City of Ghosts Read Online Free PDF

trapped by heavy black hands and forced to give up everything she’d fought all her life to gain.
    Elder Thompson was shouting now. His words slammed into her, beat her like fists. She pushed harder, aiming for the thick purple wall. Get out, she had to get out, had to—
    Another hand on her, squeezing her arm. She tried to swing, to bat him away, but he caught her. “Cesaria. Cesaria. Cesaria.”
    Elder Griffin. Elder Griffin speaking to her, his voice quiet but still somehow audible over Elder Thompson’s roar. He repeated her name again and again, and the tiny piece of her able to focus grabbed him, grabbed the sound of her name in his voice, and clung to it.
    “Cesaria. I am here with you, Cesaria. Give in. Let go and have trust in me. You know me, Cesaria. I know you. You will not be hurt here, no one will hurt you. I promise it will end when you relax, and you will come to no harm. I promise you—let go and it will end, stop fighting it, no one will hurt you. No one will hurt you, Cesaria, I promise …”
    She didn’t want to. Her head flew back and forth, denying it, refusing.
    He kept speaking, the same soft litany over and over. Tears ran down her cheeks. She could feel them, taste them, salty and flavored with calamus and cayenne from the herbs invading her body.
    Somewhere—she had no idea how long it took, how many times he repeated her name or urged her to give in and let Elder Thompson take control of her—she relaxed. Elder Griffin would not let anything happen to her. She knew he wouldn’t. She trusted him as much as she trusted anyone, trusted him more than anyone except—She trusted him, and he wouldn’t let her get hurt, and gradually she felt the energy around her change, heard Elder Thompson’s voice quiet. With a sigh she reached into herself; with a sigh she gave in to her trust.
    The energy changed. Instantly, like a puzzle piece snapping into place. Not scary anymore, not dangerous. She was in this. She was resigned to it. She’d agreed to it and she was doing it, and suddenly she didn’t care. In fact …
    It filled her, sent her floating. Better than her pills. Better than a knob of Dream. Every cell in her body was pure power, pure thick sweetness, light and full of joy. She had no choices to make, no battles to fight. No memories to deal with, no shame, no misery. She wasn’t herself anymore. She was someone else, someone who belonged to someone, and that someone would make all the decisions and let her float …
    It switched again, and she slammed back into herself. Her eyes opened.
    The light had changed. Still purple, still glowing, but colored with shooting stars of black and red, streaking across the bright screen of energy. Her blood raced through her veins, through her brain, faster and faster, her tattoos screamed and tingled and writhed on her skin, searing through muscle and bone, setting off alarms in her soul.
    Around the perimeter of the circle stood the ghosts, their clothing so familiar, their faces ones she’d seen before in paintings. The First Elders. The founders of the Church.
    Controlled by herbs, neutered by magic, they stared at her with eyes that were nothing but blank white spaces. Their hands were clasped before them, their feet planted on the floor. They would witness her oath. They would bind her.
    They would punish her if she broke the Oath.
    Holy shit .
    Elder Thompson’s voice boomed through the silence, an edge of hoarseness ruining the thick slide of it.
    “Cesaria Putnam, this night we Bind you. Bind you in loyalty to your Church, to Truth and Fact, to the power of the Church and the power of the earth. Do you accept this Binding?”
    Elder Griffin whispered something in her ear. She repeated it with a mouth that felt alien and strange, a voice rusty with nerves. “I request the parameters of the Binding.”
    “The parameters of the Binding are these: That you will not speak of your purpose to anyone but those authorized to know it. That you