There were no clues as to who had delivered this package, but Devon had developed his suspicions. The journal could only have come from one place. The Codex.
Had Presbyter Sypes delivered it?
Why?
The question plagued him endlessly, but he felt it would be imprudent to confront Sypes directly. His mystery benefactor clearly wished to remain anonymous. And what if Devon was wrong? One misplaced word could end his own life. The Spine would not look kindly upon the reappearance of such a work.
He let his gaze drop from his late wife’s portrait to the mantelpiece below it. An ornate clock ticked the moments away, lost amid a clutter of chemical bottles with handwritten labels and sugar-crust corks. Poisons for making angelwine.
Devon sniffed. A faint odour of sulphur hung in the air, pleasantly unpleasant.
He went back to the journal, tapping a pencil against the gold rim of his spectacles. Fluids leaked from the bandages covering his back. A little fresh blood had gathered in the crook of his arm: not much, but enough to add yet another stain to his already ripe tweed jacket. Devon didn’t care; his looks were of no concern. Elizabeth had still loved him.
Cracked lips pursed while he considered the pages before him.
Blood contained energy: a life-force—or soul, as the Church named it. This journal presented him with a method of extraction, a way to remove the spirit from the blood. To bottle it. Flesh withers. Everything material is poison, everything we consume. Even the air we breathe destroys us. But when we nourish the body with spirit, feed the flesh with something ethereal …Somewhere outside was a creature who did just that, and had done so for thousands of years.
“Please,” the girl said, “stop this.”
Devon glanced again at the flask of her blood before returning his attention to his notes. He had followed the letting and purification processes to the letter, but as yet there had been no sign of the expected results. Was his transcription at fault? Had he overlooked something? Impossible. There had been no error, he felt sure, in his preparations or implementation of the technique. What else could be missing? Some extra manipulation that had not been recorded? It seemed unlikely. The journal, for all it infused mysticism with science, appeared to be complete. Devon chewed the end of his pencil. A pollutant in his materials? Hardly. He could not make them any more sterile. He’d even had the containers blessed. For all the good that will do. And he’d used minimal sedative in the blood itself.
Then what? What was he missing?
The girl’s pleas came in fainter gasps. “You’re…killing me. Please…stop.”
“Hush, girl,” Devon said.
“My name is Lisa,” she wailed. The effort left her breathless.
Devon rolled the pencil between his fingers. A blister opened, leaving the wood slightly damp. Perhaps the souls were tainted, in some way damaged by the process of removal? Or was he failing to extract the entire soul? The Soft Men had taken thirteen souls before the elixir reached saturation point, when spirit could no longer be absorbed by the physical solution. Only then had the recipient flesh been able to absorb the angelwine. Devon had already harvested ten souls. After this girl he required two more. But as yet there was no sign of the elixir nearing saturation point, and this troubled him. Was a soul quantitative?
“My father is Duncan Fry, a lieutenant of the temple guard,” the girl panted. “We have money. He’s saved some, I know he has. He’ll give it to you.”
Devon slammed his palm flat against the desk. “Can’t you see I’m working?” Pain clenched his chest and he grimaced. “For what, what, do you wish to be saved? What are you hungry for? A life toiling under Fondelgrue’s sweaty palm? The grunt of some malodorous swine as he stuffs you? The skin-stretched years spent raising his litter? Iril take you, girl, have some self-respect.”
She flinched, her head twisting away as far as the bonds allowed. Her lips trembled as she spoke. “I’ll…do anything you want. I’ll give you anything you want.”
He tried to review his notes again, but it was useless. The girl’s pleas had broken his train of thought. Instead, he got up from his desk and approached her, then crouched on the carpet before her chair. He lifted her face to his, forcing her to look at him, at the sores and seeping cracks.
“But that is exactly what you are doing,” he said with a crooked smile.
A fresh bout of sobbing took hold of her. Mucus ran from her nose on to his arm. Devon wiped it on her apron and put his arm around her shoulders. “Life’s greatest mystery,” he said, “is death. What happens to us? Where do we go? You believe in God, don’t you? You believe in the soul?”
The girl sniffed and nodded, raised her eyes to meet his.
“Then you must believe Ulcis can release it from the blood.” He smoothed back some of the hair from her face. “If the soul truly exists, take comfort in knowing that yours will not be wasted.” His expression softened. “I intend to put it to great use. One more plump little grape in a rare bottle of wine, eh?”
She wailed and shook her head, sending more hair tumbling over her face.
“Hush, girl, you shouldn’t worry. It will all be over soon.” He gave her his warmest smile, wincing inwardly at the pain it caused him, and cupped his hand to her cheek. Tears spilled over his fingers. He leaned closer, speaking gently. “Shhh…You must try to be brave. I know we shun death: we lock it away, forget about it, until one day it rattles the box and reminds us it’s there. For me that day arrived when my wife fell ill. But Elizabeth had an implacable beauty that no force of man or nature could have soured. Even at the end, when her skin wept like mine, she remained beautiful—to me.”
The girl’s breathing was softer now. The clock on the mantel ticked steadily and the logs crackled in the hearth. Devon rested her head against his chest and held her gently until she died.
For the love of God, woman, for the sake of all that’s sacred and good, will you not shut up?” Doctor Salt’s hands gripped an imaginary neck.
Rosemary Salt stood with arms folded, blocking his escape from the parlour. “I will not let you talk your way around this one, Arthur. I don’t give a damn what night it is.”
“She’ll hear you,” Arthur Salt hissed. “And then none of this is going to make a blind bit of difference. Do you want to get us both killed?”
His wife didn’t budge. “Twelve bottles, Arthur? How in God’s name did you get through twelve bottles in a month? You must have been permanently ratted.”
Doctor Salt threw out his arms, his fingers splayed. “I didn’t drink them all myself. I’ve had all these functions to attend lately—you know that—and I can’t very well turn up without bringing some token.”
“Oh, bring a token, yes, fine. Next time bring your own thick skull full of Warrengrog, but don’t you dare dip into my bonus from the distillery. That case was supposed to do us for a year. What about the bottle I’d promised my father, and the one for your brother, for that matter?” Rosemary Salt stabbed a pudgy finger at her husband. “You think I don’t know what’s been going on? It’s Jocelyn Wilton, isn’t it? You’re always round there.”
Doctor Salt eased his reply through clenched teeth. “Visiting Patrick. I can hardly refuse an invitation from the faculty head, can I? He needs someone to talk to. He’s worried about Jocelyn’s health, that’s all.”
“Her health!” Rosemary cried. “Next to you, she’s the biggest drunk in Deepgate. You could pickle eggs with her blood.”
“Will you keep your voice down? Surely we can talk about this another time. I’ll buy you some more bloody whisky.”
“You’re damn right you’ll—”
There was a rap at the door.
Rosemary Salt froze. She stood with her mouth open, her tongue sticking out absurdly. Doctor Salt looked past her, wide-eyed, into the hallway. “It can’t be her,” he breathed. “I can’t imagine she’d bother to—”
Several more knocks, urgent.
Doctor Salt swallowed. “We don’t
have to answer it.”
His wife had a hand pressed to her mouth. “What if it’s not her?” she murmured through her fingers. “It might be one of your patients. We can’t leave them outside tonight.”
“We damn well can.”
“What if it’s an emergency?”
“Sod it.”
They stared at each other for a long moment.
Three more knocks.
“I’ll go ask who it is,” Rosemary said. She lifted the lantern from the dresser and crept into the hall, before stealing a backward glance at him. “We don’t have to actually open the door.”
He followed her, nerves tense as twisted wire. The front door was bolted; no sounds beyond but the wind gusting outside. The wooden panels shook with the force of it.
“Who’s there?” Rosemary asked.
A cold voice answered: “It’s Jocelyn. Let me in.”
Doctor Salt’s muscles unravelled. Breathing a heavy sigh of relief, he moved towards the door.
“Wait.” His wife grabbed his arm, and glared at him. She whispered, “What’s that smell?”
“What smell?”
“Like burning hair, or—”
More knocking. “Will you let me in, please?”
Rosemary turned back to the door. “Jocelyn, what’s wrong? You sound different.”
“Of course I sound different. I’m terrified.”
The voice did not sound terrified at all, but what did Doctor Salt know? Women were entirely unfathomable at the best of times, scared women more so. He shrugged off his wife’s arm and moved again towards the door.
Rosemary Salt grabbed his sleeve and yanked him round to face her. Her eyes, bulging with silent protest, held his own while she spoke. “Why are you here, Jocelyn? You know what night it is.”
“It’s Patrick, he’s suffered a fit.”
Doctor Salt reached for the door but his wife stopped him again. She mouthed the words We can’t be sure .
“Sod you,” the doctor said. “I’m not leaving her out there a second longer.” He shoved his wife aside, snapped back the bolt, and threw open the door.
This was going to hurt. Dying always hurt. She never got used to it. She had ratcheted the chain taut, then locked it. The excess swung through a dim beam of starlight, creaking under the hook in the rafters. She had bound the doctor’s mouth and hands, manacled his feet, and hung him upside down so that his head brushed the floorboards. His breath hissed through the corners of his mouth. His eyes were wild, bare chest wax-white and heaving, face bruised and swollen with blood and streaked with his tears. He twisted his feet against the manacles, dragged his shoulders up from the floor, then collapsed once more, his body swinging in and out of shadow.
Carnival would abandon the attic after it was done. The smell would bring Spine, and the blood would bring demons. She’d take the hook, ratchet, and manacles to another dark, derelict place, but she’d leave the blood-soaked chains. Deepgate had no shortage of chains.
She steadied him and scraped a pan across the floorboards, edging it under his torso. Her stomach was a fist. She looked at him for as long as she could bear.
His eyes flicked to the knife in her hand and away, silently screaming. The air through his nose came in quick, insistent rushes. She could have removed the gag: now he would do nothing but fight for breath.
She grabbed his wrist and felt him spasm. His bladder relaxed and urine ran down his chest and over his chin, and pattered into the pan. Carnival ignored it, knelt, cut once. Blood welled. He trembled as she brought her lips close to his skin.
Delicious warmth filled the attic. The chains creaked gently back and forward as she drank. Back and forth, slower, slower.
Carnival gradually relaxed. The ache of hunger melted away.
Darkness slid in thickly and filled the attic. It soaked into wood, into flesh and blood. Above her, the chain settled to silence. The man was still now. Only Carnival’s throat moved.
When she was sated, she stood up and looked down at the dead man’s wrist. She had bitten it more than she’d meant to, torn the skin badly around the original cut. She let his arm fall loose, scattering stars of blood across the floor.
Carnival wiped her mouth, and lifted her knife again. Blood dripped from the tip.
She waited, trembling.
And then she died.
And was reborn.
Pain ripped through her, so intense it seemed to scour her soul. She fell forward, gasping, onto her hands and knees, her own blood screaming in her ears. Her stomach buckled and heaved. She clenched her jaw and forced herself upright.
Her head felt light. For a long moment Carnival didn’t know where or who she was, and then she saw the blood and remembered.
What have I done?
A different kind of pain then consumed her, one that clawed her from the inside, like the talons of an animal trying to break free. She wheeled round, took a few steps forward, then turned back, not knowing where to go. Her fingers made vague shapes over her chest.
Blood everywhere. Blood on her hands, on her clothes.
What have I done?
She hesitated, turned away, turned back. A wave of sickness rose within her.
She looked down at her thigh and stabbed the knife in deep. She felt it glance off her femur. Blood spewed over her leg. The pain was frightening, exquisite. She savoured it, clung to it, twisted the knife and opened the wound further. Fresh pain blossomed; she closed her eyes and drew a long, shuddering breath. She wrenched out the knife, dropped it, agony building, hammering through her heart and bones. Her hands contorted like claws. Saliva—or blood—dribbled down her chin. She sucked in another rasping breath…and wailed.
Gradually, the pain ebbed.
The wound on her thigh was already healing, leaving its scar.
The pan was spattered and filthy. The man’s arm still swung back and forward over it, dripping. Carnival pulled a filthy square of linen from her pocket and wiped her lips, her face and throat. She bunched the linen and rubbed it over her hands. She threw the scrap away, then picked briefly, uselessly, at her cracked nails. She licked her teeth, and spat, then spat again. She tried to drag her fingers through her hair, but couldn’t—her hair was too matted and tangled. For the first time, she noticed the smell: blood swelling over the floorboards, foul and sweet. By morning, the attic would be seething with flies.
Carnival turned away, trembling, fighting the urge to retch. She stumbled a few steps, her feet slipping on the wet planks. She crouched, feeling the dull throb of the new scar on her thigh and the heavy pounding of her heart, until she couldn’t bear the sensations any longer. She cried out, spun round, and lashed a foot at the dead man’s head. His neck snapped like dry wood.
Carnival crumpled to the floor again, her arms wrapped tight about herself. Chains and hooks creaked above her as she wept. Her body convulsed with great racking sobs from the pit of her stomach. She grabbed the knife again, lifted the blade, and drove it back into her thigh, splitting open her newly inflicted scar—again, again, again.
The wound hurt savagely, but not nearly enough.
12
THE POISON KITCHENS
WHILE DILL WAITED for Rachel Hael in the schoolroom, he struggled with a question.
How do I dismiss her?
After all, she had been given no choice in the matter either. Presbyter Sypes had thrust her upon him. An overseer who wasn’t a proper scholar, a teacher who couldn’t be bothered to teach him, a Spine Adept who encouraged him to break Church law—nothing about her made any sense. She was supposed to be teaching him about poisons today, but was, of course, late.
She was probably still in bed.
The Presbyter had crumpled over his desk before the dusty wall of books, and lay there snoring. A fly traced lazy circles around his head. There always seemed to be flies around the old man, and Dill had been watching this one for an hour. Occasionally it settled on the Presbyter’s ink-stained fingers or mottled scalp, until he
twitched and it buzzed away for another circuit. Shafts of sunlight lanced down from the high windows, seething with dust. Full of the scent of ink and beeswax, the air hung like syrup on Dill’s wings.
The hand of the clock on the wall clunked a minute further from nine, but seemed no closer to eleven. It felt like he’d been waiting here for days already.
Dill stared at the book he was supposed to be reading,A Hierarchy of Bell Keepers, and he sighed. All the books in the schoolroom were like this: dry, dense, and reassuringly dull. Each possessed an authoritative weight he found oddly comforting, and yet he hadn’t been able to finish a sentence today.
Yesterday’s illicit flight still plagued him. Why had she encouraged him to fly? Not just encouraged, bullied . Rachel Hael was a bully. She was a bad influence. She was complicating his life.
Where was she?
Clunk. The clock hand took another tiny step into the wide gulf before eleven. The fly droned past his head. Dill swiped, and missed. For a while, he stared blankly up at the windows and imagined himself flying past them in golden armour, setting off to some distant battle.
The next Sending was tomorrow, and he wasn’t looking forward to it. Borelock would still be furious with him. Had they repaired the archon yet, or would the pillar stand empty? Empty, but full of accusation: a monument to his incompetence, his failure, standing tall before the remaining ninety-eight archons, and before the Herald himself.
Sparks of pink nipped through Dill’s eyes.
Rachel’s arrival at the temple seemed to have triggered his bad luck. First the fallen archon, then the flight. He steered the path of his thoughts away before his eyes took firm hold of it. The Presbyter would never discover what had happened if they both kept quiet. He could put the incident behind him. A life of temple service stretched like a winding river before him. To navigate it without foundering meant following the currents of temple law. Dill nodded slowly to himself. When Presbyter Sypes woke up he would tell the old man he didn’t need an overseer. He would insist. All for the best.