I draw in a deep, shuddering breath, surprised to have spoken so many words all at once. Chewing on my lip, I reach over to check the binding on her broken finger. She does not reply to my statement, though I can feel her gaze on me, hot asthe midday sun. As I unwind the cloth, I’m astounded to find her bone already healed.
“The Fatum of your city are, to us, the Fallen. Your Exalted High Ecclesia,” she tells me, her voice soft. Before I can stop myself, I glance up at her to find her eyes gone inquisitive, head tilted to one side. She studies me in the same way I’ve watched Renault study a manuscript he cannot decipher. “We called the Fatum lured to join your God’s faction the Fallen many, many anni ago. He promised the one thing even the most powerful Fatum can’t have: immortality.”
I sigh, leaning back on the stool. My hips and knees protest my lack of rest, but there is no salve I’ve found that eases those pains. “My Lord teaches that there are many who use wicked tongues to twist the truth,” I say as gently as I can. “That the Creatrixes set the diaboli upon the world when the First Son banished them, gifted with silver tongues to lure and trick good-hearted people away from the light. Yes, He offers to save us from the depths of Inferna, to bring us into the eternal light of Caelus. But it’s not immortality, not like you think.”
Sympathy for the deadly knight creeps into my bones. How terrible it must be to discover the world is entirely different than you thought. My own heart is still heavy with the jagged truth of the Saints.
She levels her gaze at me, those thunderstorm eyes glimmering like rare jewels. Her lips part and then close before she takes a deep breath. “Ophelia,” she says, the sound of my name in her mouth a temptation I fight to ignore. “You misunderstand me. I do not speak of my people’s history that I learned in so-called study or from a carefully worded papyri.”
I twist a clean strip of cotton in my hands, anxiety pounding beneath my breastbone. “What do you mean?” I ask, trying to steer the conversation, clinging to my salvation, my chance at avoiding the horrors of Inferna after I die.
“My elders werethere,” the knight says, one dark eyebrow arching. “And I was but a babe, but I was there, too, for the very end of the War of the Sundering. And every day, I watch the Sundering spread farther.”
My mouth drops open, and I gape like some silly novice. I barely recover myself enough to say, “But the War of the Sundering ended nearly five hundred anni ago.”
I know that the Fatum are long-lived, and I’ve known since the first day what that delicate, pointed curve of her ears means, but the knight’s face is flawless. A raw, primal energy pulses from her that I cannot equate with a being of that age—which would be toward the end of a Fatum’s lifespan, from what I understand. Granted, the only aged Fatum I’ve ever interacted with are the High Ecclesia, and They keep Their faces veiled.
“Five hundred anni?” the knight asks, the corner of her mouth curving into something that looks like amusement. “Is that what he tells you?”
“That is the tracking of time here in Lumendei, yes,” I reply, confused.
“Oh, Ophelia,” she says with a strange tenderness, “it’s barely been eighty anni since the end of the war.”
Panic clots in my throat, choking me. I know she is only misled, I know she only speaks what she believes to be true, but I am too fragile with the Saints a farce, Sergio stalking me like a predator, and Renault—in His name, I hope I’m wrong—perhaps not even being so different after all. The idea that another world exists, another truth prevails, is too dangerous, too intoxicating.
Just like her.
“I don’t wish to fight with you over simple arithmetic,” I manage to choke out, hoping she cannot see how much it takes from me. My mind latches onto this discrepancy, storing it away, that small, wicked voice burrowed deep in my body whispering falsehoods. “I love my Lord. He saved me. He’s saved countlessothers. I wonder if you might be willing to let just a little of His divine love into your heart and see what it does for you?”
Her mouth parts again, ink-dark brows drawn together, and for a moment she looks at me like I’m completely insane. Perhaps I am.
“How would one . . . go about that?” she asks, shifting her stance, chains clinking with the movement.
This moment should be a triumph; victory should surge in me as sure as any floodwater. The Lupa Nox, willing to experience the First Son’s love. And led to it by a simple foundling girl, no less. A miracle, I might’ve said a fortnight ago. But now it only feels hollow, like an apple that appears perfect when plucked but upon closer inspection is filled with rot.
“Perhaps I could read you some Catechisma?” I offer.
“You can read me anything you want,” she tells me, her tone heavy with suggestion. “I rather enjoy the sound of your voice.”
The gentle throbbing between my legs erupts into a vicious, needy pounding. My bust strains against the soft-boned corset of my dress. “How am I to bring the Holy Word into this chamber if you dirty it with such speech?” I stammer, curling my hand into my skirt until I can feel my nails pressing through the fabric and into my palms. “You’re no better than a diaboli.”
“Perhaps I am one,” she replies, straining against her shackles, the rigid muscles of her shoulders far too visible beneath the thin linen of her blouse. The movement pulls her neckline open further, and my traitorous eyes drop to the elegant line of her collarbone. “Perhaps I was sent here to tempt you.”
I press my lips shut, not trusting myself to speak. Gazing down at the dirt floor, I draw a deep breath, wincing as the fabric of my shift strains against the wounds on my back. But the pain is what I wanted—a reminder of what awaits me when I give in to my temptations.
“All I want,” I say, finally raising my gaze to hers, “is to help you find the truth. And the truth is that I pity you. I pity the way you’ve been taught to see the world, the way you can only find the sacred in bloodshed, in death. I pity you for not knowing the guidance and love of the First Son. I pity you for the sad, cruel way you exist in this world. Can’t you see the Sepulchyre have done nothing but make you a weapon for their own means?”
I don’t know where the words come from, how they all tumble from my tongue, or why I can’t seem to stop them. The knight lets me finish, making no attempt to interrupt, though her expression grows darker and darker, her brows drawing together, the luscious curves of her mouth flattening into a firm line.
“If we are going to speak of the truth, little dove,” she says in a drawl, her eyes flashing in the dim light, “would you like to know what your holy, perfect betrothed was feeling as you flayed your own skin open to repent for whatever sin you think you committed?”
Despair pins me to the stool, unable to move or speak, my throat collapsing in on itself. Before I can muster any type of defense, the knight lunges forward, straining at the limit of her chains.
“Pleasure, Ophelia,” she says, her teeth bared like a shadowed monster rendered in the margins of a manuscript. “Because he delights in your pain, your misery. Because to the men of the Host, there isnothingmore satisfying than a woman’s suffering.”
Chapter 19
Ifeel as though I’ve been struck in the stomach, the air forced from my lungs. Shamefully, I shrink back against the stool, fear slinking down my spine. The creature before me is every inch the Lupa Nox—muscles strained beneath linen, her eyes dark and beast-like, teeth bared, lips curled.
