The House of Shattered Wings (9 page)

People dismissed Oris as a wallflower, but it wasn't because he never spoke up that he didn't
see
things. He'd seen, for instance, the light in Madeleine's eyes at night, which made them seem almost insectile; the way her long, graying hair had grown dull and lusterless, her round, pleasant face sharp and hollow. He had heard her cough; listened to the way her voice had grown subtly hoarser over the past few months. Aragon should have seen it, if he wasn't too busy with too many patients—Oris wasn't Aragon, but he could still make his own predictions. She had a year, perhaps; a little less, a little more.

And the thought of that was a cold, cold emptiness in the pit of his stomach, more disturbing than the thought of his own end or the end of the House. He shouldn't have cared so much; but she cared, too. She tried to do her best by him, even though he couldn't rise to her expectations.

He'd prayed, of course; but her face had continued to subtly grow thinner, her skin sallower; and the bouts of coughing came stronger and more often. Perhaps God didn't acknowledge the prayers of Fallen; having cast them from His presence, perhaps He'd forgotten all about them. Perhaps the more extreme priests were right, and redemption was a gift reserved for humans. He didn't know. He'd continued to go to Father Javier's masses, because he couldn't bring himself to believe in that kind of angry, hate-filled God—because his faith was all he had left, and he clung to it as if to a raft in a stormy sea.

He was halfway back to Pont-au-Double when the light dimmed. Puzzled, he looked up, but the sky was the same light gray overcast as it had been a moment ago. Surely . . .

And then, on one of the stalls in front of him—which sold boxes and large, flat mirrors for imprisoning Fallen breath—he saw a flash of the darkness, of something huge and winged crossing the glass for a heartbeat.

No.

That first time, that horrible night of turning left and right and seeing
it
—always barely out of reach, always oozing in some corner of his field of vision—that had been an illusion. Madeleine had found nothing in the House; and nothing more had happened. It was . . .

Across the polished surface of the largest lacquered box, the darkness passed again, and this time there was no mistaking it.

No one else seemed to have seen it. The crowd was slowly dispersing, except for a few hangers-on haggling for a bargain as the market came to a close and merchants had to unload their stock. They met his eyes with idle curiosity, and then turned back to what they were doing.

Oris turned, but there was nothing behind him. But, as he turned back, there was a flash of movement; something barely perceptible against the colored background.

There.

He ran.

He made for the safety of the House, his heart hammering against his chest—and, in every stall that he passed, the darkness flashed, and lingered for a moment, spreading huge black wings; and he could hear a persistent hiss—he'd thought it was some kind of gas spreading, but after a while he realized it was the hiss of dozens of snakes, which he couldn't see anywhere.

He didn't look behind him. He didn't dare to. But there was a shadow at his back, growing as he ran, dimming the light around him; and the hiss grew stronger and stronger.

At the ruined entrance of Notre-Dame, he took the steps two by two, and staggered into the nave—for a moment he stood, breathing hard, voicing the words of a familiar prayer, praying that consecrated ground would be enough to stop them—but he was Fallen, and already knew the answer to his prayers.

Light played on the ruins of benches, of statues, of arches; and the darkness slithered across them all, and this time he could see the full span of the wings as they unfolded—as black and as huge as the ones folklore lent to his kind. They were behind him; close enough to touch; close enough for him to feel the wind of their passage, if he dared to look back. . . .

He turned, and looked; and was lost.

REQUIEM FOR A FALLEN

MADELEINE
took a deep breath and forced herself to look at Oris's corpse.

He lay in the abandonment of Aragon's hospital room, opened up from neck to pubis to the searching of scalpels and scrapers; the inner organs taken out, labeled and weighed by the nurses; the face bloodless and staring upward, with a faint tinge of blue under the eyes.

There was something . . . utterly final about Fallen corpses, some irretrievable loss of lightness, of grace—the skin going blotchier, the hair losing its luster, everything suddenly becoming squatter, heavier—the mortal world's final act of catching up, its final embrace and good-bye, a Fall more definite and eternal than their original one. What lay on the cold metal table, under the ceiling of the Hôtel-Dieu, was Oris, but Oris stripped of everything that had made him such a joy to behold; and only God knew if there was a soul, or where it had gone.

She would never again reprove him for not knowing what to do; or discuss his latest translation from ancient Greek, and argue with him over whether Fallen were exempt of the original sin—half-amused, half-angry, discussing a theology she only had scant time for. She'd always had scant time for Oris—had always fought her annoyance at him, wishing he would stop asking her questions and just get on with things.

She had always had scant time for him, and now there was no time left. None at all; and he was forever gone; forever out of reach—not until the Resurrection and its breaking open of tombs, a thought that was as much dread as it was comfort, for what would God think of Fallen, there at the end of time?

Watch over him,
she thought, to her uncaring, cruel God—the one whose existence she couldn't deny, but in whom she had no faith.
Please, watch over him.

Her fault. Her own fault, for not believing him, for reassuring him that his nighttime experience had been an illusion, that he need not worry about anything; for concealing his fears from Selene because she'd been afraid of being exposed as an angel-essence user.

Coward.

Selene was standing by her side, staring at the corpse; as usual, effortlessly elegant, effortlessly arrogant. Behind her, her bodyguards leaned against the wall of the room; and the nurses were folding used sheets and clearing a table; laying on a tray the scalpels Aragon had used, and everything that had touched Oris. One of them—Pauline, the big woman with the gentle touch—smiled at Madeleine apologetically.

Of course. Of course, the tray was for her, the alchemist of Silverspires. Not one drop of blood would be wasted; the way of life in all Houses, the only one she had ever known. Madeleine took a deep breath, trying to still the trembling of her hands—trying to make the blurred world swim back into focus.

Without warning, Pauline was by her side, laying a callused hand on her shoulder. “You all right?” she asked.

Madeleine shook her head, trying to swallow the salty taste in her mouth. “I'll—be fine,” she said, and Pauline shook her head.

“Of course you won't.” Pauline squeezed again—a little painfully, but not unkindly. “Come by the office later, if you want. We have strong stuff.” Alcohol, of course; Cointreau or chartreuse or pastis: a pleasant way to pass the time, but not what she wanted or needed. The ache for angel essence was enough to make her hands shake—she couldn't afford that, not now. She took a deep breath, and stilled their trembling.

“Thanks,” Madeleine said.

Pauline smiled, and withdrew.

Behind her, Selene and Aragon were getting on; of course there was no time for something so trivial, so insignificant as grief. “He was found in the cathedral?” Selene asked Aragon.

“Arms spread, clothes torn,” Aragon said, curtly. He removed his gloves and surgical mask; the magic that had been surging through him flickered and died, leaving the room a little less warm, a little less oppressive.

It was a small audience for an autopsy: Emmanuelle and Selene were there; and Madeleine, of course. Oris had been her apprentice, her responsibility.

“What did he die of?” Madeleine asked.

Aragon stood ramrod straight, putting her, incongruously, in mind of a soldier reporting to his commander. “Difficult to say. There's nothing wrong with him, per se. The major organs are intact—everything is clean, or at least as clean as it can be for a Fallen of his age.”

“But he's dead,” Emmanuelle said, from her place by the door. Her face was set in stone; her skin pale; her hands clenched in front of her, so tight blood had fled her fingertips. It was her, years ago, who had welcomed Oris into the House; who had seen him grow from a naive Fallen into an infuriating apprentice alchemist.

“Yes,” Aragon said. “He is dead.”

“And the pinpricks?” Selene asked. There were dozens on his arms, spaced in some frenzied, obscene pattern, dizzying in its complexity. Needle pinpricks? Except that they were too large for that—each a small, perfect circle of blood that had barely had time to smudge.

“They didn't kill him,” Aragon said. “They're too small, and the blood is clean.”

“What are they?” Selene asked.

“They look like snakebites,” Aragon said. “That is, if there were a venomless snake that could reach to man height to strike repeatedly. It's certainly not a behavior I've seen in animals. It could also be a weapon of near that shape, though that raises the question of why it'd be used.”

Snakebites. Bite marks. Claire's warning. The five deaths.

“Animals can be controlled by spells,” Madeleine said, softly; still struggling with the fact that this was happening. That Claire had been right. She should have passed Claire's warning on to Selene, but there had been no time; no time at all before Oris died.

“No doubt,” Aragon said. “There is no trace of magic on the wounds whatsoever, though. And, in any case, that's not the culprit. It's almost as if . . .” He paused, shaking his head.

“Go on,” Selene said.

“Fallen are an impossibility,” Aragon said. “Bones that fragile can't support the body, even if we weigh less than humans. And no back muscle, no matter how strong, would have powered wings; and yet Morningstar wielded his metal wings like a weapon. But—”

“But we have magic.” Emmanuelle's voice had the sharp intensity of a dagger slipping between ribs.

“Precisely. Magic, in a very real sense, is what keeps us alive. It's never been proved, of course, but I suspect that lack of magic is what eventually kills us, the Fallen equivalent to dying of old age.”

“And?” Madeleine asked.

“It's as if he ran out of magic all of a sudden—and his body went into deadly shock,” Aragon said.

“Anaphylactic shock?” Emmanuelle asked.

“Something like that, yes, except that something was taken away rather than added.” Aragon made a grimace; he hated using layman approximations. “And the magic is back now—it's a perfectly normal Fallen corpse. So it makes no sense.”

“Why not?” Selene asked. “I trust you. If you think that's the explanation . . .”

“Yes, yes,” Aragon said. “But there is no spell that has this effect. By their very nature, spells bring magic. They don't cut it off.”

“Perhaps we don't know everything about magic yet,” Emmanuelle said, gently.

Or perhaps they weren't asking the right person. Claire's dead had been humans, not Fallen, but the similarities were enough to be more than a coincidence.

“He's not the first,” Madeleine said.

“The first?” Selene's smooth face creased in puzzlement.

“Claire said—” Madeleine started, swallowed the bitter taste in her mouth—“Claire said there had been other victims.”

“Claire of Lazarus?” Selene's voice was harsh. “You didn't tell me you had met her.”

Madeleine shrank back from the cold anger, scrambling for excuses that seemed to have disintegrated. “There was no time—”

“There is always time.” Selene pursed her lips, as if deliberating punishment. “You should have—”

“Selene.” Emmanuelle's voice was gentle. “You can't change what's past.”

By Selene's sharp gaze, she clearly wished she could. Madeleine had never set herself against her, had never been overly concerned with the future of the House; but standing by Oris's corpse, she became aware, uncomfortably so, of how little she and Selene had in common. She'd loved—no, love wasn't the word; one couldn't love that kind of person—she'd
respected
Morningstar, who could be kind; who had carried her all the way into the House when she lay wounded and dying. But to Selene he had passed nothing of his random bouts of gentleness; of his amused humor. Merely the arrogance, the overweening pride of all Fallen.

“You will tell me everything Claire told you.” Selene's voice was clipped, precise.

When Madeleine was done with her halting tale, Selene remained staring at the corpse; though her gaze was distant, and Madeleine doubted she saw Oris at all, except as one of her possessions. “They weren't Fallen,” she said. “So that can hardly be the explanation. Nevertheless, it is something that should be explored.” She pursed her lips. “Javier is busy with something else, but I'll ask Alcestis—”

“Alcestis isn't concerned with this,” Madeleine said, sharply.

“Alcestis doesn't need to be personally concerned with this to be efficient,” Selene said.

“I could do it,” Madeleine said. “Oris was my apprentice.”

“Indeed,” Selene said. She didn't need to speak up; her gaze said, all too clearly, that she wouldn't trust Madeleine. “But you'll be busy training your new apprentice.”

“Who?” Madeleine asked.

“I don't know yet,” Selene said. “Possibly young Isabelle.”

She hadn't bothered to ask for Madeleine's opinion; or for anything from her but thoughtless obedience.

Emmanuelle spoke up. “Madeleine could—”

“No,” Selene said. “Madeleine will act as this House's alchemist, and strip the corpse, and wait for further orders. There is no way”—her eyes were cold—“I will let a witch untrained in House politics walk into Lazarus. The potential for diplomatic incidents is too high.”

“You could have some trust,” Madeleine said, stiffly, but it was pointless. Selene had already made her decision; and it probably meant Madeleine would be stuck with Isabelle, too. Not that she had anything against Isabelle, but it was the imposition of her that galled.

Madeleine bowed her head. “Fine. I'll strip the corpse.” She'd known this was coming, of course. First and foremost, she was House Silverspires' alchemist, and it was the duty of an alchemist to see that no fragment of Fallen magic was lost. “And I will await further orders.”

Selene appeared not to notice the terrible irony in her words; she was apparently deep in thought, possibly planning the next step in her relations with House Lazarus. “Come,” she said to Emmanuelle. “There is no time to be wasted.”

Aragon and the nurses followed them out of the room—Pauline lingering for a moment, making a gesture that reminded Madeleine the drinks were still waiting for her in the nurses' office, cold comfort for after she was done.

And now, she was alone with Oris.

Strip the corpse. Such casual words, for such a routine thing, for part of her trade—she thought of knives taking flesh apart, of hair saved in small boxes, of bones scraped clean and burned in the incinerator—of her work, now so sickeningly empty of meaning. Later, she'd go back to her room and get high on angel essence; feel the surge of power within her, strong enough to obliterate grief.

But for now, there was only the cold: the merciless clarity rising from her wrung-out lungs; the sharp, biting awareness that she could trust no one but herself.

It had been her fault, from end to end. And she might be dying, she might be weak and incompetent in House politics, as Selene had said; but she knew exactly where her responsibility lay.

She would go to see Claire at House Lazarus, and get what she needed to make sure that Oris was avenged.

*   *   *

IN
the end, as he'd known he'd have to, Philippe crept back into the cathedral—because it was the only way he would understand what was going on in the House, and fulfill his deal with Samariel.

The place was as bad as ever; the magic swirling within strong enough to make him itch all over. If anything, it seemed to have gotten worse since Oris's death, though that was absurd. There'd been nothing but the usual Fallen magic on Oris's corpse, and that would have been recovered; the body scraped clean by Madeleine until hardly a trace remained. Unlike former Immortals—who lived long but died, in the end, the same as any mortals, rejoining the eternal cycle of rebirths and reincarnations—Fallen never left much of anything on Earth.

Nevertheless, Philippe gave the blood-spattered stone floor at the entrance a wide berth, before walking closer to the throne.

It stood limned in sunlight, its edges the warm, golden color fit for an emperor; and somehow, even timeworn, even broken, it loomed over the entire cathedral, made his breath catch in his throat—as if, for a moment, a moment only, he had stepped back in time and stood in the cathedral of his visions, and Morningstar still sat in the throne with the easy arrogance of one to whom everything had been given—power, magic, the rule of a House that was the first and largest in the city, destined to stand forever tall and unbroken.

He crept rather than walked, fighting a desire to abase himself; to crawl on the floor as if he were in the presence of Buddha or the Jade Emperor; and when he reached the throne, and touched it, the warmth leaped up his arm like an electric shock, leaving a tingling like that of blood flowing back into emptied veins.

The mirror and the parchment were still where he'd left them, tucked under the throne. He took them out, and laid them in the sunlight.