Page 115 of The Second Death of Locke
The last body she needed waited for her in the basement. Kier followed her, quiet as a ghost, as she retraced the steps she’d run as a child. The stone chamber was a burned-out shell. There was no body where Severin had been—there were only shards and fragments, bones embedded in the walls, a tooth in one corner.
But she felt the spirit of him here, like a revenant, as if he’d been waiting for her this whole time. She sucked a breath through her teeth, certain she could hear her brother’s laugh, that she could feel the press of his hand on hers.
“Sev?” she asked, turning, as if she’d catch the edge of his shadow on the wall.
But there was nothing. Only disaster. Only ash and bone.
The pyres crackled with unnatural mageflame as they set off back to the Ghostwood, the cart loaded with their grisly cargo. “We should keep the ashes of Eprain,” Kier said, “to return to their nation.”
Grey only nodded.
In the clearing where the Lockes were laid to rest, Grey picked up one of the shovels Kier had thought to bring. She found a spot unmarked by stones, past the line of graves, and started digging. Wordlessly, Kier took the other shovel and started on the other end. He seemed to understand that she needed the ache of this last task, that she had to do this. Carefully, they dug a grave for her parents and grandmother and what was left of her brother, for those who had sacrificed everything for her survival. When it was finished, they each took an end of the heavy tied-off sheets, the awkwardness of their weight, and laid them carefully in the open grave.
In another lifetime, if she had made another choice, she would be laying Kier to rest with their bodies.
She watched, kneeling at the edge, as Kier tipped in shovelful after shovelful of rocky dirt. For a half-second of unrepressed grief, she thought about climbing in with them.
She had to tell him the truth. She had to make him understand the decision she had before her. She opened her mouth, searching for words—then closed it. She could not do it.
A hand reached down when it was finished, caked in dirt and grime. “Come on, Locke,” Kier said.
She took his hand. Side by side, they made their way home.
They share the title, you know. She thinks I can’t hear her calling that smug little mainlander byourname, but I do. He wields her power and tells her he loves her, and the soft-hearted fool believes him. I worry what will happen if she passes the same attitude to the children.
Letter from Pellatisa Locke to Wren Locke Teinek, her daughter, 6 yearsAD
twenty-eight
UPSTAIRS, ALONE WHILE KIERbuilt a fire downstairs, Grey opened the taps on one of the bathtubs. It was run by a clever web of magic put in place by one of her great-uncles, which filtered the seawater under the fortress and turned it into steaming, clean water at the turn of a tap. There was still soap in a cabinet under the sink—she fought back the memories at the familiar smell of it, which she’d never been able to find or replicate in Scaela. She stripped off her clothes and sank into the depths of the tub, submerging herself fully for a second before coming back. She washed, drained the water, refilled it and washed again. Kier knocked once on the door just as she was getting out, wrapping herself in a fluffy towel she’d pulled from the linen closet.
“Are you okay?” he asked through the wood.
She took a shuddering breath. “No, but I will be.” And she would. She had the oddest feeling that the bodies in the cathedral were the only ones left; that the Isle itself had protected her from any other casualties. It was as if everyone in that horrid hall had been there to guard their fallen lord and lady, even in death; and now that Little Locke was newly returned, safety was restored.
Despite the horrors of earlier, when she focused, she felt somethingalmost like peace. Like the very Isle had sighed in relief now that its dead had been laid to rest.
She found thick socks and a dressing gown in the room next door, which had once belonged to her aunt before Wren was sent to Nestria to marry before Grey was even born. While Kier was bathing, she went downstairs to search for provisions. He’d already lit a fire in the great hearth in the dining hall, which brought a smile to her face, despite everything.
In the pantry, the meat and produce was unrotten, the bread still soft and fresh, but Grey could not bring herself to touch it. She found a jar of honey and a bin of rolled oats. She took these, some spices and a tin pot into the dining hall. Kier was back and dressed in clean clothes, dragging in cushions and blankets from one of the parlors.
“What did you find?” he asked.
She held up her haul. “Better than unflavored porridge and bits of jerky.”
He snorted. “I can’t wait to tell Eron you did better with a sixteen-year-old pantry than he did with provisions.”
“Eron couldnever,” Grey agreed.
Kier went back to the kitchen to fill the pot while Grey stoked the fire and urged it to roaring warmth. When he returned, she made a thick porridge and seasoned it with honey and cinnamon. It wasn’t much, but it was edible. They sat cross-legged in front of the fire, draped with one of the big knit blankets, surrounded by the eerie quiet of the Isle. She craved the sound of the wind and sea as much as she feared it: in her heart, she knew that when those sounds returned, so would the rest of her worries of the world beyond Locke.
“I’ll only ask once more, then I’ll leave it,” Kier said finally, setting his empty bowl aside. “Are you okay? Because we can go. We don’t have to stay; we don’t have to do this.”
Grey swallowed hard, the porridge turning to dust in her mouth.Your power or his freedom. For all she knew, if they left the Isle, Kier would die—and that was not a reality she was willing to face. “I’m okay,” she said. “I think that was the worst of it.”
He nodded. “Then, the magic.” He turned so he was facing her, close enough that his kneecaps brushed hers. “I don’t reallyunderstand how you’re doing this. It feels like I’m pulling a lot from you, and you’re not even fazed.”
Grey set her own bowl aside with Kier’s. “On Locke—Lockeispower. I am not just a well for power that can run out. I am a faucet, a doorway, a river. Power flows through me to you, but here, there is no end.” She coughed delicately. “It’s why the sovereign of Locke always marries a mage.”
