Page 112 of Brimstone

“How manyarethere?”

“Twelve hundred and twenty-three.” Elroy’s whisper echoed off the walls.

Eventually, we reached the bottom of the stairs. The space ahead was vast and cloaked in darkness. When I saw what lay before us, I felt like I’d been kicked square in the chest by a horse.

“Gods and sinners . . .” I gaped at the sight.

“What? What is it?” Hayden hissed.

“Our way out of this mess,” Carrion answered breathlessly. His mouth hung open, his eyes roving over the pillars that held up the arched ceiling, and the stacks of discarded pieces of armor, and the coins, and the chalices, and trunks overflowing with all manner of metal goods. Finally, his eyes went to the huge, recessed pool at the center of the cavern . . .

A spark of light bloomed on the other side of the cavern. The flicker was just a small orange-golden glow at first. Soon, there were two sparks of light, then three. Elroy skirted the perimeter of the space, lighting torches as he went. I’d been so distracted by the contents of his secret trove that I hadn’t even noticed him leaving us. By the time he had lit half the torches in their sconces and returned to us, the cavern was suffused with a dim light strong enough to see by.

Hayden was wild-eyed as he stepped toward the giant pool.

It was the first of its kind I had seen: recessed so that its steps led down to the still, solid surface of the pool below.

You came, you came. Came. You came . . .The sound flooded my ears. It was loud again. Many voices. Scores of them, all speaking at once. I hadn’t heard the voices this loud since Iseabail and Te Léna had begun working together to heal me.

Join us. Come, come, come . . .

Hayden cocked his head, squinting at the surface of the mirrored metal that slept at the bottom of the pool. “Whatisthat?” he asked.

Elroy grunted, gruffly clearing his throat. “That, my boy, is adangerousamount of quicksilver.”

26

IN THE END

SAERIS

YOU CAME, YOUcame. Came. You came . . .

The words slammed around inside my skull.

Came. Came. You came . . .

Ammontraíeth stopped and fell to its knees as I’d sprinted through its halls, making my way down into the bowels of the palace, to the tomb that housed the Blood Court’s quicksilver. The sharp, cold eyes of scores of high bloods had followed me as I’d run.

The crypt was just as Kingfisher, Carrion, Lorreth, and I had left it. Our footprints still marked the thick layer of dust on the ground. The lintel around the pool was still damaged, the stone shattered around the lip. A long, jagged crack shaped like a lightning bolt in the obsidian forked off toward the door. I’d said goodbye to Fisher here. He’d kissed me and held me, and I’d felt safe.

I didn’t feel safe anymore. I felt like I was about to explode. My nerve endings screamed as I ran to the pool and—and—

Fuck! What was I supposed todo?

You came. You came. Came . . .

The words boomed around the tomb. Hollow. Singular. They sank into my bones, reverberating, calling to me.

Join us. Come to us. Join us. We will help . . .

I’d dropped the relic back in the forge. The last time I’d gone into the quicksilver, I hadn’t had a relic. The gods had pulled me through. It had been instantaneous: One second, Fisher had been carrying me in his arms. The next, I’d woken up in that field of tall grass with two gods giggling over me. Fisher thought my Alchemist’s blood prevented the quicksilver from affecting me the way it had affected him once, but was it true? If I stepped into this quicksilver now, would it drive me crazy? Would it justkillme?

Come. Come to us. Join us . . .

Or was entering this pool now the only thing that would save me? Was this the key to my magic? Was this something Ihadto do to bond with the quicksilver? To show it that Itrustedit?

No time to decide.