Bid My Soul Farewell Page 11

  Even though I still gripped her by the wrist and could easily call the authorities on her head for the crime she freely confessed to, the woman looked at me as if I were no more than an annoying pest. “You think you’re going to save the north?” she said, her voice dripping with antipathy.

  “I—I am.” I felt unseated. “I’m bringing a new trade commission from the mainland here.”

  “How long is that gonna take?” She chatted idly, almost sounding bored.

  “A few weeks to go there and back . . .” I started.

  “A few weeks and then everything’s solved?”

  “Well, no,” I allowed. “It’ll take a while, but—”

  “What’s going to stop me from starving in the meantime?” she said, the bite back in her voice.

  I stuttered at her, no answer rising on my tongue.

  My hand slacked, and she wriggled free but didn’t try to run away. “Here,” she said, reaching into her pocket and spilling my coins on the ground between us. “Go make the world a better place.”

  “I—I’m sorry,” I said, but she was already walking away.

  I knelt to pick up the coins. From the shadows of the alley across from me, I saw small eyes staring at me. I stacked the coins up on the sidewalk, a tiny silver tower, then purposefully turned my back and walked in the opposite direction. Scampering feet raced out, coins clinking, and faded back into the silent dark.

  TWENTY-THREE

  Nedra

  “PROUD?” I ASKED, trailing behind Bunchen as she led the way back to the front desk of her antiques shop. There was something about the way she’d looked at me, the way she’d said it that made me think . . .

  Bunchen leaned against the counter. “Proud of what you’ve become,” she said finally. She picked up an apple-sized paperweight from the counter, shifting it from one hand to the other as we spoke.

  My hand went to my crucible, the cold iron a comfort to me. It was strange to think that the last time I was here, my father had been alive, and now his ashes were mixed with the iron inside.

  Bunchen’s gaze was sharp. “I had wondered if the rumors were true,” she said finally, staring at my crucible. “Truth is always tainted when it comes from other sources.”

  “What rumors?” I asked.

  “That Bardon’s girl studied the fourth alchemy.”

  It had never occurred to me that Papa’s fame as a bookseller would mix with my notoriety. I was used to the way everyone in my village had known me. But my identity there was mostly as a twin, a somewhat rare occurrence. And at Yūgen, I was known only as the poor girl. Somehow it hadn’t hit me that my identity would be mixed up with my actions as a necromancer. I didn’t mind so much being the necromancer, feared by the people of Northface Harbor and left alone with my army of the undead. It felt different, somehow, being known as Nedra the necromancer, daughter of Bardon Brysstain, the bookseller. I could never hide from people who knew my roots. I had believed my greatest protection was first my army of the undead, and then my anonymity. My fading revenants stripped away my first protection; Bunchen had just shown me how flimsy the second was.

  But more than that, Bunchen cast doubt on what I’d thought of Papa. “Are you saying my father would have been proud of this?” I asked, touching my crucible. “Of what I have done?” Of what I did do, to him. And Mama.

  And Nessie.

  I had never thought to speak of Papa with someone who knew him. When I’d left my village, my home nothing but smoldering embers, I had excised the memories of my parents alive from my mind.

  Bunchen appraised me, a contemplative look on her face as she weighed her words. “Maybe not what you’ve done so far,” she conceded. “But of what you can do.” When I didn’t answer, Bunchen put the paperweight she’d been fiddling with into my hand.

  It was heavier than I’d anticipated, and it wasn’t until I felt the rough metal that I realized it was iron. I rolled it over in my palm, trying to figure out why it was so familiar, but it wasn’t until I put the flat end back on the counter that I recognized it. A tiny replica of the remains of the statue of Bennum Wellebourne that stood in the middle of the courtyard at Yūgen Academy, marred by having iron poured over the solid stone in ugly black lumps by the citizens who turned on him when he turned to necromancy.

  “Wait,” I said. Bunchen seemed to think I was some sort of new Bennum Wellebourne, ready to lead my army of the undead against the Empire. That didn’t bother me so much; it was reasonable for her to connect necromancy with rebellion, given our island’s history. Bennum Wellebourne had been one of the founding fathers of our colony, the first governor and a leader to our people. But the first years on Lunar Island had been plagued with poor weather, poor crops, and poor health, and when the Emperor of the time hadn’t sent aid, Wellebourne had responded with a rebellion, intending to make the island its own nation instead of a lesser colony under the vast Allyrian Empire.

  But when his militia had been slaughtered, he’d raised them again, creating an army of the undead that had made it as far as the gates of the castle in Miraband before being defeated.

  Wellebourne had been caught and executed for his treason. And I had no intention of following in his footsteps, no matter what Bunchen assumed.

  What really disturbed me was Bunchen’s other implication. “Are you suggesting Papa supported the rebellion?”

  Bunchen looked around the empty shop. “Come with me,” she said, leading the way behind the front desk, toward the back room where she and Papa had always negotiated prices while I’d been left to my own devices.

  If possible, the back room was even more cluttered than the shop floor, but a small round table was cleared off in the center.

  Bunchen settled into a cane chair at the table, while I took the seat across from her. “Your father was no rebel,” she said. “Much as I pushed him to be.”

  “But then—” I started.

  “He was sympathetic to our cause,” Bunchen clarified. “But he feared for you girls and your mother. He was a careful man. Still,” she continued, “Bardon had clear ideas on what was right and what was wrong. He did what he could.”

  “What did he do?”

  “Passed messages, mostly.”

  That made sense. I imagined it would be easy to hide messages in the books he sold, and no one would suspect him for going from village to village.

  I sucked in a breath then, remembering what Nessie had told me about Papa the day before he died. Papa had gotten sick because he’d been traveling from village to village, despite the threat of the plague, determined to pass on books and deliver medicine. I’d thought he was foolish to risk his own life for this, even if he was helping others, but if his books also contained messages for something greater, the fate of our colony, our potential nation . . .

  The cold iron of my crucible was so sharp, it felt as if it would burn my skin.

  “He spoke of you often,” Bunchen said in a gentle tone. “He told me about your studies in the city, how cosmopolitan you were becoming. He never quit talking about you and your sister.”

  For the first time ever, I was glad Papa couldn’t see what I’d become. That he couldn’t see what I’d done to Nessie. I didn’t think he’d be proud of that.

  “I need your help,” I told Bunchen.

  “I know,” she said. “I’ve got it ready for you. I’ve been waiting, just as you told me to.”

  I tried to keep a straight face despite my confusion.

  Rather than return to the shop floor, Bunchen shifted boxes out of the way, clearly searching for something in particular. In a moment, she withdrew a copper crucible, about the length of my arm but deep, like a small trough. A leather strap was wrapped around the lip in a sort of sling, making the vessel look like a strange metal purse.

  Bunchen set the copper crucible down in front of me, a look of anticipation on
her face. Copper crucibles were used for transactions—put the price inside the empty vase, speak the runes, and whatever was hidden inside the depths would appear. Master Ostrum had used a copper crucible to hide Bennum Wellebourne’s journal and Bennum Wellebourne’s own severed arm. I hoped Bunchen’s crucible contained nothing so gruesome.

  “It was a risk, sending me this without a note,” Bunchen said, a hint of chastisement in her voice. “You’d be surprised at how well this sort of stuff sells, particularly if you can prove it’s authentic. At least you had the sense to send it through the right channels.”

  “Right channels?” I asked, unable to hold back the question.

  “Through the rebel network.”

  I tipped the crucible over, examining it. Most copper crucibles were used to protect valuable items, and the intricate runes on this one indicated that it was highly secure. In fact . . .

  There it was. The reason why Bunchen thought that this crucible was meant for me. The runes were clear. Only a necromancer could unlock this crucible.

  Or, more accurately, only a necromancer’s blood.

  At the very base of the copper crucible, two runes were etched inside a circle—sanga and loggia. The runes for “blood” and “key.”

  “One day, you must tell me how you found this.” Bunchen’s voice sounded reverential. “A Bennum Wellebourne original.”

  “How do you know Wellebourne made this?” I asked.

  Bunchen shot me a withering look, and I was reminded that she was the lead antiquities expert in not just Hart but all of Lunar Island, at least according to my father.

  “Do you have your silver?” she asked, eyeing my pack, which I’d taken with me this morning. I shook my head, and without another word Bunchen passed me a small silver crucible, about the size of my palm, and then she gave me a knife.

  I had read about sanga loggia locks before, but never seen one in real life. Still, I understood the principle behind them. Most copper crucibles could be opened with a strand of hair, a drop of saliva, or even just a paper with a secret code written on it. But sanga loggia crucibles required a greater price.

  I gripped Bunchen’s knife between my left arm and chest, a simple task made harder thanks to my amputation, and then slid the forefinger of my right hand along the sharp blade. A blossom of blood bloomed on my fingertip. I held it over the lip of the silver crucible, and when the droplet fell, I whispered, “Sanga loggia.”

  Rather than a splash, my blood hit the crucible’s base with a clatter. When I tipped the crucible toward my palm, a bright red key tumbled into my hand.

  “Hurry,” Bunchen said. “You have only about five minutes once the blood melts to get whatever you want out, and then you have to do it again.”

  I carefully placed the key into the center of the copper crucible’s base. The blood melted like chocolate on a hot plate, the end of the key sticking straight up.

  The seemingly empty crucible was now full to the brim with books, boxes, and various items wrapped in cloth or paper. I sucked in my breath at the sight of half a dozen necromantic texts. Surely the answers I sought would be found here.

  “May I?” Bunchen asked, her eyes alight with wonder. I held the unlocked crucible out toward her. She reached inside and withdrew a slender box, as long as a dagger and thick as a book. Bunchen held the box reverently, as if it contained a holy relic. It was made of a smooth, black material—stone or wood, I couldn’t tell. She lifted the lid carefully.

  “I’ve only heard rumors of this,” she said, turning the box for me to see.

  Half the box contained a series of papers scrolled tightly and bound with a hemp cord. The other half of the box housed small, square boxes. I picked up the first box, opening it carefully. Inside was a circular piece of iron the size of a coin and so rusty that it looked on the verge of crumbling.

  Bunchen looked at me with eyes wide and lips quirked in surprise. “You don’t recognize it?” she asked, a hint of disappointment in her tone.

  I examined it more closely. As understanding settled on me, my eyes shot to Bunchen, who nodded grimly. “One of the rings used to seal the graves of the revenants Bennum Wellebourne raised.”

  Wellebourne had sailed across the Azure Sea, his army of the dead floating behind him. Without the need to breathe, it was easier to drag them like flotsam than afford them a spot on the ship. Wellebourne’s necromancy died with him at his execution, and the bodies floated back to the shore, where family and friends gathered them up and reburied the dead, sealing each dirt mound with an iron circle to prevent them from being raised a second time.

  “One of the originals,” I whispered, my hand hovering over the iron. Some mourner—an ancestor of mine, perhaps—had pressed this metal circle into the fresh grave dirt mounded over their loved one, hoping it would be enough to stop their decaying flesh and bones from pushing through the soil once more.

  Governor Adelaide had passed out nails bent into a circle when she’d helped the citizens of Lunar Island celebrate Burial Day last year. I could still smell the wet, red clay of the recent graves as I had pushed my iron into the earth and prayed for my family’s safety.

  I leaned in closer, turning the iron ring over in my palm. Through the rust, I could see runes.

  “Can you read it?” Bunchen asked.

  The series of runes engraved in the iron told a story. “This isn’t about death,” I said, squinting, puzzled. “I see—light and dark . . .”

  I shook my head. When used together like this, these runes meant more than light and dark, right and wrong, good and evil. They meant the unclear space between two opposites. The gray area, the murky unknown.

  “Infansik,” I said. A rune without a proper translation in Allyrian, infansik meant a circular motion that implied repetition forever. “I think the runes indicate that good and evil, life and death are cyclical,” I said. “What an odd choice for a charm meant to seal corpses in their graves.”

  Bunchen looked thoughtful. “I have seen this kind of thing before,” she said. “In the more philosophical necromantic texts. Which I no longer have,” she said when she saw my face brighten. “But many of the necromantic philosophies seem to say that our concept of what is right and wrong is not on a linear scale, but on a constantly turning circle.”

  “I still don’t fully understand,” I confessed.

  “It’s just philosophy. The salient point is that this ring was used in Wellebourne’s time. It was one of the originals.”

  I looked at the books, all clearly old, most with lettering so faded I couldn’t see their titles on the spines.

  “Do you have any other necromantic texts?” I asked. “Even philosophical ones. I can pay,” I added when Bunchen shook her head sadly. I didn’t have much money, but Grey did.

  “It’s not a matter of coin,” Bunchen said. “Those books are hard to find. What are you looking for?”

  “I need something that will help me . . .” I struggled to think of the right words. “Restore a soul,” I said finally.

  Bunchen raised her eyebrow. “Restore a soul? Yours?”

  I shook my head rapidly. “No, no,” I said. Then I paused. “Why? Isn’t it obvious I still have my own soul?”

  Bunchen gave me a somewhat sympathetic smile, but it came out more like a grimace. “I have read of the way a necromancer grows . . . thin about the soul. Manipulating death so much, over time a necromancer’s soul will start to weaken. The body, too—you’ll age faster, die younger, the more you practice the fourth alchemy,” she said. “Necromancers will sometimes steal the souls of others to replenish their own . . .”

  “That’s not what I want,” I said quickly. “It’s for—the others.”

  Bunchen’s cold gaze narrowed. “How many do you have?”

  “More than fifty,” I said.

  “A small army,” Bunchen said. “But not a force to
be ignored. And one that could grow.”

  Bunchen had given me the copper crucible because she had been instructed to pass it off to a necromancer. She worked with a network of rebels hoping to overthrow the Emperor; it seemed like she wanted me to emulate Wellebourne. I didn’t like the idea of deceiving her, but I needed information. “They could be a formidable army,” I said. “But they’re becoming weaker by the day.”

  “Their bodies are failing?” she asked. “I’ve never heard of—”

  “Not their bodies.” I thought of how strong Nessie had been fighting at the governor’s castle. “Their minds.”

  “Oh.” Bunchen looked surprised. “They’re not supposed to still have their minds, dear. They’re dead. They have you to think for them.”

  So then why were my revenants different? Perhaps it was because they had wanted to come back that they held on to pieces of themselves as they were raised. But that just proved all the more how evil Wellebourne’s actions had been. He’d taken his dead and had no problem using them as empty shells to fight his battles for him.

  I didn’t want to fight. I just wanted to be left alone. With revenants who were more than moving corpses.

  As Bunchen turned her focus back to the contents of the box, I picked up the first book in the stack inside the crucible. A piece of paper fluttered out.

  In careful black ink were written five small words:

  The Collector

  Corner Street

  Miraband

  The words were confusing enough—a partial address, no name—but what struck me was the paper itself. Because unlike everything else in this copper crucible, the paper was new. Crisp and bright white, with the uniform edges of one of the mainland’s bookbinders.

  “When did you get this box?” I asked.

  Bunchen was distracted. “Oh, maybe six or seven months ago. Just when the plague was beginning.”

  This crucible could only be opened by a necromancer, and this piece of paper was far newer than the antiquities it was packaged with. Someone had recently opened it and had left me that paper.