The House of Shattered Wings

Oh God, no.

The thundering of her heart must have been heard all the way into Heaven. Elphon, blissfully unaware of anything amiss, walked into the room and bowed to her. “We’ve met before, I think,” he said gravely.

Madeleine kept her voice level, but it took all the self-control she could muster. “We have met.” Not just once; every day of his life—they’d worked side by side in the gardens of Hawthorn, cut branches and tended flower beds together—how could he not remember?

“You’re the alchemist.” His gaze strayed to the bed; he sounded vaguely disapproving.

“Oh. No,” Madeleine said, shaking her head. “Of course I’m not here for that. Whatever happens to him, he belongs to Hawthorn.”

Elphon said nothing for a while. “I guess that’s one way of putting it.”

Aragon had disappeared—slipped out the door in Elphon’s wake, no doubt. Madeleine suppressed a curse. She should make her excuses and leave, too; but curiosity got the better of her. “Are there—no people from before, in Hawthorn?”

“Before?”

Madeleine shook her head. “I’m a refugee. Surely Asmodeus has told you that? I was in Hawthorn. Under Uphir.”

Elphon’s face froze. “Were you?”

She nodded. “I left the night of the coup.”

“Oh.” She couldn’t read Elphon’s expression. “Well, I wasn’t there, but to answer your question, there are people left from that time. Not many—I think not everyone swore fealty to Lord Asmodeus.”

Of course they wouldn’t, and of course he would ruthlessly remove them. Madeleine shook her head, trying to banish dark thoughts. Well, there was nothing for it. She might as well be honest. “You . . . look a lot like someone I used to know, once. Someone who died the night of the coup.”

“All Fallen look alike.” His face was haughty, distant.

“Yes, you’ve told me that before. But the thing is, he was called Elphon, too. And I knew him well, well enough not to mistake him for someone else. We . . . we worked together.” It seemed like such an inadequate way to encompass all that Elphon had meant to her; the exhilarating nights racing each other to the roof of the House; the quiet lunches that they’d had, hiding behind fountains and trimmed hedges; the night they had snuck down to the Seine, and watched the black waves lapping on the shore, trying to imagine that there, too, amid the polluted waters, there was magic and wonder. And, remembering, she measured the gulf between this other life and the one she had now. The river was dark and dangerous, like everything else in Paris: waters that would eat at your flesh, waves that would reach out, grab you from the embankments, and drag you under the choppy surface to drown. There was a power in the Seine, yes; magic and awe—not innocent wonder, but something as dark and as gut-wrenchingly terrifying as the God who had destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah—a faction as strong as any House, ruthlessly destroying anything that intruded on its boundaries. Not even the major Houses dared to tangle with it; and yet she and Elphon had sat on parapets, dangling their legs over the black waters, and thought only of fairy tales. . . .

Kids, that was what they had been. Innocent, careless, stupid kids. “It was in another lifetime.”

Elphon’s face was set. “I don’t remember anything. Nevertheless, if what you say is true—”

“It is,” Madeleine said. “Why would I lie to you?”

“Then I have no doubt Lord Asmodeus has his own reasons.”

“Of course he has. He killed you!”

If she’d hoped to provoke some reaction, she was disappointed. Elphon merely shrugged. “As I said—Lord Asmodeus has his own reasons, and I have no doubt he would act in the best interest of the House. It’s not my business to inquire.”

In another lifetime, she thought, sadly. They had both changed, immeasurably; taking the bitter, salt-laden paths to this dying room, where they spoke to each other as strangers. “You’re right,” she said, finally. “Just as it’s not my business to inquire. Good-bye, Elphon.”

She left without looking at his face; afraid of what she would see, if she turned round.





ELEVEN


ANCIENT HATREDS

THE cells were damp, and cold—and the khi currents in them flowed lazily: layers and layers of metal and fire with the strength of primal screams. They seemed to be one of the few things in the House that had not decayed, and Philippe could understand why: because the memory of pain and rage and the dreams of revenge and death that had pooled between the stone walls were too strong, too vivid to leach away, even in the midst of Silverspires’ atrophy.