Page 287 of Alchemised
Pain and mutilation.
Of course the chimaeras were savage. How could anything endure so much hurt and not learn only to bite?
“You’ve done remarkable work on her,” she said, her mouth dry. “Is this how you learned to heal?”
“I suppose it was some good practice.”
He looked out over the city, spread below like a glittering crown. Lumithia had yet to rise, leaving whole swaths of the East Island in darkness, but the Alchemy Tower stood above it all, its beacon ever burning.
“We should go now. It’s dark enough to fly without being sighted.”
IT WAS ONE THING TO pet Amaris; it was quite another to mount her. Helena was certain the wolf could bite her in half if so inclined. Kaine stood at Amaris’s head, scratching her ears, while Helena grasped the leather harness and clambered up.
It took an embarrassingly long time, like scaling a furry mountain. Helena was worried about kneeing or elbowing Amaris and struggled to get a good grip. Kaine swung up behind her in one easy movement.
He was barely seated before Amaris leapt off the roof.
They plummeted straight down and then the huge wings spread out, catching the air and carrying them skywards.
Kaine flew Amaris so high, the air grew thin. They kept their distance from the city and towers, flying near the mountains until they reached the dam. Amaris banked sharply, so fast the Outpost blurred and the wind from her wings rattled the windows as they sped past. One of the factories had a large open roof that they landed on.
Helena’s legs scarcely held her as she slid off, desperately grateful for solid ground and convinced that humans were not meant to fly, and it was an abomination for them to do so. She tried to appear grateful and not look too green as she scuttled away from the chimaera.
Kaine followed her. Now that the introduction to Amaris and the journey were over, there was an undeniable look of resentment in his eyes again, as if letting her return to Headquarters was not yet something he was convinced of.
Helena pretended not to notice as she headed for the gate, but it only made his mood darken. Finally, she stopped. “What is it?”
“Don’t go,” he said softly.
“You know I have to.”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t. They don’t care about you.”
The words were like a raw nerve being plucked. The pain hummed inside her. Before, she would have denied it, because Luc was there and he would never turn on her, but that was no longer true.
Still, she was unmoved. She shook her head. “We can’t let the Undying win. There is too much at stake. I have to go where I can do good.”
A look of fury joined his resentment. “No, you don’t. It doesn’t matter how many times you break yourself, the gods don’t care. There’s no reward. This”—he threw his hand out, gesturing at the city, the mountains, and the black sky that Lumithia now radiated down from—“is the Abyss. We’re already in it. None of it matters. Sacrifice and pain, the universe does not care.”
“You’re wrong,” she said.
He opened his mouth to argue, to offer an endless list of examples of how cold and uncaring the world was, but she didn’t need to be told.
“You’re wrong because I’m part of the universe,” she said. “A tiny piece, I admit, maybe never an important or mathematically significant one, but still a piece. You and I are not separate from it. No one is. It matters to me, everyone who’s died and everyone who will, and everyone who suffers. As long as I exist, I will always care. And that means that part of the universe does.” She smiled at him. “Doesn’t that make it all a little brighter?”
He looked despairing.
She gave a helpless shrug. “I want to do good in the world. That was what my father wanted most for me.” She looked down at her hands. “I know most people won’t think I have. I’ve done things now that I don’t think I’m supposed to be forgiven for. But I want to be remembered as someone who tried at least.”
She stepped back, but he caught her.
“Helena—”
She pulled free. “Be careful, Kaine. Don’t die.”
“CROWTHER’S LOOKING FOR YOU,” THE gatehouse guard said as he let her in.
Helena nodded and headed to the Tower.
