Direct them? Did his heresy have some truth to it? She tried to quiet her thoughts with recitations of faith. People were born with their split souls, theirs to do with what they liked. If they obeyed the tenets of the Church and remembered the brilliance within them, they would rejoin Asten’s peace after their mortal trial ended. And if they followed the corruption of the Shadow accidentally birthed at the same time as humanity's creation, their soul would fade in the severed realm of Hell.

There were ghosts, but they were said to be born of trauma, souls that refused to let themselves be escorted beyond the ether. They weren’t anything to speak of gently and some didn’t even believe they were real. They couldn’t, shouldn’t, be created on purpose.

“That’s the province of Asten.” She could hear Ágnes’ own instructional sharpness in her tone, and she straightened from muscle memory. Though if Ágnes had been here, she would have no doubt been dragging Csilla away.

“And They gave me this gift.” Mihály raised his hand in oath. “The most pure way to worship is to fully understand creation, to never stop trying to see what They have truly given us. That’s why knowledge is counted among the virtues. And our souls are Their most perfect creation, as eternal as They are.”

“Yet They corrupted Themselves in the making of them.” Shadow had only come about in the creation of humankind. Even an Izir shouldn’t forget that.

A sad, sick meow echoed from somewhere in a dusty corner, pulling her from the argument. A thin cat shook against the clapboard wall. She was so dark, knotted and thin, she nearly blended in with the shadows.

“That’s the mother of those dead kittens,” Mihály sighed. “Skittish thing.”

Csilla scowled and walked diagonally towards the wall, giving the cat a wide berth. Then she crouched, held out her hand, and waited. She tried not to think about the man staring at her, watching as if she were another experiment.

Gingerly, the cat stepped forward. She was a skeleton—not many mice around this time of year, and she was clearly too weak to hop on the table and fight the tarp for what Mihály had laid out. She might not even be able to chew bones.

The pink nose touched Csilla’s fingertips, and Csilla stroked the ridges of her spine, trying not to even breathe. When she got close, Csilla snatched her up in her cloak. The cat yowled but didn’t fight. She didn’t have the strength to.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, sweet thing. I’m going to help you.” Her own breath quickened with the cat’s panicked panting. She turned back to Mihály, revulsion churning. She thought she could still help the church by finding the killer, or at least help herself to Mihály’s knowledge. But this was more than she could stand. She wasn’t lying when she said she wasn’t delicate; she’d treated festering wounds and wrung chicken necks, walked hours in freezing sleet delivering medicines. The difference was that was all in the service of life. There was no life here.

“I’m going back now.” Her shoulders shook with anger, but it was all directed at herself for daring to expect something better. “Forget I ever came to you.”

He arched an eyebrow. “You came looking for me. You believed I could help you.”

She cringed at the reminder as he continued.

“And I can do more for you than you even know if you stay with me.” The sweetness was back in his voice, softening her again despite her instincts.

“What do you mean?” Csilla looked back at the table, all the stiff and dried out corpses, their frozen yawns uncomfortably close to screams. “You said your powers don’t create souls and you hardly seem inclined to help me help the Church.”

“Create? No. But with the right vessel, I can move one.” He stepped in close and drew a finger across her cheek. She jerked back, the sudden familiarity a jolt. “I wasn’t prepared before, and animals have a fragile essence. No shadow, of course, but not quite brilliance either. And moving a soul into a creature that already has one never ends well. But you, empty but not dead—“

“Do it then.” Her heart hammered, and the cat squirmed. “If you can prove you’re right using me, you can leave them alone.”

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment. “First we need a soul. And a lot of blood to carry it.”

Her throat seized, dry and closing. “Whose blood?”

“And that is where our interests align. I agree the killer needs to be caught.”

Her heartbeat thudded in her throat as pieces slid together. “You want to give me the murderer’s soul?”

Mihály shook his head. “We could, if it comes to that, but what we need is his blood. Trust me, it’s better if we use someone else’s. It’s hard to work miracles with an open vein.”

“You know something about it, then?” Her voice was so quiet she wasn’t sure he could hear her. But his lips thinned, and he rolled up his sleeve. Along the river of his vein was the raised pale flesh of a scar. By the thickness, the cut that had made it had been deep, and she instinctively reached for it even though it was long healed.

Magic that came from the body was powerful. There was a reason the Church used it in vows, and spilled blood was prayed over and cut hair was burned. That power made it easy to turn dark. “But you’re an Izir.”

“Which is why I can’t work shadow magic.” His tone was even and the brilliance of his soul showed in his smile, melting her doubt. “Asten intended for us to have these physical forms, no matter what went wrong in the making of them. Let me help you. And you will help me.”

Her entire being curled with want at his promises, rich with power and more than she’d ever dared hope for. “But we still need a soul.” Her voice was nothing but a whisper.

“I have one in mind.” His eyes were lit with a look she recognized. Hope, undercut with desperation.

He talks to ghosts.He said he calls them.

“What—“

“You’ll still be you,” he promised, eyes earnest. “That I know. But yes. I see souls. I see ghosts. Even if no one believes me.”

She looked again at the scar, a stark warning on his skin. She believed him. That didn’t mean it was safe. “What if you can’t do it?”

Offense flashed over his face, and then he softened. “Then at least we’ve caught the killer. You can stay, the faithful girl who delivered them from a monster. I’m no worse off. I’ve failed before. I can handle it.”

She could save everyone and be saved in turn. She wanted so badly for it to be true, even as her eyes flicked back to the corpses. Graced Rozalia, her mind whispered, conjuring images of the miracle of preservation, the perfect corpse said to still rest in the cathedral. There was precedent for miracles requiring death.

Mihály placed his hands over her free one, pressing her palm as if praying through her skin. “Asten brought us together for a reason. I’m the only person who can help you. And you are the only one who can prove I’m right.”

She swallowed. Their meeting did have an uncomfortable ring of fate. The church taught there was nothing without purpose.

“If you can’t trust me,” Mihály continued. “Trust Them. You made the right choice in coming to me.”

“I have faith in Them,” she answered. But she’d never had a reason to spare much faith on herself and doubt was a worm gnawing at the hope trying to root.

“And me?”

He brushed his fingers over the mark on her cloak, and a starry silver glitter danced on the surface. He was right— he was chosen. Trusting in one meant trusting in the other and that’s what she had been raised to do. She closed her eyes, blocking out the dim and stinking barn, the ruined creatures, everything but the warmth of the man in front of her.

“Yes.”

11

Ilan

Nothing good ever came of sudden meetings. He’d been planning to track down Csilla and question her about her little act of theft, but the muster bells ringing urgent summons stopped his feet, and the eyes of the other priests forced him to follow into the chapter house. There wouldn’t be a way to explain where he was going without the galling admission that a combination of exhaustion and misguided pity had resulted in what could be the largest leak in their investigation.

There were far too many clergy gathered in the dim room. Ordinarily the chapter house held a half dozen members or so as their committees debated the daily workings of keeping order: food, supplies, sanitation, changes to service. All necessary tasks, but none requiring so many hands for approval.

Elder Abe stood before them with a broad, dark-haired man dressed in the cream and silver cassock of the Incarnate’s service, though the hem hung above his ankles and black soil crumbled from beneath his boots with each step. Ilan frowned at the little clumps dotting the stone floor. The roads were damp this fickle time of year, but a wiser servant would have changed shoes before creating more work for his fellow faithful. They didn’t wear road boots to service.

“Sandor has come to us at a fortunate time,” the Prelate said. The stranger nodded at his name, raising a heavy hand in greeting. A gold and ivory seal ring decorated his small finger, oddly delicate in contrast to the thick joint. “He has been sent by the Incarnate in response to the troubles.”

So this was their stand-in. Ilan let out a sharp breath as others raised their voices in praise. He, the Prelate, and others had all written to the Incarnate, urging him to hasten his return to the brilliant city. War and taxes and council would mean little if the church lost its power.

But the Incarnate didn’t come, and the stranger looked to be a poor substitute.