Mia glanced at Ashlinn, saw fear swimming plain in her blue stare. She pulled herself from her lover’s arms, turned to face the strange figure. Pale wisps of breath spilled from her bloody lips.
“Well,” she said. “My mysterious savior.”
The figure bowed low, robes rippling in some phantom breeze. Its voice was hollow, sibilant, reverberating somewhere in the pit of her belly.
“MI DONA.”
“I suppose thanks are in order.” Mia folded her arms, tossed her hair over her shoulder. “But they can come after introductions. Who the ’byss are you?”
“A GUIDE,” the figure replied. “A GIFT.”
“Speak plainly,” Mia snarled, temper rising. “Who are you?”
“Mia…,” Ashlinn murmured, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“Speak!” Mia demanded, stepping forward with clenched fists.
The figure raised those ink-black hands, drew back its hood. In the ghostly light, Mia saw pitch-black eyes and flawless alabaster skin. Dark, thick saltlocks, swaying as if they were alive. He was still achingly handsome—strong jaw and high cheekbones, once scrawled with hateful ink stains, then made perfect by the weaver’s hands.
Lips she’d once kissed.
Eyes she’d once drowned in.
A face she’d once adored.
Mia looked into Ashlinn’s frightened blue eyes. Back to the pools of bottomless black that passed for his.
“Black fucking Mother,” she breathed.
CHAPTER 5
EPIPHANIES
“How?” Mia whispered.
She looked Tric up and down, crossing her arms over her breasts and shivering in the cold. He was different than he’d been—his once-olive skin was now carved of marble, his once-hazel eyes were pools of purest darkness. He seemed a statue in the forum, wrought cold and perfect from the stone by some master’s hand and now come to life. His face was beautiful. Flawless. Pale and smooth as gravebone, cutting just as deep. Her heart could scarcely believe the tale her eyes were telling.
But there was no mistaking the boy she’d known.
The boy she’d loved?
“But she…” Mia turned to Ashlinn, bewildered. “You killed him.”
Ashlinn was uncharacteristically silent, her eyes bright with fear. Mister Kindly and Eclipse were still sitting side by side on that strange shoreline, and Jonnen had joined them, dark eyes locked on that darker pool. The stone faces around them mouthed silent entreaties, stone tresses flowing as if in a wintersdeep wind. But Mia simply stood, staring at her old flame. Trying to ignore the flood of emotion rushing through her chest and simply make sense of it all.
“How can you be here if you’re dead?”
Tric’s black eyes glinted in the cold lantern light.
“THE MOTHER KEEPS ONLY WHAT SHE NEEDS.”
Mia drew a few deep breaths, her lungs aching from the chill. She’d heard tell of wraiths returning from the Hearth to haunt the living, dismissed most of them as old wives’ tales. But this was no children’s fable standing before her. This was her old friend, sure as her heart was beating in her chest. The boy who’d traveled with her through the Whisperwastes of Ashkah, who’d been her ally and confidant during the Red Church trials, who’d shared her bed and chased her nightmares away during her darkest hours. Her first real lover.
Killed by her second.
Mia could feel Ashlinn behind her, close enough to reach out and touch. She could still taste the girl’s lips. Smell the perfume of sweat and leather on her skin. She knew Tric must have seen them together, that he must have witnessed the passion and joy Mia had felt kissing his murderer.
“I…” She shook her head. Searching for some explanation. Wondering why she felt the need to explain anything at all. “I thought you were dead…”
Those pitch-black eyes flickered to Ashlinn.
“I AM,” Tric replied.
“He saved my life, Mia,” Ashlinn murmured behind her. “The Ministry ambushed me at the chapel. They took Mercurio back to the Mountain. They were set to steal me, too, but … Tric … he helped me.”
Mia’s stomach sank at the news of Mercurio’s capture.
“Why?” she asked. “Why help you after what you did to him?”
“I don’t know.” Ash put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Mia, I have to tell y—”
“What’s your game, Tric?” Mia turned back to the boy, burning with curiosity and indignity. “Why save Ashlinn after she killed you? Why save Jonnen and me, then leave us to wander like rats in the dark?”
At the sound of his name, Mia’s brother turned from the black pool. He blinked hard, rubbing his eyes like a boy just woken from sleep. He seemed to notice Tric for the first time, but Mia could see suspicion in his stare instead of fear. Curiosity narrowed his eyes as he looked Ashlinn