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Chapters (50)
  1. Cover
  2. Roc Books by Jacqueline Carey
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Eight
  11. Nine
  12. Ten
  13. Eleven
  14. Twelve
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-one
  24. Twenty-two
  25. Twenty-three
  26. Twenty-four
  27. Twenty-five
  28. Twenty-six
  29. Twenty-seven
  30. Twenty-eight
  31. Twenty-nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-one
  34. Thirty-two
  35. Thirty-three
  36. Thirty-four
  37. Thirty-five
  38. Thirty-six
  39. Thirty-seven
  40. Thirty-eight
  41. Thirty-nine
  42. Forty
  43. Forty-one
  44. Forty-two
  45. Forty-three
  46. Forty-four
  47. Forty-five
  48. Forty-six
  49. Forty-seven
  50. Forty-eight

Hel didn’t actually say “idiot.” She said I was foolish and that I was remiss in my duty, her voice as cold and implacable as ice, her ember eye glaring at me.

The worst part of it was that I agreed with her. I’d known better. I just hadn’t trusted my instincts.

So I didn’t defend myself. I didn’t blame anyone else. I didn’t point out that if Jojo hadn’t intervened at exactly the wrong moment, everything might have been fine. I just stood there, miserable and shivering, until Hel was finished.

Then I said I was sorry.

Hel closed her ember eye and opened her compassionate one. To be perfectly honest, I’d preferred the baleful stare. You know that look parents get when you’ve disappointed them by screwing up really, really badly? The one that makes you feel sick and squirmy inside? Well, magnify that by the power of divinity. I’d almost rather Hel punish me with her heart-squeezing trick than look at me that way.

“Is there aught else you wish to say, Daisy Johanssen?” she inquired in her sepulchral voice.

I took a deep breath, and envisioned dauda-dagr cleaving a line between me and my guilt and discomfort. At this moment they were useless emotions, and I set them aside. “Yes, my lady.” I was glad to hear the words come out firmly. “I beg your counsel. What’s going to happen because of the mistakes I made? And how can I set it right?”

Her disappointed look didn’t vanish, but it softened. “A powerful spirit has been unleashed and the dead of Pemkowet are restless. If the spirit is not contained, I fear some of them will rise.”

I swallowed. “Are we talking zombies?”

Hel hesitated. “Necromancy is an uncertain magic, and not even I can say what will manifest. I do not believe the dead of Pemkowet will rise in corporeal form. As for this . . . duppy . . . it should not be possible, since his body lies many leagues across the sea.”

“But you’re not sure.”

She inclined her head. “It would be for the best if the young sorcerer fulfilled the terms of the burden his mother has laid upon him.”

There hadn’t been a lot of time for Sinclair and me to discuss the issue, not with his father present, but there had been enough for me to sense his fury and frustration at the catch-22 situation in which his mother had placed him.