The cream tastes like fruit—not any fruit I can name, but it’s delicious all the same. Still, nothing I see or taste helps me to do what I want to more than anything else in this world—forget. Forget who I once was: a newly appointed master necromancer in love with her job and sure of her place in the world; forget the pain of losing my heart, a boy named Evander, and my mentor, Master Cymbre, within mere weeks of each other; forget the monsters I faced down with fire, monsters who had once been gentle Dead, some of whom I’d raised with my own magic; forget the living monster my former friend Prince Hadrien became when he murdered King Wylding and countless others; forget the sick, wet sound of my blade sinking into him when I ended it all so his sister, Valoria, could take the throne and lead us into a better future.
Of course, forgetting isn’t easy, but I figure the more distance I put between me and Karthia, the better chance I have at finally stopping the nightmares that have plagued me since Evander’s death, and gotten even worse after Hadrien’s.
“Stars, it’s nearly time to meet Kasmira for supper!” Meredy pulls me back to reality by shoving some of her shopping into my arms, having just returned from inspecting some patterned cloth under a big red tent. “Too bad we ruined our appetites,” she adds with a guilty grin. “Say—you still thinking about Valoria? Or...?”
I shake my head, not because I don’t want to tell her, but because I’m not quite sure how to answer. All afternoon, this vague, nagging unease has stuck with me, as if I’m missing something, like when I was a child and I’d worry my tongue against the mushy gap where a tooth used to be without fully realizing it.
It isn’t until we start walking toward the small tavern on the water where we agreed to meet Kasmira at sundown that it dawns on me: I haven’t seen any Dead since we got here. Granted, I wasn’t searching hard, but I should have seen at least one shrouded figure at the market. The Dead are always hungrier than the living, and the market simmered with fresh-cooked goods waiting to be devoured.
Just behind an inn to our left, I glimpse a familiar gleam of blue—a gateway to the Deadlands—and my heart leaps. There are plenty of people on the street right now. It wouldn’t be difficult to sneak away from Meredy and jump into that soft blue glow for a quick look around. Just to see if there are any spirits nearby who could tell me what happened to Lyris’s Dead. Mouth going dry, heart beating faster, I wait until Meredy is several paces ahead of me and duck behind the inn.
I’m a few steps from the gate when Meredy calls, “Master Necromancer?”
I freeze, not sure if I’m disappointed or glad that she immediately noticed my absence.
She hurries toward me, glancing between me and the gate—to her green eyes, only a bare patch of earth, though she knows me wellenough that her face is taut with worry. “Come on. I know we aren’t hungry, but we don’t want to disappoint Kasmira, and you know how she feels about waiting.”
I hesitate, still torn.
But when Meredy shifts all her shopping to one hand so she can grab hold of mine with the other, I let her lead me toward our destination. Partly because I’m not sure what I’ll find in the Deadlands so soon after the Battle of Grenwyr City. I might see Hadrien’s spirit, and I know I’m not ready to meet his arrogant, smirking face just yet. And partly because I don’t want to let go of Meredy’s hand.
Shortly after I take a seat across from Kasmira in the narrow tavern, sweat begins to run down my back from the press of bodies and the warmth of the fire in the hearth. I whisk off my cloak and silently scarf down the rooster pie I ordered until a funny prickling on the back of my neck forces my gaze up from my plate.
I haven’t felt the sensation of being watched so strongly since a giant Shade, the largest of those rotten-looking, corpse-devouring monsters I’ve ever seen, stalked Evander and me through the Deadlands. Sure enough, there are several sailors casting furtive glances my way. Exchanging whispers.
“Keep your elbows off the table, Master Necromancer, before you offend everyone from here to the edge of the world,” Meredy says in my ear, followed by a giggle younger than her almost seventeen years. The mead we were served has already gone to her head, turning her cheeks a glowing pink.
Kasmira sweeps her gaze around the room, unusually quiet. “Odessa, Meredy, I hope you both got enough to eat.” She keeps her voice low as she sets down her fork and casually reaches under the table. I can’t hear the soft hiss of her dagger being drawn, but I know the swift and practiced motion well. “Something’s not right here.When I stand, follow me outside and head to theParadise. Don’t look at anyone. Don’t talk to anyone. Just get on the ship, sharpish.”
She slinks toward the door, Meredy and I trailing in her wake, but we only get halfway across the room before our path forward disappears, blocked by bodies.
“You there, Karthian!” the man behind the bar roars from across the tavern, pointing an accusing finger at—me. I say nothing, startled by the recognition, and he prompts, “You speak Kanon, don’t you? I caught a few words when you came in.” His command of our language is stiff and slow, but clear. As I give a hesitant nod, he adds darkly, “We may not all speak your common tongue, but everyone here knows what that pin on your chest means,necromancer. Your kind hasn’t been welcome here for over a century.”
My hand flies up to cover the sapphire pin on my tunic that marks me as a master of my magic, hoping that for a room full of people this drunk, out of sight will mean out of mind. Now I understand the lack of Dead here; there aren’t necromancers around to raise anyone.
A few of the people nearby look at us with disgust as they repeat the word like a warning. “Necromancer.”
“Necromancers aren’t welcome here?” Meredy demands, seeming upset not just for me, but for anyone on this island with blue-eyed Sight. “What is this madness? Do Lyrians not practice their magic anymore?”
“The Republic of Lyris outlawed your kind long ago, when we saw how Karthians suffered for cheating Death,” the man behind the bar spits. “All our dead are buried, as it should be. And they’ll stay that way, because you’re leaving now.”
He jerks his head toward the door, making beads of sweat fly off his brow. He’s rattled by the mere sight of me, and somehow his fear cuts worse than his words or his patrons’ stares. Had Hadriennot forced me to slay him, we could have exiled him here, to an island that loathes necromancers and the Dead the way he wanted Karthians to.
I try to push toward the door, but the crowd around me doesn’t budge.
“Get out of my sight before I decide to call a lawman!” the barman snarls. “Your companions, too,” he adds, glaring at Kasmira and Meredy beside me. “Out. Now.”
“Wait!” an old woman calls from the back of the tavern, where she’s polishing glasses by the hearth. The quelling look she shoots the barman is one only a mother could give. “Do you bring news from Karthia? I didn’t think King Wylding allowed his people to travel, yet I see several new faces among your crew, not just the necromancer...”
“He didn’t let us doanything,” one of Kasmira’s younger sailors blurts, the words slurred from the drinks clutched in each of his hands. Like the old woman, he sits near the hearth, his face ruddy as the coals within. “But that old bag of bones won’t be handing down any more decrees, thank the stars. Gone for good now, is’n’ee?”
The whispers in the room grow steadily louder and more frantic, like the angry buzzing of hornets. I wish we’d brought Lysander to the tavern instead of giving him guard duty back on theParadise.
All night, we’ve been surrounded by people—an entire island full of people—who had no idea, despite being Karthia’s closest neighbor, of the horror that just took place so near their homes. The death of a once-great king. The rise of a new one, a man still more like a boy who believed he could change everything for the better despite not knowing whatbetterlooked like, who believed himself to be so much more than what he really was—mad. For all they knew until that sailor with shit for brains opened his mouth, nothing in Karthia had changed, and we had simply come here on a routine smuggling trip. Business asusual for Kasmira and her crew—apart from docking in the daylight, that is.
Kasmira levels a glare at the sailor, drawing a finger across her throat.
“What?” he asks sheepishly. “Not like it was a secret...”
