Fight it, a distant voice says. I no longer know who is speaking, whether it’s an echo of Archyr or the textured whisper of the girl. An explosion of colors mars my vision, and with it comes the barrage of demands. I steady my breathing.Lean on the magic, a distorted voice says. I close my eyes, thinking of the soft song of the girl from Death Spire.
When I open my eyes again, a river of green is ahead, faint and narrow. The voices are weak now; I hear birds and the soft ripples of water gliding on rocks. It even smells like the forest at dawn.
I reach for the nearest blue thread, twirling it around my fingers, mesmerized by the light shimmer. In my heart, I know this thread belongs to a Mortemagi who once was. Were they happy? Did they leave a family behind? I find myself hoping their end wasn’t agonizing. Then I remember where I am.
The blue thread flows into the river with ease, ebbing and flowing with the smooth current. This must be what Lyria meant when she said to leadthem into the river. One by one, I lead the threads into the water until I see a path ahead. The more I feed to the river, the clearer I see.
Soon, the soft forest scent is gone, replaced by the putrid smell of the catacombs. There are no birds, no water, only stones and bones.
I did it. I broke through ghost paralysis.
After some time, I snap back to reality. Archyr’s hands cup my face. His eyes brim with panic as he searches mine for any sign of life. His brows furrow, and he swallows. For a foolish second, I let myself believe that he is scared for me, and not because he’s scared to lose the only lead to his brother’s killer.
“Do you know of a girl who fell to her death from Death Spire?” I ask without preamble.
“Did you anchor to a ghost?” he asks at the same time, drowning out my question.
“No.” I shake my head. At least I hope not. I didn’t speak to any ghosts. What’s most important is that I broke out of ghost paralysis. “No,” I whisper, with hesitation this time.
Archyr studies my face for a moment, then pulls away, giving me his back. He flexes his hands, shaking his head, as if he’s trying to shake me out. I realize I want him to turn around and look at me again. And I hate it.
Our walk continues for what feels like hours. My feet are raw, and I periodically swallow my own saliva to alleviate the dryness of my mouth. Occasionally, a ghost breaks the tether, but I weave it back into the river. At first, it takes some time, but by the fourth stray ghost, I make quick work of the weave. Perhaps, the ghosts took pity on me. They saw how awful I am at magic, and they’ve decided to leave me alone.
Go.A voice, silver and purple—the colors of Arcane and Illusion— barrels through my calm mind palace. I’m about to lead it into the river when it speaks again.Go. I know this voice. I’ve known it since it chained me to the catacombs at Dearly Departed. Victor.
“Go where?” I ask.
Where the stone meets the sea, he answers. I echo his answer to Archyr.
“The ancient burial chamber,” he explains. “It’s where the… untainted lines were buried. It also houses ancestral relics, most of which are retired or only used for rituals.”
My stomach flips. It makes me sick that this place even exists. Some-how,before I came to Gorhail, I convinced myself that mages were above the common prejudice of nonmagi. But they share the same ignorance and the same misguided hate. In the end, humans are all the same.
“The founders of Gorhail believed that magic lines couldn’t be merged in order to maintain the potency of magic,” Archyr continues. “It’s nonsensical, and times have changed. No one uses these burial chambers anymore. Most mages are buried at the crypt in Riverview; some, like my parents, in their home cemeteries.”
For a moment, I forget where we are, and I contemplate asking him about his parents, what they were like, what jobs they had, and other mundane questions. But small talk isn’t for us.
At last, we reach a small empty chamber. “Is this it?” I ask. “They must not have had a lot of people to bury.”
Archyr lets out a low chuckle, and my eyes flick to his mouth. “If I remember Lyria’s map, we have one more tunnel to cross after this.”
Moonlight filters through the small cracks in the stone above, illuminating the room. Other than the two doors across from each other, this room is completely empty. If I forget the smell of rot and seawater, the chamber is almost cozy. There are no bones here, only damp limestone. What more could I ask for?
Corvi. A gruff, dark voice sneaks in behind me. It doesn’t sound human nor ghost; it sounds like a bit of both, grounded with a texture that’s rough at the edges.
I whirl, thinking Archyr is playing a prank. When he returns a blank look, the hairs on my neck stand on end. This voice has no color.
Rhea?they ask. The voice knows Nan.
“Viola,” I reply curtly. “Her gran—”
You have magic now, child?Confusion colors the voice’s question. They must be thinking about Olivia. Then again, they wouldn’t know Olivia unless she had been down here before. My beautiful sister, who used to hate walking in mud, who would refuse to take out the trash. What happened to you, that you had to come through these tunnels that reek of death and decay?
“Has she…” I pause, weighing my question carefully in case I get only one. “Have I been down here before?”
The voice cackles. It crawls through my bones, rooting me in place. They are dead, I tell myself. The dead can’t do anything to me.
A second Corvi. It laughs again.Oh wicked, clever Rhea. The voice glides around me, slick in a poisonous nectar.I’ll give you this one for free.