The Copper Gauntlet (Magisterium #2)(64)

Call hesitated. Was his father afraid? Did he hate Call?

“We’ll untie him,” Tamara murmured, as she and Jasper slipped away and went to Alastair.

“You should do as Call says. Leave!” shouted Alastair, as Tamara bent down to inspect the silver cord that bound him. It was magical and knotless. Call hoped she’d know how to undo it, because he didn’t have the first idea. “Take him out with you! None of you are safe here, Call least of all.”

“You mean Aaron least of all. Give us the Alkahest,” said Jasper, relentlessly practical. “Give it to us and we can all leave together.” He put a hand on Tamara’s arm. “Don’t free him until he gives it to us.”

Master Joseph’s focus remained on Call. “Did you think it was funny?” he asked. “The head of Verity Torres? The riddles? You were the one who came up with the design of this place, of the entrance. Of course, it wasn’t going to be her head back then, but it’s quite a funny improvisation, don’t you think?”

Call didn’t feel like laughing. He’d been so sure that it was a good thing he could figure out some of the riddles. But apparently he was good at these riddles because he was a guy who thought severed heads were hilarious.

“Just give Jasper the Alkahest, Dad,” Callum yelled, losing patience with all of this.

But Alastair turned his head away as if he didn’t want to look at Call. He was clutching the Alkahest to his body, wrenching himself away when Tamara tried to touch him. “Leave me with it!” he shouted. “Get yourself away from here! Take Call and the Makar with you!”

Aaron had moved to stand beside the body of Constantine Madden and was staring down at it, stricken. Call limped toward him; he could imagine what Aaron was thinking: that these were the hands that had killed Verity Torres, that had slain a thousand mages. The hands of a Makar, like Aaron’s own.

“The Enemy died thirteen years ago,” Aaron said flatly. “How can he look like he isn’t dead at all? How can they all look like this?”

“You think this is a mere tomb,” said Joseph.

“It sure looks like one,” said Call. “What with all the bodies and all.”

“This was your ultimate stronghold against death,” Master Joseph continued. “Here is where you taught yourself to use the void to preserve bodies, suspended, unliving but unchanging. Here you preserved your brother’s body for the day you would raise him again. Here I used the same magic to preserve your body —”

“It’s not my body!” Call shouted. “What is it going to take for you to give up? I don’t remember anything! I’ve never seen this place before! I’m not who you want me to be, and I won’t ever turn into him!”

Master Joseph smiled, wide. “It took me years to help you perfect your magic, back at the Magisterium. When we worked alone with chaos, together. Behind your master’s back. You used to get frustrated and shout at me just like this. I’m not what you want me to be. That’s what you said to me then. Once we put your soul back into your body, I believe you’ll remember more. Maybe this life will be the one that seems like a dream.” He tried to move forward, but Stanley hauled him back. “But even if you never remember, you can’t change your nature, Constantine.”

“Don’t call him that,” said Aaron, in a voice like ice. “People change all the time. And this is sick. This whole thing is sick. Constantine Madden put his soul into Call’s body; fine, no one can change that. Leave Call alone. Let the dead stay dead.”

Master Joseph’s face twisted. “Spoken as someone who has suffered no true loss.”

Aaron whirled. He was as Call had seen him only a few times before, no longer Aaron. He was the Makar, the wielder of chaos. His palms began to blacken. “I know plenty about loss,” he said. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know about Constan — about Call,” said Joseph. “Don’t you want your mother back, Call? Don’t you want her to live again?”

“Don’t you dare talk about Sarah!” It was Alastair. Either he’d torn away the metal ropes or Tamara and Jasper had freed him. Either way, he was still wearing the Alkahest.

He ran at Call.

In that heart-stopping moment, Call knew he was going to die. He remembered the chains his dad had readied in the basement of his own house, remembered the words that Master Joseph had shown to Call, carved in the ice by his own mother’s hands with the same blade that Alastair had thrown at him: KILL THE CHILD.

Finally, thirteen years later, Alastair was going to do it.

Call didn’t move. If his own father really hated him this much, if Alastair was prepared to end his life, then maybe he really was too much of a monster to live. Maybe he should die.

Everything slowed down around Call: Aaron, Tamara, and Jasper running toward him but too far away to reach him in time, Master Joseph struggling and shouting in the Chaos-ridden’s grasp.

“Let go of me, I command you,” Call heard Master Joseph say — and to Call’s numb shock, Stanley released him. The old mage darted toward Call, throwing himself on top of Call to protect him from his own father. Call’s knees buckled and he went to the ground, Master Joseph pinning him down.

But Alastair didn’t pause. He ran past Call and Master Joseph and straight to the preserved body of the Enemy of Death. There, he stopped. “Joseph, did you really think you could tempt me to betray my own son? As soon as I got your messages about trying to put his soul inside this villain’s corpse, I knew what I had to do.” With that, he raised the Alkahest, gleaming and beautiful in the dim light, and brought it down hard, slamming his metal-clad hand over Constantine Madden’s heart.