Page 15 of Alchemised

H ELENA SAID NOTHING. S HE HAD NO IDEA what to expect or what to do, so she watched Ferron like a cornered animal.

His eyes flicked from her to the door.

“Aurelia brought you here, I presume.” He sighed. “I suppose it is time that we begin.”

He came forward. Helena stiffened, but he strode past her to the wardrobe and jerked it open.

Apparently, he was not quite an ascetic.

The door of the wardrobe held an entire row of decanters.

He snatched one up and poured several fingers of amber liquid into a tumbler before turning back, taking a long sip as he stared at her over the glass, his gaze starting at the floor and working slowly up.

His attention turned away when he reached her shoulders. He looked down at the tumbler with another sigh as if the situation were deeply inconvenient for him.

“Let’s get this over with.”

Helena didn’t move.

His gaze lifted. “Come here.”

When she didn’t obey, a slow smile curved along his lips. “I can make you, if you don’t.”

He raised his hand and gestured lazily, long fingers curling with perfect precision, knuckle by knuckle.

Helena’s limbs began moving against her will, like a puppet manipulated across a stage. Her legs bent, lifted, weight shifting, step, another step. She fought against it, tensing, but it only made her bones feel like they’d snap.

It stopped once she was within arms’ reach. He tilted her chin up with a fingertip, their eyes meeting.

“See?” he said. “It’ll be easier if you obey.”

She would have spat at him, but when she tried, her jaw clenched, teeth locking together. His eyes gleamed.

“Don’t test me; it won’t get you what you want,” he said, his eerie eyes hooded. “You know, this is new for me. I don’t generally keep prisoners.”

He drained his glass and set it down.

“Sit.” He gestured towards the chair.

Her limbs came free. She considered trying to bolt, if for no other reason than to be annoying, but she could feel his resonance through her nerves like a trip wire.

She sat, and the instant she was in place, she couldn’t move again.

Ferron stepped behind her. She could hear him but not see him, which made her heart beat faster, ears straining for any sound.

One of his hands caught her jaw, tilting her head back until she was staring at the ceiling. She couldn’t see his face, only his other hand, which bore a dark ring that glittered in the low light. Two fingers pressed against her temple, and his thumb settled between her eyes.

He leaned forward just enough that she could glimpse his face.

“Now then, let’s see what it’s like to be you.”

She tensed as a weight enveloped the front of her skull, pushing down with slowly increasing pressure. It grew and grew until something gave way, as though Ferron’s fingers had gone through her forehead and into her brain.

Her mind and body were abruptly sheared apart. She could sense that her skull was still intact, his hands still on the surface, but it felt as though her head had been broken open, cracked like an egg, her brain exposed as Ferron’s resonance poured inside.

It wasn’t a channel of energy like normal resonance, but something immense and fluid that pushed into the space until she was suffocating under it, the grooves and crevices of her mind filled with the oppressive, growing sense of an Other trying to occupy the plane of her cerebral existence.

When there were no more crevices, her consciousness was crushed as though collapsing in on itself.

Everything went red.

She was screaming.

She could hear it. Feel it. The physical part of herself still immobilised in the chair was screaming, but Helena’s mind was elsewhere, fissuring beneath the growing pressure of Ferron’s consciousness.

Ferron didn’t stop. He pushed deeper. She was drowning inside her brain, trapped as the water rose and the pressure grew and there was nowhere to go. He swallowed her whole.

There was a seismic hum, then light like a mist evaporating.

She was still staring up, eyes locked on the ceiling. A pale face hung straight above her, staring down.

Her eyes moved jerkily, startled at Ferron’s cruel features, at how alien and unnatural he was. She realised sluggishly that he was in her mind, looking at himself through her eyes.

Then he was gone. His resonance and mind ripped out like an invasive taproot.

Everything inside her mind collapsed around the empty space, the integrity of her own consciousness crumbling.

She fell sideways out of the chair, the room tumbling with her.

Her thoughts rolled like dice in her skull.

Where was she?

“Get out.”

She knew the words, but they came from far away. Sounds. Not Etrasian. Etrasian was prettier. Melodic.

This was—

Dialect.

Her thoughts were very slow.

She tried to lift her head, but the room kept moving.

She must be on a ship. Crossing the sea. Leaving the cliffs and islands behind.

Where was she going?

To school. Yes, she was going to study alchemy.

There was something wet on her face. She tried limply to lift her hand and managed to smear it away.

Her fingers came away red. Why red?

“Get out!”

The room shook. Helena was picked up by an unseen force and shoved towards the door. She collapsed dazedly, but the jolt knocked her back into herself, remembering.

Ferron. The transference.

Her stomach turned over. If it hadn’t been empty, she would have vomited.

She looked back. He was right there, his face white and terrifying, twisted with fury. The room hummed.

“ I said get out ! ” He looked like an animal, ready to lunge and rip her throat open with his bare teeth.

Absolute terror flung Helena into action. She pushed herself up, wrenched the door open, and fled.

The ground rolled beneath her feet. Her vision was stained red no matter how much she blinked, as if the walls were dripping with blood, shadows turned to gore. She kept smearing her hands across her eyes as she tried to find her way.

All she could hear was her panicked breathing and her feet on bare wood, the iron in the floor like ice.

She reached the top of the stairs. She could feel herself going into shock, her limbs turning leaden, dragging her down. Her body growing colder and colder as a feverish chill consumed her.

She swayed and nearly toppled down the steps, clinging to the banister to keep upright, staring down into the foyer.

The roses rippled as if underwater, floor shifting, and around it circled a black dragon.

It was curled inwards around the table, wings spread out, head curved down so that its tail was caught within its teeth, consuming itself.

An ouroboros.

In her red-stained vision, it looked as if it were swimming in blood.

What if she just threw herself over the balcony?

There was no one to stop her. The secrets Luc had entrusted to her would be safe, and Ferron would have failed.

She leaned forward, hands trembling.

Headfirst.

Dead on impact or Ferron could use vivimancy to keep her alive.

Just a little—

A vise-like grip closed around her arm and wrenched her back an instant before she toppled over the railing.

She whirled and found Ferron glaring at her.

“Don’t. You. Dare.”

She tried to jerk loose, lunging towards escape, but he dragged her back from the railing and down the stairs as she beat and clawed at him, trying to rip herself free. He didn’t stop. He pulled her through the house, practically kicking in the door of her room before shoving her onto the bed.

Helena collapsed, breathing unsteadily, hands and wrists throbbing.

“Did you think I didn’t know you’d try to kill yourself?” Ferron asked venomously. “As if there’s anything the Eternal Flame loved more than dying for their causes.”

“I thought you liked us dead.” Her head hurt so much, she wanted to vomit.

He gave a barking laugh. “Consider yourself the sole exception to that rule. The High Necromancer wants your secrets, and until he has them, you will not die.”

He glanced around her room, and his eyes seemed to glow.

He closed them, shaking his head. “I thought transference would be enough for one night, but it seems you’re determined to make this as difficult for yourself as possible.”

He leaned over her.

Helena stared at him in dread.

“Let’s see what other ideas you’ve had.” His cold fingers pressed against her temple.

It wasn’t transference, and she was so relieved that she almost relaxed when she realised he was only violating her memories.

His resonance swept through her mind like a breeze, sending her thoughts fluttering.

He moved slowly. Instead of a long pass across time, he took interest only in recent events, winding through her memories like a current.

He seemed to pore over every detail. Exploring her room. The way the hallway frightened her, and her musings over him and his family. Her attempts at exercise.

When he finally stopped, the blood on her face had dried in tracks down her cheeks.

“Industrious as always,” he said mockingly, pulling his hand away.

Her jaw clenched.

He was still leaning over her, hand pressed into the mattress by her head. “Do you really think you can trick me into killing you?”

She stared stonily at the canopy.

“You’re welcome to try.” He turned to leave, then paused as if just remembering something. “Don’t enter my room again. If I want to deal with you, I’ll come here.”

Once he was gone, Helena didn’t move.

She hadn’t placed much faith in her plans. She’d known the odds of success were impossibly small, and yet she’d tried to convince herself otherwise. Luc wouldn’t give up. If it were him, he’d fight to the very last. How could she betray him by doing less?

But Luc was dead.

No matter what she did, it wouldn’t bring him back.

Her shivering grew uncontrollable. She curled onto her side, burrowing into the bedding. The wounded feeling in her head grew until it was a sinkhole drawing her inwards, her skin growing taut like a membranous exoskeleton.

The sheets became damp with her sweat as her fever rose. Her body was freezing, but her brain was on fire.