Page 115 of Liminal

“Don’t touch me! Please. Don’t do this. Magister? Magister, please!”

“Does everyone remember the incantation?”

“We’re not students. I’ve been practising this school of magic since before you wrote your first thesis, Cynthia.”

“Quickly now. Once we’re done here, we can retire to my parlour. I had my butler bring up a bottle of Commandaria from the cellar. We can enjoy a glass before you all return home.”

“If they were alive, they would die a hundred times over for this,” I promise Kyrith in a low voice. “I swear to magic.”

But she’s gone silent again. Mute from fear.

I barely manage to hold back when she tenses like she can levitate herself out of the shackles andscreams. It’s an unearthly sound, a thousand times worse down here than it was in the Gallery above.

Someone forces her head back, and Magister Ackland plunges a dagger over the one embedded in the glass.

Blind rage overtakes me.

Maybe it’s stupid to get possessive over a ghost, but really, it’s more like protectiveness. Kyrith has been there since I was chucked out by my own family. When she took me on as a collector, she gave me money to feed myself, not that I’ve ever told her that. The Arcanaeum paid well enough that I could pay the UAA’s insane tuition fees on top of everything else—and I always wondered if that was purposeful. Now she’s protecting Jasper and me from the Carltons, even though the two of us have caused so much damage. Just having us around is a risk for her.

She might be prickly, formal, and a little grouchy at times, but she’s more-than earned my loyalty.

The mist and the dark shadowy echoes of her murderers disappear like they’ve been sucked into the blade, and Kyrith flings herself from the altar like she can’t get away fast enough. I almost don’t have enough time to dodge.

Whatever held her has lost its hold, but she doesn’t do anything besides cradle her knees on the floor. My blood is still pounding in my ears, adrenaline blazing through me as my body remains coiled and ready for a threat that isn’t there.

So I take three breaths before I drop into a crouch before her.

Her spirit is so dim that she barely casts a glow, and I grab that scrap I debated earlier, feeling the paper burn away between my fingers as the wisplight floats beside us. It illuminates theVault, but makes her even harder to see, so I shift it behind my body as a compromise.

Kyrith’s head rests heavily on her knees as she pants like she’s run a mile and cradles her head in her hands, shrinking back from me like she’s ashamed.

If anything, my respect for her has skyrocketed. She should, by rights, be a maddened wreck, haunting the Arcanaeum like a crazed poltergeist.

Instead, she’s still here, still sane.

Most people might try to say something, but I’ve never been great with words. I’m not sure they would help here, anyway.

Pain has a way of carving through a person, demanding its due. In those situations, well-meaning words of comfort can only assuage the guilt of the person speaking them.

So I give her what she asked for, my company, leaning back against the altar beside her and waiting for her to make the first move.

“It’s late,” she finally says, staggering to her feet. “And it’s cold down here. We should head upstairs.”

My joints are stiff from how long we’ve been sitting, so I rise slower than I ordinarily would. I take in the shelves full of grimoires one last time before heading for the stairs. While I recognise the value in all of these books, I’m not interested in reading any. I’m probably the only person in the world who has no interest in most of them.

I know where my talents are, and locking myself away with books all day isn’t it.

“I suppose I should thank you,” she mumbles, floating along beside me as I scale the staircase.

“Don’t,” I cut her off.

I don’t want her gratitude. Not for this.

She searches my face for a second, and I relax incrementally when she nods, understanding my meaning perfectly.

“It helped,” she admits.

Silence lapses, comfortable and serene between us. The only noise is the sound of my breathing and my boots on the stone. Even the flames in the braziers are silent.