The Silver Scale Inn crouches under the noon sun, its skin slick with rain and debris, remnants of the storm. Hard-beaten and haggard as its patrons, it is the only inn Fornthveit has, and so we keep it.


    Faint hope grumbles beneath my ribs, and I dare not indulge it. For four years, Izzy and I scoured hovels, ruins, and distant villages, picking through the carcass of the forsaken south. All in the name of a singular goal: purging me of the drums. Of Her. It was four years of nothing, and now, a sudden something.


    The night before, I spent hours sifting through text so dense I’m not sure how Izzy made sense of it. I’m not even sure I made sense of it. Mentions of grotesque rituals and old, ancestral magic—things we had never considered possible. It’s too convenient. I know it. But Izzy’s here, and she’s trying. For her sake, I bury my suspicions with the rest of my cares, because if I don’t, I’ll turn around and go home.


    And Izzy would just come drag me out.


    I tug on the inn’s heavy doors and they groan open with invitation. A dead hearth greets me, but the inn is still warm. Only a few fishermen sit in the back, nursing soup. The scent of old, too-sweet ale has seeped into the tabletops. Years of revelry and debauchery have plastered themselves into the walls, in every porous crack. The acrid sting of drunken piss, roasted chicken, and fresh rosemary creep into my nostrils. Clanging pots from the back kitchens startle me a little. A burly man in a tunic too tight stops polishing his mug and beams.


    “Oi, Catherine! Finally came to declare your love at last!”


    I chuckle, the closest I come to laughing. “Hello, Orn. Not today, but I’m sure I’ll cave eventually.”


    He frowns a little but perks up quickly, reaching for a bottle of something fancy. “What can I do fer ya then, my winter rose?” He hoists a mug, as if to pour me some.


    “No spirits, Orn. Just looking for someone. A friend.”


    “Aye, aye, never any spirits for the young lass.” He straightens himself up. “You have friends?”


    “Point well-taken, sir. Have you seen a red-haired woman? Loud. Foul-mouthed.”


    Orn doesn’t need to think. He’s already nodding. “Ah, that one. Upstairs, back room. With the other out-of-towner.”


    I nod once and take the stairs. Izzy’s voice slices through the dim corridor as I ascend. I know that tone.


    “She has to be awake?”


    A hesitant voice follows. “Yes. Unfortunately, it won’t work otherwise. She will need to be conscious during the entire process.”


    A thud against the wooden floor. A muffled scuffle. A high-pitched yelp—then Izzy again, lethal and flat.


    “Lie to me, and I’ll fillet it off myself.”


    An ugly thought creeps in and I rub at my temple. Better save her from a dungeon cell. I rap twice on the door and step inside. The room is cramped, barely more than a bed and a crooked table suffocated with parchment and wax-dripped bottles—contents murky and pulpy. A set of tools lies open on the floor, bone dust clinging to the handles. A human hip bone sits beside them, stripped pale.


    “Calm down.” I say, placing a hand on her shoulder.


    A boy sits on the bed. Fifteen, maybe sixteen. His spine is tight to the wall, hands folded neatly in his lap. Dark hair drapes over round spectacles. They are fine and sharp, like his features. He adjusts them with precision, peering through the glass at me. His skin is olive, a shade I’ve seen only once before.


    “I’m perfectly calm, just discussing the finer points of honesty with our friend, Luca.” She steps back from the boy and sheathes a dagger. “Catherine, meet client.”


    “This child?” I say, incredulously.


    Luca ignores my rudeness. “Catherine?”


    I nod, curtly.


    “I can help you.” He says.


    “And how might you help me?” I ask with a creased brow.


    “Well. I can seal Her away. That’s what you want most? To be free again?”


    I don’t respond. Not yet. Luca’s gaze crawls over me like a mechanical spider. He is measuring me, as if I am something to be assessed. As if I am already under the knife as his experiment.


    What could he know of me? How?


    The air is thick with candle wax and dust. My breath slows and the drumming begins again, but it’s changed. What once was a prideful boast is now a sludging slink in my core. She knows. The boy is dangerous to her.


    I fix my vision to Izzy, who is shifting on her feet, arms crossed, wary. The papers, laid before me, now seem more complex, impossible to fathom. Their ink thick as dried blood. I try to form words, but none come. We searched so long and now a child stands before me with the answer? I cannot accept it.


    "I was in Merriweather when you changed." Luca says. His voice is smooth, softening the delivery.


    Izzy and I both step back and exchange glances.


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    “When were you planning on sharing that detail—


    “Lies.” I spit, cutting Izzy off. “That whole—I left no one—it isn’t possible. She would never…”


    “There were more survivors than just myself. A few of us were trapped in a cellar. Had to dig out, we nearly suffocated but, we didn’t.”


    The drums beat gleefully at the mention of Merriweather. The first. The worst. I shake off the fire and blood clinging at my memory.


    Luca continues. “Having such a creature inside you…It must be horror.”


    “You cannot even possibly imagine it.” I whisper. “Or, maybe you can.”


    Luca nods knowingly.


    Izzy comes close. “I’ve seen his craft work,” she says, quiet and reassuring. “You wouldn’t need to be some empty grave anymore, Catherine. Your father, your sister, this is what we’ve searched for.”


    I think of Mesica, my home, and my father’s paintings, my arrogant little sister a woman, now. I bet all the boys are chasing her and I’m not there to fend them off. A daughter. A sister. What price could I pay to be home with them again?


    “What would you need me to do?” I ask, throat dry, recalling the gruesome specifics of the rituals I’d read about.


    “I’d need to carve a sigil into you. You would become like an Ombresha, or bone-puppet, in your language. It will act as a doorway, pulling Her into your skeleton. A prison.” Luca says, matter-of-factly. “It must be done while you’re awake.”


    The words slide under my skin. I feel the pain before it begins. Another memory—a thin blade dragging through my spine, and a voice—you are magnificent.


    I swallow it down. The drums flutter, begging me to put an end to this foolishness. It’s too convenient, they rattle. Who even is this boy, they thump. You have everything under control, they pulsate.


    "Simple enough.”


    “Cat, he’s a bone carver.”


    I shudder at the thought. “Okay. Choose one.”


    “Woah, we don’t need to rush into—


    “Your scapula is best for the size and shape.” He pats his own as if to teach, but Catherine knows.


    "Do it, then." I say, pulling at the strings of my bodice.


    Izzy steps in front of me. “I’m glad you agree, but slow down, at least let’s go somewhere quieter.”


    “There’s only Orn and a few drunks.”


    “Won’t the innkeeper come when he hears…your screams?” Luca inquires.


    Izzy and I both chuckle darkly. “No,” we say in unison.


    The door is locked. The windows, shut. The firelight flickers, warm against my back. I begin to roll my dress off my shoulders and I remember that Luca is just a young boy. He flushes red and looks away nervously. Izzy grins a little and covers his eyes. I kneel over a chair.


    Izzy sets a vial down beside us. A familiar bottle, clear as ice water. Draught of Midnight.


    “Still had some, huh?” I ask her.


    “Yeah, well, if you start bleeding too badly, if She won’t help us…you know how I feel about having options.” She crooks her head to the side to be level with my eyes. “I’ve got you. Luca will be fast. Right?” She says the last bit through her teeth.


    “Fast as I can.” He says, voice a little shakier than before. “But there’s still the matter of pay—


    Izzy’s head snaps out of view and she mutters something I can’t hear, but Luca drops it.


    I dig my nails into my thighs as Luca rolls up his sleeves and drips a clear alcohol over them. His hands are like smooth stone, steady, unwavering, while he fingers through his tools. He chooses a thin blade, too small to be a weapon.


    Luca steadies the blade, waiting for my permission once more. I give it. The knife is at my shoulder, and the old fears rise again. My body jerks but I drown the resistance in my lived agony.


    It starts with the skin—shallow, at first. A sharp glide. My body wants to react. To twist away. To stop this. But I don’t move. I don’t breathe. Luca almost seems to stop for a moment, waiting for my shrieks, but such pains do not affect me this way. Not anymore.


    Deeper.


    The blade slides through muscle, slow and deliberate. I feel it shear apart, each layer peeling back, baring me open. Blood rolls down my ribs, sticky and thick, soaking into my waistband.


    She is angry. Her fingers coil around my skull and squeeze. No more drums, just vice-like pressure.


    "She won’t let you die," Luca says, voice calm as ever. As if my flesh isn’t in ribbons beneath his hands. I’m not sure if he’s talking about Her or Izzy.


    Izzy presses something to my lips. Bitter. Medicinal. The taste coats my tongue, numb and tingling. My stomach twists, my head sways, but feel it working.


    “To keep you from passing out, love. Be still, now.” She tucks my hair behind my ear and takes my hand.


    Luca murmurs something in his own tongue. The words hum through me as he starts chipping away at my bone. He switches tools fluidly. Izzy places her belt between my teeth as Luca begins shaping the sigil’s more delicate pieces.


    The pressure inside me grows wilder, slamming itself against my walls. She wants out.


    Fuck what She wants.


    Then, something changes.


    The sigil is finished, I know it the moment it happens.


    No, no. Not now.


    “IZZY! Something’s wro—


    I choke on black bile and she rushes to my side. “Catherine, talk to me, what’s happening!?”


    “Kill. Me.” Is all I can spit out as the bile spills from my mouth to the floor in a great black pool. My hand twists and contorts, lunging at Izzy’s throat. I grip my wrist tight with the other hand, dragging it back.


    Not. Izzy. Bitch. Never, Izzy!


    A dagger rises from her belt. It tremors wildly in her hand. Her eyes meet mine—glassy, uncertain. She knows I’m right. Her mouth opens and then closes. I turn my head to the side, to make it easy.


    You promised. Do it!


    Her grip on the dagger tightens, knuckles white. I brace for the end, knowing I take this evil with me.


    But Izzy doesn’t move.


    No, no, you promised.


    Her chest rises and falls. Her chin quivers and her lips form a word that I’ll never hear. Hot, agonized tears fall from my eyes.


    Then, she yanks a terrified Luca from the floor and they’re gone.


    An unwanted stillness caresses me. She giggles. A cavernous sphere splits open in my depths, making room for Her. The quiet is here—and then, hellfire is, too, blazing in my skull. I cry out and collapse, curling in on myself. My knees crush into my chest. I reach for my pendant, a last attempt to slow Her down.


    And She cracks me open.