'You look awful.'

The voice echoes from my bed as I walk in my room. I'm caught off guard by blonde-haired Sybella, again. She lies there, a book in her hands, lying on her back with one leg crossed in the air. I squint at the title on the tome, and realise she's reading that erotic fiction she'd teased me about previously.

She catches my stare and raises an eyebrow. 'What? It's good. There's this really good bit when they're in the Elysian Fields...'

My cheeks colour. I'm fairly sure I don't want to know what happened there, so I scoff and make a point of slamming the door behind me.

'This isn't your room!' I say, intending to sound authoritative. Instead, my voice comes out strained, lisped. My jaw is swollen. But at least my eye isn't sealed shut with the bruise around it— something Megara is currently nursing.

'This isn't your room,' Sybella mimics, kindly. Then shrugs. 'Technically, this isn't your room either. Not until you have sex with Hadrian and marry him.'

I glare at her. 'If.'

She smirks. 'I'm the one with precognition.'

My teeth clamp down hard before I can blurt out the obvious question. I'm not ready to know that yet. Further to that point, a part of me knows what answer I'd like, and there's something like terror at finding out it wouldn't be so.

'I hate arguments with you,' I huff, flopping onto the bed. 'What are you actually doing here?'

Sybella flicks a page. 'Reading. Intently. Why are you talking? Oh damn it! Why don't they just sleep together already? They clearly want to...'

Sybella starts to rant about two characters in the erotic book who are fated to be together but are still refusing to take the final step. I stare awkwardly at one of the pillars of my four poster bed. Nice wood. Strong—

'...I mean, they're just coming up with excuse after excuse because neither of them can face their feelings...'

The bed, Nerissa. How nicely made.

How nice it would be to have Hadrian sprawled on it—

'I will not have hormones dictate my choices!' I yell, slamming my hands down with a thud. Sybella jumps and drops the book, yelling out at my protests.

'What the hell, woman?' she cries. 'What got your rivers in a twist? I wasn't talking about you!'

'You might as well have been!'

'I don't need to know about your sex life, thanks!'

We're both breathing heavily, ready to carry on the argument, when Sybella runs a hand over her forehead. 'I came to see you because I had a vision.'

I tilt my head in question, and she continues.

'A lot of the time, my visions aren't specific, and in most cases, they're just my mutterings,' Sybella says. She sits up, brushing her hair aside and looking exponentially more serious. 'I don't remember what I say, which is why somebody usually writes it down if there's somebody about. But this one today was different...'

She shifts, so her arms dangle onto the bed to play with the cuffs of her trousers. She seems to be avoiding my eyes. 'I remembered it all, because I saw it play out before my eyes.

'I saw an army,' she whispers. 'A very, very big army. Our Kingdom is overrun, and all I see is Hadrian, naked and not moving...'

The fear and sorrow in her voice is what gives me pause. I might have giggled at her dreams of a naked Hadrian, but the seriousness with which she spoke make me feel like it's a death sentence.

'Does it have to come...true?' I ask. 'Aren't there alternatives to this future?'

Maybe in which one, I trust the Spring Court. And maybe in one I don't.

Finding out which is the right one will be hard...

Sybella shrugs her shoulders, frustrated and sad. 'There are many multiple ways within which we could change that vision, but it seems some things are fixed, no matter how you work around them. They are like the pillars of time, and this feels like one of them. That this event has to happen...'

I can see her fear. What she's seeing is total destruction, and the implications are that shortly our happy existence will change. It makes bile rise in my throat, to think of Hadrian gone and Hecate ruling.

It's a prime example of why I should leave this room right now and ensure Hadrian and I make the marital bond. Screw tradition and waiting until the wedding. At any moment, Hecate could strike.

But then, she still kind of wins. Plus, she could still just march in with an army and kill us all twice.

I want to wring my hands. Wars when you're already dead are complicated.

'So how do we prevent it...?' I trail off, my hands gesturing into the air above me. Sybella lies down at my side, sighing. We're both staring up at the ceiling, finding no inspiration from the top of the bed.

'I don't often get these clear visions...' she says slowly. 'The clearer they are, the more certain they are. So, we don't prevent it. We deal with the fallout when it happens.'

My eyes narrow, a shiver suppressing itself through my body. 'So we prepare for that army, and protect Hadrian.'

'...Yes. I thought together, you and I could work something out.'

I look at her, my head turning to stare. Her wonderfully pierced face is furrowed in an uncharacteristic morose expression. I give her a small smile.

'It's better to know than be caught by surprise,' I say, attempting cheerfulness. 'We always knew an army was coming. Well, now we'll get moving!'

She gives me a flat look. 'Never try to be optimistic again, Nerissa. It's painful.'

'What else could I say? We're all doomed, no matter how hard we try?'

'Speaking of trying...' Sybella checks the mantel, where a clock ticks. 'Don't you have to meet Hadrian to train?'

I groan aloud. 'Yes. I'm late, aren't I?'

'Only late enough to make him desire you all the more.'

I'm still staring at her. Trusting isn't something that's ever come easy, but she'd confided in me. So, on a gut feeling that it's the right thing to do, I tell her about the Spring Court's offer, brought by Quill. Her eyebrows raise higher and higher as I tell the story.

'So that's what he's really doing here!' she breathes. 'Well, they certainly want something from you. No point thinking that after eighteen years, your family suddenly want a connection. You're not going to go?'

'I would deny outright based on wanting to see family again,' I say darkly. 'I have no desire to make acquaintances with the people that swapped human babies. But what could prove more useful is that, as you said, they want something. Maybe I could find out what.'

Sybella nods. 'It's a dangerous idea, and a classic, but if it works...' She whistles. 'Allied with Spring, any army Hecate sends will find it difficult.'

I run a hand through my hair, thinking. 'I'll agree to meet in a day or so; I don't want to look too eager. It would be suspicious. I'll have to warn Hadrian...'

Sybella pauses. 'Don't.'

'What?'

'Don't tell him. The less people know you're playing double agent, the better. Trust me, our King is a terrible actor.'

I recall his "bounty hunter" act and how shamefully I'd fallen for it. Looking back, it should have been obvious. To skilled courtiers like Spring's citizens, it would be.

Ideally, I'd send Sybella in my place. She's far more astute than I am when it comes to politics, it seems.

I agree with a sigh. 'You're right. But I'm worried— what will he do if he finds out?'

'Ensure he does not,' Sybella says. 'Remember, Spring might have a grudge against Hadrian— we don't know yet. If you appear loyal to him in any way...'

I nod tersely. 'Right. Yes. Of course.'

Behaving as though Hadrian is nothing to me feels as big a betrayal as lying to him.

'Now go on, off to your lessons,' Sybella coos, 'Leave me alone with this great literature.'

--

Hadrian brings us back to the hospital.

He's still fuming about my lateness, and has barely spoken a word to me. So I play along, acting as coolly as I can, even when it shows in my necromancy: my emotions waver, disrupting my ability to keep up with him as he leaps from rooftop to rooftop, silent as a dark cloud coming across the sky. I can feel my preternatural stillness that allows me to slip through the world as Hadrian does: controlled, powerful, as one with the world around. But every so often my thoughts plough through my consciousness with the subtlety of a thunderstorm, and the heaviness of my body returns.

When I finally make it to the final rooftop, he just gives me a blank look. 'You're slow tonight.'

I want to say: well, when I was ready to have sex with you, you not-so-politely declined. Then, I got into a few fights and learned that my friend has had a strange vision in which it doesn't look good for you. I guess my mind's not quite able to detach it all?

But I don't say any of it. I don't trust my mouth not to say something combative, so I nod and shrug.

He glances down at what I'm wearing: no longer the simple black clothes similar to his own, but ones Char had given me to fight in. My midnight blue tunic from earlier has been replaced by a dark green, lined with fur to keep out the chill. My breastplate is the same, alongside the gauntlets and greaves, and my boots are thick, laced with a hidden switchblade.

'Maybe it's all that heavy armour,' he says, and I can hear there's a question there. But I haven't a good explanation as to why I'm dressed like I'm about to go into battle.

My life here in the Underworld has made me less alert. Before, a blade was the least I'd need. I couldn't forget that now, with Hecate surely to make a move soon.

Sybella had told me to be ready, or I'd lose Hadrian.

I won't damn lose him.

'What are we here for tonight?' I ask quietly, and Hadrian focuses on the ground below.

'Souls,' he replies. 'That's why we're here.'

I remain silent.

'Last time you didn't manage to see their souls.' He leaps from the roof, becoming a blur that darts across the pavement below.

I roll my eyes: of course he'd have to point out my flaws. I'd been able to see his soul, though last night— with help. And a lot, lot of tension.

I follow him, putting last night's escapades out of my head.

The hospital is as busy as the previous night, with even more patients piled up against the walls. Now, there are blankets on the floor, families huddled together in groups on beds and even the nursing staff has dwindled. I notice several of the uniformed are now sitting with patients, looking as ill as the rest. How, in twenty-four hours, can there have been such an increase in numbers?

What sort of autumn flu is this?

I want to tell him to leave while he still can when I see my father.

He's tending to a young man whilst talking to another woman, simultaneously comforting a young child and balancing another ton of jobs. He looks worn out, as though he hasn't stopped since I saw him last, and maybe he hasn't.

My pitiful heart actually feels worried.

Hadrian is standing, like a shadow, over a still figure lying on the floor.

I cross the room, sidestepping the unaware humans. Nobody gives us a second glance: Death is entirely invisible as he lurks among them. And when I see who he's standing over, I know what's about to happen.

The boy must be around seven years old, his face pasty, his body still. There's a scar across his nose— probably from an accident whilst playing a game— and his clothes are a few sizes too big. He has elder brothers, then, as they're hand-me-downs. There's no sign of any family here tonight, however.

He's probably not been dead for very long, and nobody around has noticed yet.

Hadrian glances as I approach, and gestures to the boy.

'His soul is Loosening,' he explains. 'It's a term we use when humans die, and their soul separates to pass through to the Underworld. His soul is very bright, pure— you should be able to see it.'

I'm standing opposite Hadrian, my legs near the boy's head. I stare down at him, realising that he's so young, even younger than Nate, and his lips are so pale—

No! Concentrate, Nerissa. Sybella warned you to be ready. If you're not ready...

The fear rises within me, and I quell a panic fluttering in my chest. Hadrian frowns, perhaps sensing my distress— and he reaches over, takes my hand.

'Steady,' he suggests, and his hand calms my crescendo of a pulse. I focus on that feeling of his hand in mine, of being connected rather than thinking...

I allow the panicked thoughts into my head, but this time, I acknowledge them. Yes, I am scared. But being scared and allowing myself to be overcome by my fear are entirely different.

The noises around the hospital grow louder, more blurred. I can hear the heartbeats of the people around, thudding and slowing, and the whistle of air as it drags through their lungs. I sense movement, as though my brain is keeping tabs on each person.

I sense more: the heat of the illness as it drags through each body. No, I can sense who is sick, and who— I can sense when a shadow is looming—

Oh, sweet Hell.

The clouds of black mean Death draws close.

For this boy, it has already left, but the air lingers with streaks of light.

A soul that is pure and beautiful. Hadrian's voice, through our hands, echoes. I jolt, and he sends a soothing message to me.

We have a connection now; we looked into one another's souls.

I blush, and draw back.

Hadrian rolls his eyes. I did warn you.

I go back to observing the boy's soul: white and grey, knitting into vines of pale blues and reds and greens, seeping from his pores. When I delve further, I hear his cries as he was born, his mother and father as he was learning to walk. I see his brothers taking care of him, see his sister born after him. I see his first day at school and I see his last. I do not see particular memories, rather a vague sense of who and what.

To my surprise, he senses me in return.

'Who are you?' he asks. His voice is tiny, afraid.

My mouth opens to swear, but I check myself. Is this normal? I want to ask Hadrian. But I don't want to risk scaring the boy away, and my whole vision has misted over. Only the murky outline of the young one exists.

'A friend,' I reply, hoping that will be enough. The boy thinks on it, before nodding slowly. Around me, the white threads whisper over and over: 'Bella. Bella. Bella.'

The boy says, 'I can't leave until I find out what happened to my sister. Will you please help me?'

I nod.

The mist fades, the boy's soul moves, the light flowing away from his body and—

Hadrian's eyes widen as the soul flows into my throat, strangling me, making me cough and choke until—

The voice that speaks is not my own.

'Mummy! Mummy, no, don't die! Don't go. Don't leave us...help! No, no Daddy, I'm not sick, I'm not, I promise, I'm not ill, don't scare Bella, don't, please— no, don't hurt her, not like Mummy— ouch!'

The voice within me lets out an unearthly howl of pain, and the voice continues.

'Bella run away— Daddy is horrible— don't go with him! No, Bella, don't let him take me to the hospital— Mummy didn't die of the sickness! Daddy killed Mummy! Daddy ki—'

My voice cuts out, and I suck in air, my head dizzy. The stream of words that had been uttered from the boy's mouth through mine are gone, but they echo in my head like haunting ghosts. Whilst I could hear nothing of Bella's voice nor his parents, one side of the conversation alone is enough to give me chills.

Still rubbing my throat, raw from screaming, I look up at Hadrian. His eyebrows are raised, and he looks stunned.

'What?' I croak.

'That's the next lesson sorted,' he says, chuckling. 'Fast learner. Well done.'

'The next lesson?' I frown at him. 'Didn't you hear what the boy said? We have to find his sister. Then his soul will pass on.'

'I did hear,' Hadrian smiles. 'I heard loud and clear, because you used the next ability of a necromancer.'

I cock my head at him. 'What's that?'

'The Tongue of the Dead.'

A/N: Hello again! It's been about two weeks since I updated (gasp) but hope it was worth it! I'm currently preparing for my NaNoWriMo novel which will be posted on Wattpad throughout November so please support me! 50,000 words in 4 weeks makes me want to cry!

The title will be called ROSE TINTED, and it will be a new adult romance novel about mental health and university. Sadly, no magic in this one...aside from the magic that is luuuuuuurve ;)

So. What were your thoughts on this chapter? :D 

lots of love 

Larissa 

xxxxx