Page 15

“Because she was usually right about most things.” Avelene adjusts her pace on the bridge, her cane finding the rhythm of the stone. “But she’s always said the Bleeding tells you something. The earlier it starts, the thinner the veil, and the thinner the veil…”

“The stronger the Nox,” Ambrose finishes.

Nox Anima. October thirty-first. We celebrate it on the islands too, of course. Bonfires on the shore, offerings left at the tree line, firecrackers shot from the pier, and candy-coated chestnuts given out to adults and children alike, and when my grandmother was alive she would tell stories about the dead walking until my sister hid behind my father’s legs. But I have no idea what the Mortis does with it.

“What’s the Nox like here?” I ask. “At the school?”

“Only the Veil Trial,” Ambrose says, his eyes widening with enthusiasm. “The most important assessment of the year. Students cross partway into death and come back with proof…you know, something from the other side. A piece of knowledge, a sensation, something verifiable. It’s how the Mortis measures who you are as a necromancer.”

“It’s also how people end up in the infirmary for a week,” Avelene adds wryly. “Last year a third-year came back speaking a dead language and couldn’t stop. She was in the nurse’s room for days with Wellspring looking after her until finally the language was vanquished.”

“But it’s not just the Trial,” Ambrose adds. “Right before is the Nox festival. The Keepers get fresh candles and garlands made of black hellebore and yew. The refectory does a feast every night with hot cider and bone-marrow broth and these little dark honey cakes that they only make once a year.”

“The cakes are exceptional,” Veronelle confirms.

“And on Demon Night, the night before the Trial, the whole school goes masked,” Ambrose continues. “Everyone wears long-beaked plague masks and black robes and you walk the Procession of the Unnamed. It’s a silent march through the corridors and out across the bridge to the cemetery, all in masks, all carrying lanterns. No one speaks. You’re not supposed to know who’s beside you. The idea is that for one night, you’re one of the dead, walking among them as equals.”

“It sounds…” I start.

“Terrifying?” Avelene offers. “It is. Terrifying and fun. There are hundreds of you in those masks and you can’t see properly through the beak and the only light is the lanterns and the red sky, and the corridors echo so all you hear are footsteps and breathing. Last year someone fainted on the bridge and two people tripped over them and someone got a broken nose before the Trial even started.”

“And also on Demon Night there’s the Bone Fire,” Ambrose adds. “In the cemetery courtyard. Students burn offerings for their dead—letters, tokens, small things. There’s mulled wine and that awful spirit that Hetch brews in his tower and pretends no one knows about.” A shudder runs through him at the thought.

“Hetch’s spirit could strip varnish,” Avelene says with a grimace. “I had half a cup last year and lost feeling in my tongue for a day.”

“It’s the best night of the year,” Ambrose says simply, punctuating it all with a smile.

“And then there’s Mortalia,” Veronelle says, her voice sounding a little less guarded than normal. “It’s in late November. It’s our formal ball.”

“The ball is extraordinary,” Ambrose says. “The whole school transforms. Candles everywhere, the refectory completely unrecognizable, music, dancing. We also wear masks then, like plague masks, but not as…”

“Ugly,” Veronelle inputs.

“And before Mortalia there’s the formal dinner,” Avelene continues, ignoring him. “Smaller, but arguably more stressful because you have to actually talk to people instead of just dancing. That’s in a few weeks.” She looks at me. “Have you thought about what you’re wearing?”

Well, since it’s the first I’m hearing about it, I haven’t given it any thought at all. There’s fabric at the cottage, a deep teal I’ve been saving, and some gold silk that might be enough for a bodice if I’m clever with the cutting, or at the very least would make a nice trim. But I feel like I’ll need something extra special for at least the ball, if not the dinner. I’ll need to bring the sewing machine back after Saturday. There’s a dressmaker on Salthaven who owes me for a ward I stitched into her daughter’s christening shawl last spring. Good fabric would settle that debt nicely.

And that’s when I realize everyone has been staring at me, waiting for an answer.

“I’ll make something,” I say.

“You make your dresses?” Avelene looks at me with fresh interest.

“Of course. All of them.”

“Even the one you wore yesterday, with the buttons?” Veronelle asks, glancing at me briefly over her shoulder.

“Sure did,” I say. “Even though the buttons are a nightmare sometimes.”

I hate to admit it, but she looks vaguely impressed and I’m delighting in it.

The cemetery materializes out of the fog as we step off the bridge. It’s a low green island packed tight with the dead, all headstones leaning at angles, mausoleums sagging together, half-bare trees with black branches against the wine-red sky. The ground is soft underfoot and gives slightly with each step, and everything smells of earth and damp stone and the sweetness of things that have been buried a very long time.

Up ahead, standing still amongst the fog, is an imposing figure.

Professor Vale is already here.

He’s standing near a mausoleum at the far end, half-lost in his dark coat against the stone. Candles burn in glass lanterns driven into the earth on iron stakes, and their light is thin and jumping, and in it his face is all shadow and sharp angles and those amber eyes catching the flame.