Baz had gone cold all over, his father’s face in his mind.
“And you know what I realized? It’s the first time I was in the mind of someone who’s had their magic sealed. I’ve never seen anything more terrifying.” Kai’s voice had been low, his eyes not quite meeting Baz’s, as if that made the admission easier. “Their nightmare wasn’t full of the normal fears and dreads I’m used to seeing. It was just… hollow. An infinite, empty sort of darkness.”
“I guess it’s a good thing you have that flask, then,” Baz had said uneasily.
Dusk had jumped from Kai’s chest, scurrying over to the window. Kai’s eyes had slid to him. “Don’t you think it’s strange? It’s like having their access to magic cut off makes them soulless. I don’t care how destructive Collapsings can be or that people think we become these irredeemable, demonic echoes of the Shadow or whatever when we Collapse.” He’d snickered, full of disdain. “I refuse to believe that one slipup equates eternal damnation for us.”
Baz had said nothing at that. He was torn on the matter: on one hand, what Kai described sounded awful, and imagining his father leading that kind of soulless existence at the Institute weighed on him heavily. But on the other hand, his father’s Collapsing had killed people. If he hadn’t had his magic sealed, that raw, uncontrollable power in his veins would have done even more irreparable damage, both to him and to others.
How often they’d heard the stories, meant to warn Eclipse children of the dangers of using too much magic. Slip up, fall into darkness. Evil awaits the careless. They were told Eclipse-born who Collapsed became wrong and twisted and unhallowed. Wholly irredeemable. As if that silver blast of power erased the people they once were, leaving this darkness inside that sought only to destroy.
Kai thought it was bullshit. He never failed to remind Baz that in the Constellation Isles, people didn’t demonize Eclipse-born the way they did here. But even they knew the Collapsing was dangerous, something to avoid at all costs. The tattoos on Kai’s chest were said to be a way to ward off such evil.
“During an eclipse,” Kai had said, “the moon moves in front of the sun and plunges everything into darkness, but it passes. The world goes back to normal. What if it’s the same for those who Collapse? If this great evil that supposedly overcomes them is its own eclipse—fleeting and temporary?”
“Then how do you explain those who escape the seal?” Baz had tried to reason with him. Few who Collapsed managed to escape the Institute’s clutches. That blast of power was too destructive, garnered too much attention for anyone to pretend it never happened. And though the blast itself faded quickly enough, making it possible for the Regulators to approach them and take them into the Institute to administer the seal, their blood remained silver, a clear indicator they’d Collapsed.
The Unhallowed Seal was their only salvation, the only thing that kept the madness at bay. By severing their ties to magic, they stood a fighting chance at a normal life.
“Whatever you need to tell yourself, Brysden. I for one think we’re trading one curse for another. Maybe I’ll push myself to Collapse for the heck of it, just to prove everyone wrong.”
Baz had gawked at him, shocked he would say such a thing. Kai knew how badly his father’s Collapsing haunted him, must have known what such a suggestion did to him, even if it was said jokingly. The shadow that had fallen over Kai’s features told Baz he’d realized his blunder.
“Relax, Brysden. I’m not stupid enough to try it.”
Baz had believed him. They hadn’t spoken of it again. A few weeks later, Romie drowned, Baz headed home for her funeral, and when he came back, it was to find the commons empty.
“Kai’s at the Institute now,” Professor Selandyn had told him. “He’s been given the seal.”
Trading one curse for another.
Baz wanted to tell Professor Selandyn that Kai’s Collapsing wasn’t her fault, that he’d had a mind of his own and would have done what he’d done regardless. That, if anything, it was Baz’s own fault for not taking Kai seriously then.
I refuse to believe that one slipup equates eternal damnation for us, Kai had said—and had become so obsessed with the idea that it had led to his downfall.
Baz couldn’t bring himself to say anything. Call it a twisted sense of loyalty to Kai, but he couldn’t betray him like that.
Professor Selandyn brought her teacup to her lips and asked, “Was there anything else, Basil?”
He cleared his throat, righted himself in his seat. “There is, actually.”
This was the part where he told her of Emory. There’s a Tidecaller in our midst. Another student for you to train. Someone else to worry yourself sick over and mourn when they inevitably Collapse and end up at the Institute.
He couldn’t do it—couldn’t burden her further.
Instead, he eyed The Tides of Fate and the Shadow of Ruin lying open on the table between them. “I was wondering about your new research topic. It got me thinking… What do you make of the parallels between the deities from the myth and the gods in Cornus Clover’s story?”
Selandyn laughed, and the sound warmed Baz’s heart. “You and that book,” she said fondly, patting his hand as she leaned over to put her cup on its saucer. “It’s no secret Clover’s manuscript draws heavily on the myth of the Tides and the Shadow, though I’m certainly no expert on the matter. You should ask Jae about it. They’ve just arrived in town.”
Baz’s ear perked up at that. Jae Ahn was an old family friend, and if anyone knew anything about Song of the Drowned Gods, especially the missing epilogue, it was them. “I’ll give them a call,” he said, wondering with a pang of disappointment why Jae hadn’t told him they were coming to Cadence. “But I’d still love to hear your thoughts on the matter. Do you think it might be something worth exploring in your research?”
She seemed to consider it. “Perhaps. It’s evident to me that, if Clover did intend to write his story as a sort of retelling of the fall of the Tides, he drew inspiration from the most common of the myth interpretations. But it might be interesting to see if he was influenced by some of the lesser-known, more obscure interpretations too.”
The professor settled back onto her divan, and Baz recognized the look on her face, that of a storyteller settling into a tale.