The Immortal Heights (32 page)
Read The Immortal Heights Online
Authors: Sherry Thomas
I swirled the beaker. “If you are unrelated, your blood will not react.”
The drops of blood, like two tiny marbles, tumbled along the bottom of the beaker. And then, as if they were magnets, they moved toward each other until they had joined into a single oval.
“Very close kinship, I would say.”
“Thisâthis can't be true. Perhaps through some coincidence we are distantly related.”
Without a word, I performed another blood assay, this time using blood from myself and Alectus. Our two drops of blood also approached each other, but instead of merging together, formed
something in the shape of a dumbbell.
“He is my great-uncle. And your kinship is far closer than ours.”
“No,” mumbled Lady Callista. “No.”
She collapsed into a chair.
Miss Tiberius held completely still, staring at her mother, the woman for whose love she had committed treason.
I could have told her time and again not to bother to win Lady Callista's approval: Lady Callista disdained all who loved herâthe only one to whom she had ever been devoted was Baron Wintervale, a man who only thought of himself, who took and took from those around him.
Earlier I had been of a mind to recommend a particularly harsh penalty for Miss Tiberius. But now I knew nothing I meted out could punish her as much as her mother's indifferenceâindeed, revulsionâat the thought of being related to her after all.
“Each of you can be charged with treason. I will, however, recommend to the High Council a less punitive course of action. Like all collaborators, you will have the chance to confess and seek pardon. Detail your dealings with Atlantis, and you will most likely receive a pardon. Conceal anything . . .”
I did not need to finish the sentence. “In the meanwhile, I will seek the High Council's assent in stripping Alectus of his princely appellation and privileges. All three of you are to pack up and leave the Citadel within twenty-four hours.”
“Butâbutâwhat are we to do? Where will we go?” cried Alectus.
“I could but I am not seizing your personal assets. So you will have more than enough to find a place to live. I believe the same is true of Lady Callista.”
“Can we not receive some leniency?” Alectus beseeched. “We are your family, after all.”
“You are looking leniency in the face. Would you like to see my less lenient side?”
Alectus trembled. “No, sire. Thank you, sire.”
“Good,” I said. “I look forward to never seeing any of you again. Now leave.”
As they shuffled toward the door I remembered something. “By the way, Lady Callista, the day before Miss Seabourne faced the Bane, she realized that she was not related to you, because her blood did not react to the blood circle you had set in the Sahara. I must say, I had seldom seen her more delighted.”
âFrom
The Last Great Rebellion: An Oral History
9
.
UNBEKNOWNST TO
the general public, the heirs of the House of Elberon have always been proficient in the wielding of blood magic.
Most mages in the Domain are familiar with the story of the arrival of the Sihar, persecuted elsewhere and desperately seeking a safe haven. What is not taught in schoolbooks is that the Sihar, in gratitude, gifted Hesperia the Magnificent a copy of their most prized manual on blood magic, as well as the secret know-how to
fabricate a folded space, a secret which later became lost among the Sihar but has been preserved by the House of Elberon.
âFrom
A Chronological Survey of the Last Great Rebellion
10
.
Iolanthe Seabourne:
The night before the state funeral, the prince and I went to my guardian's apartment in Paris. Only four days had passed since the two of them sat down to tea only to be interrupted by the tracer's signal that my location had changed thousands of miles all of a sudden.
The tea service was still on the table in the
salle de séjour
. When I saw that . . . [Pause] Excuse me. When I saw that I cried.
We went to his bedroom and gathered up his things. He had very few possessionsâit was only days before that we'd freed him from the fear circle at Claridge's. And everything was new, bought in anticipation of a long stay in Paris.
When we went into the spare bedroom, I'm afraid I cried again. I'd seen the spare bedroom when the prince and I had brought him to the apartment, but he'd rearranged the furniture and changed the wallpaper to make it look more like my room in our house at the Conservatory.
[Pause]
I sat on the bed while His Highness went through the rest of the apartment, until he called to me from the study. He had found a letter that had been hidden away. Master Haywood wrote that he was very much looking forward to my arrival in Paris, to spending time
together in safety and anonymity. But if for some reason something should happen to him, he wanted me to have the incantations necessary to invalidate the Irreproducible Charm that he had put on me when I was a toddler.
For the day when I would live in easy, peaceful times and wish to capture moments of my life, like everyone else.
I'm not sure we've arrived at completely easy, peaceful times yet. But one of the decisions His Highness and I made before I assumed a false identity was to revoke the Irreproducible Charm so that I'd indeed live as normal a life as possible, which was what Master Haywood would have wanted.
Sometimes I look at the pictures on my walls of those terrific years I spent as a student at the Conservatory, and I wishâ
Actually, I think he knows in the Beyond. He knows that everything he'd ever wanted for me has come true.
âFrom
The Last Great Rebellion: An Oral History
Donna Bray, for whom I have run out of superlatives.
Kristin Nelson, ever my fairy godmother.
Colin Anderson and Erin Fitzsimmons, who outdo themselves with each cover in the series.
The entire team at Balzer + Bray and HarperCollins Children's, for an immensely enjoyable experience all around.
Dr. Margaret Toscano, for coming up with the Latin equivalent of “Open sesame.”
Srinadh Madhavapeddi, for Vasudev's name.
The lovely and talented John Thomas, for coming up with one of the
most important uses of Iolanthe's powers. The very kind Dr. Milan, for answering my questions concerning such a use.
My family, for making my peaceful, drama-free existence possible. I could expend any amount of ink and not say enough good things.
All the readers, authors, librarians, booksellers, and bloggers who have embraced and championed this series, I am beyond grateful.
And if you are reading this, thank you. Thank you for everything.
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Photo by Jennifer Sparks of Sparks Studio
SHERRY THOMAS
is the author of
The Burning Sky
and
The Perilous Sea
, the first two books in the Elemental Trilogy. Sherry immigrated to the United States from China when she was thirteen and taught herself English in part by devouring science fiction and romance novels. She is the author of several acclaimed romance novels and is the recipient of two RITA Awards. Sherry lives with her family in Austin, Texas. You can visit her online at
www.sherrythomas.com
.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
hc.com
.
Cover art © 2015 by Colin Anderson
Cover design by Sarah Creech,
based on series design by Erin Fitzsimmons
Balzer + Bray is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.
THE IMMORTAL HEIGHTS
. Copyright © 2015 by Sherry Thomas. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2014959971
ISBN 978-0-06-220735-7
EPub Edition © September 2015 ISBN 9780062207371
15Â Â 16Â Â 17Â Â 18Â Â 19Â Â Â Â
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