Page 90 of The Bone Season

Jaxon pursed his lips.

‘The æther is essentially a different plane of being,’ Nick clarified. ‘Only people like us – clairvoyants – can sense it.’

‘Not merely sense it, butuseit,’ Jaxon cut in. ‘Forgive him, Paige. Dr Nygård tends to understate.’

‘I’m trying not to overwhelm her, Jax.’

‘Nonsense. She deserves to know what clairvoyance truly is,’ Jaxon said. ‘And rest assured, it is a marvel, Paige – not an affliction or a vice, as Scion would have you believe.’

A man with one hand brought our food on a platter. I dipped a slice of bread in my tomato soup, mostly for something to do with my hands.

‘Scion says the first unnatural was the Bloody King,’ I said. ‘He was a murderer.’

‘Edward was an unpalatable character, by all accounts. He might well have been Jack the Ripper,’ Jaxon conceded, ‘but I doubt the man was clairvoyant – rather a drunk and convenient patsy, framed to end the monarch days, and to clear a path for the Republic of Scion.’

‘Scion used him as an excuse?’

‘Yes, my dear.’ He gave me a catlike smile. ‘Harden yourself to the notion.’

‘We’re like anyone else, Paige. We do good and bad things,’ Nick told me. ‘Even if he was clairvoyant, his actions don’t reflect on all of—’

‘Don’t lie to the girl. We are most certainly not likeanyoneelse,’ Jaxon chided. ‘We are clairvoyants, Dr Nygård. We are the keepers of truth, the guardians of the future; the bridge between the living and the dead, the mundane and the divine.’

All the hangings on the screens. Everything that had happened in Ireland. If Jaxon was telling the truth, all that blood had been spilled for a lie.

‘If you—’ I took a slow breath. ‘Ifwearen’t evil, why do they hunt us?’

Saying thatwecovered me in goosebumps. That word was like a tight embrace. At first, I felt trapped and afraid – it was too intimate, too much – and then it warmed and steadied me. I let myself sink into it.

‘We don’t know,’ Nick said.

Jaxon lit a cigar with a match. Now my curiosity was layered thick, muffling any trepidation.

‘Tell me more about spirits,’ I said.

‘Gladly,’ Jaxon said. ‘When we die, we abandon our bodies. Ideally, we go to the heart of the æther, where most voyants believe a lasting death is found – but some choose to linger as drifters, of which there are various kinds. We can barter them, bind them, call them for help.’

‘You’re talking about real, deadpeople.You can just pull their strings, and they’ll dance?’ I pressed. ‘Why would anyone want that?’

‘Oh, they cling for many reasons – to settle old scores, to haunt their killers. To stay with their loved ones, I suppose,’ he said, giving his cigar a wave. ‘All voyants can feel their presence, but we use them in different ways. They have knowledge of what is, and what is yet to come.’

As I listened, I ate a little of the bread, though it had as much taste as a wad of wet cotton.

‘Let us dig a little deeper.’ Jaxon tapped my hand with a fork. ‘Behold your earthly, mortal form – the cage of flesh and bone that lets you walk upon the corporeal plane. Within this cage, your spirit dwells.’ I hung on his every word. ‘Now, if your brain is the seat of your physical self, consider the dreamscape your spiritual house.’

‘Jax, enough,’ Nick said, weary. ‘We have plenty of time to—’

‘Wait,’ I said quickly. ‘Do you mean my poppies?’

Nick paused. ‘Poppies?’

‘I’ve seen them in my sleep since Arthyen.’

His face softened.

‘Perceiving your dreamscape is not quite sleep,’ Jaxon said, watching me with fresh interest. ‘But your instincts are right.’

I nodded. ‘Do only voyants have one?’

---