Total pages in book: 210
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 200837 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1004(@200wpm)___ 803(@250wpm)___ 669(@300wpm)
This is reality and we live in it.
So I end up back in my own rooms, with my own maids, standing in front of my own mirror.
But that little bit of calm we conjured up while lying in Haryet’s bed stays with me.
And I spend the rest of the afternoon daydreaming about how, if I am called for duty, Finn Scott would step in and save me.
It’s a comfort. So much so, I let myself believe it.
And this is how I will manage to get through tonight.
With borrowed hope.
CHAPTER TWELVE
After I leave my childhood home and return to the palace, the rest of the afternoon goes by in a blur. Like time is nothing. Flowing quickly, the way the wind carried the dust during the Great Sweep.
Jeyk and Mitchell are here, and we don’t go upstairs, just stay on the first floor, but there are dozens of others. Sorting out who was going to do what was a whole task in and of itself, since no one has been allowed up here since my father became Extraction Master decades ago.
Finally, Mitch starts barking orders like a general, scaring the servants, and cooks, and my father’s panel of advisors—which is another thing to deal with, since I will need my own panel. Everyone gets busy with their assigned roles while Mitch and I go over an Extraction Master manual penned in my own father’s handwriting, which details the entire night down to the last minute, starting with the feast at seven, followed by a gala at nine, the god’s tribute ceremony in front of the tower at eleven-thirty, and then, at exactly midnight, Haryet Chettle will walk up to the massive black doors and they will open.
The moment she steps across the threshold, she will disappear. And in that same moment, the bells will stop ringing and the entire city will let out a breath, relieved that it is now over.
And after the doors of the tower close, so is my job.
Ninety-nine percent of Tau City will probably never think of Haryet again.
Only Clara and Gemna will spend the rest of the night thinking about their friend.
Well, not Clara. Not if I can help it.
She’s going to spend the night with me.
Fuck that god.
Those are the words running through my head all afternoon as Jeyk acts as emissary between the advisors and myself and Mitchell guides me through the ceremonial preparations, drilling me on the manual. We go through it page by page several times until a tailor appears stating that it is time for me to be dressed.
I have more Extraction ceremonies under my belt than any other Extraction Master in the history of Tau City. I’ve lived through eight of them. Eight in twenty-eight years. The first, of course, was when I was only eight years old myself. I don’t remember much about that one, just that I was standing on the God’s Tower stage with my father and mother. I didn’t really pay attention to what was happening, just… kinda looked around and marveled at all the pomp and ceremony. I might even have enjoyed it.
The second was Imogen Gibson, Maiden number one in Clara’s group. But aside from her spectacular display of spark as she entered the tower, it wasn’t anything unusual. Of course it was sad. For some, I guess. Not for me personally. I didn’t know Imogen. I danced with her a few times for the Little Sister dances, of course, but we never had a conversation. And anyway, she was meant to go in. She was number one. It was just… the way of things.
My third Extraction ceremony was Marlowe Hughes. And while two in one decade was rare, it was not unheard of. I maybe paid a little more attention to what was happening than I did the other two times. But it wasn’t until we got to Maiden Number four, Lucy Fisher, that I really understood just how unusual this all was.
That was several years ago now. And three more ceremonies have happened since then, I barely need to study for tonight. I know all the words to say, I know what I’m supposed to do at each phase of the evening, I know where I’m supposed to stand and I’ve got it all timed down to the second.
But this is the first time I’ll be the one in charge and I’ll have to do it alone.
This is the first time I’ll have to have that dance with Haryet and look her in the eyes. This is the first time I’ll have to come to terms with the fact that I will be the one sending her through those doors. And she will disappear and never come back.
I will be the one to kill Haryet Chettle tonight at midnight, not my father. And I’m having a hard time coming to terms with it.