Her mind whirred anew with images of stacked, dusty books and crinkling potions’ excerpts. They’d been untouched for years, resting in a hidden alcove. Transforming to a conjured likeness of murky-grey eyes and strange, slit pupils, her mind replayed what the prowler had said. Over and over, it rolled around in her head. Why did she care?
Two hundred years.
The mayor wasn’t a good man. And he’d laid claim to the mayorship for as long as she’d known, but the chosen age growled by the boy confused her, because it was impossible. People would have noticed. Gossip would have spread. Hell, surely someone more important than an arrogant boy of the Dark would have discovered the truth ages ago.
Which meant itwasimpossible.
Wasn’t it?
Perched at her kitchentable, on a rickety stool that squeaked in protest with every slight adjustment, Lux rubbed her hands across her face. Beneath the lamplight, she studied the aged pages. One after another—and another after that.
Misdeeds were undeniably rising in Ghadra, and the Shield was to blame. They turned a blind eye to anyone capable of supplying a worthy bribe, be it coin, flesh, or privilege, and she wasn’t overly surprised someone had finally taken it upon themselves to do what they would not.
Shame seeped through her core as she admitted she hadn’t ever thought about it. As long as it didn’t affect her, secluded and cut off from the world as she was, she hadn’t truly cared.
Lux shoved more pages aside, her jaw hardening.
It was true she’d revived more of the city’s affluents than any other. Once, twice even. The mayor himself suffered from fast-spreading tumors—he’d been revived four times. They were rich, they were selfish, and the entire family sought out only what would allow them to climb higher. They possessed the money, so why wouldn’t they acquire her services?
But how old were they, really? Lux couldn’t extend a body past a normal lifespan. It wouldn’t work. A moment or two and the lifeblood would congeal again, the soul abandon its vessel again. It’d be unnatural to sustain it further.
Not only unnatural. Impossible.
One sentence spoke heatedly in anger by a boy she didn’t know, and now an entire new world of doubt and possibilities opened within her mind. It could have been an exaggeration of course, but if it hadn’t been, Lux feared there was something far more sinister at work in this town, and there wasn’t a soul she trusted enough to begin an inquiry involving such questions. Even her small standing with the elite could only get her so far. Which wasn’t far at all if certain members of the mayor’s family caught whisperings of Lux’s name.
Which was why, with continued fiery fury, she dug through the pages before her. She’d remembered reading about lifeblood long ago, acknowledging it should never be drained—an abominable sin—and certainly should never be consumed. But there had been something else, too, and it gnawed at her.
Lux groaned as she flung another useless healer’s book aside. She’d never possessed the gift. Her aunt had, before having disappeared without a trace. In fact, all these pages lining the table in further disarray had once belonged to her. Along with those bothersome plants.
Lux sifted through more books on curing common illnesses.
Her parents, upon realizing Lux seemed especially drawn to the dead and dying, immediately ushered the woman to her side. They had been so proud. A rare-brillianced family member. As well as they should have been. After all, Lux’s aunt had been held in the highest regard.
Healing required fewer obscure ingredients, less energy and thus less coin. Riselda rose to become a very prominent member of the community, and it was told that the mayor himself relied on her more than his own personal physicians. Until one day, as it seemed to her child self, Riselda was there, tutoring her, encouraging her, and in the next, she’d gone.
Weeks later, upon realizing she wouldn’t be returning, Lux dove into Riselda’s abandoned books and pages of notes. Deep within an alcove of her aunt’s home, she’d found it:The Risen. The book called to her like nothing else had. Heavy within her small hands, Lux had known with ever-strengthening certainty that this was what she’d been searching for inside herself.
She knew every word in that book now, and it didn’t have the information she sought this time. Where had she seen it? When had she read it?
“Aha.”
A loose-leaf piece of parchment. Odd. She’d remembered there being more to it than that. She shrugged the memory away; she’d been a child when she’d come across it, after all. Holding it to the lamplight, she studied the drawing first.
An uncorked vial tipped upon its side with liquid pooling thick and dripping onto the branch beneath it. Where it met, a winding, decayed hand reached forth. Lux’s eyes widened, hurriedly moving on to the text.
Lifeblood: the essential element. Not akin to that of red blood cells, the lifeblood does not travel the body but rather remains contained, well protected by several layers of matter. However, much akin to that of blood, if the lifeblood slows and grows stagnant, death is inevitable.
A metaphorical anchor of the soul to the body, Revival is rendered impossible if the lifeblood is drained from its carrier, for a soul cannot remain in a vessel without it. Another lesser-known aspect of the substance, aside from its silver appearance, is the consequence of ingesting it. For should a vessel, even weakened to the point of near-death, drink another’s lifeblood, not only is health restored, but another lifetime granted.
To harvest—
Lux flipped the page, back and forth, searching for the continuation of the instruction. It was useless. It was missing. Even knowing full-well she’d gone through every piece of parchment upon the table, she did so again.
If the mayor had truly discovered how to harvest lifeblood—
Lux’s heart bounded in her chest as she shuffled the pages. Just as she’d suspected, this was all the information she had now. It was enough to cause her anxiety to rise to crippling, but not enough to give her answers on how to stop it.
That boy had known something.Lux pinched the bridge of her nose, shuttering her eyes against the lamp and the flickering firelight dancing across the walls. She blew out a breath.
