In the Wake of the Ruined (The Siren Mage, #2)(79)

His fingers went instantly to his top button. “You want to… Here?”

“Bloody Gods.” I shoved his shoulder. “No. You look too… striking.” Quickly, I started on the brass buttons down the front of his coat.

He looked dejected as he pulled it off. “Imogen, she’s bound to figure out who I am.”

“She might.” I mussed his hair further and opened the first button of his billowing shirt. “But we don’t have to give it away the second you walk through her door.” I pulled back to look at him. Better, but still devastatingly, magnificently dignified. “Gods, Theo, can you slump?”

He did his best, attempting to slope his shoulders and sink his strong chest, when a loud rustling, like the wind shaking through a wood, filled the stairwell.

I stopped cold. “What was that?”

Theodore was utterly still, his voice hushed with dread. “I don’t know.”

A shiver racked me as we kept moving up the stairs. “Fucking Mages,” I mumbled. Eventually, after a few more flights, a line of bright light slashed the darkness above us. We arrived at a small landing before an unusually narrow door. The half dozen windows in the landing were merely thin slits in the rock, crudely chipped away by hammer and chisel.

We paused a moment, side by side. Theodore took my hand. “Don’t lock me out this time.”

A shadow of dread passed over me—there was no way I was going in alone. “Promise.”

I gave two quick raps on the door. We waited, my ears ringing in the silence, until finally, the door creaked open on its own, sending an eerie metalic cry into the dusty air.

Theodore crossed the threshold first, turning sideways to fit through the jamb. My legs trembled as I followed. The round room was silent, and hardly any of the bright sunlight could break through the grimy, rippling glass of its three high windows. It looked abandoned, the uneven wood floor strewn with old books and crates. The shelves on the far wall were stocked with little bottles and veiled in a thick layer of cobwebs. I looked up toward the rafters and shuddered at the large white orbs of spider egg sacs hanging like fruit on a tree.

I had begun to inch us closer to the shelves when the sound of someone’s inhale filled the room. The breath was a deep, thoughtful drag, as if whoever had taken it was scenting the air.

“A visitor?” It was the sweet ringing voice of a young girl, her tone as bright as the day that fought through the windows.

My fingers dug into Theodore’s arm. “Y-yes.” I swallowed hard. “Two visitors, actually.”

“I know.” The girl’s words held a sharp-edged smile.

“Oh.” I shifted slightly on my feet, but Theodore had gone stone still. “I’ve… I have come for a severing draught,” I said. “But perhaps you knew that already too.”

A rustling sounded from the middle of the room and I thought of Rohana’s vines, but there was nary a plant, dead or alive, in the dusty room. “I couldn’t know that,” she said, exasperated. “I cannot know what’s in your mind until you let me in.”

Anxiety yanked through me like a tow line.

“Before we start,” she said, “are you aware of the cost?”

“Oh, I…” My hands were shaking. “I’ve been told it’s a drop of my blood for the draught. Flesh and hair as payment.”

“Oh ho!” She was amused. “You’ve been to Rohana, then? That’s curious.”

Theodore stiffened further as my stomach plummeted. My scheme was nearly up before it had even begun. “Not so curious,” I said, lightly. “I went for a prophecy when I was on Varya. Years ago. It was that prophecy that brought me to you.”

More rustling. “And what did your prophecy tell you?”

I straightened my spine, trying to force more ease into my words. “That my blood bond would be ill-fated.”

She giggled, musical and trilling as a bell. “And seeing as you are here for a severing draught, it seems she was right.” She took another deep breath. “And the man with you, is he the one you are bound to?”

“No.” I took a step farther into the room, nearer to where her voice emanated from, all but dragging Theodore along with me. “He is the man I wish to bind to instead.”

“My, you are quite stouthearted with your blood bonds, Siren. I’ll warn you that a severing ritual is painful. Some have died.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“You’ll see to her care?” she asked, and Theodore gave a jolt when he realized she’d addressed him.

“Devotedly,” he said. Then mumbled, “If she’ll let me.”

“Very well. Come.” We followed her voice to the center of the room. “I will need blood for the draught. Flesh and coin as payment. I do not care for hair.”

We drew closer to what looked like a mound of old fabric that was heaped before a wooden crate, and that was when she came into view.

I let out a loud gasp. She was the size of a child, curled up on her side. I’d expected her hair to be missing, her eyes to be wide and milky, but I’d not expected her… skin. It looked like yellowed vellum, thin and dry and brittle. The superfluous flesh beneath her eyes resembled fall leaves, crackled, veinous. She was naught but bone. I could make out the details of her knee joints, the knobs of her knuckles, the deep and hollow curve of her protruding hip bone. She looked far, far worse for wear than Rohana.