Page 39 of Tomb of Ancients
“Is all this bickering necessary?” Mrs. Haylam pinched her forehead, going to the window behind us and setting down the candelabra. “Dalton will produce the white book and see it destroyed, or he will leave, and he will take poor,poorLouisa with him.”
She had said it with such finality that we were all silent for a moment. I could hardly believe what I was hearing. Of course,it was completely in line with Mr. Morningside’s usual tricks, but even for him this seemed extreme.
“Destroythe book?” I breathed. “Is that even possible?”
“It is,” Mr. Morningside replied breezily. “Dalton knows it, too.”
I waited for Dalton to say something, rubbing my hands nervously across my skirt. “What does that do? If the book is gone, I mean, what will happen?”
“We—Upworlders, the shepherd—” He choked a little on his words and closed his eyes. “We will all cease to exist.”
“Oh,” I said, remembering part of the diary. “The book is what gives all of you power. Father consumed our book, which is why we Dark Fae are still here.”
“Precisely.” Mr. Morningside looked grim, suddenly, as if the weight of what he was asking had finally sunk in. “What would you have me do, Spicer? The shepherd is out of control. Do you see anyone else setting up cults all over London? He wants us dead.”
Dalton grunted. “No, he wants you contained.”
“He wants us dead.”Mr. Morningside rounded on him, sticking a pointed finger into his face with a sneer. “You’ve lived long enough and look miserable doing it. You’ve always hated the game, so now you’re invited to leave it. Destroy the book, and I help the girl.”
Nobody moved. For a moment, I was convinced Daltonmight strike him. His entire body had gone too still, frozen with rage, his cheeks dark red. His eyes were covered, but had they been visible and whole, they might have been shooting flames. A tremor began in his right leg, but he stopped it and slowly, carefully, took a step back. Mr. Morningside lowered his hand but otherwise waited, his terms given.
Mother and I watched the Upworlder go with weary steps to the door, where he paused and put one hand on the frame, leaning away from the Residents that gathered there to watch and loom.
“You didn’t have to make this personal, Henry,” he whispered.
“Yes,” Mr. Morningside replied, adjusting his cravat. “Yes, you made certain that I did.”
“You don’t have to do this.”
I found Dalton Spicer out on one of the narrow balconies attached to the Green Suite. Like the other rooms on that floor, its furniture had been covered and left abandoned. There were no guests at Coldthistle House, and though the people who were drawn to it had committed great evils, the place still felt emptier and colder for their absence.
He stood with his back to me, night draped around him, his palms resting on a railing still damp with rain. I watched him trace shapes into the droplets for a moment, and then he regarded the forest. The balcony faced north, toward thehidden spring and the woods where I had first encountered Khent, when he attacked me and my father, who had been masquerading as Mary.
“There must be something else he wants,” I pressed. “We can find a way to bargain with him.”
“No,” he laughed. “You don’t know him like I do. Once he sets his mind to something, he gets it, no matter the consequences.”
“I’ve been reading the diary, and I must say it’s... disturbing. All the riddles and violence... ,” I said, standing half inside still for the meager warmth. “Why didn’t Mr. Morningside turn back? So much pointless danger...”
Dalton pulled away the covering over his eyes and inhaled deeply, rubbing his face, lifting his nose to the cold night air. “When I met him, he was a different man. Not kinder, not wiser, but more malleable.”
I let that hang between us for a moment, and then I said, “Mother tells me Father changed, too. That the war among all of you broke something in him.”
He gave a wry smile at that and tilted his head toward me. “Yes, yes, that’s it exactly. I think it broke Henry, too, but he covers it well. When I first met him, it was at a meeting between him and the shepherd. They were forging an alliance, a temporary one, to punish the Father of Trees for overreaching. Henry had this... this frictionless poise. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. He was dangerous, yes, but he listened. He compromised.”
“Helistened?” I snorted. “Then, God, he really was different.”
“You have no idea.” Dalton placed the fabric back over his eyes and scrubbed one hand over his mouth, as if trying to wipe something invisible away. “After we Upworlders hunted down the Dark Fae, your people, Henry stopped listening. He stopped compromising. I think he realized he was going to live forever, and living forever with that much guilt requires a heart of stone.”
“Is that why he wanted to know so much about the books?” I asked.
Dalton took my meaning and nodded. “He saw his life stretching out before him, a long, long forever of a life, always burdened by what we had done to your folk. He had tried living with that stone heart and decided it was better to shatter the thing and be done. It wasn’t just knowledge he was seeking in the salt flats, it was his own annihilation.”
“Did Ara know? Is that why she kept trying to stop him?”
At that, he chuckled and ran his palm flat through the rain on the banister. “No, she didn’t know, not at first. Neither did I. She doesn’t think that way. Mrs. Haylam would happily live forever with the death of millions on her shoulders. She’s simply made of stronger stuff.”
“No,” I said, plunging out into the cold to stand beside him. “That isn’t strength at all. I don’t think there’s a word for what that is.”
