The Obsidian Tower by Melissa Caruso

Author:Melissa Caruso [Caruso, Melissa]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2020-06-02T00:00:00+00:00

It was hard to force myself to listen to Bastian discuss the murder scene without letting my thoughts slide into an awful black hole of memory. I strove to cling to his words as if they were precious shards of something sharp but fragile.

“… She must have died mere moments before we arrived. She may still have been alive when Ryx’s chimera came to get us.”

Hells have mercy. I squeezed my eyes shut, but waiting behind my lids was the image of my aunt lying pale and empty on the floor, arrow fletchings hovering over her bloody wounds like flies.

Are you all right? Kessa mouthed from the far side of the fresh sprawl of notes and papers cluttering the Rookery sitting room.

I nodded. I wasn’t, of course. But I had to be.

“Plus,” Bastian was saying, “it seems there was a paralytic poison on the arrowheads. An alchemical one, strong enough to work on a powerful vivomancer despite their natural resistance.”

She’d been awake up until the end, in terrible pain, knowing she was going to die. Oh, Aunt Karrigan.

“Interesting that they used a bow,” Kessa mused. “I believe they consider them archaic in the Serene Empire, but mages use bows instead of guns sometimes in Vaskandar because a vivomancer can enhance wood but not metal.”

Foxglove shook his head. “Bows are quieter. Imperial assassins still use them sometimes.”

“If I wanted to pin a murder on a mage, I’d use a bow,” Ashe said.

Bastian lifted a hand as if he were in a classroom. “An alchemical poison like that wouldn’t be easy to get in Vaskandar,” he said. “It certainly isn’t something a Vaskandran would randomly carry around with them, while I could see the Raverran delegation bringing a kit of assorted alchemical supplies. If it was a Vaskandran, I’d think they brought the poison here with the express intent of killing a mage.”

“All the more reason to think it was the same person who murdered Lamiel,” Foxglove said.

I stirred, unease coiling in my belly. “No. It wasn’t the same person.”

“What do you mean?” Foxglove asked.

This had gone far enough. I met his eyes squarely. “I killed Lamiel.”

Everyone gaped at me. Even Ashe’s eyebrows went up.

“I didn’t mean to,” I added, my chest constricting at the looks on their faces. “She grabbed me when I was trying to block her from getting to the gate. I was actually trying very hard not to kill her. Regardless, I sure as Hells didn’t kill my aunt.”

My heart galloped erratically as a three-legged colt. Now they knew. They could take my jess and turn me in to Alevar—but that wasn’t what I feared most. They were some of the only friends I had, and the thought of losing them was more terrifying than the gate waiting with all its sinister potential in the Black Tower.

Ashe let out a low whistle.

“That explains some things,” Foxglove murmured. The look he gave me was strange, soft and sad around the edges—almost one of recognition.

“Are you going to turn me in?” I asked, my shoulders rigid with tension.

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