Nevernight (The Nevernight Chronicle #1) - Jay Kristoff Page 0,102

with her questions and her fears. But she pushed back against the weight of it, hands wrapped tight around the box Mercurio had gifted her, the gravebone blade in her fist.

Three baths later she was escorted by a silent Hand up the winding stairs to the Sky Altar, there to eat her mornmeal as if nothing were amiss. The male acolytes were nowhere to be seen—probably already in Godsgrave, being rounded up for their own round of beatings and torture. She saw Ashlinn seated at table, her lip fat and cheek split. Mia wouldn’t meet her eyes. Collecting her food, she took a seat, eating without speaking a word. Noting the other female acolytes who filtered slowly up the stairs, the smiles and jokes from past meals just a memory.

By meal’s end, only Ashlinn, Jessamine, Carlotta and Mia sat at that long, lonely table. All of them beaten. Bruised. Bloodied. But alive, at least. Of the nine girls who’d gathered in Aalea’s chambers yestereve, only four had returned.

Four of iron.

The rest, glass.

They looked among each other. Carlotta, ever stoic. Jessamine triumphant. A thin line of worry between Ash’s brows—probably at the thought of what might be happening to her brother. But not one of them spoke. Mia stared at her plate, chewed her food, one ashen mouthful at a time. Forcing herself to finish every crumb. Mop up the gravy like blood on rough stone. And when she was done, she stood quietly, trod back to her room and closed the door behind her.

She looked at her face in the mirror. Dark, bruised eyes. Thin, trembling lips.

“… i am sorry, mia…”

Mia looked at the not-cat, curled on the edge of the bed. Cassius and Eclipse had rattled Mister Kindly worse than she. But her questions about darkin, about the Lord of Blades and his passenger, all of them simply died on her lips.

“It’s all right, Mister Kindly,” she sighed.

“… never flinch…,” he offered. “… never fear…”

Mia nodded. “And never, ever forget.”

She sat before the looking glass and stared at the girl staring back at her. The killer Cassius had described. The monster. Wondering, for one tiny moment, what her life might have been before Scaeva tore it to ribbons. Trying to remember her father’s face. Trying to forget her mother’s. Feeling the burn of tears in her eyes. Willing them gone until nothing remained. Just Mia and the dry-eyed girl staring back at her.

Mercurio must have known the test of loyalty was coming. Knew what the Cassius and the Ministry had planned. And though another might’ve felt betrayed their master had given no warning, instead Mia felt only pride. The old man had known what was in store for her, and still he’d not breathed a word. Not because he didn’t care.

Because he knew.

Cassius and the Ministry had no clue. No idea at all what she was made of. But he knew.

Iron or glass? they’d asked.

Mia clenched her jaw. Shook her head.

She was neither.

She was steel.

1. A branch of Aa’s church almost as old as the religion itself, the Confessionate is, as you may suspect, charged with rooting out heresy within the Republic. Chiefly concerning themselves with those who worship the Mother of Night, confessors are recruited from among the most zealous—or imbalanced—of Aa’s ministers. The current head of the Confessionate, Attia Fiorlini, went so far as to crucify her own husband on suspicion of heresy early in her career. Her superiors were duly impressed with her devotion, and her star rose quickly thereafter.

In actual fact, Attia trumped up charges against her beau after discovering he was diddling one of the maidservants.

Still, two birds with one stone …

CHAPTER 18

SCOURGE

The final tally to survive Lord Cassius’s test was seventeen. Four female. Thirteen male. All of them various shades of bloodied, battered and bruised. Hush’s eyes were so blackened, the boy could barely see for three turns. Marcellus walked with a limp for weeks. Pip’s jaw had almost been broken, and he ate only soups for almost a month.1

Mia knew she shouldn’t have cared whether or not Tric survived. But when he’d walked up the stairs and sat quietly down to his evemeal, she’d found herself smiling at him. When he’d glanced up and caught her in it, she decided not to try and hide it.

And Tric had smiled back.

Her swordarm still wasn’t fully healed, but Mercurio’s scolding had sunk home. When the flock were deemed recovered enough for lessons to begin again, Mia decided to attend the Hall of Songs. She’d