House of Flame and Shadow (Crescent City #3) by Sarah J. Maas

Jesiba gave him a flat look. “No. And if you take that tone with me again—”

“There might be a way,” Hypaxia said quietly.

Even Jesiba blinked, turning with Ithan to survey the former witch-queen. “Once the dead have crossed that threshold into Reaperdom—”

Hypaxia’s gaze met Ithan’s and held, the pain bleeding away to pure determination. “Necromancy can lead her to that threshold; it can haul her back again, too.”

“How?” Jesiba asked. Ithan could barely breathe.

“We need a thunderbird.”

Jesiba threw up her hands. “There are none left.”

“Sofie Renast was a thunderbird,” Ithan said, more to himself than to the others. “We thought her brother might be one, too, but—”

“Sofie Renast is dead,” Jesiba said.

Hypaxia only asked, “Where’s her body?” The question rang like a death knell through the morgue.

Jesiba got it before Ithan did. “After that debacle,” she said, pointing to the examination table where Sigrid had laid moments before, the sheet now discarded on the floor beside it, “you really want to try raising the dead again?”

“Sofie’s been dead for too long to raise,” Ithan said, nausea churning in his gut. And, he didn’t add, he couldn’t help but agree with Roga about Hypaxia’s track record.

“If she hasn’t been given a Sailing, then it should work—though the decayed state of her body will be … gruesome.” Hypaxia paced the room. “She should still have enough lightning lingering in her veins to bridge the gap between life and death. The thunderbirds were once able to aid necromancers, to use their lightning to hold the souls of the dead. They could even imbue their power into ordinary objects, like weapons, and give them magical properties—”

“And you think it can somehow undo Sigrid becoming a Reaper?” Ithan said.

“I think the lightning might be able to pull her soul back toward life,” Hypaxia said. “And give her the chance to make the choice again. A few days as a Reaper might change her mind.”

Silence fell. Ithan looked to Jesiba, but the sorceress was silent, as if weighing Hypaxia’s every word.

Ithan swallowed hard. “Will it work?”

Jesiba didn’t take her eyes from Hypaxia as she said quietly, “It might.”

“But where’s her body?” Ithan pushed. “The last I heard from my friends, the Ocean Queen had it on her ship. She could have sent it out the air lock for all we know—”

“Give me thirty minutes,” Jesiba said, and didn’t wait for a reply before stalking out of the room.



* * *



There was nothing to do but wait. Ithan didn’t feel like doing anything except sitting at the desk and looking at his hands.

His inept, bloodstained hands.

He’d tried to save Sigrid from the Astronomer, and had only succeeded in killing her. And then turning her corpse into a Reaper. Every choice he’d made had led them from bad to worse to catastrophic.

Jesiba breezed through the metal doors of the morgue exactly thirty minutes later. “Well, it took more bribes than I’d have liked, but I have good news and bad news,” she declared.

“Good first,” Ithan said, looking up from his hands at last. Hypaxia had sat in the other desk chair the entire time, silent and thoughtful.

“I know where Sofie’s body is,” Jesiba said.

“And the bad news?” Hypaxia asked quietly.

Jesiba glanced between them, gray eyes blazing. “It’s on Avallen. With the Stag King.”





50


Ruhn had no idea how Bryce managed to not kill Morven. He honestly had no idea how he didn’t, either.

But they wasted no time getting to work. Though Bryce was apparently on Team Caves, she insisted on checking out the archives first.

The Avallen Archives were as imposing and massive as Ruhn remembered from his last and only visit to Avallen. Granted, he’d never been allowed inside, but from its looming gray exterior, the building rivaled the Depth Charger in sheer size. A city of learning, locked behind the lead doors.

Only for the royal bloodlines—the royal males—to access.

“We really have to work?” Flynn groused, rubbing his head. “Can’t we relax for a bit? This place gives me the creeps—I need to decompress.”

Athalar gave Flynn a look. “It gives all of us the creeps.”

“No,” Flynn said gravely, shaking his head. “I told you—my magic hates this place.”

“What do you mean?” Bryce asked, peering at him over a shoulder.

Flynn shrugged. “The earth feels … rotted. Like there’s nothing for my magic to grab on to, or identify with. It’s weird. It bothered me the first time we were here, too.”

“He whined about it the entire time,” Declan agreed, earning an elbow in the ribs from Flynn.

But Flynn jerked his chin at Sathia, standing by herself a few feet away. “You sense it, too, right?”

His sister twisted her rosebud mouth to the side, then admitted, “My magic is also uneasy on Avallen. My brother’s claims are not totally without merit.”

“Well,” Bryce said, “buck up, Flynn. I think a big, tough Fae male like you can power through. We’ll decompress tonight. Tomorrow we split into Team Archives and Team Caves and work as fast as we can.”