Page 245 of Alchemised
Her lips were trembling, eyes burning as she braided her hair.
She bit down on her lip as she coiled the long braids carefully at the base of her neck.
Her fingers were trembling too hard to make her resonance stable, so she left the bruises.
Calm down. You only have one chance to convince Crowther.
But the more she thought it, the more unsteady her breathing became. She crouched on the floor, pressing her hands over her face until she was quiet.
She looked at her reflection again. She was thinner now than she’d been when she first saw Kaine last spring. Her cheeks had hollowed, there were craters of exhaustion under her eyes, and her collarbones jutted out. Stress had carved her away like water cutting through sand.
She rummaged through her satchel and found a salve for bruises, spreading it across her lips. Eventually her hands were steady enough that she could conceal the bruises with a tingle of resonance, watching the only colour in her skin slowly fade.
She pulled on a fresh shirt and walked out. The rooms were silent.
“Crowther,” she called, her voice hollow.
There was no answer. She went to the front room; the fire had dimmed to embers, and he was gone.
She swallowed hard, trying not to cry. Of course he’d gone. He wasn’t going to listen. No one would. He’d picked up whatever he’d come for and left again.
A pit of despair opened in her stomach.
Your failure was always the plan.
The room seemed to stretch as she reached the door. Her hands were shaking too much to manage the knob.
It swung open, Crowther reentering. He was dripping wet, his thin hair plastered against his scalp. He looked like a wet cat.
“What are you doing?” he said as he came back in. “Sit down.”
He had a paper packet in his hand, already tearing from the rain. He ripped it open, and several bottles tumbled out.
“I wasn’t sure what was needed,” he said.
She looked at the vials. He must have gone back to Headquarters and taken them from the hospital. The drop point kept basic medical supplies but nothing too valuable or prone to supply shortages. She recognised her own handwriting on the labels.
She stared at them, and considered taking the laudanum, something to smooth down the razor-sharp edges of her emotions, but she needed to stay clearheaded.
She inspected the next option. A contraceptive.
Her throat worked as she set it down. “You know I don’t need that.”
The only useful thing he’d brought was a valerian tincture, which the hospital used to calm patients who were in shock.
“What happened?” Crowther asked as she unscrewed the lid and swallowed it.
“You know what happened,” she said. “Exactly what you expected when you sent me there. I’m just a bit slow.”
“Marino.” His voice was sharp but then he seemed to catch himself and softened it. “What happened?”
She’d planned to go to Headquarters and make her report without any explanations about exactly why or how, to be calm and assured, but Crowther had caught her before she was ready. Her jaw began trembling uncontrollably.
She felt so used. She understood rationally that it had to be like that. The war was larger than any one person. Even Luc, whether his family legacy was real or not, was a figurehead, an idea greater than himself.
She knew that and she was willing to follow orders, knowing the consequences, understanding the sacrifice. She didn’t need any promises of reward or acknowledgement or eternity; she would do what was necessary because it was necessary. They knew that, and they had still lied to her.
“I told Ilva that all I needed was more time,” she said simply. “It was just—abrupt. We’d been training. The bruises were from that.”
