Page 54 of Kill the Beast
“No,” she said, more sharply than she’d intended.
“And why is that?”
“Exhuming a coffin would take too long,” she told him. “If we get caught, we’ll hang.”
He snorted, as if the very idea amused him. Lyssa’s eyes flitted to the new cravat covering the brutal scar on his throat, her brows furrowing in concern.
“What about a crypt?” he asked.
“A crypt might work,” she said. “We wouldn’t have to dig anyone up, at least. But it would have to have wooden coffins, and not just stone sarcophagi.”
“This one does.”
Hope flared within her, easing the tightness in her chest for a brief moment before she tempered it with caution. “Most crypts are private, though. Locked gates. Guarded against body-snatchers, in some cases. Plus, we don’t know if any of the Beast’s victims are buried in crypts.”
Alderic hesitated. Took a sip of his drink as if he needed a moment to gather his thoughts. “Desmond is in the crypt in Liedensham Cemetery,” he said finally, his voice tight with suppressed emotion.
“Desmond?”
“My brother.”
Lyssa picked at her bottom lip, fighting against that fierce urge to protect him from more pain. Nails from his brother’s coffin would be immensely powerful, and would make the sword even more powerful in turn. And, with coffin nails as their faerie repellant, they would only have to use one personal concern apiece, instead of needing extra.
It seemed the Lady had granted her a chance to redeem herself for her reluctance to force Alderic to face his past at Bellgaard. She would be a fool not to take it.
He wants the Beast dead, too,she reminded herself.He’ll do what he has to, no matter how much it hurts.
She couldn’t help the pang of guilt at the thought. Alderic would pry nails out of his brother’s coffin because she was too weak to pry them out of Eddie’s.
“Will anyone be suspicious of us?” she asked him.
“No. The priestesses there know me. They’ll give me as much privacy as I need.”
“All right, then.” Lyssa sat back and wiped her mouth with her napkin. “Coffin nails are the most potent when collected during the black moon, same as grave dirt. If we get the dirt as soon as it’s dark, that night, we should be able to draw a Door, get to Liedensham, and collect the coffin nails before dawn the same day. It’ll be tight, and we’ll have to hurry, but it should work.” Ithadto work. The equinox was only a few weeks away, now. If they had to wait until the next black moon, they would also have to wait until the Summer Solstice to kill the Beast, and the power in the items they’d already collected wouldn’t last that long. They would have to start all over.
She peered out the window again. A few more weeks until the culmination of everything she had been working toward for almost thirteen years. She let out a breath, a sudden flood of emotion washing over her.
“Feeling all right, Carnifex?” Alderic asked.
The question startled her. She hadn’t known he was watching her. Hadn’t known he could read her expressions, her exhalations, like Ragnhild read her bones.
“I’m fine.”
From the look on his face, he didn’t believe her. “The black moon isn’t for another few nights,” he said. “What do we do in the meantime?”
“Gather our personal concerns,” she said. “If we do that now, then we’ll have everything we need once we get the dirt and nails, and plenty of time to forge the sword.” That alone would take days—days they might not have to spare, if they weren’t careful.
His lips thinned. “But I don’t know what personal concern to use.”
She sighed heavily, the hope of a moment ago fading. “Me, neither,” she admitted, frustrated at the idea of wasting time, when they had so little left until the equinox. “Let’s spend the next couple of days figuring them out, at least, so that we can gather them quickly once we’re done with the grave dirt and coffin nails.Oh—I need to buy metal, too. They were out of the kind I use last time we were here in Warham. We’ll go over to the Iron Lane tomorrow morning, as soon as they open.”
Alderic frowned. “Why doIneed to go to the Iron Lane? Can’t you go by yourself?”
“No, I cannot. Someone has to pay the bill, and it’s not going to be me.”
“But—”
“Remember what we agreed, when you hired me? Expenses up front, the remainder of the payment when the job is done. Metal is an expense, and expensive. I don’t have that kind of money on me.”
