Give the Dark My Love(74)

It was Papa’s book that revealed the third thing I needed. The words had been written as a warning, but I took them as instruction: All of alchemy operates on a balance. The price must be paid. For necromancy, the sacrifice is even greater than in other alchemies, because the reward is so much higher. Much has been written on the cost of ash and bone, flesh and blood.

But there is a higher cost. A necromantic crucible will never be truly complete if it is not imbued with a soul. And if the necromancer does not supply one, the alchemy will still demand a price.

It will take the necromancer’s soul.

My eyes went to the hallway, to the door, to the room where my parents lay.

I stood up. I got a knife.

Before, I had to be Nedra the alchemist to do what needed to be done.

Now I would be Nedra the necromancer.

“Ned?” Ernesta’s voice was weak as she sat up in bed, calling after me as I strode down the hall. “Neddie?”

I kicked away the oilcloth that had blocked the stench from the front room and swung open the door. I stared straight ahead, but my nostrils flared with the acrid, sickeningly sweet smell of rotting flesh. I forced my head to tilt down, my eyes to focus on the bodies.

Specimens.

Not bodies.

Not Mama and Papa.

“Neddie?” Ernesta asked, more urgently this time. She’d gotten up and stood outside the front room, propping herself up against the wall for support. Fear filled her eyes.

I ignored her as I knelt down beside my mother’s body.

Here, the necromantic texts diverged. Master Ostrum’s book spoke of carving the runes directly into the flesh of the dead. Papa’s book said they should be sealed with the necromancer’s blood. I decided to do both.

“Nedra!” Ernesta cried as I pressed the tip of the blade onto my mother’s forehead. She had been dead long enough that her blood was thick and oozing, like syrup. I worked quickly, slicing the skin in the shape of the rune for Death. Then I shifted, pulling off the thin cloth of her chemise and exposing her breast as I carved the rune for Life over her heart. I turned the blade to my own hand, pushing the point into the pad of my fingertip until my skin burst. The bright red was vivid against the almost black blood of my dead mother. I retraced the open lines on her skin with my own blood, smearing the two together.

Ernesta said something else, but she was so quiet I did not hear her.

I stepped over my mother’s body and knelt beside Papa.

A sharp pain sliced into my gut, and black stars danced behind my eyes.

Not Papa, not Papa.

The specimen.

My hands shook as I carved more runes into his dead flesh. Mama would provide the blood for the crucible; Papa the soul. The rune for Hope on his head, Love on her heart. I had to pierce my finger again and force the blood out to retrace the symbols.

I stood up, letting the knife lie on the floor between the two bodies.

The iron within a human body is limited, but the runes will enable the trace amounts to be easily discovered amid the ash, Master Ostrum’s book had said.

The soul will cling to the ash until it is forged within the crucible cage, Papa’s book had said.

Now I needed a fire.

“Nedra!” Ernesta screamed as I moved past her, gathering armfuls of Papa’s books. “What are you doing?”

I dumped the books onto Mama and Papa’s bodies. I closed my eyes and breathed through my mouth, grateful that the pages shrouded their faces. More. I needed more. I ran back to the hallway, my movements frantic. Books spilled out of my arms. Fairy tales with happily ever afters. Children’s stories about rabbits and frogs, the margins filled with doodles drawn by my sister and me. The poetry my mother loved so much. Plays from the mainland, histories of the Empire, maps of the world.

Ernesta shrank away from me, her eyes wide and fearful.

You’ll see, I thought. This will save you.

Leather-bound books with gilt edging on the pages spilled over my mother’s legs. The spine of an ancient text broke as I tossed the book, the pages fluttering like butterflies.

And then a spark, a flame, a fire. I expected the smoke, the heat.

I didn’t expect the smell.

But I stood there and watched. I knew what had to be done.

Ernesta watched me watching it all burn.

Neither of us spoke. The only sound was the crackling of our world catching ablaze.





FORTY-SIX


    Nedra



Timbers creaked.

“Nedra? Ned? We have to . . .” Ernesta’s fingers on my arm were as light as a butterfly’s touch, but I could feel the urgency within them.

My home is on fire, a part of me thought, the part of Nedra that wasn’t an alchemist or a necromancer. What have I done?

My heart leapt into my throat. “We have to get out of here,” I told Ernesta, clutching her shoulders.

She nodded, eyes wide. “I know,” she gasped. “Come on.”

She tugged at me with her remaining arm, but I jerked away, rushing to our bedroom. I could feel the heat through the walls; I choked on the air. Hastily, I grabbed my bag and the golden crucible, Master Ostrum’s book and Papa’s. Ernesta was already in the kitchen, her hand on the back door.

“What if—” she started, but I barreled past her, throwing open the door.

There were people in our yard—neighbors, villagers—the ones who were left, who hadn’t yet died of the spreading plague. No one threw rocks at us to go back inside, but no one moved to stop the fire either. Our house was by itself, no risk of the flames jumping to burn another home.