The House of Shattered Wings

“Yes,” Madeleine said. “I’m surprised they trust you with this, instead of Hawthorn’s doctor.”


“Oh, they’ve gone for Iaris. She should be here at any moment, but in the meantime . . .” Aragon shrugged. “I’ve done business with Hawthorn, too, and Asmodeus knows he can trust me.” He ignored the slight revulsion that went through Madeleine. “All the Houses are the same, Madeleine. You should know that.”

“I know,” Madeleine lied.

Aragon didn’t insist. “Mind you,” he said, “I’m sure not much trust is required to leave him into my care. It’s not like I can make him worse.”

“Do you—” Madeleine looked away from the bed, and back to Aragon. “Do you know what did this?”

“You mean the description? I thought you’d seen it.”

“Yes,” Madeleine said. “Shadows that move, that feel like they’re picking apart your thoughts. But that doesn’t tell me . . .”

“What it is?” Aragon asked. “Or how it can kill that way?”

On the arms, which hung limp and deformed, were the same marks Aragon had pointed out on Oris, the same marks Madeleine had seen on the other corpses: the perfect circles with a single dot in the middle, a livid blue against the paleness of the skin.

“I think it’s some kind of creature, a summoning or something.”

“Summonings are impossible,” Madeleine said. She thought of the shadows again, moving as though they were alive; of the hissing sound just on the cusp of hearing. “Aren’t they?”

“Summonings have a mind of their own, and rules of their own, which often end badly for the summoner. But you’re right, broadly speaking. There hasn’t been a successful summoning in centuries. There are legends, of course—people who went digging into the past of the city—the Middle Ages, the Greeks and Romans, even the prehistory—who summoned up harpies and unicorns and saber-toothed tigers.”

“And they’re untrue?”

“I . . . don’t think so,” Aragon said. “But they’re old. Even being generous with them, the most recent one would have been four hundred years ago, and the Fallen in question spent decades just preparing his ritual. We just don’t have the power—or the level of obsession—for this anymore. They require energy beyond even what a Fallen might produce; even with artifacts, even with essence.”

Madeleine tensed, but the words didn’t appear to be directed at her.

Aragon went on. “It does sound like a summoning—or a trained beast. Maybe a construct, modified with magic. It’s clear that it’s not human. Not, mind you, that anything human was capable of leaving those marks.”

A construct. That didn’t sound like a cheerful notion, either. Again, there were tales: memories of Fallen who had survived the war and seen constructs in action. There was a reason why no one dared to use them anymore.

“He doesn’t look the same as—” Madeleine swallowed. “He doesn’t look the same as Oris.”

“No,” Aragon said. “Oris didn’t look as though every bone in his body had shattered.”

“You said—you said Fallen bones couldn’t support the body.”

“No,” Aragon said. “They’re thin and built for flight. Like a bird’s. Hollow inside.” He tapped the head of the bed, thoughtfully. “Oris died when magic was removed from him. I think Samariel’s magic was removed for a much, much longer time.”

Madeleine would have felt sick, once upon a time. “More slowly perhaps,” she said. So he wouldn’t die all at once, but would linger for a little while. Except that no one, of course, should be alive in that condition.

“I don’t know what the shadows are,” Aragon said. His hands tightened around the bedstead. “I don’t know, and this is . . . alarming.” His face didn’t move, but Madeleine could read the fear in the depths of his eyes; in the hands that remained stubbornly clinging to the metal frame of the bed.

Aragon had never been afraid of anything or anyone. “You’re worried,” she said, slowly, carefully. It was . . . even worse than Selene being worried. Aragon was always detached and clinical—impatient sometimes, but certainly never scared.

“Of course I am,” Aragon said sharply. “There is something that’s killing again and again in this House, with as much ease as a child snapping kindling sticks. I’d advise you to be worried, too.” He closed his eyes for a moment and then said, with a visible effort, “Sorry. It’s been a long night. You shouldn’t listen to my ramblings.”

But it hadn’t been ramblings—simply the truth; the mask of propriety and impassibility lifted to show her what lay beneath. “I’m scared, too,” Madeleine said. She’d seen it, felt it, and would give anything to never see or feel it again in her life.

“Don’t be,” Aragon said, but she couldn’t believe him anymore.

Her gaze drifted to Samariel’s face: the eyes were closed, but no one would have mistaken this for sleep. Likely he was too far gone to even hear them. Time to leave. “I’ll be back,” she said; and turned, and saw Elphon in the doorway.