“What is this commotion?” The Mother Superior’s voice, calm but cutting. “Shoo, the lot of you. You’re behaving like headless chickens.”
Seraphina laughed. The Mother Superior had a unique way of scolding her flock. She’d almost missed it. She stepped closer to the gate to meet the woman face to face. Beyond the grille, her weathered face was tense, her eyes hard.
“Here you are,” the nun said sternly. “The prodigal daughter.”
“Well, if we are to respect the parable, what follows is forgiveness?”
“We live in the real world, Seraphina. You have disappointed me greatly.”
Seraphina chuckled. “So, the Bible stories aren’t real?”
The Mother Superior ignored her. “You have disrespected the house of God, the good sisters who took you in and nursed you back to health, you have stolen our most precious relic, and now you show up out of nowhere and expect to be let in? You don’t even ask for forgiveness, you demand it.”
“You know why I left,” Seraphina said in a lower tone. “You know why I had to. And I did the right thing because, see? I got my eyes back. I’m not a ruined woman anymore.”
“No. You are the ruin of others,” the Mother Superior spat. “Are your hands stained with blood? Is your soul marked by sin?”
“Please don’t talk to me like your nuns don’t raid the roads in search of relics to steal.”
“It is for a holy purpose, to protect sacred bones whose wrongful use would bring more misery to us all. We do not kill.”
“Only maim.”
“If absolutely necessary.”
Seraphina spread her arms wide. “Forgive me, now I see my fallacy,” she said sarcastically.
“A fallacy it is, to consider your thirst for revenge the same as our mission.”
The nun’s words sank into Seraphina, stirring her anger, bringing it to a boil. She was done being judged, and by the people who were supposed to love and support her, no less. Briar, the sisters at Saint Vivia’s, even Idris. They all criticized and held speeches about how revenge rotted the spirit, and how her reasons for spilling blood were inferior to theirs, because they did it for the greater good, for science, and to protect others, while she did it entirely for selfish motives.
She loved Briar, and she loved Idris. That would never change. She was eternally grateful to the sisters for all they’d done. But there was one person, and one person alone, who’d never judged Seraphina. Not once. Who’d never expected her to change for him, to bend her own principles to match his. That was Rune, and she’d come here for him. Once she had him, everyone else could go be righteous and pious in their own fantasy worlds they’d created for themselves. She wouldn’t have to see or listen to them again. She could love them all from a distance, think about them with fondness but recognize they belonged in her past.
“Mother Superior,” she said, voice firm. “Let’s put our differences aside. I’m here for two simple things. I know it was wrong to steal Saint Vivia’s relic, I apologize, and I’m ready to return it. In exchange, I only want to know if Briar is here, if she arrived with a man that I seek.”
The woman narrowed her eyes at her. “So, it’s transactional.”
“No, it’s not. I will give you the relic regardless. But tell me, is Briar here?”
The Mother Superior sniffed. “She is not.”
Seraphina held her gaze for a long moment. She rolled her lips, thinking. She knew the nun was lying.
Sister Hedwiga leaned to whisper into the Mother Superior’s ear, then they both turned away, and Sister Magdalena’s face came into view.
There was another way for Seraphina to get what she wanted. She’d tried to avoid it, promised herself she’d use respectable methods, like communicating clearly, asking nicely, apologizing even. They’d all failed, and she didn’t have the rest of her life to beg at this gate.
She felt the power of the apex relic spread through her ribs.
It wasn’t fair. She was bringing back what she’d stolen. She’d only had the atlas vertebra for, what? Two months and a half? Three? She didn’t understand the tragedy. And she wanted to know whether Briar, her best friend, was here. She wanted to see Rune and, yes, take him with her. Because he was hers. She should never have left him, never allowed Briar to come close to him. Her friend had called Rune a devil, while Seraphina had always – always! – treated him like the kind soul he was. She didn’t care how he was made, or that his body was covered in ugly stitches. She wanted toseehim. She would find every part of him lovely, no matter what others thought about him.
It was more than just not fair, it was preposterous. There were these women, huddled together behind a heavy gate and a stone wall, emerging only when they deemed it necessary, their vault filled with relics they rarely even used. Meanwhile, Seraphina had been in the real world and felt the rage of it, seen the desperation and hideousness of it. She carried the tolls of two relics, one implanted between her ribs, one tucked miles away, behind two latticed walls, in the strongroom of Krähenstein Academy. She only deserved one of the two. The second, she’d inherited. What did these women know about her pain? About her nightmares and the torture she endured simply for havingbeen made the unwilling keeper of a secret that could end them all?
They didn’t. They didn’t know, couldn’t see, and Seraphina was done.
“You,” she said, locking eyes with Sister Magdalena. “Open the gate.”
Sister Hedwiga had the keys, so Sister Magdalena snatched the ring from where it hung tied to her cincture. That made Hedwiga yelp and lose her balance. The sisters fought over the ring of keys. Magdalena pushed Hedwiga, who crashed into the other sisters, causing consternation and yelling, and shoved the right key into the lock. The gate opened.
