Bone Crier's Moon (Bone Grace, #1)(83)

The owl doesn’t move while the thoughts chase through me. It’s like she can read my mind and is waiting for her turn to speak. She stands taller on the parapet and spreads her wings open. A translucent and silver-tinged image shimmers before me. My pulse quickens.

Ailesse.

She’s lying on her side on quarried limestone, which means she’s underground. That’s all I can make out of her surroundings. She’s clean and wearing a new green dress, but her drawn expression says she’s suffering greatly.

My heart rises up my throat. “Ailesse.”

She doesn’t look up or even bat an eye. I don’t understand. Last time I had a vision of her, she saw me, but now her gaze is fixated on the ground. Maybe she’s too starved of Light to sense me.

I’ve never seen her so terribly weak before.

She holds a piece of chalk in her shaking hand and sketches a shaded-in circle. “New moon . . .” she murmurs on a hoarse breath. “Bone flute . . . bridge over water . . . land bridge . . .

ferrying night.” She draws another circle, but doesn’t shade it in. “Full moon . . . bridge over earth . . . Castelpont . . . rite of passage . . .”

My mouth slowly falls slack. Ailesse can’t know I’d consider my own rite of passage tonight.

Unless the owl has somehow been communicating with her, too.

“Ferrying night?” she whispers, and traces the second circle again. She drops the chalk and painstakingly rolls from her side to her back. Pinched lines form between her brows as she stares up at a ceiling I can’t see.

Then her image starts to ripple and fade.

My breath hitches. “No, wait!” I haven’t had a fair chance to catch her attention. I haven’t even assured her I’m doing everything I can to save her. “Ailesse!”

She flickers out. The silver owl closes her wings.

I stumble backward and steeple my fingers over my nose and mouth.

The owl rasps at me, but I shake my head. Ailesse knows I’m not ready to do what it takes to become a Ferrier. She wouldn’t ask me to complete my rite of passage. She’d know I’d never go through with it unless I had no other choice.

My body quakes with guttural rage. I turn on the owl. “I know what you’re trying to tell me, but I won’t hear it. Ailesse isn’t going to die!” I may be Odiva’s daughter, but I can’t really be her heir unless my sister is dead. Furious tears sting my eyes and smear my vision. All these weeks can’t have been leading up to Ailesse’s death and my ascension. I never agreed to be a part of that.

The owl hops off the parapet and screeches at me.

“No!” I cry. I’m not playing this game any longer. I’m not completing my rite of passage or ferrying souls or even opening the Gates of the Beyond. I’m going to focus on saving Ailesse before it’s too late. There has to be another way to save Dovré from the Chained.

And suddenly I know what it is.

I’ll give Odiva the bone flute—the one I spent the last three days carving.

I race away from Castelpont. I run full speed for Chateau Creux.

I don’t care what the silver owl or even Ailesse wants me to do.

I’m not giving up on my sister.





38

Bastien

I QUIETLY STEP FROM THE scaffolding and enter the room off the quarry, careful not to wake Ailesse.

She needs her sleep. Every day she needs more.

She rests on her side with her back to me. I set down my pack and drift closer to her. My body shivers with heat. Ailesse’s auburn hair lies in swirls like dark flames and shining water. That’s how my father would have described it. He’d study her from every angle before trying to capture her with his chisel and hammer. He’d save his money so he could afford to sculpt her from marble instead of limestone.

“Your father carved this one for you, didn’t he?” Ailesse asks on a weak breath.

I stiffen. Because she’s awake. And she’s thinking of my father, too. Her hand is on my most prized possession. I see it on the ground over the curved line of her waist. My dolphin sculpture. I’m not sure how I feel about her touching it. It’s the only sculpture my father never tried to sell. It was his gift to me. He often took me to the coast to see dolphins, my favorite animals. We’d watch them jump from the water in pairs. “What makes you think that?”

“Because it’s the best one.” Her slim fingers glide along its tail. “That’s proof of how much he loved you.”

I shift my weight from leg to leg. I don’t know how to reply. I’ve learned to live with the pain of losing my father, but I never shared the sorrow. Jules and I shared the anger instead.

Jules. I sigh. She and Marcel weren’t anywhere in the castle district. Hopefully, Birdine has better luck finding them tonight.

I set down my lantern and pack. It’s filled with more food and supplies. Ailesse never asks if I steal what I bring her. Does she even understand the concept of money—what it’s like to need it and never have it?

It doesn’t matter. If I had a thousand francs, I’d give them away for anything that might make her smile. “How are you feeling?” I move closer, wishing I could see her face.

Except for her fingers tracing the dolphin’s back, she holds perfectly still. “Did you know I once hunted a tiger shark? I killed her with a knife, and I didn’t even have graced strength—not until she gave it to me.”