The Fifth Howl

Chapter 10 The Inquisitor

The Tower doors didn't open for the Inquisitor.

They dissolved.

One second there was ancient warded oak bound in silver and spell-iron, the next there was just... nothing. Like someone had taken an eraser to reality and rubbed the door out. Cold, dead air rushed in, smelling of stone and incense and nothing. Absolute nothing.

That was how I knew he wasn't a wolf.

Wolves smell like something. Even Kade, who smelled like cold shadows, smelled alive. This thing smelled like a tomb that had been scrubbed clean.

He floated up the last step. He didn't walk.

White robes that didn't touch the floor. A hood that hid his face, but underneath, there was no face. Just smooth white skin with no mouth, no nose, only two pits where eyes should be, and a single white circle branded in the middle of his forehead. The Circle of Silence.

The White Temple.

Behind him, Elder Thorne looked grim. Professor Margot looked like she was going to throw up. Two Enforcers flanked them, but they wouldn't meet the Inquisitor's eyeless face.

"Quad," the Inquisitor said. His voice wasn't a voice. It was in our heads, but like someone speaking through water. "You have broken asylum law by harboring a false vessel."

Jaxon stepped in front of me instantly, fire cracking over his fists despite the wards. "She's not false. She's-"

"Silence."

Jaxon choked. Literally choked. His fire went out as if drowned. He clutched his throat, eyes wide, no sound coming out.

"Jaxon!" I lunged forward, but Kade grabbed my arm, holding me back.

"Do not engage," Kade hissed in my ear. "That's how they win. They feed on voice."

Rhys stepped forward, hands up, calm even though his mind-marks were blazing violet trying to fight the pressure. "Inquisitor, with respect. According to Treaty of the First Howl, Article 7, any potential Fifth manifestation must be examined by the High Council, not the Temple. You have no jurisdiction until Council declares her false."

The eyeless thing tilted its head. The white circle on its forehead pulsed.

"The High Council sent me. They have already declared. The girl calling herself Lyra is an abomination. A wolfless human who stole a god's echo through blood ritual performed by Alpha Vane. She is to be nullified and the echo returned to the Temple vault."

LIAR! Lyra roared inside me so loud my vision went white. THEY ARE THE ONES WHO STOLE ME! THEY CUT ME! THEY PUT ME IN A JAR!

My new mark over my heart - Silas's mark - burned cold. Silas felt it. He was suddenly beside me, his hand finding mine under Kade's shirt sleeve.

The Inquisitor's head snapped to our joined hands. To the faint violet glow coming through the fabric of the shirt.

"What is that light?" he said in our heads.

Elder Thorne spoke up, fast. "Surge residue. As I said, unstable manifestation. The Tower wards-"

"She is marked."

Two words, and the entire Tower shook. The violet runes screamed.

The Inquisitor moved. He didn't walk, he just was suddenly in front of me. Too close. That blank face inches from mine. That nothing smell filling my lungs.

He reached out a hand that had too many joints.

Kade's shadows hit him first. A spear of pure darkness slammed into the Inquisitor's chest, making him skid back a foot. Kade was breathing hard, nose bleeding, his shadow marks blazing violet.

"Do not touch her."

The Inquisitor looked down at where the shadow had hit. White fabric was torn. Underneath, there was no skin. Just more white, smooth, like porcelain.

"Quad has marked the false vessel," he said, and now there was something like excitement in the watery voice. "Quad is corrupted. The prophecy is compromised."

"Check," Rhys said suddenly, loud. He pushed past Kade and stood in front of me, yanking the collar of my sweater down just enough to show the edge of the silver-violet wolf paw over my heart. "Check the mark, Inquisitor. If she is false, a true Soul mark would have burned her to ash. Silas Nocturne is the purest Soul heir in three hundred years. His mark would not hold on a thief."

It was a gamble. A huge, insane gamble.

The Inquisitor stared at the mark. The circle on his forehead spun.

He reached again, but this time with a single finger, and touched the edge of the glow.

The reaction was instantaneous.

My mark flared - not silver, but pure, blinding violet-white. Silas's matching mark on his chest flared through his shirt, answering. For a second, we weren't two people. We were one light, one soul, howling.

The Inquisitor screamed without a mouth. He jerked back, his finger smoking, white porcelain cracking, revealing swirling violet underneath.

"IMPOSSIBLE!" he shrieked in all our heads at once, so loud Margot fell to her knees clutching her ears. "THE FIFTH DIED! WE KILLED HER! WE SEALED HER!"

Silence.

He'd said it out loud. In our heads.

We killed her.

Elder Thorne's eyes went wide. "What did you say?"

The Inquisitor realized his mistake. He went still.

Then he looked straight at me. Straight through me, at Lyra.

"Little stolen god," he whispered only to me, so quietly only I could hear. "You remember now, don't you? You remember the knife."

And I did.

A flash - not my memory. Lyra's.

White hands holding her down. A white circle knife. Four chains. Her screaming for her brothers who hadn't been born yet. And a voice saying "Cut her into pieces, so she can never howl again."

I screamed.

Not with my mouth. With Lyra's.

The entire Observatory Tower exploded in violet light. The wards shattered. The windows blew out. Every shadow, every flame, every mind in the Tower was thrown back.

When the light faded, I was on my knees in the middle of a crater where the floor had been, eyes pure violet, hair floating, claws fully out, Lyra's giant white ghost wolf standing behind me, teeth bared at the Inquisitor.

And I said, in a voice that was mine and not mine:

"We remember you, Silencer. And we have come to collect your tongue."

The Inquisitor took a step back.

For the first time in Temple history, a White Inquisitor was afraid.

Kade was suddenly behind me, his hands on my shoulders, shadows wrapping around me like armor. "Elara, come back, breathe-"

Jaxon was on my other side, fire back, hotter, violet. "Holy s**t, girlfriend's got a big wolf."

Rhys and Silas completed the circle around me, marks blazing.

Elder Thorne looked at the five of us - at the god and her tethered Quads - and he started to laugh, low and disbelieving.

"Well," he said, wiping blood from his nose. "I think that's proof enough of Tether for the High Council. Inquisitor, I believe you are dismissed from this campus."

The Inquisitor stared at us. At the marks. At the giant ghost wolf only he and we could see.

"This is not over," he said in all our heads. "The High Priest will come. And he will unmake you."

Then he turned into white smoke and vanished, leaving only the smell of burnt incense and a single white feather on the floor.

It wasn't a feather. It was a tooth. A long, white, human tooth.

Silas picked it up with shaking hands. "A Silencer's tooth... they only fall when they feel true fear."

Jaxon looked at me, then at the crater, then at me again.

"So... still hungry?" he asked weakly.

And despite the terror, despite the god in my head screaming for revenge, I burst out laughing until tears ran down my face.