The House of Shattered Wings

“You wouldn’t understand.”


That clearly stung. “Try me.”

He opened his mouth, saw only Morningstar’s bottomless eyes—felt a twinge of pain in the hand that Asmodeus had disjointed; and remembered the slimy feel of shadows sliding across bare walls, across the facets of crystal glasses—and, on his skin, Samariel’s heavy breath, whispering the spell that had set him free. No words came out. “I need to go for a walk. Sorry.”

“Philippe!”

Outside, it was no better. The pall of pollution seemed to hang heavier on La Goutte d’Or, or perhaps it was just him, feeling sweat run down his body in rivulets. Perhaps he was the only one with that hardening mixture of panic and resolution within him; who couldn’t tell, anymore, if it belonged to Isabelle or to him.

Stay out of this. It was a House struggle, like House Draken, and he’d lost enough to Draken and Draken’s fall; it was a ghost more powerful than him, a House that he had no cause to love. Keep your head down. Rebuild, always with the darkness at his back, haunting him as surely as it haunted House Silverspires. Always, with the memory of Isabelle—of stepping away from her, and leaving her to fend for herself—to die—in the storm that was engulfing Silverspires.

He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t be free of her. He—

He had to go back.

*

MADELEINE sat in the gardens, watching water pool on the rim of the fountain. If she closed her eyes, she would see Asmodeus again; feel the heat of his radiance on her hands, hear his voice again, level and emotionless, calmly stating the obvious.

A truth like a salted knife’s blade . . .

Do you really think he came halfway across the city to find you dying on the cobblestones?

She had believed; or had wanted to believe, so much; that she had been chosen by Morningstar himself, that her presence in Silverspires had meaning. That there was safety there, yes—that it was the oldest House—but that he had known. That he had extended his hand as his last act in this world.

And it was a lie. It wasn’t kindness that had saved her, but merely a whim. Worse than that; a whim of the Fallen who had killed Uphir, who had killed Elphon—who had destroyed her world—and who had decided, because it cost him nothing, that he could spare her life.

It would cost her nothing to deny him his victory.

A knife’s blade, or a noose, or a pool of water: so many ways she could leave. He might stop her once, or twice, but he couldn’t keep her forever. In the end, she would win.

No one would miss her. Selene would be glad to be rid of her, and the House at Silverspires had already forgotten her. In a way, the sentence had already been passed, long ago, her twenty years nothing more than suspended time, a miracle that had had no right to exist. No one would—Isabelle would weep. But no, Isabelle was young, and naive—give her a few centuries, and she’d be as hard as Selene.

She stared at the water, knowing she didn’t have the courage for any of this. If it had been essence, perhaps she’d have gone on, slowly killing herself. But every other solution required fortitude she didn’t have.

In this, as well, she was a failure.

*

SELENE was staring at the wings, wrapped in a corner of her office where Isabelle had left them. She’d looked distinctly unhappy, muttering something about shoddy work; and had left abruptly. Even for her, that had been beyond politeness. Whatever the case, it was done. The wings were now infused with magic; with the combined breaths of every Fallen in the House from Choérine to Alcestis to Morningstar—God grant that it would be enough, though she knew all too well the futility of prayers for such as she. Now all that remained was . . .

Her thoughts, as usual, drew back from the abyss: she knew what had to be done, the only thing that they could do, but . . .

“Selene?”

“Come in,” she said.

It was Emmanuelle, dressed in a simple white cotton tunic that set off the darkness of her skin. “There’s a sprig of green just around the corridor.”

“I know.” And, more softly: “I will give the order to evacuate this wing. And I will go with them.”

“The parvis?” Emmanuelle asked.

“Yes.” There was no choice. Because a House was not merely a fortress of spells and wards, but a collection of dependents, and she couldn’t wait for them to be picked off one by one. The parvis remained clear of roots; and yet still within the protection of the wards: that was where she would tell them to assemble, Javier and Choérine and Gauthier and Geneviève and all the others, from the youngest children to the eldest mortals, grown old in the service of the House. And she would go with them; because it was more important that someone defend them than a last-ditch, desperate attempt to stop a ghost who had almost already won.