Chapter 45 Nevelyn Tin’vori

Nevelyn was being haunted by ghosts.

She saw them moving around her like vengeful spirits. Talking and pointing and she could not hear anything they were saying. Surely, they had to be ghosts. One of them tried to take Garth from her. She bit and scraped and cursed and fought. When she tasted copper—someone else's blood—she realized that the ghosts weren't there to hurt her. They were there to help. Heavy hands pulled her away. A pair of women brought her to the bath. They quietly undressed her, patiently washed away all the blood. Nevelyn said nothing as her skin turned pink and wrinkly. In the other room, she could see people scrubbing at the blood on the floor. Cutting away the dark cords she'd spent so much time measuring and installing. There was a discussion of what to do with the body. It was so short that Nevelyn did not even hear what they agreed to. There was a far more thorough debate over the dress. No one seemed to want to touch it. Could they burn it? Was it still dangerous? Eventually they left. Everyone except for the two women. Both of them had matching, half-faded bruises along their arms and collarbones. They helped her get dressed, led her over to her bed, and tucked her under the covers like a child.

And like a child, she fell straight to sleep.

When she woke, Dahvid was there. His was the only voice she ever cared to hear again. His and Ava's. Why risk speaking to anyone else? She'd just have to watch them die eventually. She was starting to feel like their life was just a long, winding curse.

"Your plan worked," he said.

Nevelyn nodded. "Why doesn't it feel that way?"

She thought he might understand her bitterness. Surely he'd been told about the man they'd cleaned up from her apartment floor. She hoped for empathy. Instead, her brother's expression broke. He began weeping. She'd only seen him cry one other time. The night they'd left the estate.

"Cath," he whispered. "Cath is dead."

Nevelyn wrapped her brother in a hug. She'd always been the comforter. For little Ava and all her tantrums. For Dahvid, too, when the days felt long and the way home impossible. It was a part of why she'd never had any time for herself. No pursuits of her own. Not until Garth.

"How did it happen?"

"It was me." He shook his head, wiping away tears. "I used Ware's tattoo."

The reaching hands. They'd talked about it so many times over the years. Dahvid had always viewed it with a certain mysticism. She'd begged him to test out the magic, but he'd always felt destined to use the tattoo in his great moment of need. Apparently, destiny really did not care much for the Tin'Vori family. It always did its best to spite them.

"And what happened?"

"It was clever," he said sadly. "Ware was always clever. It's an exchange. My physical condition for his physical condition. I think he assumed that he would always be my favorite. Activating the tattoo was intended to draw on his life force, and only enough to restore my energy for a battle."

"But it drew on Cath," she whispered. "Because she was your favorite. And the tattoo's power had grown over the years. It would have been impossible to control how much you drew on her. Oh, Dahvid. I'm so sorry."

She found herself telling him about Garth. Not just the end, but the entire story. As if she needed to convince someone else that it had really happened. That it was not what it felt like—an already-fading dream. "He's gone."

There was silence. What else could be said? Words would not bring them back.

"What happens now?" she asked.

"House Brood will publicly admit to the fact that the raid of our houses was done on illegal pretenses," Dahvid said. "They will condemn it and ask the governors of Kathor to reinstate our house to its previous status. We are to be paid restitution. Restored."

Nevelyn nearly choked on that final word. How could they ever be restored? She remembered seeing Theo Brood on the floor when she was walking around the estate. Obviously, he had survived. Who else would accept public disfavor to help a long-broken house like theirs? It had to be him—and Ren Monroe. At least the girl was good enough to keep her promises.

There was only one question that mattered.

"Have you heard from Ava?"

Dahvid's expression darkened. "No. I am making inquiries."

Her jaw clenched. It would be one more reason to feel guilty. It was their fault that she'd been in Nostra. They'd sent her there, knowing all the potential risks. Nevelyn wished she could convince herself that they'd all decided to accept the risk at the outset of the plan, but Ava was the baby sister. She was always going to agree to do anything they asked her to do.

"We'll find her."

She did not believe her own words. Dahvid nodded as if he did. After a moment, he stood.

"Come."

"What? Where?"

He looked back. "We still have to bury them."

They were escorted to their former residence. Nevelyn had never dared to come anywhere close to the old house, for fear of being recognized, and she was shocked to see how it stood. A literal castle, nestled between the busy sprawl of other houses and businesses, and it had remained vacant. All this time. No one had ever moved in after them.

Apparently, every carpet and painting and spoon had been claimed in the aftermath of the raid. All divvied up. But there had been some difficulty in litigating the actual residence. Who should be allowed to claim the property? It was quite valuable, but making a claim demanded that someone put their official name on the deed. That kind of official documentation would unmask one of the culprits. Everyone knew who'd raided the house, but rumors would not hold up in a court of law the same way a signature on a house deed might. And so it had sat all this time. Empty.

Nevelyn followed Dahvid through halls that were so empty, rooms so barren, that she nearly started laughing. Even their house was a ghost. They aimed for the run of glass windows along the back of the house. There were cobwebs and broken glass and decrepit stains. Even in such a state, the view over their back gardens of the harbor was breathtaking. Like looking through time and into her own childhood. She followed her brother outside.

"I had them dig up Ware's body," Dahvid explained quietly. "And the tree that had grown over his grave—I burned it. It was a cursed thing. Fed by Thugar's hatred for him. Our brother's spirit was restless there. Now he's home. He will hear our voices instead."

There were three fresh graves. Dark pits waiting to take the dead from them one more time. One for Garth, one for Cath, and one for Ware. She looked at the three bodies under their black-mesh burial shrouds and thought of all they had lost. Dahvid signaled. The gravediggers quietly set down their shovels, murmured their condolences, and left.

Nevelyn looked around the empty courtyard and the surrounding gardens. All of this had once been a pretend land for them to conquer. They would imagine themselves as famous spellcasters or marauders or pioneers. Such bright imaginations, and all they'd managed to do in real life was turn it into this: a graveyard.

She was about to ask Dahvid if he wanted to say anything when magic rippled in the air before them. Both of them tensed as a girl appeared in midair. She was reaching out, her fingers pinched together, as if she'd just extinguished a candle. She floated above the ground for an impossible moment. And then gravity snared her.

She fell straight into one of the waiting graves. Dahvid hissed one of his rare curses. Nevelyn rushed forward and fell to her knees. Ava Tin'Vori was there. She let out a horrible groan, rolled onto her back, and stared up at them. She was covered in dirt and dried blood and gods only knew what else. After a long moment, she grinned up at them.

"I don't remember the graves. Are they new?"

"You insensitive, crass little creature…"

In spite of her scolding, Nevelyn reached down with Dahvid to help their sister up.

"Not a single word from you. Even though you knew the plan. Not a whisper! We've been worried sick, Ava. We thought you'd…"

"Died?" Ava laughed as they finally pulled her out of the grave. The irony drew out a smirk from Nevelyn, too. Her heart was pounding with relief. So many terrible things had happened. There'd been no reason to smile. Not until now. At least the three of them had survived. But she saw that it had been a near thing for Ava. Her sister's entire body was covered with bruises. She'd bandaged a gash on her left arm, but the blood had soaked through and the wound looked infected. There were a dozen other smaller scrapes and wounds.

"What happened to you?"

"It's a long story," Ava answered. "And I will not tell it without a glass of wine in hand."

Dahvid snorted. "You're insufferable."

"Good to see you, too. Hey. Who are we burying?"

Their brother's smile fell away. "Cath, Ware, and Garth."

Ava navigated past the open graves to look down at the bodies. They followed. She knelt beside Cath's slender form first. "She was so very good to you. I'm sorry, Brother."

He nodded solemnly. She turned to Ware next, setting a gentle hand on his skeletal foot.

"Ware… you look a lot thinner than I remember. Good on you for staying fit."

Nevelyn laughed. It hurt to allow the sound out into a world that felt so joyless, but she could not keep it in. Dahvid was grinning, looking more like his old self. Ava stepped around Ware to the last of the three bodies.

"Garth," she said, her voice thick with emotion. Then she turned back. "Who the hell is Garth?"

All three of them were laughing then. Loud enough to wake the dead. It was only later, after they'd finished the burials, that she found herself wishing it worked that way. That a smile or a joke might bring them back. The three siblings gathered together in the empty kitchen that looked out past the back gardens and offered a glimpse of the distant harbor. Nevelyn procured some wine from a shop on the corner of their street, as well as a few cups. She poured a healthy measure for each of them as Ava recounted what had happened.

When she finished, the quiet held.

Dahvid was pacing back and forth. Nevelyn could see that little crease between his eyebrows that meant he was quietly raging. Angry about how close they'd come to losing her. Ava poured herself a second glass. All three of them stared through the windows at the distant harbor. The last time they'd seen it was from a very different angle. Down in the tunnels beneath the house. Watching their parents' ship burn like a lantern in the endless black of night.

Between then and now, they'd lived a hundred different lives. Pretended to be messengers and war orphans and farmer's daughters. Anything they could do to keep themselves clothed and fed and alive. Each of them had sacrificed. Each of them had given everything to make sure, one day, they would return to this place. And each one of them had lost so much to come back.

Nevelyn knew that now was the time to begin again. A season of restoration. Maybe that would mean restoring the castle or selling the place to start new lives elsewhere. Thugar Brood was dead. He could haunt them no longer. They'd just defeated one of the greatest houses in the world. Unbidden, the old dream of living in the mountains returned to her. Reading books on a porch at dusk. It would be a quiet life—one that she'd more than earned.

That was the right decision to make, but Nevelyn's thoughts kept drifting to Ava. The thought of her baby sister alone in that mountain pass, leaving tracks of blood in the snow as she crawled down to Nostra for help. She could not stop the words she spoke next. Even if some small part of her hated to say them.

"I think I might have a plan."

Both of her siblings smirked. Nevelyn always had a plan.

This one was simple: House Tin'Vori would rise again.