go back, only ahead, on their own. The girl’s energy bloomed within her. It shot to her fingers, her feet. It pricked in her nose and behind her eyes.
Lux was nearly there. The enchantment nearly done. She could feel her: Cecily. But for the first time, she noticed something else lingering too. Another brilliance. A harnessing of emotions. Had such awareness during revivals always been a possibility? Had her own brilliance truly stretched?
Her consciousness flickered.
Contain it!her head shouted.
She…would. Shedid—
And slumped forward.
“Wakeup!Oh,please,wake up.”
Lux blinked dazedly upward. “Cecily?”
The girl was bent over her, braid tickling her jaw, and Lux didn’t realize, until Cecily fell crying upon her, she was splayed out upon the cold flagstones.
Her body hummed.
Cecily’s weight upon her was uncomfortable.
She gently shoved her off. “I’m fine,” Lux mumbled, grinding her teeth over the lie.
