Above, light from the belfry flickered and pulsed. His chin tipped slowly skyward. A voice in the back of his mind, growingfainter the longer he stared, whispered that he needed to look away.
He didn’t want to.
Suddenly, the gold peeled back, exposing the dark contours of the tower’s facade. Each carved face stood out in sharp relief. The texture of the stone-like skin looked softer than flesh. He tried to close his eyes, tried to see anything that wasn’t gold and watching, leering faces.
He couldn’t.
He couldn’t, he couldn’t, he couldn’t.
The saints under his hands turned to stare at him. Their eyes grew wide, their mouths opening as terror overtook their carved features as effortlessly as if they were human. The tolls pulsed louder, drowning out his thoughts, his heartbeat, the very blood inside him—
‘Jude?’
For a harrowing second, Jude didn’t recognize the man before him. A hood obscured his face and swamped his frame in a sea of mud-stained black. His sudden appearance ate away the preternatural calm from the bell tower until only panic remained, strong enough to send a shockwave of dizziness through him. The hand reaching for him – unwelcome.
Jude stumbled back as the man grabbed his shoulder, pulling him away from the clock tower.
The hood slid off. All the breath returned to his lungs in a painful burst. ‘Elden?’ Jude sagged, scraping a hand over his face. ‘Fuck.’
Elden’s hand tightened on his shoulder before it loosened. ‘What are you doing out here? Shouldn’t you be with Maeve?’
Jude looked away. He couldn’t tell him what had happened, not now. ‘I was.’
Elden didn’t reply. Jude chanced a glance at his face. He was looking over his shoulder, brows furrowed and lips moving soundlessly. Jude stepped closer. ‘Elden?’ he repeated.
He shuddered, a rough movement that travelled from head to toe. ‘We should go back,’ he murmured. ‘It’s late.’
Jude nodded his assent. Elden wove through the streets like he held a map before him, not checking to see if Jude followed. The village seemed even lonelier than when he’d left the inn, if such a thing was possible. No curtains twitched as they passed, no distant sounds of laughter or arguments coming from nearby taverns and brothels. Only silence padded his ears.
Elden turned a corner, the toe of his boot catching on a loose cobble. Jude hurried to right him, his hand fastening around Elden’s bare wrist. His magic hadn’t reacted without his consent in weeks, regulated not by the books, but by his own growing acceptance of it. His steadying internal keel. But now, on edge and anxious, it lunged.
Elden’s memory shot through him, completely blank but for a deluge of noise.
Fog as grey as ash-fire sank down his throat and obscured his eyes. A hand wrapping around his throat, the words in his ear sweet and unavoidable. He didn’t want to, hecouldn’t—
His lips froze as a silent scream left his throat.
The word wouldn’t come.
Jude jerked free. His thoughts spun out. ‘What – what was that?’
Elden kept walking, his steps short and jerky. He didn’t pause as Jude gaped after him.
‘Elden!’ he called as he hurried to catch up. What had he just seen? Memory tampering, that much was obvious, but he’d never seen a memory so obscured it was little more than stifled emotions made manifest. Nothing but words in his ear.
Vaguely, Jude recognized the sky had somehow lightened in the minutes since he’d left the bell tower. Streaks of violet and indigo shot through the clouds above. Hadn’t the clock just tolled midnight? The sun shouldn’t be rising for another eight hours.
Elden finally turned to face him just outside the door to theinn. His eyes flared wide as panting breaths clouded the air around them. In the limpid light, every slack angle of Elden’s face was suddenly visible. His eyes were entirely blank, like he wasn’t even there, like he no longer inhabited his body at all. Sweat beaded on his temple and the line of his neck.
‘I—’ Elden choked. Both hands raised to wrench through his hair. His eyes bulged. ‘Forgive me.’
Jude didn’t have time to reply, didn’t even have a second to breathe before they were on them.
Hands on his shoulders, his wrists. Clasped over his eyes. Shouts filled the air alongside the violent sound of retching. A wet rag shoved between his teeth, the sweet smell of incense in his nose. Cloying and searching, wiping away everything that wasn’t his final, fading view of Elden, falling to his knees, a puddle of vomit pooling around him.
42
Maeve
