Page 20 of Alchemised

F ERRON TOOK HER TO AND FROM THE courtyard each day. His mood was always dark after that, and he’d mockingly point out the location of the various light switches that she was “too dense” to observe on her own.

He was so condescending, she wanted to throw a rock at him and was disappointed when she found nothing outside but little pieces of finely milled white gravel.

The courtyard bored her. It was tedious and bitterly cold, the winter snow bearing down in the clouds, although there was never more than a dusting on the ground—enough to leave her feet numb with cold.

When alone, she ventured out of her room, determined to find a passable weapon; even a furniture nail would do. If Ferron wouldn’t slip up and do it, she’d kill herself before another transference session arrived.

In the hours when light trickled through the east windows, if she stayed near the walls and thought very carefully about breathing, she could manage the excursions.

But whenever she left her room for long, the necrothralls began materialising. They didn’t try to stop her or herd her back into her room; they just watched her, hovering like ghostly apparitions.

She tried to ignore them along with the creaks and groans of the house, the shifting shadows, but they made it impossible for her to find any means of suicide.

She persisted doggedly, but most of the rooms were locked tight, and those that weren’t held nothing but old furniture and useless knickknacks.

In one old room, she found a painting crammed behind a disassembled bed frame. It was covered by a dustcloth. She pulled it out, curious.

Drawing the fabric back, it was a portrait of the Ferron family. Not Ferron and Aurelia, but Ferron as a boy with his parents.

Atreus Ferron, the former patriarch, was a large man Helena vaguely remembered seeing at the Institute.

He had hawkish features, a harshly lined face, and heavy brows that shadowed pale-blue eyes.

He was elegantly dressed, but the family’s lineage as blacksmiths and ironmongers was plain to see in his build, his broad shoulders and huge hands with heavy iron rings decorating the fingers.

Kaine Ferron stood beside his father. He looked exactly as she remembered him from the Institute, so unlike the distilled iteration he would become.

His face was fuller, and while he was almost the same height as his father, he had none of the build that made the patriarch so intimidating.

Ferron was gangly, with the air of a colt.

His manners were a clear imitation of the man looming beside him.

His brown hair was lighter than his father’s but styled identically, his expression and posture also mirroring Atreus, dark brows drawn down over hazel eyes.

The central figure of the portrait was a woman in a pale-grey dress.

She wore an iron ring on her wedding finger, but her hands were so delicate that it looked out of place on her.

She was slight as a willow, with a heart-shaped face, grey eyes, and a small chin framed by ash-brown hair.

If Helena had seen a portrait of her alone, she would never have guessed that this was Ferron’s mother, but side by side, she could see her influence in his build, the way her features softened Ferron’s, erasing the harsh hawkish angles and build he would have inherited from his father; but there was the greatest likeness in their mouths and something in the light and tilt of their eyes.

Helena studied the faces for a long time before noticing that the portrait was incomplete. The details of their clothing and the motifs usually included in such portraiture were all absent. As if something had interrupted it, and that was why it was abandoned.

She let the dustcloth slip from her fingers and tucked the painting back into its hiding place. Her mind flipped like a coin between the dark-haired Ferron in the painting and the silvery-pale iteration that now existed.

“T HE INFLAMMATION IS NEARLY GONE,” Stroud announced two weeks later, bringing Mandl with her once again, and pressing her resonance intrusively into Helena’s brain until her vision turned red.

“I think monthly sessions will do. Although”—she picked up Helena’s wrist, inspecting her muscle tone with disapproval—“you’re not recovering the way I’d hoped. Are you going outside daily?”

“Yes. The High Reeve has been ensuring it.”

“And exercising? The stronger your constitution is, the more likely you’ll handle transference without any more febrile seizures.”

Helena stared at Stroud in speechless disbelief at this revelation that no one had seen fit to reveal previously. She’d had seizures?

Stroud stared back expectantly, and it took her a moment to remember that the woman thought walks might prevent them.

“Yes,” Helena bit out.

“Good. It’s been noted that you have a nervous disorder.”

Helena’s jaw tensed. Of course Ferron would have told Stroud.

“Yes. I don’t like—dark places I don’t know.”

There was a snort of laughter from Mandl.

“Well, not much to be done about that,” Stroud said, and resumed her examination of Helena. “You know, it’s a pity I can’t use you as one of my program’s trial subjects. I was rereading your admission paperwork. You had a remarkable repertoire.”

Helena’s throat closed.

“The Holdfasts did love collecting rare alchemists,” said Mandl.

Helena bit her tongue until she tasted blood.

Stroud nodded. “Once the High Reeve is done with you, I think I might request to have you next.”

Helena’s chin snapped up. “Well, you won’t have much luck with me. I’m sterilised.”

She winced as Stroud’s resonance suddenly jabbed into her lower abdomen. A moment later, disappointment and anger lit Stroud’s face.

“When did this happen?”

Helena looked away, staring across the room so hard, her vision blurred.

“It was one of the conditions the Falcon had for allowing me in the city. Since vivimancy is a corruption of the soul that begins in the womb, it could—it could be passed on. I’d already taken vows as a healer that I wouldn’t ever marry or have children, but he—” She swallowed. “He wanted to be sure.”

“And of course you agreed,” Stroud said, withdrawing her hand. “Because you thought they’d accept what you are if you only reduced yourself enough.”

Heat spread along Helena’s jaw. “There wasn’t any point in refusing. Like I said, I’d already made the vows.”

Stroud chuckled. “Usually, it was children who fell for that lie.”

Helena looked at her, eyes narrowing.

Stroud had an arch expression and glanced at Mandl again.

“Didn’t you know? Your Eternal Flame was quite adept at identifying potential vivimancers not even born.

It was, what, thirty years ago that Principate Helios mandated that all pregnancies be managed by the Faith’s hospitals.

Devout doctors trained to know what to look for and what solutions to offer.

What kind of parents would want to keep a monster once they’re warned of the danger? ”

Helena’s stomach clenched.

“Mandl here was abandoned at birth, raised as an orphan in one of the aeries. Children like her were told their soul’s corruption must be purified, and that if they did what was asked, they might be wanted someday.

” Stroud shrugged. “Of course, neither the Faith nor Paladia ever did want them for anything but forced labour. And look, they handled you the same way.”

“No,” Helena said, shaking her head. “Luc wasn’t like that.

He didn’t even know about the conditions for me becoming a healer.

Or how healing worked. He wouldn’t have let me, if he’d known.

People like Falcon Matias had harsh views, but Luc was always reining people like the Falcon in. Once it was over, he wanted to—”

“If he didn’t know, all that means is that he was a puppet and a fool. And you’re still one,” Mandl said, her dead face seething with hatred, before she turned to Stroud. “You should tell her what His Eminence did with Holdfast after he killed him.”

Helena’s stomach dropped like a stone. She looked quickly between them, but Stroud shook her head. “Remember your place, Mandl.”

When they were gone, Helena sat, frozen and wondering what had happened to Luc.

Of course it was no surprise they hadn’t cremated him properly, but—what had been done that Mandl wanted Helena tortured with knowledge of?

Luc had never deserved the cruelty and hatred he’d been subjected to.

She’d admit he hadn’t known everything, but that wasn’t because he was a puppet.

The position of Principate was complex. Being a religious head and ruler was a difficult task, especially during war when he was expected to be fighting and governing.

He couldn’t be weighed down by everyone else’s personal decisions.

Some choices had to be made without him, certain sacrifices that would have paralysed him to make or even know of. That didn’t make him a puppet. It made him human.

Helena had loved him for how human he was. He didn’t need to be Principate or favoured by the gods. He’d been good enough just as he was.

F ERRON MADE HIS ROUTINE APPEARANCE after Helena’s inedible lunch. She went resignedly to fetch her cloak.

“No need today,” he said. She paused, looking at him warily.

The door closed behind him with a soft click.

His fingers spun, and his resonance seized hold of her. She was pulled forward. Once she was near the bed, his hand flicked, toppling her back onto the mattress.

Ferron sauntered over, expression bored, the only emotion a glint in his eyes.

Helena bit her lip to keep quiet, willing her breathing to steady as she fought against his resonance.

He stared down at her through hooded eyes.

She hadn’t even considered this. She should have. She knew he was a monster, but he’d never shown interest.