Chapter 21 · Untitled Chapter

"Don't touch him!" Cade caught Ivy's wrist before her fingers reached the dead man's face.

His grip wasn't what it used to be.

It still stopped her cold.

"Let go."

"That isn't Elias."

"I know what my brother looks like."

"No. You know what his memory looks like. That's the problem."

The body between them jerked.

Its eyes stayed shut. Black lines crawled from the corners of its mouth, moving under the skin like spilled ink.

The same pull caught Ivy behind the ribs.

Her magic wanted the corpse.

It wanted to crack the body open and climb inside.

"Cade." Mira's voice shook behind them. "That's the third one."

"I can count."

"Then count faster."

Another dead man sat up beside the broken fountain. His neck bent at the wrong angle, then snapped straight.

A woman nearby began screaming, even though her throat had been cut when she died.

Two more bodies crawled out from beneath the fallen council platform.

The city had gotten its sky back.

It had also gotten its dead.

Ivy twisted against Cade's grip. "Rowan is here."

His eyes locked on hers. "Who?"

"The courier. The one who carried the council seal into the bell vault.