Total pages in book: 63
Estimated words: 59565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 298(@200wpm)___ 238(@250wpm)___ 199(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 59565 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 298(@200wpm)___ 238(@250wpm)___ 199(@300wpm)
The victim’s hand twitches, sparks briefly and fizzles. He has magic; maybe I can get him to heal himself. “Listen,” I murmur. “Channel it to your head to stop the blood—”
I lose my voice.
Under me, the man has gone limp.
With my free hand I grab for his wrist, feel for his pulse. Then feel harder for it. It must be there. Has to be.
It’s not.
I sink away from the body, hands shaking, covered in blood that seeped through the fabric of my cloak and my gloves. Sooner or later you’ll see.
No magic, no healing.
If a vitalian had been here, this man would have lived.
Ishut my eyes, soaking in the cruel reality, and almost lose the contents of my stomach when I open them and spot a wooden mask in the bottom of the boat.
No-no-no-no.
I gently turn his face and fight the urge to scramble back in panic.
Vitalian Dimos. Someone bashed the back of the man’s head and left him to die. I frantically search the boats and the shadows around me. Could the culprit be close? Watching?
Eyes stinging and fear in my stomach, I take off my cloak and rest it over Vitalian Dimos’s body. I wash the blood off my gloved hands in the canal and return to Quin’s dinghy. Hurriedly, wet fingers slippery on the oars, I row towards the constabulary. With clumsy feet I make my way to the road and hover in the shadows across from the gates. On a public noticeboard beside them is my picture, with a group of constables in thick conversation.
I swallow and spy to the left a familiar crest on the doors of a passing carriage. Prince Nicostratus. He’s been called in formally, for an apology and to remove his house arrest.
I race alongside the carriage as it pulls to a stop close to the gates. I open the doors and Nicostratus ducks out. “Thank—” He sees me lifting my mask and stops abruptly. First his face is awash with joy, but his eyes narrow onto the shoulder of my shirt and his expression quickly greys. He looks away.
“You’ve approached for a reason,” he says, dismissing the aklo who came to aid him.
My stomach sinks. “Please, I need you to get Quin.”
He hisses, and starts striding past me.
“There’s been another murder,” I say.
He hesitates but keeps walking.
“The sooner we solve this, the sooner this all ends.”
He pauses. “Tell me where. I’ll send him there myself.”
I give him all the details, where the body is and when I found him, and then I leave Nicostratus to sort it out with his brother. Better this way. What can I possibly do to help?
I stare at my hands and scrub them once more in the water. They still feel heavy with blood. I pick up pebbles and use them to scratch it all off but it only rips holes in my gloves.
Hot tears leak down my face. I can’t even use my hands to wipe them away.
I trudge back to the apothecary and try again to wash and mend my gloves.
Ruined.
I slip them back on anyway and let my chest sink every time I look down at them.
Cherry liquor is my only consolation. I find some in a dusty corner and imbibe on the floor of the sleeping nook. As the day wears into evening, I begin singing and laugh hollowly between songs. An emptied bottle spins in the dimming light of the room, and I stare at its dance while sipping from a larger bottle.
“Make me forget.”
The door creaks open further and a breeze rushes in. The curtain beside me flickers in front of my eyes and when it settles, there’s another presence in the room. The weight of him, leaning on his cane, is like a pressure on my chest.
I laugh through it and continue singing.
He witnesses this silently, and sinks into a sitting position against the opposite wall.
I choke on the final lyrics and end with, “I failed to save him.”
“You can’t save everyone.”
“Did you find who did it?”
“Not yet. They struck again.”
I frown.
“They bashed Eparch Valerius on the temple and left him for dead.”
“He died?”
“Nearly. Luckily, he’d invited so many vitalians to his home. And he was quickly found.”
I curl my useless fingers tightly.
“It’s not your fault, Cael.”
“I tried. I failed.”
“Not trying would be the bitterest failure.”
The clarity of his words, the sincerity . . .
I shut my eyes not to look at him. It’s not my fault. There’s simply no magic. And no reason for me to wait here until the mystery is solved. I should be putting distance between us. I should have packed my things and moved into an inn on the opposite side of the city. So why, then, have I stayed in the apothecary, drinking? Why, then, have I hoped he’d find me?
Say goodbye and go now. Get this . . . this tightness off me.