The Bone Season

29 His Parting from Her

The gust of heat blew me back across the room, deafening me. I landed hard on my right side, cracking my hip. I felt Nick grabbing my wrist, hauling me to my feet, pulling me out of the way, into the foyer. We barely reached the door before the flames caught up. I threw myself at the ground, covered my head with my arms. Fire burst from the Guildhall, shattering the windows. I kept low, moving as fast as I could. The flare gun was still in my hand.

None of the harlies had the kind of ordnance to cause such an explosion. Julian must not have told me something. Where had he found a mine, or the time to plant it? Had he taken it from No Man’s Land? And what kind of mine sent roaring fire straight through a building?

In the thick of the smoke, Nick took my elbow and hauled me to my feet. Glass fell from my hair. I coughed from my chest, my eyes burning.

“Wait.” I strained away from Nick’s hand. “Warden—”

He couldn’t be dead. Nick was shouting something, but he sounded distant. I tried to use the golden cord. To see, to feel, to hear. Nothing.

Outside, the sirens were howling and a rampant fire smoked in the next street. The Room belched flame and black cloud. One—no, two of the residences were ablaze. One of them was Balliol, the only building with electricity. The emissaries would have trouble getting word out to the citadel now. Thank you, Julian, I thought. Wherever you are, thank you.

Nick lifted me into his arms. “We’ve got to move,” he said, his voice ragged. He looked at the unfamiliar city, his face drawn with stress. “Paige, I don’t know this place—how do we find the train?”

“Just keep going north.” I tried to get down, but he gripped me too tightly. “I can run, damn it!”

“You just survived an explosion and a poltergeist,” Nick shouted at me. His face was red with anger. “I didn’t come all the way here for you to go and get yourself killed, Paige. For once in your life, just let someone carry you.”

Sheol I was in a state of warfare. Now the Guildhall was broken, the rebels had spread out across the streets, where they were fighting with all they had against the Rephaim. Scion emissaries were fleeing in every direction, trailing their bodyguards, who had opened fire on the voyants. Julian’s unit, the ones in charge of arson, had risen to their challenge with murderous enthusiasm—they’d already set fire to most of the Rookery. I wanted to stay, to fight, but I had to set off the flare. I’d save more lives that way.

Nick took the safest route, away from the fighting, through a narrow street. I caught sight of another skirmish. Harlies fighting alongside amaurotics and jackets, teaming up to take out individual Rephs—even Cyril had joined the struggle.

A piercing scream reached my ears. I looked over Nick’s shoulder. Nell. Her hands were restrained by two Rephs. “You’re not going anywhere, 9. We need to feed.” One of them pulled her head against him, holding her by the hair.

“No! You get your hands off me! You’re not ever feeding on me again, you parasite!”

Her screams were cut short when her keeper clapped a hand over her mouth. “Nick,” I shouted.

He heard the frantic edge to my voice. His arms loosened. I hit the ground running, straight toward Nell. I had no weapons—but I did have my gift. No longer my curse. Tonight it would save a life, not take one.

I threw my spirit at the bigger Reph. I pushed against his dreamscape, forcing my way into his hadal zone, and sprang straight back to my body. I was there in time to throw my hands out, stopping my chin from smacking into the ground. With no idea what had happened, Nell pulled her hands free of the Rephs and knifed the one on her right, stabbing deep into his side. At the same time, she pulled a spirit from nowhere and hurled it into his face. He let out an awful snarl. His companion was still reeling from my attack. Nell grabbed her fallen supplies and sprinted for her life.

The two Rephs were injured, but they were still threats. The one I’d attacked looked up at me, and his eyes—orange—came into focus. He took a blade from a sheath on his arm. “Go back to the æther, dreamwalker.”

The blade flashed toward my face. I didn’t duck fast enough: it caught my arm. Nick let off a round. The bullet hit the Reph in the chest—to no avail. I sent my spirit at his dreamscape. The second attack weakened him. I picked up the blade he’d thrown and drove it into his throat.

My mistake was forgetting about his companion. All the breath was knocked from my lungs as the second Reph crashed into me, pinning me to the ground. His giant fist smashed down, half an inch from my head.

Nick tossed his gun away. As the Reph raised a fist for a second try, Nick snatched three nearby spirits and hurled them in quick succession. I sensed the surge in the æther as he sent a vivid snapshot into the Reph’s dreamscape, blinding him. In the second the Reph rolled off me, fighting the spirits and the vision, I was on my feet and running back to Nick.

We hadn’t gone far before my my sixth sense stung. My head jerked around to face the threat.

“Nick!”

He knew. In one seamless movement, he threw down his backpack and reached for another spool. The target was familiar: Aludra Chertan.

“Dreamer.” She didn’t even glance at Nick. “I believe I still owe you for your little display in the chapel.”

“Stay back,” Nick warned.

“But you look so refreshing.”

Her eyes changed color.

Nick’s face contorted. Blood swelled in his tear ducts, and the veins in his neck strained out. “Almost as refreshing as the walker,” Aludra continued, moving toward us. “I might just keep you, oracle.”

Nick grasped his knees, trying to hold himself upright. I killed your heir apparent,” I said. “Don’t think I won’t do the same to you. Just crawl back to the rotten hell you came from.”

“Kraz was an arrogant creature. I am not. I know which of my enemies are worth my precious minutes.”

“And I’m one of them.”

“Oh, yes.”

I grew still. There was something behind her: a shadow. A massive, cumbersome shadow. She was too greedy to see it. The rotten giant. I recognized that blot in the æther. “How many minutes?”

“Only one.” She raised her hand. “But a minute is more than enough time to die in.”

Then her expression changed. Shock. She’d felt it, but she didn’t turn fast enough. The thing had her in its grip before she could move. White eyes. Dead eyes. I could only see bits of it—the gas lamps had gone out when it appeared—but it was more than enough to scar itself onto my memory, deep into the tissue, grating the delicate fabric of my dreamscape. Aludra stood no chance. Her scream was cut off before it started.

“Yes,” I said. “More than enough.”

Nick was frozen stiff. His eyes were wide, his mouth clenched. I grabbed his arm and ran.

We sprinted for our lives. The Emim were in the city. Just like Bone Season XVIII. “How long?” I called to Nick.

“Not long.” He grabbed my hand, pulling me faster. “What was that things? What’s Scion done to this place?”

“A lot.”

We took a side street, one of several that led into the ghost town. A figure came racing down from the opposite side, panting. Nick and I both reacted at the same time: Nick tripped the boy, sending him flying into the pavement, and pressed my hand against his Adam’s apple.

“Going somewhere, Carl?”

“Get off me!” Carl was drenched in sweat. “They’re coming. They’ve let them into the city.”

“Who?”

“The Buzzers. The Buzzers!” He shoved at my chest, almost in tears. “You had to ruin it, didn’t you? You had to try and change everything! This place is all I’ve got—you are not taking it—”

“You have a whole world. Don’t you remember it?”

“A whole world? I’m a freak! We’re all freaks, 40! Freaks that talk to dead people. That’s why we need them,” he said, stabbing a finger in the direction of the city center. “Don’t you see? This is the only place that’s safe for us. They’ll start killing us soon—jumping us—”

“Who?”

“The amaurotics. When they realize. When they realize what the Rephaim want. I’m never going out there again. You can keep your precious world. You’re welcome to it!”

I released his throat. He scrambled to his feet and bolted. Nick watched him go.

“You’ve got a long story to tell when we get home.”

I watched Carl disappear around the corner.

It was less than a mile to the meadow, but I wasn’t counting on getting there without a fight. Nashira was out there somewhere, and it was possible that not all of the bone-grubbers had taken Duckett’s concoction. We kept to the edge of the street, working our way through the ghost town.

There was an explosion in the distance. Nick didn’t stop. The windows of the buildings rattled. I couldn’t think straight. Were people trying to flee across the minefield? They must be panicking, wondering where the flare was, running through the trees to get away. I had to call them to safety. We ran all the way down the blasted street, then veered off on the path toward Port Meadow. I could see the fences, and the sign. A few voyants and amaurotics had gathered outside. They must have thought they could leave the city this way.

And Warden. He was there. He was filthy, covered in cinders, but alive. He caught me in his arms. “Where the hell did you go?” The words heaved out of me.

“Forgive me. I was sidetracked.” His gaze shifted toward the city. “You did not plant that incendiary device under the stage.”

“No.” I grasped my knees, trying to catch my breath. “Unless—”

“Unless?”

“12. The oracle, the red-jacket. He said something about an alternative plan.”

“Let’s just focus on getting out of here.” Nick glanced at Warden, then looked back at me. “Where’s the entrance to the tunnel? It was light when we arrived.” The meadow was pitch-black now, too dark to navigate.

“Not far,” Warden said.

“Right.” Nick looked at his old Nixie watch. He wiped his upper lip with a shaking hand. “Did Binder make it?”

“You can use his real name, Nick.” I could feel sweat running down my neck. “He knows.”

“Mr. Hall and three of your companions are in the meadow, waiting for you,” Warden said. His eyes stayed on the city. “Paige, I recommend you use one of those flares. You still have time.”

Nick went to the sally port, where Jaxon seemed to be studying the ethereal fence. I went to stand beside Warden.

“I am sorry about Liss,” he said.

“So am I.”

“I will see to it that Gomeisa does not forget her death.”

“You didn’t kill him?”

“We were interrupted by the explosion. Gomeisa was much stronger than us, having fed, but we did weaken him. The fire in the Guildhall may have done the rest.”

He was still wearing gloves, even now. Something twinged inside me: hurt, perhaps. Had I thought he would change so easily?

Warden didn’t take his eyes off mine. The golden cord shivered, just a little. I didn’t know what he was trying to transmit, but I was suddenly more focused, more resolute. I grasped the handle of the flare gun. Warden took a step back. I found a point above the meadow, cocked the hammer, and turned my head away.

The flare hung above the meadow, bursting out signal after signal. I watched it scorch and smoke as I stood beside Warden. Red light flickered in his eyes, and at our feet.

I looked past the flare, to the stars. This might be the last time I ever saw the stars like this, in a city without light, without smog. Or perhaps one day the whole world would look like this. The world under Nashira’s hand. One great dark prison city.

Warden placed a hand on my back. “We must go.”

I walked with him to the sally port. When he opened the gate, the voyants and amaurotics—eight of them—moved through into the meadow. When we were on the other side, he pulled the gate wide open and took out another vial. He had more vials than a gallipot.

The contents were pale and crystalline. Salt. He poured a thin line of it across the port. I was about to ask about the Emim when Jax grabbed me by the arms and slammed me against a post. I could feel the power of the fence, so close my hair crackled.

“Idiot.” Jax grabbed the front of my dress. “You’ve just shown them exactly where we are, you wretched child.”

“I’m showing everyone where we are. I’m not leaving all these people here to die, Jaxon,” I said. “They’re voyants.”

The muscles in his face twitched. His face was contorted with rage. This was the Jaxon I feared—the man that owned my life.

“I agreed to come here to salvage my dreamwalker,” he breathed. “Not to save a rabble of soothsayers and augurs.”

“Not my problem.”

“It is very much your problem. If you do anything more to compromise this endeavor—the endeavor to rescue you, I might add, ungrateful little urchin—I will make sure you work the shallow for the rest of your days. I shall send you to Jacob’s Island, and you can busk with the extispicists and the splanchomancers and all the other sacks of scum that wash up on the edge of the world. See what they do to you.” His cold hand rested on my throat. “These people are expendable. We are not. You may have claimed a little independence, O my lovely, but you will do as you are told. And we will go back to how things were before.”

His words stripped layers from my dreamscape. I was back to my sixteen-year-old self, afraid of the world, afraid of everything inside me. Then armor built around me, and I was someone else.

“No,” I said. “I quit.”

His expression changed.

“You do not quit the Seven Seals,” he said.

“I just did.”

“Your life is my property. We made a deal. You signed a contract.”

“I don’t give a toss what the other mime-lords say. If I’m your property, Jaxon, then my employment is nothing more than slavery.” I forced him away from me. “I’ve had enough of that for a lifetime.”

The words came out, but they didn’t seem to come from my head. I was turning numb. “If I can’t have you, no one does.” His fingers tightened. “I will not surrender a dreamwalker.”

He was serious. After what had happened at Trafalgar Square, I understood his bloodlust. His aura betrayed it. He would kill me if I left his service.

Nick had spotted us. “Jaxon, what are you doing?”

“I quit,” I said. And again: “I quit.” I had to hear myself say it. “When we get back to London, I won’t be going to I-4.”

His eyes moved to Jaxon. “We’ll talk about it later,” he said. “There’s no time now. Fifteen minutes.”

The reminder sent a cold dart through my gut. “We need to get everyone on the train. Now.”

Nadine was back. “Where’s the entrance?” She was sweating. “We came up from a passage to this meadow. Where is it?”

“We’ll find it.” I looked behind her. Only Zeke was there. “Where’s Dani?”

“She’s not answering on the transceiver. She could be anywhere.”

“She does work for Scion,” Nick said. “She might get away with saying she was an emissary. But it’s not ideal.”

“Did Eliza come?”

“No, we left her at Dials. We needed one Seal in the citadel.”

Jaxon got to his feet and brushed himself down. “Let us all be friends for now. We can discuss our differences on our return.” He beckoned. “Diamond, Bell—cover us, if you please. We have a train to catch.”

“What about Dani?” Zeke looked nervous.

“She’ll make it, dear boy. That girl could make it through a minefield.”

Jaxon brushed past me, lighting another cigar as he went. How could he smoke at a time like this? He was putting on a nonchalant act, I was sure. He didn’t want to lose me. I wasn’t sure I wanted to lose him, either. Why had I said all those things? Jaxon wasn’t an oracle or a soothsayer, but his words had sounded prophetic. I couldn’t end up busking—or worse, nightwalking—in a voyant slum like Jacob’s Island. There were far worse places to be than in Jaxon’s employ in the safe area of I-4.

I wanted to apologize. I had to apologize. I was a mollisher; he was my mime-lord. But pride stopped me.

I fired another flare. The last one. A last chance for the last survivors. Then I started to run, following Jaxon. Warden shadowed me.

The flare lit our path. A few more humans made it to the sally port. They followed us into the meadow—some in pairs, others alone. Most were voyant. When Michael arrived, he caught my arm. He had a bad cut on his face, running from eyebrow to jaw, but he could walk. He hefted my backpack into my arms.

“Thanks, Michael—you really didn’t have to—” He shook his head, his narrow chest heaving. I slung a strap over my shoulder. “Is anybody else coming?”

He made three quick signs. “The emissaries,” Warden translated. “They are coming with their bodyguards. How long?” Michael held up two fingers. “Two minutes. We must be well ahead of them when they arrive.”

This was a nightmare. I looked over my shoulder. “Can’t they just let us go?”

“They will have been told to contain every last witness to this event. We may be heading for a fight.”

“We’ll give them one.”

A stitch pulled at my side. In our path, a wounded man was sprawled on the grass. His chest rose and fell with shallow breaths. I had half a minute to get this man on his feet or we’d have to leave him here. “Go ahead,” I said to Warden. “Let them know I’m coming. Can you open the tunnel?”

“Not without you.” He looked down at the man. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. “Be quick, Paige.”

He walked ahead with Michael. I knelt beside the man. He was lying on his back, his eyes closed, his hands folded on his chest. He would have looked like an effigy, if not for his Scion uniform—red tie, black suit, all soaked with blood. When I checked his pulse, he opened one eye. With sudden urgency, his ring-laden hand clasped mine.

“You’re the girl.”

I kept still. “Who are you?”

“Wallet. Look.”

After a moment, I pulled the leather wallet from inside his jacket. Inside was an id card. He was from the Starch. “You work for Weaver,” I said softly. “You sick, sick bastard. You did this. All of this. Did he send you to watch me die? To keep an eye on the hell he threw us into?”

He was an obscure person, someone whose name I didn’t recognize. “They will d-destroy—everything.” Blood glinted on his lips.

“Who?”

“The c-creatures.” He drew in a labored breath, throat rattling. “Find—find Rackham. Find him.”

With those words, he died. I held his wallet in my hands, shivering in the sudden cold.

“Paige?”

Nick had come back for me. “He was from Scion.” I shook my head, exhausted. “I don’t understand anything anymore.”

“Nor do I. We’re being played, sötnos. We just don’t know what we’re playing yet.” He squeezed my hand. “Come on.”

I let him pull me to my feet. As soon as I was upright, I heard the distant gunshot. My back tensed rigid. The emissaries. They must have reached the sally port. At the same time, the æther gave off an odd signal. Four yellow-eyed figures were heading toward us. “Rephs,” I said. My feet were already moving. “Run. Nick, run!”

He didn’t argue. Our boots pounded on the cold earth, but the Rephs were hot on our heels, faster than us. I pulled a knife from my backpack and turned, intending to put it through an eye, but my hand was stopped by Terebell Sheratan. “Terebell,” I said, my chest heaving. “What do you want?”

Terebell looked me in the eye. With her were Pleione, Alsafi, and a younger female I didn’t recognize. And behind them, her shirt torn and bloodied, was Dani. The sight of her took a weight off my shoulders.

“We brought your friend,” Terebell said. Her eyes held little light. “She will not last long here.”

Ignoring them all, Dani limped past me, heading for the group of stragglers. She looked like death. “What do you want in return?” I said, wary. “You don’t want to come on the train.”

“If we did wish to come, you would not stand in our way. We have all saved human lives. We have brought your friend to you, and delayed the Night Vigilance Division. You are beholden to us.” Alsafi stared me out. “Fortunately for you, dreamwalker, we are not bound for the citadel. We have come for Arcturus.”

“He’ll come when he’s ready.” I still needed Warden.

“Then relay him a message. He is to meet us in the clearing as soon as you are gone. We will be waiting.”

Just as quickly as they’d arrived, they were gone, heading for the fences. They disappeared into the darkness, like dust into shadow, fleeing the inevitable retribution of the Sargas. I turned and made my way toward a training platform, where two lanterns burned in stained glass panes.

Getting here had been the easy part. Now I had to get these people into the tunnel and onto the train.

The stragglers had gathered on the edges of a concrete platform—but not the right one. This was rectangular. Nick was checking Dani’s face. There was a deep gash above her eye, but she shrugged it off. At the back of the rectangle, Jaxon gave the city a cold stare. No sign of Julian. Swallowed by the fire, just like Finn. I hoped it had at least been quick.

“We have to leave,” I said. “No more waiting.”

“There’s no point.” An amaurotic boy gripped his hair with white-knuckled hands. “The NVD are coming.”

“We got here first.”

A few sets of eyes grew brighter. I pulled a torch out of my backpack and switched it on. “Follow me,” I said. “Move as fast as you can. Carry the injured if possible. We have to reach another marker—an oval. We don’t have long.”

“You’re with the Rephs,” said an embittered voice. “I’m not going anywhere with a leech.”

I turned to the man that had spoken and I pointed to the city. “You want to go back there instead?”

He was silent. I brushed past him, ignoring the twinge in my side, and broke into another painful run.

Once we were past the scrying pool, it was easy to remember the right place. Warden stood where we’d trained all those months ago. “The entrance is here,” he said when I was close, indicating the concrete oval. “Nashira rather liked the idea of having the train beneath the training ground.”

“Do you think she’s dead?”

“That would be too much to hope.”

I pushed the thought aside. I couldn’t think about Nashira now. “They’re waiting for you,” I said. “In the clearing.”

“I do not intend to go with them yet.”

The words were a relief. I looked down at the oval. “There’s no guard,” I said. “They didn’t just leave it open.”

“They are not that foolish.” Warden pushed back a layer of moss, revealing a silver padlock. A thin bar of white light appeared down the middle, as if a bulb inside it had been activated. “This padlock contains an ethereal battery. There is a poltergeist inside it. They intended to send a Rephaite guard with the emissaries to unlock it before power is restored to the line—but if you can persuade it to leave, the charge will fail, and the lock will spring.”

The marks on my hand stung.

“It cannot hurt you in your dream-form, Paige.” He knew. “You are best equipped to deal with a breacher.”

“Jaxon is a binder.”

“That will not eliminate the problem. The poltergeist must be persuaded—or compelled—to leave the object, not bound. Until it has been freed from its physical restraints, your friend cannot bind it.”

“What do you expect me to do?”

“You can travel through the æther. You can communicate with the poltergeist without touching the lock, unlike us.”

“There is no ‘us,’ Reph.” The voice came from an augur, a little older than me. “Get away from that lock.”

Warden stood with no argument, but he didn’t take his eyes off the augur. There was a heavy pipe in his hands, an improvised weapon from the city. “What are you doing?” I said.

“There’s no such thing as an ethereal battery.” His teeth were gritted. “I’ll deal with this. I’m getting out of here.”

He swung the pipe. It crashed down on the padlock.

A shock cut through the æther. The augur was blasted back twenty feet, screaming. “No, please, don’t. I don’t want to die. Please! I—I don’t want to be a slave! No!” He arched his back, shuddered, and was still.

I recognized those words.

“I’ve changed my mind,” I said. Warden flicked his gaze back to me. “I can deal with this poltergeist.”

Warden nodded. Perhaps he’d understood.

“Here they come!”

I looked up.

Beneath the moonlight, the NVD charged through the meadow. They were armed with riot shields and batons, escorting a cluster of emissaries. Birgitta Tjäder was among them, as was Cathal Bell. Tjäder spotted us first, and she gave a shout of anger. Nick raised his gun, aiming for her head. No point using spools on amaurotics.

I turned to face the prisoners. For the first time since they’d come here, they needed to be encouraged. They needed to hear a voice telling them that they could do this. That they were worth something.

That voice would be mine.

“Do you see those Gillies?” I pointed at them, raising my voice. “Those Gillies are going to try and stop us getting out. They’re going to kill us, because even now, they don’t want us in their capital. They don’t want us to share what we’ve seen. They want us to die—here, now.” My voice was sore, but I pressed on. I had to press on. “I will open this access hatch, and we will leave this city on time. I promise you that we will be in London by dawn. And there will be no day-bell to send us to our cells!” There were murmurs of assent, of anger. Michael clapped. “But I need you to defend the meadow. I need you to do this one last thing before we can leave this place forever. Give me two minutes, and I will give you freedom.”

They didn’t say anything. No war cries, no shouts. But in unison, they picked up their improvised weapons, summoned every spirit they could muster, and surged toward the NVD. Nadine and Zeke went after them, straight into the fray. The spirits of the meadow rallied to their cause, flying at the NVD with twice the strength of bullets. Jaxon held still, assessing me.

“An excellent speech,” he said, “for an amateur.”

It was a compliment. Praise from a mime-lord to his mollisher. But I knew it wasn’t really admiration.

I had two minutes. That was my promise.

“Dani,” I said, “I need the mask.”

She reached into the pocket of her coat. Sweat coated her brow. “Here.” She threw it at me. “It’s running low on oxygen. Make it count.”

Positioning myself as close as possible to the padlock, I lay down on the grass. Nick looked at Warden. “I don’t know who you are, but I hope you know what you’re doing. She’s not a toy.”

“I cannot allow you to lead these people through No Man’s Land.” Warden cast his eye toward the woods. “Unless you can think of an alternative, Dr. Nygård, this is the only way.”

I strapped PVS2 over my mouth and nose. It sealed and illuminated, indicating a steady flow of oxygen. “You haven’t got long,” Dani said. “I’ll give you a shake when you have to come back.”

I nodded.

“Warden,” I said, “what was Seb’s middle name?”

“Albert.”

I closed my eyes.

“Timing two minutes,” Nick said, and that was the last thing I heard, at least in meatspace.

I could see the tiny receptacle in the æther. It absorbed me as any dreamscape would, like one small droplet might absorb another. And then I turned to face a lost boy.

I didn’t move toward him. I just stood there. But there was: Sebastian Albert Pearce, the boy I had failed to save. He was hitting the walls, shaking the iron bars of the room. Outside the bars was the endless darkness of æther. His face was bloody, contorted with rage, and his hair was black with ash.

Last time I’d encountered a poltergeist I’d been in a physical form, but Seb could still do some injury to my spirit. I would have to stop him.

“Seb,” I said, as softly as I could.

It didn’t take long for him to see the invasion. He rounded on me, ran at me. I grabbed him by the wrists.

“Seb, it’s me!”

“You didn’t save me.” He was snarling, rabid. “You didn’t save me and now I’m dead. I’m dead, Paige! And I can’t”—he hit the wall—“get out”—again—“of this room!”

His narrow form shook in my arms. His ribs and bones jutted, like they had before. I forced down my fear and held his filthy face between my hands. The sight of his broken neck made me flinch.

I had to do this. I had to quell the wrath of the spirit he’d become, or he would live in this state forever. This wasn’t Seb. This was Seb’s bitterness and pain and hatred. “Seb, listen to me. I’m so, so sorry. You didn’t deserve this.” His eyes were black. “I can help you. Do you want to see your mother again?”

“Mother hates me.”

“No. Listen, Seb, listen. I didn’t free you, and—and I’m sorry.” My voice was about to crack. “But we can free each other now. If you leave this room, I can leave the city.”

“Nobody leaves. She said ‘nobody leaves.’ ” He gripped my arm, and his head shook so fast it blurred. “Not even you. Not even me.”

“I can make you leave.”

“I don’t want to leave. Why should I leave? She killed me. I should have had longer!”

“You’re right. You should have had longer. But do you really want to live in this cage for the rest of forever?”

Seb began to tremble again.

“Forever?”

“Yes, forever. You don’t want that.”

His neck healed.

“Paige,” he whispered, “do I have to leave forever? I can’t come back?”

I was shaking now. Why couldn’t I have saved him? Why couldn’t I have stopped her?

“For now.” Slowly, carefully, I placed my hands on his shoulders. “I can’t send you all the way to the last light. You know, that white light people say they see at the end. I can’t send you there. But I can send you a long way away, to the outer darkness, so nobody can ever trap you again. And then, if you really want, then you can come back.”

“If I want.”

“Yes.”

We stood there for a while, Seb in my arms. He had no pulse, but I knew he must be afraid. My silver cord trembled.

“Don’t go after her,” Seb said, grasping at my dream-form. “Nashira. All they want to do is suck us dry. And there’s a secret.”

“What secret?”

“I can’t say. I’m sorry.” He took my hands. “It’s too late for me, but not for you. You can still stop this. We’ll help you. We all will.”

Seb threaded his arms around my neck. He felt as real as the living boy. That was how I remembered him. I whispered the threnody: “Sebastian Albert Pearce, be gone into the æther. All is settled. All debts are paid. You need not dwell among the living now.” I closed my eyes. “Good-bye.”

He smiled.

Then he was gone.

The pocket of æther inside the numen began to collapse. The silver cord jerked, more urgently this time. I took a running jump, and my dreamscape brought me back into its hold.

“Paige. Paige.”

My eyes ached in the sudden light. “She’s all right,” Nick said. “We’re out of here. Nadine, round them up.”

“Warden,” I murmured.

A gloved hand squeezed mine, and I knew he was there. I opened my eyes. I could hear gunfire. And his heartbeat.

Warden lifted the access hatch: a heavy door, covered by concrete, which concealed a narrow staircase. The empty padlock clattered away. Warden hitched me over his shoulder, and I wrapped my arms around his neck. The humans spilled down the steps, still firing at the NVD. Tjäder grabbed a dead Gilly’s gun. The bullet hit Cyril in the neck, killing him. I caught sight of the city—the light on the sky, the beacon in the dark—before Warden followed the survivors. His warm, solid frame was the only thing I could focus on. My perception returned in painful jolts.

The tunnel was cold. I could smell it: the dry, musty odor of a room that was rarely used. The shouts from above blurred into a senseless cacophony, like the barking of dogs. I clenched my fingers, gripping Warden’s shoulder. I needed adrenaline, amaranth, something.

The tunnel wasn’t large, barely the size of an Underground tunnel, but the platform was long and wide enough to accommodate at least a hundred people. Stretchers stood at the far end, piled up on top of one another. I smelled disinfectant. They must have been used to take fluxed voyants from here to the Detainment Facility, or at least to the street. But I was sure I could hear something in the darkness: the vibrant hum of electricity.

Warden shone his torch toward the train. A moment later, the lights came on. I narrowed my eyes.

Power.

The train was a light metro, not designed to carry many passengers. The words SCION AUTOMATED TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM were printed across the back of the train. The carriages were white, with Scion’s insignia on the doors. As I looked at them, they opened, and the lights turned on inside. “Welcome aboard,” Scarlett Burnish said. “This train will depart in three minutes. Destination: the Scion Citadel of London.”

With gasps of relief, the survivors went through into the carriages, leaving their makeshift weapons on the platform. Warden stood still.

“They’ll realize.” I sounded tired. “They’ll realize the wrong people are on the train. They’ll be waiting for us.”

“And you will face them. As you face all things.”

He let me down, but he didn’t release me. His hands cradled my hips. I looked up at him. “Thank you,” I said.

“You do not need to thank me for your freedom. It is your right.”

“And yours.”

“You have given me my freedom, Paige. It has taken me twenty years to regain the strength to try and claim it back. I have you, and you alone, to thank for that.”

My reply caught in my throat. A few more people boarded the train, Nell and Charles among them. “We should get on,” I said.

Warden didn’t respond. I wasn’t sure what had happened over the last six months—whether any of this was real—but my heart was full and my skin was warm, and I wasn’t afraid. Not now. Not of him.

There was a distant sound, like thunder. Another mine. Another pointless death. Zeke, Nadine, and Jax staggered into the tunnel, supporting a semiconscious Dani. “Paige, are you coming?” Zeke said.

“You get on. I’ll be there.”

They went into a carriage near the back. Jaxon looked out of the door at me.

“We’ll talk, my dreamer,” he said. “When we return, we will talk.”

He hit the button inside the carriage, and the doors slid shut. An amaurotic and a soothsayer stumbled into the next carriage, one with a bloody shirt. “One minute to departure. Please make yourselves comfortable.” Warden tightened his arms around me.

“How strange,” he said, “that this should be so difficult.”

I studied his face. His eyes were dim.

“You’re not coming,” I said. “Are you?”

“No.”

The realization came slowly, like dusk encroaching on a star. I realized I’d never expected him to come—only hoped for it, in the last few hours. When it was too late. And now he was leaving. Or staying. From this point on, I was alone. And in that solitude, I was free.

He touched his nose to mine. A slow, sweet ache rose inside me, and I didn’t know what to do. Warden didn’t take his eyes off my face, but I looked down. I looked down at our hands, his larger hands on mine: shielded by gloves, hiding the rough skin beneath—and my pale hands, with rivers of blue vein. My nails, still tinged with lilac.

“Come with us,” I said. My throat felt sore, my lips hot. “Come with—with me. To London.”

He had kissed me. He had wanted me. Maybe he still did.

But anything between us was impossible. And from the look in his eyes, I knew that wanting me wasn’t enough.

“I cannot go to the citadel.” He rolled his thumb over my lips. “But you can. You can go back to your life, Paige. That chance is all I want for you.”

“It’s not all I want.”

“What do you want?”

“I don’t know. I just want you with me.”

I had never said those words aloud. Now that I could taste my freedom, I wanted him to share it with me.

But he couldn’t change his life for me. And I couldn’t sacrifice my life to be with him.

“I must hunt Nashira from the shadows now.” He pressed his forehead against mine. “If I can draw her away from here, the rest may leave. They may give up.” His eyes opened, burning his words into my mind. “If I never return—if you never see me again—it will mean that everything is all right. That I have ended her. But if I return, it will mean that I have failed. That there is still danger. And then I will find you.”

I held his gaze. I would remember that promise.

“Do you trust me now?” he asked.

“Should I?”

“I cannot tell you that. That is trust, Paige. Not knowing whether you should trust at all.”

“Then I trust you.”

As if from miles away, I heard a pounding. Fists on metal, muffled shouting. Nick came running into the tunnel, accompanied by the remaining survivors, who piled onto the train just before the doors snapped closed. “Paige, get on,” he shouted.

The countdown was over. Out of time. Warden pulled away from me, his eyes hot with remorse.

“Run,” he said. “Run, little dreamer.”

The train was moving. Nick swung himself over a rail onto the back and held out a hand.

“PAIGE!”

I came back to myself. My heart leapt, and all my senses hit me like an iron wall. I turned and ran along the platform. The train picked up speed, almost too fast. I grabbed Nick’s outstretched hand, vaulted over the rail, and I was on the train, I was there, I was safe. Sparks flew across the track, and the metal frame shook beneath my feet.

I didn’t close my eyes. Warden had vanished into the darkness, like a candle blown out by the wind.

I would never see him again.

But as I watched the tunnel race before my eyes, I was certain of one thing: I did trust him.

Now I had only to trust in myself.