12
Bastien
I CAN’T BE THE BONE Crier’s soulmate.
A bead of sweat drips down my spine. My hand slides to my sheath. I graze the hilt of my father’s knife.
I could kill Ailesse now.
She sits on the stone slab in the corner of our secret catacombs chamber. I’m standing a few feet away, leaning against a limestone wall. I haven’t been able to sleep, unlike Marcel who’s sprawled out and snoring, smack in the middle of the oblong room. This space has always felt large—fifteen paces wide and twenty long—but with Ailesse among us, I’m cramped. She holds her knees to her chest with her tied hands looped around them, and rests her cheek on top. Curled up like that, she looks so small. So easy to murder.
Her head turns. Her umber eyes collide with mine. In the warm glow of the oil lamps surrounding us, she holds my gaze with the same ferocity she did at Castelpont.
A wave of heat rushes through my body. I clench the muscles along my jawline to make it stop. I slowly pull my hand away from my knife, but now the blade feels lodged between my ribs.
What if we are soulmates?
Her death would be my death. My father would have no justice.
“Here.” Jules limps over to me and presses a wooden cup into my hand. “The water has settled.”
I unhitch my back from the wall and take a long swallow. I don’t mind the mineral kick of the limestone water, especially when it’s not choked with the silt we dredged up in the tunnels. “How’s the leg?” I ask, putting the cup aside.
“It’ll heal,” Jules replies, the scratch in her voice raspier than usual. She takes my hand and turns it over, examining all my cuts and bruises, like I’m somehow hurt worse than her. I let her warm touch linger. We’re going to figure out how to make it through this mess like we always do—together. Not only will we survive, we’ll find a way to get our revenge.
“Take off your shirt,” she murmurs.
My gaze flies up to her hazel eyes. “What?”
“I need to wash it,” she explains, biting her lower lip to hold back a grin.
My ears burn. Ailesse is still watching me, one of her brows lifted. I keep my face straight, pull my shirt over my head, and pass it over to Jules. We always rinse our silt-drenched clothes after the water settles in the catacombs. She doesn’t need to make a game out of it.
“Come with me.” Her eyes drift over my bare chest. “It’s dark where the water is. Private.”
“Knock it off, Jules.”
Her jaw muscle tics, but she laughs like a tavern girl, completely out of character. “Look how tense you are.” She pokes my abdomen, and my muscles involuntarily flex. “The queen won’t come tonight. It’s almost dawn. Even if she tracked her daughter’s bones, she could never get all the way down here. She’ll wait until she has a whole night, when she’s at her strongest.” Jules unties the muddy laces at the top of her blouse, and the rough-spun cloth parts lower. “Plus, once she realizes we’re in the catacombs, she’ll have to rethink her strategy. So you can afford to let down your guard, Bastien.” She traces a thin scar above my navel.
I push her hand away. “Hurry up with our clothes, all right? We have work to do.” She shouldn’t have kissed me in Gaspar’s shop. I shouldn’t have kissed her back. “I’m not leaving the Bone Crier alone with Marcel.”
Jules scoffs and glances at Ailesse. “Why? She’s a weakling now.”
“Go, Jules.” I push her again, this time with more force.
She catches my wrist and squeezes hard. We haven’t gotten into a scuffle since we were kids, but the glint in her eyes says she’s itching to break that streak. She finally lets go and forces a sultry smile. “Suit yourself. Have fun with your soulmate,” she says in a singsong voice.
On her way out of the chamber, she throws a pointed look at Ailesse while flinging my dirty shirt across her shoulder. Ailesse’s glare is just as hateful.
I drag a hand over my face when Jules leaves. It’s laughable, really, the idea of soulmates. If the Bone Crier and I really are bound by ritual magic, it’s not because we’re meant for one another. That would mean my father was meant for the woman who killed him, and I refuse to believe he was meant for anyone else besides my mother. Even if I don’t remember her.
“I know why you resist her.” The smugness in Ailesse’s voice claws under my skin.
“You know nothing about me.”
She tilts her head to study my face. She’s filthy from the chalky tunnel water, and there’s a nick at the base of her throat, along with a smear of dried blood. My blade did that. I glance away and rub a knotted muscle in my arm. “I know you have a spark of Elara’s Light,” she says. “Everyone does. It’s the whisper in your head, the thoughts behind your thoughts. It tells you your friend might prick your heart, but she doesn’t pierce your soul.”
I snort. “Your gods aren’t my gods, Bone Crier. They don’t speak to me. They sure as hell don’t dictate my life.”
Her nostrils flare. I’m still a few feet away, but she leans toward me and tucks her bent knees to the side. The movement pulls on her dress, and it falls off one of her shoulders. I try not to stare at the creamy softness of her skin. She doesn’t notice. She’s too busy throwing darts with her eyes. “I wouldn’t have chosen you either, Bastien.”
My chest jolts when she says my name. It’s too personal, too familiar, coming from her. Ailesse stiffens. I realize I have a death grip on the hilt of my knife. Her hands close into fists. She’s ready to fight back, despite her bonds and lack of power. A pulse of admiration trips through my veins.
Marcel lets out a loud snore and rolls over, lugging his pack onto his chest. Even in his sleep he’s guarding his book—as well as Ailesse’s bones. Jules stuffed them inside after we entered this chamber and threatened Marcel on pain of death—which means nothing, since Jules says it so often to him—to keep the pack out of Ailesse’s reach.
The worst of my tension diffuses. I let go of my knife and walk over to Marcel. I scoot away his pack with the toe of my boot. It’s the only way to wake him up. I swear he’d sleep if his bed were burning.
He jerks upright and swipes at me with his eyes still closed. I slide his pack out of reach. “Get up, Marcel. I need your help.”
“Why?” He absently licks his lips. “It isn’t morning. I wasn’t dreaming. I start dreaming two hours before dawn.”
Leave it to Marcel to determine the time, even though he can’t see the moon or sun. “We need to sleep during the day from now on.”
His eyes slit open and he peers back at Ailesse, who watches him like a predator. “Oh, right. We’ve stolen a Bone Crier.” He blinks. “And I told Birdie I’d walk with her by the river today—and tomorrow, and the day after that.” He releases a heavy sigh.
“Get out your book.” I toss him his pack. He doesn’t catch it fast enough, and it thunks against his chest. “You want to see Birdie? Start reading.”
His brows wrinkle. “I fail to see the connection.”
I crouch beside him, my back turned to Ailesse. “The queen will track us here as soon as tomorrow night,” I whisper. “We’re not getting out of these catacombs alive unless we form a proper plan to”—I slice my finger across the base of my throat—“her. That involves you doing what you do best: reading between the lines of those Old Galle folktales.”