Лей Бардуго - Ninth House

“Did he really deserve better? Men die, Alexandra. It’s rarely a tragedy.”

“He won’t pass behind the Veil, will he?” Alex said, beginning to understand. “You eat their souls and they never move on.” That was why North hadn’t been able to find Gladys or any of the other girls on the other side. And what had become of Tara’s soul, sacrificed to Sandow’s ritual? Where had she gone in the end?

“I’ve upset you. I see that. But you know what it is to carve out a place in the world, to have to fight for your life at every turn. You can’t imagine how much worse it was in my time. Women were sent to madhouses because they read too many books or because their husbands tired of them. There were so few paths open to us. And mine was stolen from me. So I forged a new one.”

Alex jabbed a finger at Belbalm. “You don’t get to turn this into some kind of feminist manifesto. You forged your new path from the lives of other girls. Immigrant girls. Brown girls. Poor girls.” Girls like me. “Just so you could buy yourself another few years.”

“It is so much more than that, Alexandra. It is a divine act. With each life I took, I soon saw a new temple raised to my glory—built by boys who never stopped to wonder at the power they claimed, only took it as their due. They toy with magic while I fashion immortality. And you will be part of it.”

“Lucky me.” Alex didn’t have to ask what she meant. Belbalm had rejected Sandow’s offering because she hadn’t wanted to spoil her appetite. “I’m the prize.”

“I’ve learned patience in this long life, Alexandra. I didn’t know what Sophie was when I met her, but when I consumed her soul? It was wild and gamey, bitter as yew, lightning in the blood. It sustained me for over fifty years. Then, just as I was beginning to weaken and age, Colina appeared. This time, I recognized the smell of her power. I scented her in a church parking lot and followed her for blocks.”

Their deaths had been the foundations of the tombs for St. Elmo’s and Manuscript.

What was the word Belbalm had used? “They were Wheelwalkers.”

“It was as if they were drawn here to feed me. Just like you.”

That was why the killings had paused in 1902. Girls had died in rapid succession through the late 1800s as Daisy fed on ordinary girls to stay alive. But then she’d found her first Wheelwalker, Sophie Mishkan, a girl with a power just like hers. That soul had kept her sated until 1958, when Belbalm had murdered Colina Tillman, another gifted girl. And now it was Alex’s turn.

This town. Did New Haven draw Wheelwalkers here? Daisy. Sophie. Colina. Had Alex always been on a collision course with this place and this monster? Magic feeding magic?

“When did you know what I was?” Alex asked.

“From the moment we met. I wanted to let you ripen for a while. Wash the stink of the common from you. But…” Belbalm gave a profound shrug. She threw out her hand.

Alex felt a sudden sharp pain in her chest, as if a hook had lodged beneath her sternum, notched into her heart. Around her, she saw blue flames ignite, a ring of fire surrounding her and Belbalm. A wheel. She felt herself falling.

Hellie had been sunlight. North had been cold and coal smoke. Belbalm was teeth.

Alex was swaying next to the grill on the tiny balcony at GroundZero, the smell of charcoal thick in the air, smog smeared across the hills in the distance. She could feel the bass track thumping through her bare feet. She held up her thumb, blotting out the rising moon, then making it reappear.

A woman leaned over her crib, reaching for her again and again, her hands passing through Alex’s body. She wept, silver tears that fell on Alex’s chubby arms and vanished through her skin.

Hellie had hold of Alex’s hand. She was pulling her along the Venice boardwalk. She slid the Nine of Wands from a tarot deck. Alex already had a card in her hands. No way I’m getting that inked on me , said Hellie. Let me draw again.

Len took one of the leather bracelets from his arm and fastened it around Alex’s wrist. Don’t tell Mosh , he whispered. His breath smelled like sour bread, but Alex had never been so happy, never felt so good.

Her grandmother stood in front of the stove. Alex smelled cumin, meat roasting in the oven, tasted honey and walnuts on her tongue. We’re eating vegetarian now , Mira said. At your own house , said her grandmother. When she comes here I feed her strength.

In the garden, a man lingered, pruning the hedges that never changed, squinting at the sun even on cloudy days. He tried to talk to Alex, but she couldn’t hear a word.

One by one, Alex felt the memories plucked away like threads, caught on the spikes of Belbalm’s teeth, unraveling her bit by bit. Belbalm—Daisy—wanted them all, the good and the bad, the sad and the sweet, all equally delicious.

There was nowhere to run. Alex tried to remember the smell of her mother’s perfume, the color of the couch in the common room, anything that would help her hold on to herself as Daisy swallowed her down.

She needed Hellie. She needed Darlington. She needed… what was her name? She couldn’t recall, a girl with red hair, headphones around her neck. Pammie?

Alex was curled up on a bed. She was surrounded by monarchs that became moths. A boy was behind her, nestled against her. He said, I will serve you ’til the end of days.

Belbalm’s teeth sank deeper. Alex couldn’t remember her body, her arms. She’d be gone soon. Was there some relief along with the fear? Each sadness and loss and mistake would be wiped away. She’d be nothing at all.

Belbalm was going to crack her open. She was going to drink Alex dry.

A wave rose over the stone plaza of Beinecke; a beautiful dark-haired boy was shouting. Let all become mid-ocean!

She could drift into the Pacific, past Catalina, watch the ferries come and go.

The wave crashed over the plaza, carrying away a tide of Grays. Alex remembered cowering on the floor of that beautiful library, tears streaming down her cheeks, singing her grandmother’s old songs, speaking her grandmother’s words. She’d been hiding from the Grays, hiding behind… Darlington, his name was Darlington… Darlington in his dark coat. She’d been hiding the way she had her whole life. She’d sealed herself away from the world of the living, for the sake of being free of the dead.

Let all become mid-ocean.

Alexandra. Belbalm’s voice. A warning. As if she knew the thought as soon as it entered Alex’s head.

She didn’t want to hide anymore. She’d thought of herself as a survivor, but she’d been no better than a beaten dog, snapping and snarling in any attempt to stay alive. She was more than that now.

Alex stopped fighting. She stopped trying to close herself off from Belbalm. She remembered her body, remembered her hands. What she intended was dangerous. She was glad.

Let all become mid-ocean. Let me become the flood.

She threw her arms wide and let herself open.

Instantly she felt them, as if they had been waiting, ships on an endless sea, forever searching the dark horizon, waiting for some light, some beacon to guide them on. Throughout New Haven she felt them. Down Hillhouse. Up Prospect. She felt North climbing his way back from the old factory site where the death words had thrown him, felt that kid forever looking to score tickets outside the vanished Coliseum, felt the Gray running wind sprints outside Payne Whitney, felt a thousand other Grays she’d never let herself look at—old men who had died in their beds; a woman pushing a crumpled pram with mangled hands; a boy with a gunshot wound to his face, reaching blindly for the comb in his pocket. A desiccated hiker limped down the slope of East Rock, dragging her broken leg behind her, and out in Westville, in the ruined maze of Black Elm, Daniel Tabor Arlington III drew his bathrobe tight and sped toward her, a cigarette still hanging from his mouth.