Nox shoots an icy stare at me.
I shrug. “I overheard.”
“Right,” he says, and it looks as if he intends to bore his fingers through his skull with the way his veins bulge when he massages his temples.
“Well, you’re clearly not in the mental state to work right now. So just tell me. Tell me what you are.”
Nox heaves out a long sigh and backs himself up against the wall before sliding down it, knees splaying as he rests his forehead into his open palms. “Fine.”
I shift, and Nox flinches. “Don’t come any closer.”
“Wasn’t planning on it,” I say, backing toward the bell on the wall in case I need to alert the queen that I really am about to die and she better consider long and hard whether she’s willing to let that happen.
“Years ago I found I became fascinated with reanimation—the theory that there are darker forms of magic that can be used to bring the dead back to life.”
Goosebumps prickle on my skin, and I find myself wrapping myself in my arms. “Seems like the type of thing that would be more popular if it actually worked.”
Nox lets out a resistant chuckle. “If only you’d been here to tell me that a few years ago.”
I wait, and after a moment, he continues. “I got it into my head that if I could bring back the queen’s son, she’d finally decide I was no longer of any use for her. That her obsession with me would fade, eclipsed by her joy of being reunited with her son. So I sought to bring him back.”
“You wanted to resurrect him?”
Nox shakes his head. “Not exactly. There wasn’t a body to resurrect. Only ashes. But I thought if we could find a host, a body to act as a shell, we could imbue the body with Farin’s spirit. His soul.”
My mouth goes dry. “Souls stick around in the ashes of a body?”
“Not exactly,” Nox says, and I feel a bit of relief. “Even then, I didn’t expect the boy to truly be Farin. More like the essence of him. But I hoped it would be enough for the queen. It took very little convincing to get her to agree. I told her to recover a corpse she thought was befitting to house her son.”
“But she had other things in mind.” My stomach recoils.
“Exactly.” Nox still doesn’t look at me. He just stares at the same spot on the floor like his life depends on it.
Like my life depends on it, I suppose.
“Gunter warned me not to dabble in this sort of magic. Not to trust the queen. But I wouldn’t listen. And when it came time to perform the ritual, the queen hadn’t produced a body. I thought she was just being particular and couldn’t find a body worthy of suiting her son, but I was wrong. She’d had a plan all along. The first part of the ritual involved drinking…well, a rather displeasing concoction that included the ashes of the deceased.”
My dinner churns at the thought.
“She shoved it down my throat before I realized what was happening. I remember nothing after that. Not until I woke up, at least. She performed the ritual without me, but it didn’t go as planned. When I woke I was different. Something else. Something not quite fae. I could lie without consequence, and then there was him…”
He trails off for a little while, and I debate whether to prod. Not that I wish to rush his story, but the more he talks, the less tense his muscles seem, the less he looks like he’s moments away from closing the distance between us.
“Does that mean he’s inside you now?” I whisper when the silence stretches on for too long.
Nox picks at the grout between the stone that makes up the floor.
“His essence, yes.”
A shudder creeps up my spine, but it’s not fear that rattles me.
A brilliant flare of commiseration rushes through me, and I try to shove it down, tuck it away.
I’ve no business glorying in someone else’s possession, even if it does make me feel less alone.
And I don’t. Not really. I ache for him, even more than I ache for myself.
But there’s an understanding there too. One I’m grateful to be privy to.
“Can you feel him?” I ask, and Nox nods.
“Sometimes. He’s hungry. Always. But not for food or drink. He’s hungry for…for pain. I can’t describe it, but when I cause pain…” He swallows, like he’s trying to force the words out. “If I go too long without causing suffering, the headaches and body aches set in.”
A chill sweeps through the room. “You started rubbing your temple all the time. It was after you stopped torturing me,” I say.
Nox doesn’t look up. “I didn’t want you to suffer.”
I bite my lip. “But then, there have been times since then that you’ve seemed…better.”
The question lingers between us, stale as the dank dungeon air. All the question implies.
And all of a sudden, I’m picturing Nox, but it’s not the Nox I’ve come to care for. It’s the Nox from the day of the parchment cut, the Nox with his hands wrapped around me like I was his possession.
What if I’d rather keep you?
It’s that Nox I picture slicing into the flesh of his victims with a scalpel. That Nox I picture ripping bones from sockets.
I feel as though I’m going to be sick.
