Bone Crier's Moon (Bone Grace #1)(74)

I slump with relief, hanging on to the bending end of the branch, and look below.

The Chained man has fallen into the river. The rapids are sucking him downstream at a helpless rate.

A weighted breath purges from my lungs. Thank you, Elara.

I take a moment to recover my strength, then crawl off the branch and onto blessedly solid ground. I waste no time. I run back for the hollow, soaked and shivering but resolved.

I have to give the jackal bone to Odiva. The dead can’t be ferried yet, but maybe she can lure them with the song and herd them into a cave. We can seal it up with large rocks. The Leurress can guard them there until the next new moon.

My lungs are on fire by the time I reach the hollow. I don’t stop to rest. I pull out the bone knife and skin the flesh off the jackal femur. I’m going to present a clean and ready bone to my matronne. It might help her forgive me for slaughtering the beast.

My hand slips, and the blade of the knife nicks my palm.

Something gives a rasping screech six feet in front of me. I suck in a sharp breath, expecting to see another Chained. But it doesn’t glow with chazoure. It isn’t human in form either.

It’s the silver owl. Here of all places. Feathers drenched as the rain pelts her.

My stomach hardens. I pull the bone onto my lap with my uninjured hand. “We need a bone flute,” I say defensively, assuming that’s why the owl has come. She helped me kill the jackal, after all, when she prevented Odiva from doing the same.

She hops nearer, tilting her head at me. She blinks her beautiful eyes. Somehow I know what she’s trying to communicate. That I need to trust her. That she’s well aware that the dead are swarming South Galle. And Ailesse already has a bone flute—the true flute. She played it on the cliff above the land bridge.

Claim this grace, Sabine, and use it to save your friend.

The thought comes like another voice in my mind. It showers me with calm understanding.

I stare at the owl. The rain doesn’t let up, but I don’t shiver. “Will you help me find her?”

The owl bobs her head, and my heart thumps faster.

I inhale a deep breath and open my palm. The rain washes away most of the blood from my nick, but it’s still bleeding at a steady rate. It will be enough.

I grit my teeth and press the jackal bone against my blood.





34


Ailesse


I SIT CURLED UP NEXT to the relief of Chateau Creux in Bastien’s hideout, my finger idly tracing the towers that no longer exist there. My famille didn’t always live beneath the castle; we used to dwell in secluded glens of the forest and caves off the shore, but I don’t remember those places. I was a baby when King Godart died from an unnatural death. That was the same year a fierce storm swept the land and battered Chateau Creux, adding to the rumors that the castle was cursed. But Odiva held a fondness for the place. She moved our famille there when it was abandoned.

I look around me at the room off the quarry where I’ve lived these last ten days. I’ve grown comfortable here—as comfortable as I can be with all my strength leaching away and my desire to help my famille eating at my nerves.

The scaffolding at the edge of the quarry pit creaks, and my limbs tingle with warmth. Bastien is back.

He steps off the scaffolding and into the room with a satchel slung over his shoulder and something tucked beneath his arm. The lantern light catches the angles of his strong jawline and the fresh gleam of his hair. He had time to shave his stubble and bathe while he was above. A sign that the search for Jules and Marcel was uneventful. Again.

“Any luck?” I ask, still clinging to vain hope. Maybe my grace bones and the bone flute are in Bastien’s satchel, and he cleaned up to celebrate.

“Jules wasn’t in the attic over the brewery,” he says, and my shoulders fall. He’s already checked all the places he and his friends ever took refuge in, and now he’s combing through random spots in Dovré. It’s all starting to feel pointless. “Don’t worry, I’ll find her.”

I study the forced grin on Bastien’s face and the lines beneath his tired eyes. He’ll never give up searching—he’s just as stubborn as I am once he sets his mind to something—but that doesn’t mean his hope isn’t failing, too.

“And the dead?” I ask. “What’s happening with them?”

He sighs and walks closer to me. “More of the same. Rumors of people hearing bodiless voices. Some of them plead or apologize. Some threaten. But none of them are as violent as they were around you and the other Bone Criers.” He lowers his satchel on the ground, as well as a cloth-wrapped bundle. “Seems like the dead are more cunning around ordinary people.”

“But not any less dangerous.”

He nods, sitting down to remove one of his boots. “I overheard a couple men in the tavern mention friends who have fallen sick.” He shakes out the dust and pebbles. “But those friends don’t have fevers or rashes or any obvious symptoms.”

“The dead are drawing out their Light.” My skin prickles as I think back on what my mother taught me before I attempted my rite of passage. If the Chained aren’t ferried, they’ll seek vitality from the living. And if they steal enough Light from a person, they’ll kill them, body and soul. “I wish I could be out there with you, helping you find the flute.”