“You must be very good,” I remarked, almost involuntarily. He was young, and a doppelganger. To be sent to the Light city indicated enormous talent.
“That’s what the ladies all tell me,” Carwyn said.
Mark looked disgusted. “Who else saw . . . the creature?”
I knew what Mark meant: Who had seen his face? Carwyn had had his back to the train. I was certain the passengers had not seen him.
“Just these guards,” I said honestly. I heard my voice shake, and Mark nodded as if confirming that it should. We both knew that I was signing the guards’ death warrant.
But they had tried to kill Ethan. It was Ethan or them.
“Thank you,” Mark told me. “I am certain a private conference with these fine officers will clear everything up.”
Some of his men, trained both to be subtle and to kill, depending on which was required, split from the protective unit around us and surrounded the Light guards from the train. I saw one of the guards’ faces, pale in the stark light of the train station, as scared as I had been, and then they were lost in the crowd.
“In the meantime, I am afraid that you were recognized on the train, and it has caused some upheaval among our civic-minded Light citizens,” Mark said. “There were rumors that the Golden Thread in the Dark had been taken off the train by the sans-merci. If you would be so kind as to spare some time to put the public’s mind at rest . . .”
He smiled at me. I smiled back at him.
“Of course.”
I grabbed Ethan’s elbow. “Don’t let Carwyn out of your sight!” I hissed.
Letting Carwyn disappear in the same way my mother had, the same way those guards would, was no way to repay him.
I left them both and went to Mark’s side.
“Ladies and gentlemen!” called out Mark Stryker. “The Golden Thread in the Dark.” Applause crackled, brief and abrupt as the clash of swords meeting. “As you can see, she is quite safe, and we intend to keep her so.”
He took my hand and turned me to the crowd, a gesture that read as protection unless you could feel his owner-tight grip. I blinked and added another sheen of distress to my face—wet eyes and parted lips.
“Thank you all so much for your concern for me,” I called. I did not know what the story about the sans-merci was, and did not dare risk contradicting whatever people were saying. I kept it vague. “I was scared for a while back in the train, but I had Ethan with me”—people laughed a little, indulgent about young love—“and now I’m back with Mr. Stryker, so I know I’m safe.”
I smiled up at Mark. He smiled down at me. We had perfected our smiles by then. This was easy.
Mark cleared his throat. “When the French scientist Louis de Breteuil discovered Light, he lit the world, changing and illuminating everything. Light replaced old and crude technologies with power that transformed a world. Nobody lives who remembers the world as it was, as a savage and lawless place where men used their limited resources to kill each other for those same resources. Light has saved us and spared us from such knowledge. Yet ever since Light has existed, it has had a shadow: the Dark, who use our blood in their spells, who benefit from our power and yet who think to rise up against us. The Dark are ungrateful and vicious, and they have forgotten the natural order. But I promise you, Light citizens, they have risen up in the past and failed. The Dark is always defeated. The Light cannot be quenched. Ever since the Garden, the serpent has existed. Ever since knowledge came into this world, evil came twined around it, and time and again evil has always been crushed. No matter what new measures we must introduce, our Light Council will remain dedicated to the protection of this city from dangerous insurgents. We will keep you safe.”
The cadence of Mark’s voice had changed from his earlier announcements, becoming low and persuasive. This was a very familiar speech, the essentials of which were so well known to me that they seemed like a prayer or a children’s story. Since I knew it by heart, it seemed true.
Light magic commands all things on this earth. So long as the sun burns in the sky, we rule the world.
All we need is the sun . . . and to be drained. The use of Light builds up in our blood, begins to be painful. It feels like burning in our veins, in the same way muscles burn when overstrained, but it does not stop there. If a Light magician is not drained, the pain gets worse. Eventually the magician will burn away from the inside out, bones turning to ash, and blood to flame.
Long ago, people used to drain patients’ blood with leeches to restore them to health, a barbaric ancient practice that did not work at all. Now the ancient lie has become truth. A practicing Light magician has to have their blood drained by a Dark magician. The more often we use magic, the more often we have to be drained. If we do not get drained regularly, we die.