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Instead, I turned to Oryous’s painting. But when I mimicked his stance, when I reached my arm out in front of me, I did not raise it in objection. I reached for Death like a friend.

“Nedra?”

The voice startled me, and I dropped my unlit candle, the hot wax spilling on my hand.

Grey stepped into the chapel, his eyes seeking me. He smiled when he saw me, and I was grateful that he hadn’t seen me a moment before, and that he couldn’t read my blasphemous thoughts.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

I held out the prayer candle as answer. “How did you know to find me here?”

“I checked the library first,” he said. “Then I went to Master Ostrum’s office. He suggested the chapel.” He looked around, drinking in the paintings. I realized this must be his first time here.

I stepped back over the kneeling pads and past the eternal flame, dropping my candle into the basket to be reused by other worshippers. It wasn’t until Grey had followed me out of the chapel that I turned to him. “I thought you were going to come with me this morning,” I said, not meeting his eyes.

“Are we not still going?” Grey asked.

I gaped at him. “Where have you been?”

“You’ve already gone down to the factory?” Grey asked.

“I told you last night,” I said. “Sunrise.”

Grey laughed, but cut himself short when he saw my look. “But the cafeteria doesn’t open until...” his voice trailed off. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Youdidsay sunrise, but I just assumed...”

“The gods forbid you miss breakfast,” I said, not bothering to bite back my tone.

“It’s not like that,” Grey said.

I raised an eyebrow at him. He did not deserve my rage, but all I had within me now was anger boiling, steeping in sorrow.

“I messed up,” Grey confessed. “I’ll be ready tomorrow. I’ll meet you at sunrise, like you said.”

“Sure,” I said as if it didn’t matter.

I wondered what he would have thought of me if he’d seen me today, reaching past the limits of medicinal alchemy. Would he have tried to stop me?

And then I wondered: If he had been there, would I have even attempted it in the first place?

TWENTY-EIGHT

Nedra

I looked askanceat Master Ostrum’s cluttered laboratory, not willing to meet his intense gaze. We both knew what needed to be said.

“So,” Master Ostrum said. “Today.”

“Today,” I replied.

“Today you... crossed a line.”

I looked down at my hands in my lap. “I just... I wanted to help.”

“You realize,” Master Ostrum said slowly, considering each word, “that you were toying with necromancy.”

Something inside me ached with a hunger that mirrored the greedy maw of Death. And then I remembered the statue of Bennum Wellebourne in the center of the quad, and how people hated him so much they poured molten iron over his image.

“It wasn’t necromancy, though,” I said. “I used my golden crucible.”