Page 55 of The City of Stardust

“You promised you had yourself under control!” Aleksander says. “Now Johannes is dead. You killed a man—ascholar!”

Yury swallows, aware of the burn in his lungs. “Aleksander, I—”

He can still feel the echo of the breastplate on his chest. He just needs moretime. He is so close.

“It’s over, Yury.” Aleksander pauses. “I’m going to Prague alone. I’m sorry.”

After he leaves, Yury becomes aware of a keening sound, like an animal caught in a trap. Sometime later, he realises it’s him.

For an indeterminate period, he drifts on an ocean of white-hot needles. No vials means no reprieve from the pain. He is so cold, he is no longer sure where the agony stops and his flesh begins. Time stretches and twists.

But somewhere within the agonising current, a plan emerges. His mind has not so fully betrayed him yet.

To become a god, one must present a gift to them. A sacrifice, if you will.

And there is a young woman Penelope isveryinterested in.

Forget Aleksander and his cringing deference. Yury will be astral. He will be light itself made manifest. He will shuck mortality for eternal glory, like shedding a skin.

It will be glorious.

Piece by piece, Yury claws what remains of himself upright and begins the long journey to Prague.

PART THREE

A Fairy Tale

WOULD YOU LIKEto hear a story?” Ambrose asks.

Violet is just past ten years old, brooding and resentful, her mother two weeks into her “adventure.” Ambrose can’t really blame her. In his mid-twenties, he, as the long-suffering, pliable youngest—and also not Gabriel—has been dragged away from his postgraduate degree in literature to mind his niece. When Marianne comes back, he’ll resume his studies, of course. There is a reason why he was so reluctant to return, even when Marianne showed up with a baby, and the Everly siblings were forced to regroup. Back to the house with its long stretch of memory and baleful portraits, where the Everly name supersedes all. But the truth is, he’ll never be able to go back to his degree, and by the time he realises this, his niece’s bright inquisitiveness and tenacious heart will have already won him over.

Tonight, though, they are still strangers, and Violet is on the edge of tears and angry about it. Angry at the world. Still, she perks up when she hears the wordstory. Reluctantly, she nods.

“It’s a good one, I promise,” Ambrose says, settling in with her on the couch. “And it’s your legacy. Because it starts with an Everly. He wasn’t the first, and he certainly wouldn’t be the last, but he was perhaps the most extraordinary of us all.” He clears his throat, and begins the same way Marianne had explained the origins of the Everly fate—with a fairy tale. “Once upon a time, in a magical city on a distant shore, lived Ever Everly.”

“That’s a stupid name,” Violet mutters.

Ambrose hides his smile. “Ah, but you see, he was a clever man.”

He was a craftsman, Ambrose says, and an amazing one at that. With a blow of his hammer, or the twist of a screw, he could make magical toys beyond compare. And people loved them. But Ever Everly had a secret, and it was that no one had ever lovedhim.

He hadn’t minded, at first. If that was the way of the world, then let it be so. Yet as he grew older, and watched couples filter in together in the shy throes of new love, then pregnant, and then perhaps with two children at their side, he yearned for how neatly they fitted into one another, like puzzle pieces. And if he was a puzzle piece, he was the one missing from the box, unable to be part of the picture.

Then, one day, a woman came into his shop.

To say she was beautiful would be to call the moon a rock. She was so beautiful, people would weep at the sight of her, and said she looked like a star upon the earth. So beautiful, and yet missing something, too. For just as Ever Everly had never been loved, she had neverloved. Magic, however, she had in spades. She took one look at him, and she knew he longed to be the half of a whole.

For Ever Everly, she decided, she could learn what love is. So she offered him a deal: she would love him for a year and a day, and then she would give him a choice: either she would eat his soul, or the soul of everyone in the city. He was a good man, and she knew he would choose the former. A soul fat on love was a very powerful thing indeed, and she had no desire to taste the souls of the city, most of whom were mealy and unripe.

The woman thought this was a fair exchange, and so, in his own way, did Ever Everly. Apart from love, he had lived a good life, and he would be ready to give himself to her when the time came. A year and a day of love, he reasoned, was generous for a lifetime. They married underneath the swords of their ancestors, and it wasn’t long before they bore a child.

What the woman hadn’t counted on, however, was what love did toher. Love gave her strength. Love made her weak. Love made her want him more than she’d ever wanted anything else. She loved thecare he took over what he made, the way he asked after every customer’s family. The way he said her name, like a jewel in his mouth.

But she had entered a binding contract. At the end of the year and a day, she would be forced to either eat his soul, or the souls of the city. Unbeknownst to Ever Everly, she was making her choice.

Six months went past. Then nine. A year.

On the last evening, Ever Everly got his affairs in order. He tidied his workshop, gave away his toys, and closed up his shop for the final time. Then he turned to the woman and told her he was ready to be eaten. She wouldn’t have him, however. He was too precious to her. She would rather take the city.

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