Page 168 of The Dragon and the Dove

Sera knew Maurius, Saint of Travellers and Seafarers, by his generous beard and weathered face, his voice as calm as the summer sea. ‘Stay the course, Maker.’

Alisa, Saint of the Sick, was soft and pious, the mist like a shroud around her heart-shaped face. ‘Be well, Maker.’

Calliope, Saint of Beauty and Youth, was more ravishing than any of her portraits. Her red lips spanned full and wide as she purred, ‘Listen to your fair heart, Maker.’

Jasper, Saint of Artisans, looked up through his crooked spectacles, as if from his work, and said, ‘See beyond what is obvious, Maker.’

The clouds tugged forth the figure of an old man with curling white hair. Placido, Saint of Peace, with a voice as soft as prayer, murmured, ‘Lead with love, Maker.’

Then Calvin, Saint of Death, was before her, those beautiful green eyes glinting like emeralds. With the slash of a smile, he crooned, ‘Don’t flinch, Maker.’

Sera was surprised when Lucille Versini appeared, an errant slant of sunlight bouncing off her golden hair. The thirteenth saint had no discernible power beyond curiosity and perseverance yet she sat in the heavens among those who had gone before her, and to Sera said simply this, ‘Thank you, Maker.’

Sera wanted to ask for what? but someone was singing then, and the sound was so beautiful she forgot her disquiet. Celiana, Saint of Song and Poetry, hummed a song of peace, and when it was over, she looked at Sera with hope shining in her eyes, and said, ‘Soar, little dove.’

The clouds blanched white, then gathered into a familiar flowing gown. Sera tipped her head back to find Saint Oriel’s face alone in the heavens. The saint seemed to span the entire sky, her eyes, now golden, shining like twin suns.

There was no grand farewell, no bolstering advice, just three words, uttered low and urgent:

He’s coming, Maker.

Sera woke to a pain in her chest. The thorn there was angry, the skin around it hot and red. It prickled with the truth of what lay ahead. The end was almost upon them. Upon her.

Oriel had parted the mists in her mind to reveal it and now Sera could not hide from the truth. She had one more thorn to earn.

One last part to play.

Andreas Mondragon Rayere had to be unmade. There was no world in which she would be able to avoid seeing the prince again, smell his saccharine breath on her face, glimpse too close that maniacal gleam in his eye. To unmake him was to touch him, to tangle together the very threads of their magic in the hope of ripping his out at the root.

The Silver-tongue had travelled too widely throughout the kingdom, bent the minds of far too many to simply pass from this world with a knife in his back. He would leave all his compulsions behind, a legacy she simply could not risk.

Andreas’s note was Sera’s chance to get close enough to do it.

A twist of fate and an unholy risk that felt both reckless and inevitable.

An ending for the prince.

An ending, perhaps, for her.

But a new beginning for Fantome.

She was so lost in the tide of her thoughts she didn’t notice Ransom standing by her dresser until he cleared his throat.

‘You’re back.’ She sat up in bed.

The sun had set, and a slate of grey clouds hung low over the city. The stars were lost to them tonight, the moon turning its back on the Hollows. Perhaps Ransom had chased it from the sky. Even here, in the quiet of their bedroom, shadows spilled from him.

‘Lark is dead.’

‘Oh.’ Relief rushed her. She gripped her blanket to remind herself she was awake. ‘How did it happen?’

Ransom spoke without triumph. ‘We tracked him to an alley at the end of the Hollows, cornered him like a rat. Nadia let him make the killing blow himself. Then we burned his body in a field.’

The Necromancer was gone.

The dead of Fantome could finally rest.

Andreas had lost a saint.