I’m still turning it over in my mind when there’s a sharp jerk of brakes. I put the paper down, wondering what’s happening. Then I hear voices, and the hiss of the door from below. I get up, shoving my bare feet into boots and barrelling downstairs. The living area is deserted, the coach door open. I step outside to a scene of devastation.
We’re stopped near a small cluster of buildings, on a finger of land by the sea. Homes, by the look of them, and possibly a shop. All ruined now. Glass shattered, gaping holes in the walls as though they’ve been ripped apart, scars in the brickwork still fresh. My parents and Varin, along with several Raven guards, are picking their way through the wreckage. I go to join them, and tread on something soft. Oh, darkness.
It’s a little doll, a child’s toy. Now stained with dirt and something darker, more ominous, spattered across its smiling face.
‘Emelia.’ My father comes to me. ‘I don’t think you should see this.’
‘I should see it.’ Even though my stomach is roiling, I need to. My father knows it, too. He takes my arm, leading me through the debris and over a shattered wall.
‘Oh God.’ I swallow, hard.
We’re in the remains of a room, at the back of what looks like a shop. Splintered tables and chairs are tumbled together, along with piles of ash. Dark stains are splattered across everything; a faint, rotting scent. And, on the most intact of the walls, a familiar symbol. The Raven mark, scored by tattered lines. The North Wind.
‘Human remains.’ Varin pauses on the other side of the pile of broken timbers, looking down, his brow furrowed.
I don’t need to see that. ‘Was … was this one of those nomadic settlements? Did we do this?’ I try not to look at the exposed upper storey of the house next door. A child’s bed, the coverlets ragged and stained, hangs from the remains of a pink bedroom. As though it was ripped from it. ‘Please tell me we didn’t do this.’
‘We did not.’
My mother comes over to us, her eyes darker than usual. ‘Aleks.’
‘We donotmurder children.’ My father’s voice becomes a growl.
My mother casts sorrowful eyes across the wreckage. ‘There’s nothing we can do here.’
There never is, once death has visited. It’s not something that can be turned back. Yet it seems like I always end up here, among blood and darkness and dead humans.
If you keep taking the same path, you’ll end up at the same destination.
There’s silence, a faint glimmer in the distance heralding the dawn. Yet it’s dark, among the scattered debris. I don’t bother asking the question, because I know the answer.
If Raven didn’t do this, there’s only one possible option.
An option that, potentially, holds the key to what I want to achieve. But, as I look around at the devastation, I don’t know how I can even consider approaching them.
Reapers.
ChapterSeventeen
LIVING THE DREAM
‘Humans used to fly to these places, didn’t they?’
‘They did.’ Varin brings me a mug of tea and sits next to me on the velvet sofa. Night is almost over, but I can’t sleep. We’re back on the south coast, after travelling through the night from Old London, parked on the edge of a huge port, waiting for the ferry to the Channel Islands. A vampire port, so everything is gleaming and works well. No rusted hulks, no rotting buildings here. I should be excited, to finally see my project come to fruition, but can’t seem to muster any joy. Only rage.
I can’t get the destroyed settlement out of my mind. Or anything else I’ve seen. The ache in my chest never seems to fade, the feeling of a lost world, just beyond my reach. I know we can’t go back there. But I don’t want things to stay as they are, either.
‘Vampires don’t fly?’
‘No. We have a horror of it. The way light comes upon us so quickly above the clouds, it’s not safe. Plus, there’s no point.’ He shrugs. ‘Time has less meaning for us than it has for humans. We’re not as invested in getting to places so quickly, despite our speed. We’re creatures of the earth, of blood and soil, our affinity with the ground, not the sky. It was humans who dreamed of getting closer to the stars, not us.’
‘And now they waste away on glorified farms. All that talent, all that creativity. Reduced to one thing. Blood.’
‘Emelia, that’s?—’
‘How it is, right? Sorry.’ I slump back on the sofa, my arms folded. He’s trying, I suppose. Everyone is trying. My mother doesn’t know what to do for me, buying me clothes from glittering shops, hugging me whenever she can. My father tried talking to me, but I don’t know what to tell him. I can’t seem to get out of this trough.
The Challenge hangs over me like an axe waiting to fall, compounding my sorrow and anger. I’m nervous about what’s going to happen when we get to Versailles, whether any part of our strategy to change the families’ minds will work. Lion still haven’t responded to our invitation, and neither have Scorpion. Jaguar sent a single jade amulet of a snarling beast, fangs out. It’s a beautiful thing, and very valuable. I’m unsure whether it’s a gift or a threat.
