He was fighting left-handed, his right arm cradled against his body.
The drugs were taking effect. Luc was strong enough to resist Hel-
ena's attempts to hold him back and alert enough to realise how out-
numbered they were. Still she tried to stop him.
"Luc, you're injured. I'm not even sure how much. You're just not
feeling it."
"I'm not watching them die." He tried again to shove her and Pur-
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Alchemised • 625
nell off.
She dug her fingers into his arms. "Luc, you don't have resonance."
"Then heal me again later," he said, finally ripping himself free and
throwing himself into the fight. He kicked a necrothrall so hard his foot
went through its chest. He snatched up its sword.
Soren called him several names, but there was no time to do more
than curse as they kept fighting their way down.
Helena pulled out a knife when they reached the basement. Wagner
was huddling behind Purnell as if he expected her to protect him. Pur-
nell's eyes were wide, the whites glaring with visible panic as she clutched
back. They shouldn't have brought her. The girl was beginning to fall
apart. She didn't have the nerve for combat.
They got into the room and blocked the door, but it was barely se-
cured before the whole wall shook. They fled into the tunnels, scram-
bling after one another into the sewers, trying to reach the flood
cathedral. Alister brought up the rear, crushing and sealing the tunnel
behind them, step after step, so that pursuit would be slow.
They reached one of the larger tunnels and paused, gasping for
breath.
"You're not supposed to be fighting, you moron," Soren said, slump-
ing against the wall. In torchlight, he'd turned very grey and his nose
was broken, blood streaming down his mouth and chin.
Purnell was crouched on the ground, rocking and muttering,
Mummy? Mummy, please don't, over and over.
"Don't tell me what to do," Luc said, breathing hard, shifting his grip
on the sword. "This sword is shit. You could have brought a weapon for
me. Do you have my rings at least?"
"You don't have resonance," Helena snapped.
Luc grimaced but gripped the sword harder.
"I don't know how Lila's never killed you," Soren said, pushing him-
self up but looking ready to topple over.
"Hold on." Helena went over and checked him. His arm was broken
again. Three times in a year. It was unlikely to ever heal properly after
this. She aligned the bones again and fused them.
"Do you have something for pain?" Penny asked in a small voice. "Or
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626 • SenLinYu
maybe you could block off some nerves."
When she was done with Penny, she made them all take her blood
tonics, so that if they required healing, what she'd need would already be
there. She'd brought two for everyone but hadn't expected an extra pris-
oner. Wagner drank hers while she was passing out the others.
"We need to keep moving," Soren said. They had to drag Purnell
with them; she was completely gone, staring blankly as if she didn't
know where she was anymore, still saying Mummy, her voice chillingly
childlike.
They retraced their steps, following the maze of tunnels back to their
entry point. At first it was a relief that they weren't being pursued, but
the closer they got, the eerier it was.
Helena's ring burned again.
"Sol save us. It's Blackthorn!" Penny said, her voice strangled with
terror as they rounded the corner.
The shallow sections of the flood cathedral were filled not only with
a horde of necrothralls but also a number of what looked to be the mor-
tal Aspirants, lined up and blocking their path.
"Go back!" Soren immediately said, but he'd barely spoken the words
before there came a scream of metal behind them, followed by a savage
roar.
Chimaeras.
They were penned in.
Blackthorne stood at the front, barely armoured. "Capture Holdfast,
kill the rest, and you will receive the immortal reward!"
There was an eager roar among the Aspirants, while the necrothralls
just stood still, waiting.
"Stay close," Luc ordered as he fell in, shoulder-to-shoulder, with
Soren and Sebastian.
"Get across," Soren said.
The plan, as much as there had been a plan, fell apart. There was no
escaping with Luc when he was in the thick of the fighting. Helena's
fingers went for her daggers.
The first wave of necrothralls hit, and the group splintered like a
wrecked ship.
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Alchemised • 627
Several necrothralls rushed towards Helena. There was no time to
think. She moved on instinct, blocking, slicing, her dagger morphing to
chase after crucial joints, while her other palm pressed flat and she
jerked back, ripping their reanimation free.
The energy struck her, a blistering flare of power, and she sent it
outwards, pulverising the necrothralls closing in. There was light some-
where, fire, torches, reflecting across the frigid water that was already up
to their knees. The noise was deafening. The roar and chaos shattered
the senses. She looked for the others, but it was impossible to see them
in the throng. So many bodies, living and dead, moving through the
dark. Kaine had trained her to defend herself and flee, not fight in a
melee. She tried to key up her resonance, but there were so many bodies
and movements and weapons swinging, it was dizzying. She ducked a
swinging club and lashed out with her knife, the blade singing with
resonance as it tore through the waxy decaying skin, up the torso and
throat, slicing through bones like butter, into the brain.
She twisted her resonance and the blade curved, severing the head
completely.
Something collided with her, bowling her over. A warm hand,
wrenching her up. Ally, she thought, until she saw the steel-gauntleted
fist, gripping a sword and swinging it towards her head. She drove her
knife up, the handguard just barely large enough to deflect, and then she
stabbed towards the weak point near the shoulder, narrowing the blade
as thin as she could until her resonance with the metal told her she'd
pierced flesh. She flared out the knife blade as it sank into the hilt. She
jerked it back and felt the warm, heavy spurt of hot blood across her
hand as the grip on her loosened. The sword fell, barely missing her
head, and the Aspirant crashed into the water on top of her.
Cold water hit her head-on, painful as a kick to the ribs. She scram-
bled to her feet, fighting to get free of the body nearly drowning her.
She stabbed blindly, the water and noise and disorientation making
it impossible to sense anything clearly.
She crawled out of the throng, found a wall, and got up, trying to
catch her breath, trying to find the others in the flickering dark. There
was screaming. It kept going on and on. It was Purnell. She'd snapped
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628 • SenLinYu
out of her daze and was now screaming at the top of her lungs, the
sound bouncing off the walls, drawing attention. A group of necro-
thralls was closing in.
Wagner, who was nearest to Purnell, shoved her straight at them as
he tried to escape. As she fell, Purnell seemed to become lucid again,
comprehending terror sweeping across her face.
She was weaponless but quick. She leapt, somehow evading the
clawing hands, and fleeing into the centre of the flood-filled room.
Half a dozen steps and then Purnell stepped too far, vanishing un-
derwater.
Helena watched, praying that she'd resurface, that somehow she'd
escaped the current. Something rammed into Helena, knocking her
sideways. A boot came down on her wrist, and she inhaled water when
she gasped with pain.
Fire tore along her ribs.
She crawled back towards the wall. Her clothes freezing on her skin.
She turned, looking desperately for the others, coughing up water.
Wagner had somehow managed to reach the far wall and had a spear
he was beating off necrothralls with.
Luc and Sebastian were fighting together in the centre of a horde,
while Soren had broken away and was trying to reach Alister and Penny,
who'd been backed into a corner far from everyone else.
The light flickered madly off the water, only giving glimpses. The
chimaeras had caught up. Fangs and claws were flashing as Alister tried
to raise a barrier. Penny gave a cry as her weapon caught in the shoulder
of a chimaera and was ripped from her hands.
Soren raced through the water, his weapon morphing as he ran, try-
ing to reach them before the chimaeras closed in.
An axe came swinging through the air, barely missing Soren's leg.
Soren caught himself, stumbling in the water, and turned hard, look-
ing around wildly to find his attacker. His scythe flashed, barely block-
ing a blow that nearly threw him off his feet. Now he facing his
opponent. Blackthorne barred the way.
Blackthorn, realising the disadvantage of his opponent, kept moving
to the right. Making all his attacks from Soren's blind spot. Tiring him.
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Alchemised • 629
"Soren!" Luc suddenly shouted.
Soren pivoted sharply as a chimaera leapt at him. He beheaded it in
one clean sweep of his blade.
There was a horrible, wet cracking sound.
When Soren turned, Blackthorne had swung from the right.
The axe head was buried all the way through his ribs to his spine.
Blackthorne jerked the axe free and licked it as Soren dropped, van-
ishing into the water.
Everything went out of focus.
Luc was screaming, but Helena's body seemed to abruptly come
alive. She stumbled forward, slashing at anything in her path, trying to
reach Soren before the river took him.
Luc was faster. By the time Helena reached him, Luc was already on
his knees, pulling Soren up into his arms, stained with the rush of blood
that poured out of him. Sebastian was a moment behind him, immedi-
ately throwing himself into Blackthorn's path and holding him off as
Luc knelt in the water, Soren clutched against his chest.
Luc looked up when Helena reached him.
"Y-You can heal him, right?"
"Luc— "
But he was already pushing Soren into her arms, the weight drop-
ping her to her knees in the water.
She held on to Soren with trembling hands, ignoring the throb of
her wrist.
"I'll cover you," Luc said, picking up his sword. And then he was
gone.
The battle did not stop for Soren.
Helena tried to ignore the fighting that raged around her, trying to
focus. A thread was all she needed. She could keep him alive.
Just like she'd kept Lila alive.
But the wound was so big. Wounds like this didn't survive a journey
to the hospital. This blow had been lethal. Soren's remaining life was
feeble, slipping away as her resonance tried to grasp it.
Fingers brushed against her hand.
Soren was staring at her. "Two souls is still a bargain."
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630 • SenLinYu
The words had barely passed from his lips when a surge of cold
deathly energy hit, slamming through Helena's resonance.
She was so raw with exhaustion, so focused on trying to keep him
alive, her vision blotted out as a jolt of death ran through her. She dou-
bled over, for a moment too dazed to comprehend what had happened.
Her vision cleared and Soren's blank, sightless gaze met hers.
He was gone.
"No. No. No. Soren!"
He hung in her arms, his blood still flooding against her skin, the
only warmth.
Helena looked around. Alister was calling to Penny to fall back as
she fought the chimaeras using a knife, letting them get dangerously
close before she could hit them. One mistake was all it would take.
Soren was dead. Purnell was dead.
Sebastian was doing everything he could to keep Luc protected,
holding off Blackthorne. Luc was fighting, but his focus was split. He
kept checking on Helena where she knelt with Soren clutched in her
arms. She could see the desperation in his eyes. The certainty that she
was going to save Soren. That she could. But it was too late.
She met his eyes for one guilt-stricken moment and turned back,
pulling Soren's body against her.
"Anything," she said, pressing a hand against his neck. "Whatever
the price."
She pushed the energy out of her body and brought him back.
It was more than just easy. It was instinctive.
She knew Soren, knew exactly what it felt like when he was alive.
Her resonance wound through him like a current, knitting the
wound closed with absolute efficiency, stitching the severed sections of
his organs back together, rejoining the bones, but she didn't stop there.
She felt his mind return, a shadow, the barest glimmer of him, and
she poured her energy into that.
Come back. Come back. You can't go yet.
Soren blinked up at her, and she felt a connection materialise be-
tween them, a wisp. She strengthened it, because she couldn't let him
go.
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Alchemised • 631
"You can't rest yet, you have to protect Luc," she said, and heard the
words echo through him.
Soren knew her. She could feel it. The familiarity she represented. It
was horrible, feeling this abomination of life in her arms. For all her
efforts, this was a shadow. Soren was a puppet she'd slipped her hand
inside.
After so many years of healing, necromancy was effortless. There was
nothing to hurt. She simply told Soren's body that it could not die. He
would fight as he'd always fought. He would protect them, because he
knew how to do that.
He stood and helped her up, weapon already in hand.
Muscle memory lingered, like a sleepwalker's habits, even when the
person was gone.
She could see herself through him. Her consciousness kept flicker-
ing back and forth along the connection forged between them. He
turned then and saw Luc, and she felt the pull towards him. He looked
for Lila next.
Luc saw Soren standing, and for an instant, relief flooded across his
face. Then vanished.
Luc knew. In an instant, he somehow knew.
Still Soren started towards him. Helena stopped him.
"You need to protect Penny and Alister," she said, both in her mind
and aloud, pointing, turning his focus away from Luc. "Get us out."
Soren turned and obeyed. Helena watched, her mind swimming
from the disorienting secondary awareness in her mind. Her conscious-
ness didn't know where to go.
A chimaera leapt towards her face.
She dodged. A scythe flashed before her eyes.
Soren.
She blinked, trying to make out her own surroundings.
Soren killed the chimaera without breaking his stride as he reached
Penny and Alister, shoving Penny to safety before turning back.
A blur from the left. Helena lurched sideways, trying to dodge, not
sure if she was seeing her assailants or Soren's. Her focus narrowed for
an instant, bringing her surroundings back into the forefront of her own
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632 • SenLinYu
mind.
If she died, Soren would be gone, too. She had to stay alive until they
got Luc out.
She tried to block out Soren, but he was rooted in her mind. She
sensed something and turned an instant before it slammed into her. The
air was knocked out of her lungs. She looked down, blinking through
her fragmenting consciousness.
Soren. Helena. Soren.
There was a knife driven to the hilt into the right side of her chest.
Helena.
If she'd turned a split second later, it would have gone through her
heart, but—as she squinted, struggling to focus—she didn't think it had
hit anything immediately vital.
Pain was what it took to drag Helena's consciousness securely back
into her own body.
She managed to slice off the hand of the necrothrall that had stabbed
her before it could pull the knife out. Using her throbbing right hand,
she held the knife in place, trying to keep it from being jostled as she
stomped down on the inside of the necrothrall's knee.
She stumbled away, gasping, the edge of the blade slicing the wound
wider as she moved.
A chimaera's fangs closed around Soren's leg, tearing it open. He cut
off its head, unmindful of the injury.
He was being torn apart. She could feel the injuries, even though
pain didn't register fully. She hadn't brought that part of his brain back.
He didn't stop fighting.
Get the knife out, close the wound. She went towards the far wall.
She huddled in the freezing water. Another chimaera had attacked
Sebastian and Luc. The size of it, it had to be part bear. Luc's strength
was flagging.
The chimaera was huge, mostly mammal but with a longer, reptilian
jaws and skin so thick, their weapons glanced off. It screamed like a
human.
She tried to focus, biting down on her lip, bracing herself to pull out
the knife.
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Alchemised • 633
Fingers dug into her braided hair, and Helena was abruptly dragged
up until her toes barely touched the ground.
Basilius Blackthorne peered at her, teeth bared into a grin, blood-
stains from mouth to chin.
He ate his wife and children with those teeth . . .
"The Eternal Flame has a necromancer, I see." His voice was raw and
rasping,
She tried to stab the arm gripping her, but he batted her hand away
with a blow so hard, her left hand nearly went numb. Her knife hit the
water with a splash.
She grabbed for his wrist.
Her fingers grazed his skin, her resonance lashing out.
But Kaine had always warned her: Once the Undying knew what
she was, they'd be wary.
Before her resonance could connect, he wrenched her hand off, fin-
gers closing around the knuckles of her left hand, squeezing and twist-
ing. His grip was like iron, and her bones broke like twigs.
Helena screamed. The knife in her chest shifted, painful pressure
growing inside her lungs.
Blackthorne looked at her shattered hand expectantly and then
laughed. "Forgot, you won't regenerate."
His gaze turned to her right hand, eyeing the awkward way she had
the knife braced. "I think this one is already broken, but let's make sure."
With unexpected gentleness, he pulled it away from the knife hilt
and snapped her wrist. Black spots of pain danced in her eyes as another
strangled scream burst out of her.
"I should keep you alive," he said as he pulled the knife from her
chest very slowly, savouring the glide of the blade.
Helena was in so much pain that her mind kept flickering over into
Soren's, seeking an escape.
He was mobbed by necrothralls. The chimaeras were dead, but there
were too many necrothralls, dozens of them, shoving him down into the
water, tearing him apart. His leg twisted as teeth bit down, tearing out
the tendon behind his knee.
He was still fighting. His scythe was gone, but he had a knife. Penny
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634 • SenLinYu
was screaming behind him but Alister held her back. Soren kept stab-
bing, tearing, clawing his way back, following her instruction not to
stop fighting even as he was ripped apart. Dead fingers scrabbled across
his face, finding his remaining eye. His jaw was torn down, his throat
left gaping.
Helena jerked reflexively each time a little more of him was ripped
away, but the pain was all with Helena. She couldn't feel her fingers;
there was just a beacon of agony radiating up her arms.
A warm gush of blood ran down the side of her body.
She thought Basilius would stab her again, but he dropped the knife
into the water. He touched her side, fingers light across the wound. Her
raw nerves screamed in protest.
His fingers traced along the slit between her ribs, and without warn-
ing he shoved two of them into it. Helena screamed as her skin tore
wider. The bones bowed as he forced his fingers inside the wound, slick
with her blood.
"Did you know, my favourite things are wounds," he said, the words
breathless. "Wetter, hotter, and tighter than anything else."
Helena's legs thrashed, her broken hands scrabbling to push him
away, the ruined bones grinding, but it was no use. She screamed and
screamed but no one noticed, bashing her head against his chest until
he gripped her by the throat with his free hand, his thumb shoving hard
against her trachea until she stilled. Her lungs seized, spasming.
"Yes, just like that," he said with an approving groan. "Don't worry, I
won't let you die. You'll still be alive when I hand you over. Bennet is
going to love you."
Her consciousness had frayed to its outermost limit. Her vision
blurred. She couldn't even breathe to scream anymore.
She was only half aware as Soren was ripped from her mind, his
body washed down river, the connection unravelling like blood in the
water.
"One more scream. You do it beauti—"
Blackthorne stumbled, gasping as if the breath had been knocked
out of him. His grip on her loosened, grip slackening, fingers sliding
free an instant before he was wrenched backwards.
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Alchemised • 635
Helena dropped like a stone. The frigid cold drove her back into
consciousness or she would have drowned. She cowered back, looking
for Blackthorne in terror and spotted him being dragged by his throat
through the water, a wire or rope, wrapped around his neck.
The person dragging him wasn't one of the Resistance.
It was one of the Undying. Immediately identifiable by the helmet
and black uniform.
By the time the two were in range of each other, Blackthorne had
recovered himself and lunged at his attacker. He'd snatched up a sword
from the water and swung, going straight for the head, but the other
Undying sidestepped.
Blackthorne tried again, and again. His attacks were precise, the
movements of a highly accomplished combat alchemist, but his oppo-
nent simply dodged. No weapon. No counterattack. Quick and light,
evading as if it were a dance, until Blackthorne left himself open for an
instant. An instant was all it took.
The Undying stepped past a blow and with his bare hand, punched
through Basilius's armour and into his chest as easily as if reaching
through water. A pale, long-fingered hand dripped red with blood as it
pulled out a gleaming piece of metal from Blackthorne's chest cavity.
Blackthorne collapsed into the floodwater, vanishing.
The entire fight had not even lasted a full minute.
In the chaos, no one else had noticed. Helena tried to breathe in but
choked from the pressure inside her lungs. She pressed her arm against
the wound, trying to prevent more air from seeping into her chest cav-
ity.
The necrothralls began to drop. A few Aspirants noticed the new-
comer and seemed confused about what had happened. Before they
could react, they were dead. A weapon gleamed so quick that she barely
saw it, just watched the bodies fall.
It was Kaine.
She'd never seen him fight. He'd never really fought with her. But
she knew. There was no mistaking that brutal efficiency.
He was as deadly as she'd imagined.
She could see the techniques he'd tried to drill into her, the fluidity
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636 • SenLinYu
that she'd lacked, how quick he was. No movement wasted. The mo-
mentum of one kill led to the next.
Bodies fell like stars.
He stalked through the water towards Helena. Not a step wavering,
cutting down everything that crossed his path.
When a chimaera leapt at him, he lifted his hand, and the instant it
touched the creature, the body unravelled, limbs sloughing apart as if
he'd ripped out all the invisible stitches assembling it. One minute a
monster, and the next dead in the water.
It wasn't combat, it was slaughter.
A numbers game. Minimum effort, high return.
It was impossible that he'd ever fought to his full potential before. If
anyone had ever fought like that, everyone would have known about it.
He reached into a pocket, pulling out a fistful of somethings and
flinging them outward.
They looked like shimmering bits of metal, and as they flew, she felt
his resonance expand, carrying them.
The metal sang through the air, moving like an avian murmuration,
and hit like a spray of bullets, tearing through the necrothralls' skulls.
Rather than fall, the metal stayed suspended in midair, sweeping
back, dripping blood and gore. Kaine drew his hand up and they came
darting back, cutting through more bodies. A flick of his fingers and
they shot out again.
When he reached Helena, his eyes were burning with rage behind
his mask, glowing bright as molten silver.
"You idiot," he said, and dragged her up out of the water, crushing
her hard against his chest.
His resonance in the air grew heavier. A wave that swept outwards.
She watched it hit the nearest necrothralls and Aspirants. They began
jerking and seizing, dropping into the water. The necrothralls crumpled,
while the chimaeras and those living were gasping as if their lungs were
being compressed, clawing at their throats.
Helena could still breathe laboriously, but everyone around her was
suffocating.
Sebastian was trying to reach Luc but collapsed into the water. Luc
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Alchemised • 637
was tearing gouges down his throat as his face turned blue, eyes bulging.
"Stop it," she gasped, realising that Kaine was making no distinction
between the Undying and the Eternal Flame. He was killing everyone.
"Stop it! You can't kill them! Stop!"
She struggled, trying to get free as Luc's eyes rolled back and he
slumped in the water.
The invisible wave reached the walls. Penny collapsed. Alister fol-
lowed.
The struggle was coming to an end.
"Stop. Stop! Stop!" She renewed her struggles to get free. "Stop!"
"Shut up," he snarled through his helmet, letting go of her. "Wait
here."
He stormed over to Sebastian and Luc, Penny and Alister and even
Wagner, although she hardly cared if he died. He placed a hand on their
chests, and one at the back of their heads, and she watched them jerk
and start breathing again without regaining consciousness.
She tried to stand up, but her legs wouldn't hold her. By the time
Kaine was coming towards her again, everything was swaying.
He dragged her towards the far wall, where several tunnels disap-
peared into darkness.
"Can't leave them," she rasped, trying to pull free.
"Shut up." The water was only to their ankles, and there was a ladder
leading up to a walkway that was shoulder- height.
"You can't leave them," she said, struggling. "Bring them, or I won't
go."
He turned without a word and went back, kicking most of the necro-
thralls into the current, but pausing beside a few dead Aspirants and
reanimating them. They crawled to their feet and began helping to carry
Luc and the others over and shoving them up onto the walkway while
Kaine lifted her as gently as he could. She nearly bit through her lip at
the pressure on her ribs. His palms were red with her blood, but he said
nothing as he swung up the ladder and scooped her up again.
The necrothralls hauled the rest of the rescue team up over their
shoulders and followed.
Helena faded in and out of consciousness in the dark, briefly coming
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638 • SenLinYu
to as she heard the sound of grinding metal and a loud roar of rushing
rising water coming from the flood cathedral before they continued on.
Kaine stopped walking and kicked the wall. A door almost invisible
along the endless passages swung open. He carried her into a small
room.
There was a table against one wall, and he laid her on it. He turned
away, shoving the door closed, and reached up to rip off his helmet. His
face was twisted with fury.
"Tell me you can last long enough for me to get a doctor." His voice
was shaking.
She shook her head.
He was breathing fast, but he swallowed. "Then you'll have to tell me
how. Can you still do that?"
"All right," she said unsteadily, even though she wanted to pass out
more than anything. "The first is—my liver. It's where the blood is com-
ing from. I think. There's air—in my chest, collapsing my lung. After—
after you—fix my liver, you can—stimulate blood generation. I don't
have the tonic, but you should be able to manage some."
He unbuckled the straps on her satchel and cut away her soaking
clothes so he had clear access to the wound between her ribs that had
been ripped wide.
She flinched, trying not to recoil as he stanched the bleeding, and
listened carefully as she described what he needed to sense to identify
and repair biliary ducts.
Without her hands working, without resonance, it was like instruct-
ing the blind.
"Shut up," he told her when she apologised for not being sure of
what was wrong. He reached into his cloak, pulling something out.
"This one for blood, right? Does it work for you?"
He held up a familiar green-blue vial.
Her throat tightened and she nodded. "Yes. That works for me."
The process of siphoning the air collapsing her lung was difficult
because she didn't have the supplies for it. She swallowed hard. "There's
a tube in my satchel."
He found it, and she gingerly indicated where to numb and punc-
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Alchemised • 639
ture, giving only a small whimpering gasp as it sank through the tissue
and into her chest cavity.
She swallowed, staring up at the ceiling overhead, able to think more
clearly as breathing grew easier. "You need to look for damage to the
lung tissue next, then you wash the wound and close the diaphragmatic
muscle and— "
His fingers brushed near the wound, and her mind stalled, careening
violently.
"Don't—don't touch it!" The words came out a strangled scream. She
almost fell off the table, trying to get away.
He snatched his hand back as she collapsed and lay there, drawing
sharp laboured breaths as she tried to calm down, choking back pan-
icked sobs.
Her heart was pounding so hard, she could feel it in her temples.
"He was going to—going to—" She tripped over her own tongue,
trying to protectively cradle that side of her body. Keep it from being
touched.
"He's gone." Kaine's expression was pulled taut, a forced flatness to
his entire demeanour. "He won't ever come back. Should I just cover the
wound and fix your hands instead?"
She shook her head. "No. I'll stay still. Just—" She swallowed. "Sorry."
The muscle in his jaw set. As he worked, he began telling her each
time he was about to touch her, what he was about to do, his voice low,
calm, and she realised he was imitating the way she used to narrate her
treatment of the array.
It was the simplest part of the procedure, but she wanted to throw up
because she was so sick with terror.
"There."
The immediate danger had passed. Kaine also seemed to finally
breathe.
"Why were you there?" he finally asked.
She stared at him for a moment and then looked away. "The Council
was going to do whatever it took to get Luc back."
"You aren't experienced in combat," he said. His hands trembled as
he wiped blood off her face. "Why would they bring you without even
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640 • SenLinYu
giving you a partner."
"I had a partner," she said. "She died in the fight."
"Who?"
"Purnell. She was an—orderly."
He glared at her.
"It had to be a small team; we were supposed to get in and out with-
out being noticed. Sofia and I weren't supposed to fight."
"You knew it was a suicide mission. That is what the Bayards do, they
die for the Holdfasts. They know nothing else."
"Yes, but if Luc dies it's over, for all of us. It was worth it to go."
"And if you'd died?" He looked up, his eyes glittering with rage.
"There's plenty of people to replace me. I've always been expendable,
remember?" She used her elbows to sit up. "I need you to fix my hands
now."
The strain showed around his eyes. "I know."
She forced herself to inhale. "Start with my left. It won't matter as
much if it doesn't all set right."
He blocked off most of the feeling from her elbow down but left
enough that she could sense if he was setting it correctly, working as
gently as he could. The broken pieces ground together, sending a sudden
pain through her arm into her shoulder, even with most of the sensation
gone.
"Good," she choked out, dropping her head onto his shoulder as she
fought back tears.
He rejoined the bones in her wrists before he worked her hands di-
rectly. He had to physically move several bones back into alignment,
twisting the parts that Blackthorne had mangled.
The pain without the adrenaline surge of battle bore into her. She
was sobbing into his shoulder by the time he finished aligning the bones
and began fusing them.
Her hand was swollen, purple and red from bruising when he fin-
ished.
He cradled it in both of his and ran his thumbs across her palm and
up to her wrist, his resonance like a balm, repairing the damaged tissue
and the broken blood vessels with the sweep of his thumbs, then work-
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Alchemised • 641
ing along each finger. He was so gentle.
She recognised the technique. She hadn't realised he'd paid atten-
tion.
"You could be a healer," she finally said as he removed the block on
her nerves. She flexed her hand, opening and closing. It was still sore,
and fragile as though hairline-fractured. "You have a natural talent for
it."
"That's one of the most ironic things anyone has ever said to me," he
said quietly.
He turned his attention to her other hand.
"You can numb it all the way," she said. "I can use my resonance
now."
Working together, it was surprising how quick the process was.
When he finished, he massaged her hand again, in the same way he had
with the first.
"Don't ever go on another mission," he said without looking up, her
hand trapped in his.
She looked away, drawing a deep breath.
"That's not your call," she said, slipping her hand free and standing.
The room swam. She was dangerously lightheaded. She didn't have a
saline drip or the plasma expanders that would be on hand in the hos-
pital. Tonic or not, she didn't physically have the resources needed to
regenerate all the blood she'd lost.
She pulled her satchel gingerly over her head, trying to be gentle
with her hands as she prepared to leave. They'd never said goodbye be-
fore, and she didn't see any point in starting now.
He blocked the door, his eyes gone cold. "Remind Crowther that if
the Eternal Flame wants my continued assistance, they will keep you
alive."
His eyes had that cold silver gleam in them as he stared at her. Her
heart wavered for a moment and then turned to lead. He'd been quite
clear about what she was, how he regarded her, and how much he hated
her for having any hold on him.
This concern, this obsession with her preservation wasn't about her
at all. It was about his mother, Enid Ferron, and his failure to save her.
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642 • SenLinYu
To him, Helena was an opportunity to try to get it right. A consolation
prize he didn't even want but couldn't bring himself to give up on.
No wonder Crowther had been so pleased. Well done, Marino.
"You're doing this for your mother, Kaine. Would you really give that
up because of me?"
She knew that would anger him: to outright insinuate that what he
felt towards her was in any way comparable to his feelings for his
mother. He would make a point of proving her wrong.
He went very still.
She stepped around him, reaching for the door, but he caught her
shoulders, turning her back, the expression on his face stark.
"She's dead," he said "You are not. My loyalty was to those least re-
sponsible for her suffering, but if the Eternal Flame has decided that
you are an affordable casualty, I will not be noble or understanding. I
can exact dual revenge. I will make them pay if they get you killed."
She stared at him, startled. She hadn't accounted for this. She knew
Kaine wasn't a spy because of any ideological reasoning; it was purely a
sense of personal interest. He hated the Holdfasts and the Eternal
Flame but he hated Morrough and the Undying more. That fact was
immutable. The source of all his motivation.
But now, because of a careless comment from her, he was reevaluat-
ing whether the Eternal Flame served his interests.
She swallowed hard. She should be cold. She should remind him
that she would always put the Eternal Flame's interests first. If he ex-
pected more than that, he would have to wait. And earn it.
She looked up at him, willing the words to form, but they stayed
trapped in her throat. She was so tired. Life had been cold for such a
long time.
The others are hurt. You don't even know what's been done to Luc, and
you're wasting your time here.
She flexed her hands, feeling the new tissue, focusing on it as she
attempted to pull away. "I have to go." Her voice shook.
He wouldn't let go. He gripped her tighter. "You are not expendable.
You don't get to push everyone away so that they'll feel comfortable
using you and letting you die."
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Alchemised • 643
She shook her head.
"This is war," she said, forcing her voice to stay steady. "It's not some
sort of tragic self-condemnation to be expendable. It's a strategic liabil-
ity not to be." She met his eyes. "That was why you picked me, remem-
ber?" Her voice broke. "Well, thanks to you, I'm worth less now. They
added all these new healers after you asked for me. I had to train all my
replacements." She gave a bitter laugh. "You made me as expendable as
I am now. And you didn't even want me, either."
He flinched, his grip loosening enough that she pulled free, turning
again. He caught the door as she opened it, shoving it closed.
"You are not replaceable," he said, his hands trembling against her
shoulders. "You are not required to make your death convenient. You are
allowed to be important to people. The reason I'm here—the reason I'm
doing any of this—is to keep you alive. To keep you safe. That was the
deal." He searched her face. "They didn't tell you."
She shook her head, giving a broken sob and—before she let herself
think— she kissed him.
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CHAPTER 51
Aprilis 1787
Kaine cradled her face in his hands as he returned her kiss,
pulling her closer, his arms wrapping around her.
She was half crying as she kissed him, tracing her fingers along his
face and under the curve of his jaw, trying to memorise every detail: his
pulse under her fingertips, his lips pressed against hers. The taste of him.
Her eyes fluttered shut, trying to savour it all. This one moment. She
could have this.
She'd earned it.
Then, all too soon, she forced herself to step back, pulling away. "I
have to take care of the others."
He didn't try to stop her again, but the rest of the team wasn't out-
side the door as she'd expected; Kaine's necrothralls had moved them
deeper.
Her fingers trembled as she checked for pulses. They were still alive,
although Luc's skin almost burned to touch.
"How do we get out?" she asked as she started checking for injuries,
trying to work out how hurt everyone was, how much work it would
take to get them conscious and moving.
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Alchemised • 645
"Down this tunnel. Go right, then right again, and then straight.
There's an upper floodgate on the far north."
"Where they released the chimaera?" She remembered the place.
"You'll have to break it down, but it'll get you out."
She nodded. "You have to go before I wake them."
"I know," he said, but he didn't leave, lingering until she looked up.
His eyes shone in the dark, as if there was moonlight underground.
He touched her cheek, tilting her face up and kissing her. "Use the
ring, call me, if you ever need anything."
She wanted to say she would, but she couldn't bring herself to.
He was a spy that they depended on. And she was—
Not his handler. No, that role belonged to Crowther.
She was—
A prison.
"Go," she said instead. He disappeared down one of the tunnels, his
necrothralls following him, as silent as wraiths.
She woke Sebastian first, hoping that he'd be calm and easier to
manage. He'd also know what to do. She searched what supplies they
had. She'd lost both her daggers, and everything in her satchel was con-
taminated with floodwater. Only one of the electric torches still worked,
providing dim light in the darkness.
When he woke, Sebastian just sat silently staring at Luc's still face
while she gingerly fixed his dislocated shoulder and several shallow
wounds that had already stopped bleeding on their own. Finally, he
looked at her.
"What happened?"
She shook her head. "I don't know. Everything went black, when I
woke you were all unconscious. I was afraid more of the Undying would
show up, so I brought everyone here."
His eyes swept pointedly over her. "Helena, I know you used necro-
mancy. There's no chance you moved us all here on your own."
She started to shake her head in denial.
"You reanimated Soren. There was no surviving the blow he took."
She went still. She didn't know if would be better or worse to tell
Sebastian that Soren had asked her to.
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646 • SenLinYu
"That was why he brought you, wasn't it? I did wonder."
Helena said nothing. Soren's death felt like a wound too deep to
even wrap her mind around. She didn't think she could even say his
name without choking.
"Is he still—nearby?" Sebastian's voice was wistful.
Helena's throat ached. "No. He—he's gone. I'm sorry."
There would be no holy fire to liberate Soren's soul from his body.
Somewhere downriver, he would decay into the earth and see no after-
life. Lila would never see her twin again. Not even in the afterlife.
Sebastian said nothing for a long moment. "We'll tell the others we
brought them here together."
There was blood crusted around Alister's eyes, ears, and nose from
the strain of all the transmutation he'd done. She woke him slowly, but
he seized into consciousness, clawing at his neck, his eyes wild as they
locked on Helena.
"What happened?" he gasped.
"We're not sure," Sebastian said, leaning over him. "Are you all right?
We need to move before we freeze. Luc's sick."
"Where's Soren?"
"Killed in combat," Sebastian said shortly. "Marino, can you get
Penny up?"
Penny's leg was wrecked, the tendons ripped out with teeth. There
was no saving it. Helena blocked the nerves and fused the bone so she
could limp on it. Penny didn't even cry when she woke, just scrubbed at
her face and struggled to her feet.
Wagner was unscathed. Of course he was. Coward. At least she
didn't have to waste any of her energy healing him.
Helena tried to wake Luc. His fever was searing. He'd somehow got-
ten hotter in the minutes after she'd left him. She tried to cool him, but
his body kept fighting it, pushing the fever higher and higher. She'd
drugged him too much.
When he regained consciousness, he screamed. The noise reverber-
ated through the tunnels.
"Knock him out!" Sebastian said, lunging forward. "Keep him cold.
We'll carry him back."
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Alchemised • 647
It was fortunate they could smell clean air ahead, because Helena
couldn't have explained how she knew the route out.
Sebastian had an entangled medallion like Helena's ring. He used it
to send a pulse code to Headquarters.
A few times, they heard sounds echoing through the tunnels.
Screams. Roars. Splashing. They moved quietly. Helena worried first
whether Kaine could have gotten clear and then began to wonder if the
reason they did not run into anyone was because he was lurking in the
shadows.
When they reached the locked floodgate, Alister broke through the
stone wall to get past it. A torrent of icy water rushed by. They struggled
through, fighting to find stable footing as they clambered out.
A dense fog hung in the air, and a slim smuggling boat shot into
view, moving silently across the water towards them.
Sebastian sighed with relief. "Althorne."
General Althorne glared at them from the boat as it pulled to shore.
His men silently slipped into the water, not even splashing as they came
towards the straggling unit.
"Where's Soren?" Althorne asked, his expression hard as Luc was
carefully lifted into the boat.
"Killed in combat," Sebastian said quietly.
One of the men was lifting Penny into the boat. Alister scrambled
aboard himself, smearing away the fresh blood around his eyes with
shaking hands, clearly on the verge of burnout.
Althorne looked at Luc, his expression a mixture of concern and
relief. "We'll need to keep him restrained until he's cleared."
Helena gestured towards Wagner. "We found him in a cell. I think
Crowther wants him. Don't trust him, he killed Sofia Purnell."
Althorne jerked his head, and two of his men came over and seized
Wagner's arms.
He grumbled but didn't resist, clearly preferring Resistance captivity
to the Undying.
"You are all currently in custody for your violation of orders," Alt-
horne said, once the boat was pushed off. There was no bite to his words.
They'd rescued Luc; any censure for that would be a formality.
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648 • SenLinYu
Helena slumped against the side of the boat. The journey passed in a
blur— docking on a concealed wharf, being herded up a staircase and
into the back of a lorry.
When they arrived at Headquarters, Penny, Alister, and Luc were
taken away to the hospital ward. Wagner was placed in a cell. Helena
and Sebastian were checked, cleared of serious injury, and escorted to
their rooms to be locked inside with guards stationed at the doors.
Helena was glad not to be kept in the hospital, even though she
could have used the saline and plasma expanders. She stripped out of
her wet, ruined clothing, hands shaky and trembling, and took a shower,
washing away the filth of the tunnels and spring melt.
As the traces vanished, she grew eerily removed from what had hap-
pened, as though at some point during the battle, she'd left her body
and couldn't return to it. Back in her room where everything looked
familiar, it felt as if it had been a dream.
Soren wasn't dead. He couldn't be.
She would go out and see him sitting next to Luc in the hospital.
The memory of him, dead in her arms, felt like a tear in the fabric of
her mind, as if the way she'd tethered him back to life had been ripped
out when the connection between them broke. The person she knew,
and the body she'd reanimated had been tied together, and now there
was a wound left.
He couldn't be dead.
It was a horrible dream.
She stared down at her hands. Somehow she'd expected them to be
stained or blackened by her necromancy.
What would Sebastian tell the Council? He'd have to tell the truth
in a report. Once the truth came out, there'd be consequences.
It would have been a lesser crime to have murdered Soren. Murder
was only a mortal crime; necromancy was a crime upon this life and the
afterlife.
She packed away all her possessions in her trunk and sat waiting.
There was a loud banging on the door. She stood, ready.
"Helena! Helena! There's something wrong with Luc!" It was Elain
outside. "We need you in the hospital!"
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Alchemised • 649
All thoughts of arrest vanished.
"What's wrong?" Helena opened the door, and the guards stepped
back to let her out. She rushed towards the lifts with Elain.
"We've done all the examinations and doubled-checked for talis-
mans, and he's clear. But his organs—they're all poisoned. I don't know
what they could have done. We tried reversing the damage, but they
won't regenerate. We were trying to get his fever down and Pace had me
wake him, but he started screaming. Now he won't stop, and he doesn't
let anyone near. He's hurting himself."
Luc was in a quarantine room at the far end of the hospital. She
heard him before she saw him.
His eyes were deranged, his face gaunt with scarlet stains in the
cheeks. There was a ripple of heat coming off him as if he were molten
gold.
Ilva was standing helplessly in the doorway, along with Althorne,
Maier, Pace, and several medics. Ilva kept trying to talk to him, but Luc
didn't seem to hear anything. The screaming faded as his throat stripped
itself raw. He'd seemingly forgotten how a body worked. He seized, his
arms and legs and fingers and head all tilting into bizarre angles, and
then he slammed himself into the wall.
"I brought Helena," Elain said breathlessly.
Luc's head swivelled. He stared at Helena. His eyes seemed to grow,
bulging from their sockets, head weaving like a snake.
"Hel—" he croaked. He reached for her. His fingers looked broken,
but he didn't seem to notice. "Hel—"
"Careful, he's been violent," she dimly heard Pace say. She paid no
mind.
She reached out, laced their fingers together, and touched the side of
his face with her knuckles. His skin was so hot, it almost burned. He
somehow bent his fingers, not seeming to notice the pain, clutching her
hand, pulling her close.
"I'm here. What's wrong?" She numbed his hand, setting his fingers
quickly.
His eyes had gone out of focus, and he started shuddering. "Out—"
he moaned, shaking his head. "Inside—"
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650 • SenLinYu
She pressed her hand against his forehead, ignoring the way his skin
scalded her hand, letting her resonance flow into him, trying to find the
source of what was wrong. What was she missing?
"Hel—" Luc was saying again.
Pain exploded through her chest.
The world went careening, spinning. Vicious red burst across her vi-
sion, slamming into the back of her head. An endless ringing filled her
ears.
She struggled to focus her eyes. She couldn't breathe.
She clutched at her chest. Noises were elongated. Faces loomed over
her.
Something grabbed her. She gave a panicked scream, going for her
knives, but they weren't there. She clawed wildly to free herself.
"Calm down, Marino," Matron Pace was saying. "You're all right, just
a bad scare. Knocked your breath out."
The raw terror ebbed. The room came slowly back into view.
She was on the floor, breathing raggedly, pain consuming her chest
as she tried to make sense of what had happened.
Luc was on the other side of the room. His expression had turned
scorchingly lucid.
"You— " His eyes were suddenly clear and burning. "You used necro-
mancy on Soren."
The accusation hung in the air like the lull between lightning and
thunder.
Everyone froze.
Helena pushed herself upright.
"I'm sorry," she rasped, struggling to speak. Her lungs were seizing
for air, sending jolts of pain through her ribs. She knelt and almost
doubled over on the floor of the hospital. "I tried to heal him. I'm sorry."
"He was alive. Why didn't you just heal him?" Luc's voice was racked
with grief.
She couldn't breathe enough to explain herself, to describe how
quickly Soren was gone, that he'd known he'd die, and that he'd asked
her to do it.
"I'm sorry, Luc."
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Alchemised • 651
"Get out . . ." He wasn't looking at her anymore. His gaze lost focus,
and he swayed.
"Luc, you're sick—"
"Get out!" He closed his eyes, starting to shudder again, his breath-
ing coming faster and faster as if being in the same room with her was
about to drive him mad. "Get out! Get out! Get out!"
He started clawing at his chest, screaming, tearing grooves into his
skin as if trying to tear his own heart out.
"Luc?" another voice broke in.
Lila stood in the doorway, a crutch under one arm. Rhea was beside
her, helping her walk.
The scars on Lila's face and chest showed vividly where she was
stitched together.
Luc's eyes shot open at the sound of her voice.
"Lila . . ." he said, his voice both grief-stricken and filled with relief,
as if he hadn't believed she was still alive until that moment.
Several people tried to hold her back, murmurs of Careful, but Lila
let go of her mother, reaching desperately towards Luc. She let her
crutch fall and toppled into his arms, clinging to him.
"I told you to run," Lila was saying, clutching him close. His hands
were shaking as he touched the laceration running down her face.
Lila brushed across the gouges he'd clawed in his chest. "What did
they do to you?"
He just shook his head and pulled her closer, burying his head
against her shoulder, arms wrapped around her.
It was painfully intimate. If there had been any doubts about whether
or why Luc had handed himself over, they were all gone now.
There was a touch at Helena's elbow. She looked up and found Ilva,
who nodded towards the door.
Helena pushed herself to her feet and slipped out before Luc noticed
her again. When she passed Rhea, she looked away.
It was Lila who coaxed Luc into bed, who persuaded him to let Pace
and Elain examine him again, to accept an intravenous drip in his arm,
and take the medicine needed to bring his fever down.
Helena sat on a hospital bed in the main room, an intravenous drip
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652 • SenLinYu
in her arm, while Elain fixed a fracture in her sternum and spread a salve
across the bruise that spanned most of her chest, then treated the back
of her head, where she'd hit the far wall.
It wasn't the first time Helena had been injured by a patient, but it
felt different.
Luc was never going to forgive her for what she'd done to Soren.
She'd broken him.
The curtain around the hospital bed rustled, and Ilva stepped
through. Elain lingered until Ilva glared, and then the healer fled. Hel-
ena closed her shirt and didn't look up.
"We're taking reports on what happened," Ilva said, her tone unread-
able.
Helena sat numbly. Would they put her on trial now? Or would it
wait until after the war?
"What have you heard?" she asked in a dull voice.
Ilva cleared her throat. "Luc is delirious, his version of events hardly
reliable given that he was not only severely injured but also heavily
drugged. Alister and Penny both gave statements that Soren Bayard
died protecting them. Sebastian Bayard—" Ilva paused for a moment.
"Sebastian corroborates this, and claims that the two of you managed to
drag the others to safety after the rising floodwater washed away a large
number of the attacking forces."
"And?" Helena asked.
"Lucien— hallucinated Soren Bayard's alleged reanimation. Perhaps
Soren fell briefly. In the confusion of a battle, it is impossible to know.
The point is, this was a heroic rescue. The Principate was saved though
the price was great. Sol's will was done."
Helena knew she was supposed to be grateful, but she also knew the
lie wasn't for her sake. It was all for the story. It didn't matter what had
really happened, only what people believed.
"The obligations of Soren and Sebastian's vows supersede any orders
by the Council," Ilva said. "Alister and Penny were obeying the orders of
their direct superiors. You would have a reprimand on your military
record for your participation, but as a healer you're not part of the mili-
tary. Matias will be the one to decide what sort of reprimand you de-
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Alchemised • 653
serve. Until then, you'll be off duty. I believe it would be best if you stay
out of sight until the official story has circulated."
Helena went back to her room and collapsed into her bed, exhaus-
tion rolling over her like a wave. It was dark oblivion at first, but then
the landscape of her mind morphed.
She was sinking, down, down. There were teeth sinking into her.
Hands clawing, curling around her limbs, tearing her apart. She kept
fighting. Cold fingers carving gouges through her flesh, stabbing into
her bones. She tried to fight. The weight bore down on her.
Her bones cracked. Teeth sank into her flesh. The tendon behind her
knee ripped out. Wet hands found her mouth, clawing in so deep she
couldn't bite down. Her jaw gave way, ripping until her throat tore open.
She was still fighting as water closed over her head.
Helena started violently awake, gasping to breathe, hands clutching
at her open throat.
Just a dream, just a dream, she tried to tell her pounding heart.
Not really a dream though. A memory. Soren's memories postmor-
tem were lodged inside her consciousness as though they were her own.
Bright and lurid in all their details.
She hadn't known necromancy was like that. That she would never
be free of the person she brought back. No wonder necromancers went
mad. Who could stay sane with the minds of the dead inside them?
The place where Soren had been was like a pit of festering guilt. Her
body and mind had been cored, and now something dead and rotting
was left there. Everyone always talked of what a curse necromancy was.
Warned against it and its consequences, but Helena had been so con-
vinced of its necessity, and so distracted by the eternal consequences,
that she'd never paused to consider there being immediate ones.
She lay there, still feeling phantom fingers tearing her apart, her
body was unutterably cold, reliving the cold, snowmelt water. She pulled
more blankets onto herself, stealing Lila's bedding, and huddled, trying
to sleep, to escape from the deadness Soren had left inside her. Every
time she closed her eyes, Soren's final memories and sensations flashed
through her mind.
She hadn't brought back his ability to feel pain or emotions, but her
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654 • SenLinYu
own mind dutifully tried to fill in those blanks, phantom sensation and
terror rippling through her until her mind threatened to fissure, split-
ting between two realities.
It was only pain that drew her back into herself. She kept pinching
at her skin, scratching at it. It wasn't intense enough. She needed some-
thing stronger.
She blinked and found herself holding one of Lila's knives, a second
away from shoving it through her left forearm.
She dropped it and fled the room, wandering half blindly through
the empty hallways of the Tower. It was night, quiet; almost everyone
was asleep. It was so eerily still. She was consumed with a sort of mania.
She stumbled outside, hoping that the clear air would help centre
her.
Lumithia hung overhead, bright as a white sun in the black abyss.
Helena's eyes throbbed just looking up at her. The Ascendance al-
ways put everything on edge, but Helena was already on edge. Ascen-
dance had shoved her right over.
She closed her eyes and she was drowning again, nails dragging
welts across her skin.
Kaine.
Kaine would know what was wrong. He'd understand. He used nec-
romancy; he must know how to deal with this.
Without pausing to think, she headed for the Outpost. The destina-
tion was deliriously urgent. Curfew would be soon. She had to get
through the checkpoints.
The streets of the city were like silver ribbons gleaming under full
Ascendance, the shadows like teeth.
Just a little farther, she kept telling herself with every step. Until she
was across the bridge, the river high and roaring beneath her, the tene-
ment looming in front of her.
It was only when she reached the steps that she stopped to think.
She'd promised Kaine she would never come to the Outpost unless
there was a Resistance emergency. He was a spy. It was dangerous for
him. She'd given her word she wouldn't set foot here unless sent by the
Eternal Flame.
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Alchemised • 655
She'd risk his cover—endanger him.
She turned away.
Without a destination, her focus fractured.
Soren. Helena. Soren.
She felt her jaw give way, cold air and blood as her oesophagus tore
open. Fingers gouging into her eye sockets. Water closing over her head.
She was drowning but couldn't die, so she just kept drowning.
When her consciousness found her again, she was lying on the
ground. The black sky, dark as ink, loomed overhead as Lumithia bore
down, a scorching cold in Helena's resonance.
"Marino, what have you done to yourself ?"
She was barely conscious of being lifted off the ground. Hot hands
touching her face and forehead, driving away the drowning cold. She
burrowed into the heat.
She was delirious. Truly delirious now, because Kaine was there with
a giant winged dog standing behind him.
She'd never had a hallucination before, but all things considered, it
was oddly pleasant. Kaine was like a furnace, and when she buried her-
self in his arms, face pressed against his chest, she could scarcely feel the
cold dead fingers anymore.
"Soren Bayard died and I—I brought him back, but the other necro-
thralls tore him to pieces. I can't stop remembering how it felt. I think
he took part of me with him. How do you do it again and again without
going insane? Is it like this forever?"
One of his hands tilted her head back so she could see his eyes. In
the moonlight, the grey glowed almost as bright as Lumithia, his hair
gleaming that same colour.
"Had you ever used necromancy before?"
She shook her head.
"I don't suppose anyone told you how to do it, did they?" He exhaled,
the back of his fingers pressing against her forehead. "You had the shit
luck of knowing him, too. You're going into shock."
A hysterical laugh bubbled up from her. Of course no one had told
her how to perform necromancy.
He shushed her, pulling her back against his chest, warding off the
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656 • SenLinYu
way her skin crawled with the memory of decaying fingers burrowing
into it. "You tried to bring him back, didn't you? Idiot. You're freezing
cold."
She didn't struggle as he half carried her toward his giant dog.
On closer inspection, it wasn't a dog, but a wolf with bright-yellow
eyes, and it was the size of a warhorse, with wings the size of—
She didn't know of anything on earth with wings that large.
Kaine pushed her up and set her on a saddle, cinched behind the
wings, and then swung behind her. Helena's eyes fluttered shut as she
sagged against him, tensing at the sensation of icy-cold fingers tearing
open her skin. The creature hunched down, muscles rippling beneath
thick fur. There was a lurch, then a sickening jerk that nearly threw
Helena off.
Without warning, they were airborne.
Wind stung across her face, and her eyes rolled back. She was barely
conscious of anything except Kaine behind her and the cold wind
screaming in her ears.
Then she was sliding down, her legs giving out, and Kaine caught
her before she hit the ground. They were standing somewhere so high
up, the night so bright, that she could see beyond the mountains. She'd
never been so high.
She looked around. She was on a balcony and alone with Kaine. For
the first time in years, she felt a sense of distance from it all, looking
down the East Island, cratered by years of war, cast in moonlight
The air was thin as if she were back in the mountains, the world
dreamily still.
She held out a hand, letting the silver coat her skin.
"Do you think this is what my subconscious thinks I want?" she
asked, peering towards the light of the Alchemy Tower's beacon gleam-
ing like a small golden sun. "To run away from the war with you?"
Kaine's expression was unreadable as he pulled her back from the
railing. There was a dark doorway, and he led her through it and into a
hallway. After the silver brightness of the city, her eyes struggled to
adjust.
"What do you want?" he asked.
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His voice seemed to come from the darkness.
Her eyes burned and she reached, feeling the wall under her finger-
tips.
"I don't want to always be alone," she said. It was easier to be honest
in the dark. "I want to love someone without feeling like if they know,
it'll end up hurting them. People who love me always die. No matter
what I do, it's never enough to save them. I have to love everyone from
a distance, and I'm so lonely."
Her eyes blurred, and then the darkness fell away, revealing a large
room with a roaring fire. The place was lavish. The Holdfasts' city resi-
dence had once been like this, filled with gilded furniture that glittered
in the firelight.
It was elegant but impersonal. There wasn't anything to make the
place feel lived-in.
She looked back; Kaine was standing behind her. His black clothes
were limned by the glowing firelight, adding a flush of gold and ember
red to his almost monochrome appearance. He still had that other-
worldly glow about him.
"You don't have to be alone," he said.
She looked down, wanting to fall headlong into the fantasy of be-
lieving that; to feel good for a little while, and tell herself it would do no
harm.
But she knew that was a lie. Her mind was never quiet enough to let
her enjoy anything without thinking about its consequences.
"Why? Because of you?" she asked bitterly, going towards the fire
instead, sinking onto her knees in front of it. She couldn't think she was
drowning here. She shook her head. "I don't get to care about you."
Her chest clenched, fingers curling into fists. "If I care about you—I
won't be able to use you. And you're the only hope I have of keeping
everyone else alive."
She curled in on herself, staring at the dancing flames. Somewhere
on the Outpost, she was lying on the ground, going into shock, possibly
freezing to death.
"Then use me," Kaine said. He was right next to her. He pulled her
close and tried to kiss her.
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658 • SenLinYu
She jerked away. "No! No, I can't." She shook her head. Wake up,
Helena. "I don't want to do that to you. You don't—deserve that. I can
take care of myself."
He wouldn't let go.
"You don't have to push me away to protect me," he said in a hard,
familiar voice. "I can take it. You can stop being lonely. I won't misun-
derstand. I know you just want someone to be with."
She looked for a door. An escape.
He didn't let go. "Helena . . ."
She stilled at her name.
"I'm alone, too," he said.
A lump rose in her throat, her heart pounding. "But I don't want to
hurt you, you don't deserve—"
He kissed her, swallowing her objections. She didn't struggle when
he pulled her into his arms. The heat of the fire faded until there was
only the heat of him, his lips warm against hers, his hands cradling her
face. Then there was the softness of a bed beneath her back, pillows and
sheets, and she pulled him closer, fingers seeking the buttons on his coat
and unfastening them, but he caught her hands in his, holding them
captive against his chest, and drew back. He tilted her face into the
light.
She stared dazedly at him as he pressed the back of his hand against
her forehead and tucked her in as if she were sick and needed nursing.
When she tried to sit up, he sat down next to her and let her huddle
close, face buried against his chest.
"Necromancy doesn't—bring someone back . . ." he said, "but that
can be hard to remember in the moment. When it's someone you know,
when you can feel the span of their loss, it's instinctive to think it costs
that much to bring them back. What you did with Bayard was put a
part of yourself into reanimating him. In other circumstances, you could
have reversed it, untethered yourself, but he took all of it with him when
he was destroyed."
There was a pause.
"You'll recover, but it'll leave a scar. You just have to stay grounded
until your mind learns not to go there. Lucky for you, animancy should
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Alchemised • 659
help with that."
"Did this ever happen to you?"
He was silent for a minute. "Something similar once, but it was a
long time ago."
Helena curled closer to him, listening to his heartbeat.
He was alive. She had kept him alive. She found his hand, pulling it
up near her chin, holding it in both of hers, tracing the ridges of his
knuckles, lacing her fingers along them. Just holding on.
She lifted her head to look at him.
He didn't move, not even when she let go of his hand to reach up and
touch his face. Or when she shifted near enough to brush her lips
against his cheek. Her fingers traced across his cheekbones, and she
kissed his temple and his forehead. Then, hesitantly, she pulled him
closer and kissed him on the mouth.
He was fire to touch.
She kissed him slowly until his arms slid around her back and he
returned it.
She didn't know if what she was doing was holding on or letting go.
The first thing his fingers found were the pins in her hair. Her braids
tumbled down her back, his fingers combing through them until her
hair was loose. His hand tangled through it as he kissed her again.
The kisses were slow. It wasn't seething or rushed or guilty, but it was
still desperate, because he always made her desperate.
She kissed him the way she'd wanted to. The way she'd secretly
wished she could.
She could have this.
Once.
She gave a low sob. He paused, but she held on, not letting him go.
"This— is the way I wanted it to be," she admitted. "With you. I
wanted it to be like this with you."
He went very still.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry it wasn't," he finally said, pulling her closer.
Had he ever actually been like this? She wondered sometimes how
much of her drunken memory of kissing him was real. Or if she'd in-
vented all the intimacy to replay when her life felt too void of any ten-
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660 • SenLinYu
derness.
"It doesn't matter," she said, resting her head against his shoulder.
"Yes, it does. Let me give you this now." He drew her face to his and
kissed her. Slow and intent.
Like a star, he was glittering and ice-cold from afar, but when the
space was bridged, the heat of him was endless.
His lips didn't leave hers as his hands found the buttons on her shirt
and underclothes, unfastening them slowly this time. The fabric whis-
pered across her skin as his fingers traced along her spine. His mouth
followed the curve of her collarbones, fingers drawing her head back so
he could taste the dip of her throat.
She fumbled at his clothes. Her fingers were unsteady, but there was
no rush this time. She managed the buttons one by one.
He was unfathomably gentle. His touch light, and yet it made her
feel as though a flame were kindled inside her, a desire that made her
ache.
It wasn't too fast, or too much before she was ready. He went as
slowly as she wanted him.
When he pushed inside her, his eyes were fastened on her face. "Is
this all right? Is it good for you?"
She gave a gasp and nodded. Because it was good this time.
"It's good. Don't stop," she said, gripping him by the shoulders, pull-
ing him nearer. She could feel the scars of the array spanned beneath
her fingers. She didn't know how he could be so calm with all that
power humming beneath the surface of his skin.
His forearms were around her head as though framing her, his fin-
gers laced in her hair. When he started to move, he pressed his forehead
against hers, their breath intermingling.
When he kissed her, it felt like the beginning of something that
could be eternal.
It happened so gradually, she almost forgot that there was more to it.
They could have stayed like that, lost in each other, and it would have
been more than enough. She breathed in against his neck, tasting his
skin with the tip of her tongue, memorising his scent, the feel of him in
her arms.
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Alchemised • 661
The world beyond them had ceased to exist. He knew how to trail
his fingers across her skin so that she was gasping, kiss her so that her
legs wrapped tight around his hips, and move so slowly that, at first, she
didn't notice the coiling tension inside her. That lurking hunger.
But of course there was more, and Kaine was looking for it. All his
meticulous attention to when her breath caught, what angle made her
hips rise in response, when she caught her lip between her teeth to hold
back a low moan, body shuddering. He entwined their fingers and no-
ticed when she gripped him, squeezing so tight her nails bit against his
knuckles, breath growing short.
The pace and friction and contact increased, growing into something
larger and deeper than comfort.
When he slid his hand between her legs, she instantly flinched away.
The comfort vanished. She went cold all over, trying to twist, wanting
to escape, turning her face away.
"No." She tried not to panic, but this was all a mistake. "No, don't."
He withdrew his hand and cradled her face, kissing her. "You get this
part. This is yours."
She shook her head. "No. It's not." She drew in on herself, chin
down, speaking rapidly. "When I became a healer, I had to promise I
wouldn't ever— I took the vows—and— and then you said—about Luc,
if he knew. I can't stop thinking about that. That—that I'm a whore—"
Her voice failed.
"I'm sorry." His hand still entwined with hers tightened. "I'm so
sorry. I ruined so much of this for you. This is how it's supposed to be.
Let me give this to you now."
She didn't move, her heart pounding against her ribs.
"Please, Helena."
She gave the barest nod.
"Close your eyes." His breath whispered against her cheek.
Her eyes fluttered closed as he kissed her.
Without being able to see, her focus was on the sensations, the feel-
ing of his body pressed against hers. The movement of air across her
skin. When his lips brushed against the pulse-point of her throat, she
moaned. His palm cupped her breast, stroking as he started to move.
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662 • SenLinYu
He kissed her as he slid his hand between their bodies again, deep-
ening the kiss until her jaw loosened, mouth slack, and pleasure flooded
through her, so intense her spine bowed. She gave a ragged gasp against
his lips.
She was being wound up, fire igniting, growing, running outwards
along her nerves, through her arms and legs until her fingers twisted,
tangling in the sheets. Every time he moved or his lips found some new
sensitive place, the tension ratcheted inside her, notch by notch, until
she was on the verge of fracturing open.
Her breath caught inside her lungs as she struggled, trying to hold
herself together, overcome by the terror that she would break apart. She
couldn't.
If she broke, there would never be anyone to pick up the pieces.
"I can't—" she finally gasped out.
"Helena." Kaine's lips brushed across her cheek and temple, his
breath ragged. "You get to have this. You're allowed to feel good things.
Don't be alone. Have this with me."
He pulled her leg up with one arm, deepening and shifting the angle,
drawing the tension higher, and crushed their bodies together, kissing
her.
Her eyes shot open.
She stared up at him as her whole world shattered into shards of
silver.
"Oh gods— " She sobbed the words out. Her fingernails sank into his
arms. "Oh— oh— oh . . ."
She came apart under him, and he watched every moment of it.
As she lay panting, trying to catch her breath, his speed increased.
Gripping her closer, tighter, his expression going tense. When he came,
his mask slipped. He met her eyes for a moment before he buried his
face against her shoulder, and she saw all the heartbreak in him.
Afterwards he held her close, not letting go.
She looked up. He was watching her, his expression distant, his emo-
tions carefully hidden away.
She reached up and ran a finger along his cheek, looking for any
trace of that boy who'd first greeted her at the Outpost, but there was so
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Alchemised • 663
little of him remaining. Even his hair was all silver now.
"I think I've nearly memorised you," she said. "Especially your eyes.
I think I learned to read them first."
The corner of his mouth twitched, and he caught her hand, captur-
ing it against his chest.
"I memorised yours, too," he said after a moment, and then sighed,
looking away. "I should have known—the moment I looked into your
eyes, I should have known I would never win against you."
She gave a small smile, struggling to stay awake, afraid it might all
fade away if she did. "I've always thought my eyes were my best feature."
"One of them," he said quietly.
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CHAPTER 52
Aprilis 1787
When Helena woke, she found herself in a large bed, in
a large room, and through the windows, the Novis Mountains were ar-
rayed around them, gilded by a golden sunrise.
She was tangled in juniper-scented sheets and wrapped up in Kaine's
arms, and she had no memory of how she'd gotten there.