“Worse, maybe,” Cordelia agreed, glancing around nervously. Kellington had picked up a small knife from his table. Slowly, he cut the back of his hand, watching in fascination as the wound swiftly healed. “Maybe we should go.”
Lucie bit her lip. “There’s a chance—maybe—that Malcolm is in his office.”
Even if he was, Cordelia doubted Malcolm would be in any fit state to help them. But she couldn’t say no to the look of hope on Lucie’s face. As they left the main room, they passed a table of vampires; here the spilled liquid was blood, dried to brown, and she had to catch herself to keep from retching. The vampires lifted goblets of blood long hardened to their lips over and over, swallowing air.
Malcolm’s office seemed undisturbed, though it had the same atmosphere as the rest of the Hell Ruelle: dark, unlit, and damp. Cordelia lit her witchlight and raised it, illuminating the room; it seemed safe enough to use it here. She doubted the Watchers had any interest in the Ruelle.
“No Malcolm,” Cordelia said. “Should we go?”
But Lucie was at Malcolm’s desk, holding her own witchlight over it, flipping quickly through the papers stacked there. As she read them, her expression changed, from curiosity to concern, and then to anger.
“What is it?” said Cordelia.
“Necromancy,” said Lucie, letting the pile of papers she was holding fall to the surface of the desk with a smack. “Proper necromancy. Malcolm promised me he wasn’t going to try to raise Annabel from the dead. He swore to me!” She turned to face Cordelia, her back against the desk. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know it doesn’t matter right now. I just…”
“I think we both know that when you lose someone you love,” Cordelia said carefully, “the temptation to do anything to get them back is overwhelming.”
“I know,” Lucie whispered. “That’s what frightens me. Malcolm knows better, but it doesn’t matter what he knows. It’s what he feels.” She took a deep breath. “Daisy, I need to tell you something. I…”
Oh no, Cordelia thought with alarm. Was Lucie about to confess to something awful? Had Malcolm been teaching her dark magic?
“I have a problem,” Lucie said.
Cordelia spoke with great care. “A… necromancy problem?”
“No! Honestly. I haven’t done any necromancy. It’s more of a—well, a kissing problem.”
“And you want to talk about it now?” Cordelia inquired.
“I do, because—well, I suppose it’s sort of a necromantic kissing problem.”
“Kissing Jesse isn’t necromancy,” Cordelia said, frowning. “He’s alive now. Unless you’re kissing someone else.”
“I’m not,” said Lucie, “but every time I kiss Jesse or touch him, for more than a moment”—she blushed deeply enough for it to be obvious even under witchlight—“anytime my skin touches his, really, I feel as though I am falling into shadow. And… I see things.”
“What kind of things?”
“Belial’s sigil. But changed; it doesn’t match up with what’s in the books. And I saw towers, gates, like in Alicante, but as if Idris had been possessed by demons.” Her voice shook. “I heard an incantation, some kind of demon language saying—”
“Don’t speak it aloud,” Cordelia said quickly. “Belial might be trying to trick you into doing just that. Oh, Lucie. Did you talk to Malcolm, tell him what was happening?”
Lucie nodded. “He said that in using my power to raise Jesse, I might have forged a channel between myself and Belial.” She frowned. “I imagine I’m seeing things he’s thinking about, or doing. I wish he would stay out of my mind. As it is, I fear even to touch Jesse’s hand.”
At least you can see him. At least he is in the same world with you. But that was unfair, Cordelia knew; for such a long time, it had not been true. “I cannot say I know Jesse well yet, but it is apparent that he truly loves you. And that he is patient. He has had to be, considering the life he’s had. I am sure he will wait for you—there is nothing he cares about more.”
“I hope so,” Lucie said. “It’s all going to be over soon—one way or another. Isn’t it?” She shuddered. “Shall we go? It feels terrible to be out on the street right now, but it’s better than the creeping feeling this place gives me.”
They left Malcolm’s office and made their way back into the main room of the Ruelle. As they headed for the exit, something caught Cordelia’s eye: a patch of wall that had been painted with the image of a forest, small owls peeking from between the trees. She recognized it as a piece of the mural of Lilith that had covered the wall during Hypatia’s celebration of the Festival of Lamia, now incompletely painted over.
The image of the mural remained with her, and by the time they were back out on Tyler’s Court, it had given her an idea. A very, very bad idea. It was exactly the sort of idea that seized the imagination and, against one’s own will, took hold, growing stronger by the moment. It was a dangerous idea, perhaps a mad idea. And there was no James around to tell her not to do it.
There had been a long, long time of darkness before James awoke. How long, he could not have said. He had been in London, in the courtyard of the Institute, looking at Cordelia through a mist of shadow. Then he had seen Matthew rush toward him and heard Belial’s roar in his ears—and then it was the roar of the wind, a tempest that tumbled him head over heels, and darkness had come down like an executioner’s hood.
The first thing he had noticed upon awaking was that he was lying flat on his back, staring up at a sky that was a sickly yellow-orange, roiling with dark gray clouds. He scrambled to his feet, head and heart pounding. He was in a courtyard with a flagged stone floor, surrounded on all sides by high, windowless walls. Above him on one side rose a fortress of gray stone that looked very much like the Gard in Alicante, though this version of it had high black towers that vanished into the low-hanging clouds.
The courtyard looked as if it had once been a sort of garden, a pleasant, enclosed outdoor space meant for the enjoyment of the occupants of the fortress. There were stone walkways, which had probably once bordered a riot of flowers and trees; now, all there was between them was packed dirt, gray and stony; not so much as a single weed poked up from the unfriendly ground.
James whirled around. Cracked, ancient marble benches, the stumps of withered trees, a stone bowl placed precariously atop a broken bit of statuary—and there, a flash of green and gold. Matthew.