a Historian, her legs folded, her carved mask tucked on her brow, like a low-hung hat. I knew this Historian well. She was the one who always came and watched me sleep. It was almost a comfort to have her there, because the expression on her face wasn’t predatory.
It was motherly.
Faded black paint spread across her nose and forehead in perfect streaks only marred by the line of tears dripping from eyes I almost recognized.
“Help me,” I pleaded. I crawled up onto my hands and knees and held the bar. “Help me,” I raged again, my voice shaking with anger and need, like an open wound.
Her tear-streaked eyes recorded my agony, but she didn’t move. I pulled at her cloak, trying to bring her closer, to force her to action, but she stayed planted.
Her cloak slipped off.
Underneath the cloak was a structure of rusting gears and green misty ghostlight, a skeleton of pipes, sparks, and machinations. Historians were nothing but walking Whirligigs, with a face of someone I almost remembered.
I dropped the cloak and found a corner on my own.
She recorded my deaths.
Again and again.
I died of thirst, a slow death that rattled my lungs and set a sharp pain in my abdomen.
I reawakened a foot away from where I’d lain, only to die from poisoned food. Each time I awoke, my body was battered, but my heart was still beating. I didn’t know how long I could live, clutching on to life with only one heart left to beat. Three times she watched me die. She stood sentinel as I shuddered awake, vomited on the cold stones, and screamed into the darkness to let me go. I didn’t want to live, only to stay dead.
She watched, but she never said a word.
* * *
Hours, or days, or years later, a door opened, and a lantern’s sharp light burned my retinas.
“Still alive?” Edvarg said nonchalantly, like he wasn’t surprised, or as if he simply didn’t care.
The Historian was gone.
“How many days?” I croaked. My throat was rough as used sandpaper—dry and full of muck.
Edvarg’s cape flicked in the breeze. He cocked his head to the side. “Perhaps if we remove your head entirely.”
“How. Many.” I stopped to fill my lungs.
“Eleven.” Edvarg scratched his beard. “Perhaps if there were enough witnesses…”
I ignored my uncle’s casual inquiry in how to kill me and clenched my eyes closed. My parents were eleven days gone. I’d lost eleven days of my quest. My palm brushed the bauble around my neck. I died from a lack of drink, yet I had crystal-clear water strung around my neck that I would never consider drinking.
Not until I knew I’d be strong enough to do this.
3
DAGNEY
I was in the market when the Executioner gongs rang out. Loud. Mechanical. I clutched the book against my chest and glanced up at the moons above me.
There was time. There was still time.
The bookseller pulled his embroidered books from their stands and packed them in a large trunk. I stepped quickly to his table.
“How much will you give me for this?” I asked. I showed him the bindings, but did not let go. You never let a trader hold your wares. Father taught me that.
“Lady Tomlinson.” He eyed the title on the spine, and then shook his head. “I don’t deal with traitors.”
And I didn’t deal well with people calling me names. I grabbed a handful of his lace cravat and pulled him until our noses were almost touching. “Jecky Varnes, I’ve bought enough books from you to furnish your entire house, so you will deal with me. How much?”
His eyes bulged at my violence. “One silver.”
I let go. “I bought it for five not twelve days ago.”
“Prices go up, prices go down.” He fiddled with his collar and went back to stacking.
I folded my arms. “You are cheating me? I’m your best customer.”
“You were a council member’s daughter,” he muttered. “I could call the guards on you. I’m sure King Edvarg would love payment for your father’s betrayal.”
I lowered my hands. “My father left me too.” My throat tightened, but I refused to let it weaken me. “He loved me more than anything in this world, and he and my brother left me with nothing. Please. I have a household to feed.”
He met my gaze, a spark of light back in his eyes. “Five silvers.”
“Thank you.” I handed him the book and it slipped into his trunk before I could count my silvers. “I’m looking for information about my brother.”