A surge of light exploded from the revenant, spilling through the iron the way the magic spilled through the boy’s body, and then all the light—save for the ghost glow—went out. Even the boy’s inner light was gone, his magic apparently used up.
Panting, he took up the final piece of armor—the helmet—and slid it over the obedient revenant’s pierced skull, the iron ringing when it settled against the neck piece. It had no eye holes, no slots for breathing, because of course, the revenant didn’t need them. All was darkness.
“Go,” the boy rasped, head hanging, not bothering to look at the thing he had just made. “To the others. To Caston. Find her. Obey her.”
Others? How many others?
The iron revenant moved at once, armor clanking with every footstep, out through a door somewhere in the back of the throne room.
“We should follow it,” Wren said, though a part of her was desperate to speak to this boy, to understand, and he was currently all alone…
“Come on,” Julian said, getting to his feet. “We need to—”
As Wren moved to stand, her boot connected with a piece of rubble. The pebble went flying, skittering across the ground before cascading down the wide staircase, echoing loudly on every step.
She froze, but too late. The boy was on his feet, squinting up at the gallery. Their eyes met—hers bone-white, his ghost-green—and then he spoke, his voice booming with residual power.
“Trespassers,” he said, and Wren thought he was talking to her and Julian until he added, “Stop them.”
The words ended, ringing in the silence… until new sounds filled the hall. Scraping, scuttling, hollow rattling… Spots of light flickered into existence below, and higher, along the gallery, emerging from the shadows, from hallways and rooms, from entire wings of this building shrouded in darkness. Wren’s magic was alive with their presence, their appearance bursting to life in her senses like fireworks.
She and Julian made for the door, but several undead had beaten them to it, and not all of them had bones to carry. Some were ghosts, their bodies out of sight, tethers stretched to unknowable lengths in this magic-rich place, while others were surely geists, setting up winds and sending dust and pebbles scattering.
Julian lifted his staff on instinct but knew better than to swing. The undead didn’t attack—the ghostsmith’s orders had been to stop them, not harm them—instead circling around them like wolves on a hunt.
Wren raised her bone sword. All she needed to do was clear a path to the water, but as she swung left and right, other undead swarmed in behind her, cutting her off from Julian.
She thought of her lessons. She had been taught to protect, to fight in a pair, and she had allowed herself to be separated from her charge.
Expression frantic, Julian raised his staff again.
“Don’t,” Wren warned, afraid any sudden movement might goad the undead into an attack. She was usually the reckless one—which Julian had pointed out several times—but the terror was plain on his face, and he wasn’t thinking straight.
Despite his fear, he heeded her warning and halted his staff midswing, but apparently it was too late.
One of the revenants snapped its head in his direction, sensing his violent intention. Then it detached from its corpse right before their eyes, the rotten body tumbling to the ground while the ghost surged directly at him. It retained its body’s shape, a human figure, face contorted as it barreled toward Julian with outstretched hands.
It would kill him, here and now. A single touch and the deathrot would set in.
And he was out of Wren’s reach.
Panic seized her, and she did the only thing she could think to do.
“Stop!” she shouted at the ghost, dredging the word up from deep within.
And it did.
The ghost halted in midair, as if it met with some invisible barrier. It crackled and hissed, brimming with pent-up energy, but it did not move again.
It remained suspended mere inches from Julian, who had flinched away. He looked at it now, then at Wren, open shock on his face. Then his gaze shifted, spotting something behind her, and before Wren could turn, a hand landed on her shoulder.
She jumped, whirling around, heart galloping in her chest. She expected to find a revenant, to feel the telltale cold of deathrot sweep up her arm.
Instead, she was face-to-face with the ghostsmith boy.
The sight of that horned skull looming before her caused her stomach to clench painfully with a deep, primal fear that robbed her of breath and rooted her to the spot.
Realizing how badly he’d frightened her, maybe, or just wanting to see better, the boy’s other hand reached for the mask, pushing it off his face to rest atop his head, allowing Wren to truly see his features for the first time.
He was starkly pale—paler even than Wren—with matching hair and a delicate nose under stern brows. There were dark shadows beneath his eyes, which were wide and uncertain, and his mouth was pinched—he looked exhausted, confused… scared. His expression tugged at her, and the mystery of who he was and what he had done made her take a hesitant step forward.
Seeing this, his wariness faded and his demeanor turned thoughtful, his green-eyed gaze unnerving as it took her in.
He had seen, of course.
Wren had commanded the undead, just as he—a ghostsmith—had done, and he had seen it.
She tugged at his grip, her chest heaving, her breath ragged, but he didn’t let go. Looking down, she saw that he wore a ring on one of his long ivory fingers.
Her heart, which had been thundering against her rib cage, seemed to stop.
The ring. It was bone-white, with a black spike… and birds engraved on either side.
Her other hand flew to her pocket. The boy stilled—maybe he thought she’d been going for a weapon. Perhaps she should have. Instead, she withdrew the ring she had found in the Bonewood. The exact twin of his.
She held it out in her palm, and the boy stared at it, then up at her face again. His features shifted rapidly from suspicion to confusion to dawning comprehension.
“Wren!” Julian cried out, trying to go to her, but every time he moved, the undead shifted and crackled in warning.
Wren looked back at him, then at the ghostsmith boy. His gaze, meanwhile, never left her. He was drinking her in, she thought. Memorizing her.
Finally, he released her arm, but only so he could raise his hand, the ring gleaming in the ghostlight.
He pointed at one of the birds—the larger of the two, the bird of prey—then at his own chest.
Wren, breathless, followed his every movement. Her body was wound tight, her muscles poised to flee in the face of information she didn’t want but desperately needed. He seemed to sense her struggle, his actions slow and cautious, like she was a deer in the woods he didn’t want to startle.
When his finger pointed at the smaller bird, the songbird, Wren started to shake. Knowing, even before it happened, what he would do.
Raising his hand, he pointed squarely at Wren.
She shook her head. Slowly at first, then more forcefully.
Her fingers closed around the ring, hard, her hand curled into a fist.
She turned.
“Move!” she bellowed at the revenants that stood between her and Julian—between them and their escape.
And they did, parting for her like a ghost for a bone blade. She looked once over her shoulder, but the boy didn’t attempt to follow her.