I sat down against the wall with a sigh. The after-effects of Ji-yeong’s healing were setting in and my limbs felt heavy and tired. My stomach was also telling me in no uncertain terms that I was hungry, and I knew the sensible thing would be to go back to Landis’s camp and get a hot meal and a nap on one of those camp-beds.
I rummaged in my bag for a protein bar instead. My stomach growled in protest.
I stared up at the sky as I chewed. From my angle, I couldn’t make out the moon, though its beams cast the opposite wall in blue-white light. A few stars were visible through the haze. The first time I’d come to this castle, Anne and I had spent the night in this windmill. She’d been afraid and vulnerable, but she hadn’t given up, staying awake and on the run for days. Only when I’d found her had she allowed herself to finally fall asleep. It had been right in this room, and I’d been against the wall . . . here?
No, it had been the other side. I got up, ignoring the angry complaints from my legs and back, and dropped down against the opposite wall. I shuffled over a little bit until, as far as I remembered, I was in the exact same spot. Once I did, I closed my eyes.
That was it. I’d been against this wall, just here, and Anne had been on my right. I’d had my arm around her, and that was how she’d fallen asleep, her head on my shoulder. I remembered how she’d looked, white skin pale in the moonlight, strands of black hair falling across her cheek down to my coat, the slow rise and fall of her chest. Had that been when I’d started to fall in love with her? Memories . . . waking in Arachne’s lair as Anne healed me, lying side by side with her on the grass of the heath, training together in Wales . . .
It had been here that I’d first met Anne’s shadow, too. Maybe that was where things had started to go wrong.
Anne’s shadow had been a danger for a long time. Not the kind that creeps up on you, but the kind that sits and waits and is just a tiny bit bigger every time you look. The more I’d learned, the more worried I’d become. I’d tried talking to her; I’d tried getting help; I’d even travelled into Elsewhere to face it. In the end, none of it had really made a difference. Arachne had told me in her letter not to blame myself, that Anne’s doom would have fallen with or without me. But I still felt as though it was my fault.
Maybe that was why I was here.
I kept my eyes closed. As long as I didn’t move, I could pretend that Anne was next to me, just for a little while.
I felt the change in the futures before I heard the footsteps. They climbed the stairs. I didn’t open my eyes.
Luna appeared in the doorway. ‘Hey.’
I held up a hand.
Luna put a plate down next to me, the plastic clacking against the stone. ‘I brought you something.’
I could smell the sausages from the kitchen. My stomach growled again. ‘Thanks.’
Luna sat back against the wall, and I sensed the silver mist of her curse spreading out. Luna keeps it under tight control when people are close, relaxes it once they’re at a safe distance. She does it automatically these days. ‘Landis is quizzing Ji-yeong about the castle.’
I nodded.
‘Still think we can trust her?’
‘Sagash taught Ji-yeong one way to live,’ I said. My stomach wanted me to eat, but I didn’t reach for the plate. ‘Now she’s realising that there are others. As to which one she’ll pick . . . I think she’s still figuring that out herself.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘Tomorrow’s going to be ugly,’ I said. ‘The Council’s going to launch an all-out attack. They’ll probably spend all night arguing about it, but in the end it’s not going to make a difference, because it’s the only choice they’ve got. Landis knows it, I could see it in his eyes. A lot of people are going to end up dead.’
‘Okay,’ Luna said, and paused. ‘That wasn’t really what I was asking.’
‘I know, I know. You just want to know about Vari.’
‘No!’
I looked up in surprise. Luna was frowning at me. ‘Alex, give me some credit, okay? Yes, I’m here because of Vari. But I know you’ll do everything you can for him. Right now, I’m more worried about you.’
‘You don’t need to worry about me.’
‘You think I haven’t noticed?’ Luna asked. ‘Those conversations with Karyos? The way you’ve been giving me access to all those bank accounts, “just in case”? You aren’t planning on coming back from this shadow realm. And you act different as well. You don’t tell jokes or make fun of me or even smile. You’re just . . . distant and focused.’
‘I’ve got a lot to be focused on.’
‘That doesn’t mean you’re supposed to act like a machine.’
‘What do you want from me, Luna?’ I snapped. I had too many things to worry about, and I didn’t need this now. ‘You just said that I’m going to do all I can for Vari. Well, you’re right, I am, and it’s going to be really frigging hard, because I’ve been counting up the numbers and I don’t like the answers I’m getting. If I’m right, then saving him means solving a problem I don’t know how to solve, on top of saving Anne, which means solving at least two more problems I don’t know how to solve, and that might not be even possible to solve, but I have to solve them, because if I don’t, there’s nobody else. So excuse me if being friendly and approachable isn’t high on my priority list!’
Luna was silent and I looked away, already regretting my words. I knew I shouldn’t have lost my temper, but I was strained to breaking point.
‘You remember when we went into that bubble realm in the British Museum?’ Luna asked. ‘When we were going after the fateweaver the first time?’
‘Yeah.’
‘We ran into Cinder and Deleo,’ Luna said. ‘They were caught in a trap and couldn’t get out. I thought we should just leave them. You didn’t. After they were gone, I asked you why you did it. You remember what you told me?’
‘If you can’t get another ally, next best thing is to give your enemy another enemy.’
Luna nodded. ‘But when I kept asking, you gave me another answer. You remember?’
‘Honestly, no.’
‘You said there was another reason.’ Luna was looking at me steadily. ‘You said whenever you kill someone, it gets a little bit easier to do it the next time. You said if you’re making the decision to do that, when you’re doing it deliberately, to be really sure you know what you’re doing. Because you’re going to have to live with it for ever.’
I hesitated. Had I told her that?
I couldn’t remember.
That bothered me.
‘It’s been a month since you took the fateweaver,’ Luna said. She hadn’t taken her eyes off me, and in the moonlight, I could make out her steady gaze. ‘How many people have you killed since then?’
I didn’t answer.
‘Alex?’
I spoke quietly. ‘I’ve lost count.’
The answer hung in the silence for a long moment before Luna started speaking again. ‘Back when I first met you, I wanted to be a badass. You know: tough and strong and good at fighting. Like you. Even when I started to get into your world and met Dark mages and Light mages who could throw me around like I was nothing, it didn’t put me off. It just pushed me to get better. It was why I got into duelling. I wanted to go up against mages and beat them. Even when I got hurt, it didn’t put me off, I’d just drive myself harder. I think . . . I think in some weird way, I felt like I was fighting my curse. If I could get strong enough, go far enough, then I could beat it. So I kept training and pushing myself.
‘Then there was what happened with White Rose. You remember that battle at the end, where Vari and I were with the Keeper strike team? I saw men killed right in front of me. And afterwards, watching them carry away the bodies . . . it made me realise something. The normals and the adepts killed in that battle, they trained too. They wanted to be tough too. And in the end it got them . . . nothing. They died for nothing.