The Lady Alchemist Page 15

  Ruhen’s mouth curled into a sneer. “I have,” he said, in a tone he’d never used with Sepha, not even when she’d shut him out for weeks on end. “I have, and I’m glad I did.”

  They were very close now, knees touching beneath the table, his face inches from hers. The mess hall had long since melted away, and the world was only Sepha and Ruhen and the crackling air that separated them.

  “What now, Sepha?” he asked, staring at her so intensely it was difficult to hold his gaze. “Will you turn me in? Am I evil now, too?”

  “Of course not,” Sepha said. “Don’t be stupid.”

  Ruhen gave a sour half-smile. “Well, that’s a relief,” he said, and Sepha turned away, so angry she was shaking. Gods, what was wrong with him? Saying magicians were good, then getting mad at her for not being as stupid as he was?

  “What about you?”

  Sepha closed her eyes. “What about me?”

  Still pushing, still insistent, Ruhen said, “Thuban and Henric think you’re a magician, for one. For another, you know the person who did this to us. And since you haven’t even told me about that person, I assume you haven’t turned them in, either.”

  Sepha’s cheeks went hot. Sudden apprehension snuffed her anger, and she opened her eyes. If Thuban and Henric decided to accuse her publicly—if they refused to accept alchemy as proof that she wasn’t a magician, or if someone caught the undead magician and he told them about her, then—

  “You can’t talk to me anymore,” she said abruptly. “If they think I’m a magician, they’ll assume you were helping me keep it a secret. They’ll kill us both.”

  Ruhen gave her a look, then took a huge bite of his food, ignoring her.

  Sepha narrowed her eyes. In the two weeks that had passed since her birthday, she and Ruhen had spent more time together than ever. From breakfast until dinner, she sifted through textbooks and asked him to read passages that might be helpful—they never were—and he pretended not to be curious about what information she was looking for, and why. He even joined her on her frequent breaks to the proving grounds or the underground laboratories, where she burned away her frustration with exercise or alchemy.

  They hadn’t kissed again. But they’d been circling each other, spiraling toward a collision, and Sepha wasn’t oblivious enough to think no one else had noticed. The Institute was a small place. The other alchemists had long since noticed that she and Ruhen were constantly together.

  Sepha glanced at Fio, who sat beside her, his blond eyebrows furrowed in a worried frown.

  A regular frown. He couldn’t be worried.

  Actually, not a frown. He couldn’t frown.

  Sepha shook her head. “If you could take care of Fio if anything happens to me, even if we stop talking …”

  She let the sentence die and waited. And waited. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”

  “They already know we’re friends, Sepha, so it’d be pointless to pretend we aren’t. And we’re not going to stop talking, either,” Ruhen said, giving her another look. “It’s not as if we could cut each other out completely, anyway. What with the whatever-it-is.”

  The practicality of his answer was profoundly irritating. “You’re the one who brought up what could happen to me. Don’t get mad at me for thinking it through.”

  Ruhen made a frustrated growl. “I brought up what could happen so you’d see how stupid the new law is! I thought you’d realize how many people are in danger now, all because the Magistrate is overreacting to these recent attacks. Clearly I miscalculated.”

  “Clearly,” Sepha echoed, leaning away and crossing her arms. “But if I’m in danger, you are, too.”

  “Noted.”

  This was the closest to an argument they’d ever had, and it was worse because Sepha couldn’t understand why Ruhen was being so unreasonable. The air between them took on weight, a tangible thing. She watched his gaze travel from her eyes to her lips, her ear, the braid that hung over her shoulder, the willow pendant that rested just below her collarbones. Ruhen’s hard expression fell away, leaving him looking troubled, and Sepha could practically read his thoughts.

  He’d realized she was right.

  Sepha’s stomach gave a sharp twist. Her anger drained away, leaving behind a hot, sick knot.

  He’d realized she was right.

  After an eternity, he said, “You’re my friend. No matter what. And I won’t be scared off by some poster.”

  Sepha exhaled and, feeling strangely exhausted, leaned against Ruhen’s shoulder. He sighed and pressed his lips against her hair. Rested his cheek on her head.

  A tray plopped onto the table, and Ruhen straightened.

  “Take it easy,” Destry said, with a sharp look at Ruhen. “It’s only breakfast.”

  “Yes, spare us,” came Henric’s slinking voice as he sat beside his sister.

  Ignoring Henric as usual, Destry pulled a slim book from her pocket and handed it to Sepha. “I saw this and thought it might help with your research.”

  Sepha took it without reading the title and stuffed it into her pocket. Her cheeks were hot. “Thanks.”

  “Did you know about this, Destry?” Ruhen cut in, jerking his head toward the mess hall doors.

  Destry frowned, her fork hovering over her plate. “Did I know about what?”

  “If you mean you and Sepha,” Henric said, pointing at them with his knife, “everybody knows.”

  “Shut up, Henric,” Sepha snapped. She didn’t need this. She didn’t need him. Not right now.

  Henric’s smile went cruel. He flicked a lock of his curly hair out of his face and said, “Interesting sign out there, hm?” He jerked his head toward Ruhen and said, in a stage whisper, “Does he know what a dangerous position he’s in?”

  That windmilling thoughtlessness howled through Sepha’s mind. But this time, it wasn’t from panic.

  It was from rage.

  “Ruhen,” Henric went on, “I say this as a friend. At a certain point, you have to evaluate your situation. Whether the risk,” he eyed Sepha, “is worth it.”

  Worthless, cackled the snide voice. Worthless!

  “Shut up, Father!” Sepha bellowed, then snapped her mouth shut.

  Father?

  The mess hall went silent, and Sepha’s cheeks went crimson. Without a word, she rushed out of the mess hall.

  Father?

  She’d left him cowering in their home weeks ago, but she still wasn’t free of him. When would she stop hearing every insult in his voice?

  Sepha stormed into the library and slumped into a chair in her usual study room. When she squeezed her eyes shut, hot tears leaked out. When she tried to think, she only heard Father’s taunting voice. So she opened her eyes and stopped thinking.

  Instead, she pulled out the book Destry had given her. Focused on it.

  It was green and rather thin. A broken wax seal indicated that it had, at one point, been held under lock and key in the Secret section.

  Now the title. She pinned down the squirming letters one by one and at last made it out: Modern Alchemical Progress: A Commentary on Recent Events. It was dated less than a decade prior.

  The door opened, and the chair near the door squeaked as Fio slid into it. He started swinging his feet in a rhythmic thud-thud, thud-thud, against the legs of his chair. The sound was calming, and Sepha began to read.

  By the time her tether reeled in, she’d struggled through the table of contents and had flipped to a chapter titled, oddly, Magic and the Law of Human Transmutation. She’d seen so many chapters with too-good-to-be-true titles by now, though, that she didn’t feel even a spark of hope. Nothing good would happen today. She could feel it.

  When Ruhen eased into the room, he looked at once sheepish and pitying. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but there was nothing Sepha wanted to hear from him. Not right now. She held the book out and tapped her finger at the first paragraph in the chapter.

>   Ruhen hesitated, deciding whether or not to force the issue, before taking the book. He sat beside her and said, “Oh, good. Another maddeningly random passage.”

  With a forced smile, Sepha said, “Of course. What else?”

  Ruhen studied her for a moment before offering a half-smile.

  “Godsdamned Henric,” Ruhen murmured, and Sepha let out a weak laugh.

  “Godsdamned Henric,” she agreed, and Ruhen’s smile widened. He jostled her with his shoulder, the briefest touch, before leaning away. He located the passage she’d pointed out to him and began to read.

  “Three hundred years ago, rising tensions between Tirenia and Detenia had begun to spark talk of war. As the two countries were equally matched, the Tirenian court decided that war was to be avoided at all costs. Detenia was of a different mind. In pursuit of expanding the Detenian army, Detenia’s alchemists began to research human transmutation.

  “By its 1585th year, Tirenia heard whispers that Detenia’s alchemists had successfully performed human transmutation. There was a short period when all was quiet; then Detenia unleashed the army it had transmuted. But the transmuted humans were not foot-soldiers or even alchemists. Detenia’s transmuted army exhibited strange and unnatural powers, which were heretofore unobserved outside of legend. The Detenians had somehow transmuted an army of magicians.

  “At great cost, Tirenia discovered the truth: Detenia’s human transmutation had not resulted in newly created bodies. The transmuted army had originated in another realm, from which Detenia’s alchemists had transported them. Because each transmuted person displayed the same unnatural powers, the Tirenians concluded that all people from that realm were magicians.”

  Sepha sat with her knuckles pressed against her mouth, hardly daring to breathe for fear that she would miss a word.

  Tirenia and the After weren’t the only planes of existence. The cosmos wasn’t limited to Tirenia, the After, and the little pocket realities that popped in and out of existence for the duration of each alchemical exchange.

  There was another world filled to the brim with bloodthirsty magicians.

  Bloodthirsty magicians who were only an alchem away.

  Ruhen, who seemed similarly tense, was reading the passage faster and faster.

  “This finding led to the most important discovery in alchemical history: that alchems, rather than being agents of physical and chemical change, are actually portals that connect our own reality to the realities alongside it. Typical alchemical exchanges, in which inanimate matter is exchanged for inanimate matter, access pocket realities, which only exist for short durations and cannot contain life. Any exchange of organic or living matter, however, accesses not a pocket reality, but an entire separate plane of existence.

  “These facts were eventually distilled into the Law of Human Transmutation: Life cannot be alchemically created, separated, conjoined, or destroyed; it can only be alchemically relocated.”

  Sepha sucked in air through her nose, feeling horrified. Alchems could not create life. They could only steal it. If this was true, then Sepha would never be able to create a new, empty human body for the undead magician. Never.

  Ruhen continued, interrupting her thoughts.

  “Detenia’s magician army was effective. Unfortunately, though, Detenia had failed to account for the magicians’ autonomy. Three violent magicians named Amra, Dnias, and Igraine banded together. They quickly gathered followers, and, in what has since been termed the Necro Rebellion, turned on Detenia and slaughtered civilians by the thousands. Aware that their power was unmatched, the magicians then waged war against both Tirenia and Detenia.

  “In desperation, Tirenia’s alchemists sought to recreate Detenia’s human transmutation alchem so that they might call up a magician army of their own. After months of experimentation, they finally succeeded in performing a successful human transmutation. They knew almost immediately that something was different.

  “The person Tirenia’s alchemists transmuted was able to do magic. Unbelievably, she was also able to perform alchemical exchanges. She referred to herself as an alchemancer. While the Detenian human transmutation alchem was designed—inadvertently—to summon magicians, Tirenia’s alchem was designed—by the grace of the gods—to summon alchemancers. Tirenia’s alchemists transmuted dozens more of these alchemancers and rallied them to their cause: the alchemancers wielded such massive amounts of power that even a few alchemancers would be capable of destroying the magicians’ army.

  “In a mighty battle that shook the land, the alchemancers found and destroyed the murderous magicians. The night the battle ended, the Magistrate’s soldiers held a feast and plied the alchemancers with wine. When the alchemancers were heavily asleep and defenseless, the soldiers slaughtered them; for the Magistrate was wise and knew that beings this powerful ought not to roam freely.

  “Some few magicians and alchemancers escaped and have been a scourge to the land ever since. The reader alone can decide whether the Tirenians’ decisions were justifiable, but your humble author …”

  Ruhen stopped abruptly and snapped the book shut. For several moments, they each stared into the air, unable to believe what they’d just read.

  “I can’t believe I never learned that in school,” Sepha breathed. She was having difficulty keeping herself from screeching “The homunculus tricked me!” Because that, even more than the betrayal and murder of these long-dead alchemancers and the existence of a world full of magicians, was what had upset her.

  Alchemically creating a living, empty human body was impossible. And if human transmutation was tied up in the history of Tirenian magicians, the homunculus had to have known it. He had to.

  For the first time, Sepha asked herself why—really, why—the magician needed a body. And why from her, specifically? He had shown up in her prison cell unasked-for. He had chosen her, and he must’ve had a reason for it. He’d said the homunculus’s body was weak. Why did he need to be strong? So that he could restart the magicians’ quest to dominate Tirenia?

  And why from her? Well, she’d been in terrible need of help, but that was probably true of many women. But unlike many women, she was an alchemist, which meant that her child would be one, too. Did that mean that, if the magician lived inside her child’s body, he’d be able to do both magic and alchemy, like a contrived alchemancer?

  Normal magicians couldn’t use alchems. But if the magician could make himself into an alchemancer, he would not only be extremely powerful on his own. He would also be able to use alchemy to summon more magicians to Tirenia.

  And if he summoned more magicians from this magicians’ realm, then Tirenia, defenseless without its erstwhile army of alchemancers, would fall.

  That had to be his plan. To bring in more magicians and finish what they’d started three centuries ago.

  And her child would be the key.

  This was what she’d been missing. This was the something important, the something she’d been too stupid to see until it was right in front of her.

  Well.

  There was only one thing to do. Her contract would try to force her to have a baby when her year was up, but she could try to stop that from happening. She already had been, but now she would have to try harder and force herself to be completely alone. Alone, despite the headaches. And the tether, that infernal thing, would at least keep her one step ahead of Ruhen.

  Without looking at Ruhen, she said, “I have to go. I need to think for a while.”

  And pack.

  Ruhen, speechless for once, only nodded.

  Sepha stood up, walked away, and didn’t say goodbye.

  Sepha went to her room and stuffed her clothes into her knapsack. She was a drop of water in a wave, inescapably caught up in something much bigger than herself. But now she had to run away, a breath of wind against the storm, to keep the undead magician from ripping her country apart.

  The magician had taken advantage of her so thoroughly,
and that abomination of a contract was only the beginning.

  At the thought of it, her contract—that smooth, hard thing beside her heart—began to ache. It was a pulsing reminder that, regardless of her feelings on the matter, she was magically bound to create an innocent human with her own body and to give it to a monster, thereby sentencing thousands of other innocent people to death. Because she’d willingly agreed to do it.

  Wicked! laughed the snide voice. Stupid, wicked girl.

  Sepha tucked her axe—the axe from the Willow—into her knapsack and heaved it over her shoulder, threw open the door, and pounded down the stairs.

  Her tether told her that Ruhen was in his room. If she was lucky, he’d be too preoccupied to notice her leaving. If she wasn’t lucky … she’d have to evade him somehow.

  It was already late afternoon when Sepha burst from the lobby of the Ten. She sprinted toward the IAD doors, half afraid that if she slowed down, she’d lose heart and decide to stay despite everything. She’d nearly reached the doors when she heard a scurrying tread behind her. Not Ruhen’s.

  She whirled around and saw, to her surprise, Fio.

  He stopped a few paces off, his chest heaving, and stared at her with his eyes wide, eyebrows raised. The look on his face—one of surprise, of hurt—pierced her so sharply that she couldn’t even pretend to be imagining it. He couldn’t feel, but he did feel, and right now, his expression was enough to still her heart.

  Selfish. She was so godsdamned selfish! She’d been so intent on leaving the Institute that she hadn’t spared a single thought for Fio.

  Fio, who’d been a spare. Fio, who was her responsibility. Fio, who’d been her constant, albeit silent, companion for weeks.

  “Come on, Fio,” she said, and his mouth turned up in a relieved grin. Somehow.

  Together, they descended the stone steps outside the Institute and ran to the train station. The trains passed by every hour, and only stopped if there was someone waiting on the platform.