Alchemised

by SenLinYu

The woman was a vivimancer. Necromancy’s inverse twin, wielded on the living rather than the dead.

By its nature, lumithium bound the four elements of air, water, earth, and fire together, and in that binding, resonance was created.

Usually, resonance was channelled into the alchemy of metals and inorganic compounds, allowing for transmutation or alchemisation. However, in a defective soul which rebelled against Sol’s natural laws, the resonance could be corrupted, enabling vivimancy—like what the woman had used on Helena—and the necromancy used to create necrothralls.

All she knew was that as long as those manacles remained locked in place, she wasn’t an alchemist at all.

Takes months of good behaviour to get permission, and we have to wear these.”

She held up a wrist cuffed with a copper band, brighter and more fitted than Helena’s.

Absolutely not… I feel as if this were something similar to in ww2

“There’s no Resistance!” Grace said in a harsh whisper. “You think the rest of us were going to keep fighting, with everyone in the Eternal Flame dead? There’s no point. The High Reeve kills everyone. Any hint, even whispers get people killed. He has this—this monster he uses for hunting. There’s no point in running away or resisting or organising unless you want to be the next corpse.”

The only interesting thing in the entire stack was a preliminary casualty list that had Helena listed among the presumed dead.

If she was cooperative, there was a chance she’d survive transference, but if she did survive, she’d be betraying the Eternal Flame, giving up information she’d sacrificed her own memory to protect.

She wouldn’t be a traitor. Whatever she’d allowed to be hidden in her mind, she wouldn’t let the Undying discover it. Surviving didn’t matter. She’d kill herself before they learned anything from her.

Men prone to violence were generally thoughtless, acting with emotion first and applying reason after.

One mistake was all she’d need, and her secrets would be lost. No amount of necromancy could bring a mind back from death.

He turned. Helena’s throat closed as the world around her vanished, footsteps faltering. He was not old at all. It was the iron guild heir. Kaine Ferron.

They’d been the same year, shared classes, even worked as assistants on the same research floors.

Sooo they know eachother

She squeezed the cup, trying to bend it and work it. If she could break it, she’d have a nice sharp edge to slit her arteries open.

DAMN

His gaze lifted. “Come here.” When she didn’t obey, a slow smile curved along his lips. “I can make you, if you don’t.”

I mean…

If the war had ended fourteen months ago, that would have been in late summer of 1787. Which meant that she had no memory of nearly nineteen months of the war.

As she looked down, she discovered scars that she had no memory of.

The largest was right in the middle of her chest, running between her breasts. The roping scar was raised, slightly puckered, as if her sternum had been split open and stapled back together.

What happened

“You know,” Ferron said, jolting her from her thoughts, “when I heard it was you I’d be getting, I was looking forward to breaking you.” He shook his head. “But I don’t think it’s possible to exceed what you’ve done to yourself.”

Damn

“I have no desire to touch you,” he said, sneering. “Your presence here is offensive enough.”

Damn thats harsh

He raised an eyebrow. “I’ll tell you if you swallow it like a good girl.”

Stooooop

Healing was permitted within limits because it was categorised as a spiritual intercession, something selfless and divinely led.

She was a vibrant corpse, hardly different from the necrothralls haunting Spirefell.

The world was not supposed to be beautiful any longer. It was supposed to be dead and cold, forever mirroring the misery of Helena’s life.

She was trapped forever in winter, in the season of death.

“Oh, Marino.” His thumb trailed along her neck, following the scar below her jaw. “If I’d known what pain you’d cause me, I never would have taken you.”

“But at this point I suppose I deserve to burn. I wonder if you’ll burn, too.”

“Let me be very clear, then. I don’t want you. I never wanted you. I am not your friend. There is nothing I want more than the moment I’m finally done with you.”

“Kaine Ferron has offered to spy for the Resistance,” said Crowther.

WAIT WHAT

It was a dragon curled into a perfect circle, long fangs tearing apart its own tail. On the upper right, taloned wings arched above the curved body.

Ohhh the dragon on the cover

“It’s an ouroboros,”

“In Khemish alchemy, a serpent ouroboros is supposed to represent infinity or rebirth.

“An interrogator won’t stop until they have valuable information. If you’re captured, there’s nothing you’ll be able to do to stop it, but if they think you’re weak they won’t look carefully. You have to give up something valuable enough that it seems legitimate as a way to keep the things that matter most hidden.”

“You don’t even want me. Why did you ask for me?”

“You’re right, I don’t want you, but owning you will never get old. As long as you live. What a promise to make. I wonder how much I can make you regret it.”

think we might as well plan to skip the next few weeks. I don’t expect to make it.”

wtf does that mean

she started massaging the palm and worked slowly to his fingertips, knuckle by knuckle, her resonance seeking out every bit of tension and knotted muscles.

Stop bc this is how he massaged her hands… literally crying

“Don’t die, Marino. I might miss you.”

“Stay,” he said softly, and his head dipped so close she felt his breath in her hair. “You know, there’s something about you, Marino, that inspires the most terrible decisions from me. I’ll know better, but then I’ll still…”

“You have such a singular mind. Even when I’m not inside it, I can still see it churning away behind those eyes of yours.”

“Stay,” he said, his voice coaxing, pleasure-soaked, his face so close to hers. “Have a drink with me.”

“Just—one drink,” she said, her voice barely wavering.

He smiled. The first real smile she’d ever seen from him. “One drink,” he said.

He pressed a finger beneath the decanter she held, lifting it up, and watching as sh...

“Thank you, Marino.”

“Still not Helena?”

“Helena.” He said it slowly, drawing it out, as if he was testing the way it sounded.

She tore her eyes away, not wanting to be accused of leering again, but he didn’t seem to have noticed this time. He was still studying her.

“You’re like a rose in a graveyard,” he said, and his lips twisted into a bitter smile. “I wonder what you could have turned into without the war.”