فصل 06

6

NINA

Nina couldn’t stop staring at Colm Fahey. He was a bit shorter than his son, broader in the shoulders, his coloring classically Kaelish—vibrant, dark red hair and that salt-white skin, densely clouded with freckles by the Zemeni sun. And though his eyes were the same clear gray as Jesper’s, they had a seriousness to them, a kind of sure warmth that differed from Jesper’s crackling energy.

It wasn’t only the pleasure of trying to find Jesper in his father’s features that kept Nina’s attention focused on the farmer. There was just something so strange about seeing a person that wholesome standing in the stone hull of an empty mausoleum surrounded by Ketterdam’s worst—herself among them.

Nina shivered and drew the old horse blanket she’d been using as a wrap more tightly around her. She’d started tallying her life in good days and bad days, and thanks to the Cornelis Smeet job, this was turning out to be a very bad day. She couldn’t afford to let it get the best of her, not when they were this close to rescuing Inej. Be all right, Nina willed silently, hoping her thoughts could somehow cut through the air, speed over the waters of the Ketterdam harbors, and reach her friend. Stay safe and whole and wait for us.

Nina hadn’t been on Vellgeluk when Van Eck had taken Inej hostage. She’d still been trying to purge the parem from her body, caught in the haze of suffering that had begun on the voyage from Djerholm. She told herself to be grateful for the memory of that misery, every shaking, aching, vomiting minute of it. The shame of Matthias witnessing it all, holding back her hair, dabbing her brow, restraining her as gently as he could as she argued, cajoled, screamed at him for more parem. She made herself remember every terrible thing she’d said, every wild pleasure offered, each insult or accusation she’d hurled at him. You enjoy watching me suffer. You want me to beg, don’t you? How long have you been waiting to see me like this? Stop punishing me, Matthias. Help me. Be good to me and I’ll be good to you. He’d absorbed it all in stoic silence. She clutched tight to those memories. She needed them as vivid and bright and cringe-inducing as possible to fight her hunger for the drug. She never wanted to be like that again.

Now she looked at Matthias, his hair coming in thick and gold, long enough that it was just starting to curl over his ears. She loved the sight of him, and she hated it too. Because he wouldn’t give her what she wanted. Because he knew how badly she needed it.

After Kaz had settled them on Black Veil, Nina had managed to last two days before she’d broken down and gone to Kuwei to ask him for another dose of parem. A small one. Just a taste of it, something to ease this relentless need. The sweats were gone, the bouts of fever. She could walk and talk, and listen to Kaz and the others hatching their plans. But even as she went about her business, drank the cups of broth and tea heaped with sugar that Matthias set before her, the need was there, a ceaseless, serrated sawing at her nerves, back and forth, minute to minute. She hadn’t made a conscious decision to ask Kuwei when she’d sat down beside him. She’d spoken to him softly in Shu, listened to him complain about the dampness of the tomb. And then the words were out of her mouth: “Do you have any more?”

He didn’t bother to ask what she meant. “I gave it all to Matthias.”

“I see,” she’d said. “That’s probably for the best.”

She’d smiled. He’d smiled. She’d wanted to claw his face to shreds.

Because she couldn’t possibly go to Matthias. Ever. And for all she knew, he’d thrown whatever supply of the drug Kuwei had into the sea. The thought filled her with so much panic that she’d had to race outside and vomit the spare contents of her stomach in front of one of the ruined mausoleums. She’d covered the mess with dirt, then found a quiet place to sit beneath a trellis of ivy and wept in jags of unsteady tears.

“You’re all a bunch of useless skivs,” she’d said to the silent graves. They didn’t seem to care. And yet somehow the stillness of Black Veil comforted her, quieted her. She couldn’t explain why. The places of the dead had never held solace for her before. She rested for a while, dried her tears, and when she knew she wouldn’t give herself away with blotchy skin and watery eyes, she’d made her way back to the others.

You survived the worst of it, she had told herself. The parem is out of reach, and now you can stop thinking about it. And she’d managed for a while.

Then last night, when she’d been preparing to cozy up to Cornelis Smeet, she’d made the mistake of using her power. Even with the wig and the flowers and the costume and the corset, she hadn’t quite felt up to the role of seductress. So she’d found a looking glass inside Club Cumulus and attempted to tailor the circles beneath her eyes. It was the first time she’d tried to use her power since her recovery. She’d broken into a sweat from the effort, and as soon as the bruised color faded, the hunger for parem hit, a swift, hard kick to her chest. She’d bent double, clutching the sink, her mind filled with breakneck thoughts of how she could get away, who might have a supply, what she could trade. She’d forced herself to think of the shame on the boat, the future she might be able to make with Matthias, but the thought that had brought her back to sanity was Inej. She owed Inej her life, and there was no way she was leaving her stranded with Van Eck. She wasn’t that person. She refused to be.

Somehow, she had pulled herself together. She splashed water on her face, pinched her cheeks to pinkness. She still looked haggard, but with resolution, she’d hitched up her corset and flashed the brightest smile she could muster. Do this right and Smeet won’t be looking at your face, Nina had told herself, and she’d sailed out the doors to snag herself a pigeon.

But once the job was done, when the information they needed was secured, and everyone had fallen asleep, she’d dug through Matthias’ few belongings, through the pockets of his clothes, her frustration growing with every passing second. She hated him. She hated Kuwei. She hated this stupid city.

Disgusted with herself, she’d slipped beneath his blankets. Matthias always slept with his back to a wall, a habit from his days in Hellgate. She’d let her hands wander, seeking his pockets, trying to feel along the linings of his trousers.

“Nina?” he’d asked sleepily.

“I’m cold,” she said, her hands continuing their search. She pressed a kiss to his neck, then below his ear. She’d never let herself kiss him this way before. She’d never had the chance. They’d been too busy untangling the skein of suspicion and lust and loyalty that bound them together, and once she’d taken the parem … It was all she could think of, even now. The desire she felt was for the drug, not for the body she felt shift beneath her hands. She didn’t kiss his lips, though. She wouldn’t let parem take that from her too.

He’d groaned slightly. “The others—”

“Everyone is asleep.”

Then he’d seized her hands. “Stop.”

“Matthias—”

“I don’t have it.”

She yanked herself free, shame crawling over her skin like fire over a forest floor. “Then who does?” she hissed.

“Kaz.” She stilled. “Are you going to creep into his bed?”

Nina released a huff of disbelief. “He’d slit my throat.” She wanted to scream her helplessness. There would be no bargaining with Kaz. She couldn’t bully him the way she might have bullied Wylan or plead with him the way she might have managed Jesper.

Fatigue came on suddenly, a yoke at her neck, the exhaustion at least tempering her frantic need. She rested her forehead against Matthias’ chest. “I hate this,” she said. “I hate you a little, drüskelle.”

“I’m used to it. Come here.” He’d wrapped his arms around her and gotten her talking about Ravka, about Inej. He’d distracted her with stories, named the winds that blew across Fjerda, told her of his first meal in the drüskelle hall. At some point, she must have drifted off, because the next thing she knew, she was burrowing her way out of a heavy, dreamless sleep, woken by the sound of the tomb door slamming open.

Matthias and Kaz had returned from the university, holes burned into their clothing from some kind of bomb Wylan had made, Jesper and Wylan close on their heels, wild-eyed and soaked from the spring rain that had begun to fall—with a beefy Kaelish-looking farmer in tow. Nina felt like she’d been given some kind of lovely gift from the Saints, a situation mad and baffling enough to actually distract her.

Though the hunger for parem had dulled since last night’s frenzy, it was still there, and she had no idea how she was going to get through the mission tonight. Seducing Smeet had only been the first part of their plan. Kaz was counting on her, Inej was counting on her. They needed her to be a Corporalnik, not an addict with the shakes who wore herself out with the barest bit of tailoring. But Nina couldn’t think about any of that with Colm Fahey standing there mangling his hat, and Jesper looking like he’d rather be eating a stack of waffles topped with ground glass than facing him, and Kaz … She had no idea what to expect from Kaz. Anger, maybe worse. Kaz didn’t like surprises or potential vulnerabilities, and Jesper’s father was one very stocky, wind-chafed vulnerability.

But after hearing Jesper’s breathless—and, Nina suspected, abbreviated—description of how they’d escaped the university, Kaz simply leaned on his cane and said, “Were you followed?”

“No,” Jesper replied with a decisive shake of his head.

“Wylan?”

Colm bristled. “You doubt my son’s word?”

“It isn’t personal, Da,” said Jesper. “He doubts everyone’s word.”

Kaz’s expression had been unruffled, his rough stone voice so easy and pleasant that Nina felt the hair rise on her arms. “Apologies, Mister Fahey. A habit one develops in the Barrel. Trust but verify.”

“Or don’t trust at all,” muttered Matthias.

“Wylan?” Kaz repeated.

Wylan set his satchel down on the table. “If they’d known about the passage, they would have followed us or had people waiting in the printmaker’s shop. We lost them.”

“I counted about ten on the roof,” said Kaz, and Matthias nodded confirmation.

“Sounds right,” said Jesper. “But I can’t be sure. They had the sun at their backs.”

Kaz sat down, his black eyes focused on Jesper’s father. “You were the bait.”

“Pardon, lad?”

“The bank called in your loan?”

Colm blinked, surprised. “Well, yes, as a matter of fact, they sent me a rather sternly worded letter that I’d become an unstable credit risk. They said that if I didn’t pay in full, they would be forced to take legal action.” He turned to his son. “I wrote to you, Jes.” His voice was confused, not accusing.

“I … I haven’t been able to collect mail.” After Jesper had stopped attending university, had he still managed to receive letters there? Nina wondered how he’d maintained this ruse for so long. It would have been made easier by the fact that Colm was an ocean away—and by his desire to believe in his son. An easy mark, Nina thought sadly. No matter his reasons, Jesper had been conning his own father.

“Jesper—” said Colm.

“I was trying to get the money, Da.”

“They’re threatening to take the farm.”

Jesper’s eyes were firmly fixed on the tomb floor. “I was close. I am close.”

“To the money?” Now Nina heard Colm’s frustration. “We’re sitting in a tomb. We were just shot at.”

“What got you on a ship to Ketterdam?” Kaz asked.

“The bank moved up the collection date!” Colm said indignantly. “Simply said I’d run out of time. I tried to reach Jesper, but when there was no reply, I thought—”

“You thought you’d see what your brilliant boy was up to here on the dark streets of Ketterdam.”

“I feared the worst. The city does have a reputation.”

“Well deserved, I promise you,” said Kaz. “And when you arrived?”

“I made inquiries at the university. They said he wasn’t enrolled, so I went to the constabulary.”

Jesper winced. “Oh, Da. The stadwatch?”

Colm crushed his hat with fresh vigor. “And where was I supposed to go, Jes? You know how dangerous it is for … for someone like you.”

“Da,” Jesper said, looking his father in the eye at last. “You didn’t tell them I’m—”

“Of course not!”

Grisha. Why won’t either of them say it?

Colm threw down the lump of felt that had been his hat. “I don’t understand any of this. Why would you bring me to this horrible place? Why were we shot at? What has become of your studies? What has become of you?”

Jesper opened his mouth, closed it. “Da, I … I—”

“It was my fault,” Wylan blurted. Every eye turned to him. “He uh … he was concerned about the bank loan, so he put his studies on hold to work with a…”

“Local gunsmith,” Nina offered.

“Nina,” Matthias rumbled warningly.

“He needs our help,” she whispered.

“To lie to his father?”

“It’s a fib. Totally different.” She had no idea where Wylan was going with this, but he was clearly in need of assistance.

“Yes!” said Wylan eagerly. “A gunsmith! And then I … I told him about a deal—”

“They were swindled,” Kaz said. His voice was as cold and steady as ever, but he held himself stiffly, as if walking over uncertain ground. “They were offered a business opportunity that seemed too good to be true.”

Colm slumped into a chair. “If it seems that way, then—”

“It probably is,” said Kaz. Nina had the strangest sense that for once he was being sincere.

“Did you and your brother lose everything?” Colm asked Wylan.

“My brother?” Wylan asked blankly.

“Your twin brother,” Kaz said with a glance at Kuwei, who sat quietly observing the proceedings. “Yes. They lost everything. Wylan’s brother hasn’t spoken a word since.”

“Does seem the quiet type,” Colm said. “And you are all … students?”

“Of a sort,” said Kaz.

“Who spend your free hours in a graveyard. Can we not go to the authorities? Tell them what happened? These swindlers may have other victims.”

“Well—” Wylan began, but Kaz silenced him with a look. A strange hush fell in the tomb. Kaz took a seat at the table.

“The authorities can’t help you,” he said. “Not in this city.”

“Why not?”

“Because the law here is profit. Jesper and Wylan tried to take a shortcut. The stadwatch won’t so much as wipe their tears. Sometimes, the only way to get justice is to take it for yourself.”

“And that’s where you come in.”

Kaz nodded. “We’re going to get your money. You won’t lose your farm.”

“But you’re going to step outside the law to do it,” Colm said. He shook his head wearily. “You barely look old enough to graduate.”

“Ketterdam was my education. And I can tell you this: Jesper never would have turned to me for help if he’d had anywhere else to go.”

“You can’t be so bad, boy,” said Colm gruffly. “You haven’t been alive long enough to rack up your share of sin.”

“I’m a quick study.”

“Can I trust you?”

“No.”

Colm took up his crumpled hat again. “Can I trust you to help Jesper through this?”

“Yes.”

Colm sighed. He looked around at all of them. Nina found herself standing up straighter. “You lot make me feel very old.”

“Spend a little more time in Ketterdam,” said Kaz. “You’ll feel ancient.” Then he tilted his head to one side and Nina saw that distant, considering look cross his features. “You have an honest face, Mister Fahey.”

Colm shot Jesper a puzzled glance. “Well. I should hope so, and thank you for marking it.”

“It’s not a compliment,” said Jesper. “And I know that look, Kaz. Don’t you dare start those wheels spinning.”

Kaz’s only response was a slow blink. Whatever scheme had been set in motion in his diabolical brain, it was too late to stop it now. “Where are you staying?”

“The Ostrich.”

“It isn’t safe to go back there. We’re moving you to the Geldrenner Hotel. We’ll register you under a different name.”

“But why?” Colm sputtered.

“Because some people want Jesper dead, and they already used you to lure him out of hiding once. I have no doubt they’d be willing to take you hostage, and there’s too much of that going around already.” Kaz scribbled a few instructions to Rotty and handed him a very thick stack of kruge. “Feel free to take your meals in the dining room, Mister Fahey, but I’d ask that you forgo the sights and stay inside the hotel until we contact you. If anyone asks your business, you’re here for a bit of rest and relaxation.”

Colm considered Rotty and then Kaz. He expelled a decisive breath. “No. I thank you, but this is a mistake.” He turned to Jesper. “We’ll find another way to pay the debt. Or we’ll start over somewhere else.”

“You’re not giving up the farm,” Jesper said. He lowered his voice. “She’s there. We can’t leave her.”

“Jes—”

“Please, Da. Please let me make this right. I know—” He swallowed, his bony shoulders bunching. “I know I let you down. Just give me one more chance.” Nina suspected he wasn’t only speaking to his father.

“We don’t belong here, Jes. This place is too loud, too lawless. Nothing makes sense.”

“Mister Fahey,” Kaz said quietly. “You know what they say about walking in a cow pasture?”

Jesper’s brows shot up, and Nina had to stifle a nervous laugh. What did the bastard of the Barrel know about cow pastures?

“Keep your head down and watch your step,” Colm replied.

Kaz nodded. “Just think of Ketterdam as a really big cow pasture.” The barest smile tugged at the furrow of Colm’s mouth. “Give us three days to get your money and get you and your son out of Kerch safely.”

“Is that really possible?”

“Anything can happen in this city.”

“That thought doesn’t fill me with confidence.” He rose, and Jesper shot to his feet.

“Da?”

“Three days, Jesper. Then we go home. With or without the money.” He rested a hand on Jesper’s shoulder. “And for Saints’ sake, be careful. All of you.”

Nina felt a sudden lump in her throat. Matthias had lost his family to war. Nina had been taken from her family to train when she was just a little girl. Wylan had been as good as evicted from his father’s house. Kuwei had lost his father and his country. And Kaz? She didn’t want to know what dark alley Kaz had crawled out of. But Jesper had somewhere to go, someone to take care of him, somebody to say, It’s going to be all right. She had a vision of golden fields beneath a cloudless sky, a clapboard house protected from the wind by a line of red oaks. Someplace safe. Nina wished Colm Fahey could march over to Jan Van Eck’s office and tell him to give Inej back or get a mouth full of knuckles. She wished someone in this city would help them, that they weren’t so alone. She wished Jesper’s father could take them all with him. She’d never been to Novyi Zem, but the longing for those golden fields felt just like homesickness. Silly, she told herself, childish. Kaz was right—if they wanted justice, they would have to take it for themselves. That didn’t ease the starved-heart pang in her chest.

But then Colm was saying his goodbyes to Jesper and disappearing through the stone graves with Rotty and Specht. He turned to wave and was gone.

“I should go with him,” Jesper said, hovering in the doorway.

“You already almost got him killed once,” said Kaz.

“Do we know who set up the ambush at the university?” Wylan asked.

“Jesper’s father went to the stadwatch,” said Matthias. “I’m sure many of the officers are susceptible to bribes.”

“True,” said Nina. “But it can’t be coincidence that the bank called in his loan when they did.”

Wylan sat down at the table. “If the banks are involved, my father may be behind it.”

“Pekka Rollins has influence at the banks too,” Kaz said, and Nina saw his gloved hand flex over the crow’s head of his cane.

“Could they be working together?” she asked.

Jesper rubbed his hands over his face. “All the Saints and your Aunt Eva, let’s hope not.”

“I’m not ruling anything out,” said Kaz. “But none of this changes what has to happen tonight. Here.” He reached inside one of the niches in the wall.

“My revolvers!” Jesper exclaimed, clutching them to his chest. “Oh, hello, you gorgeous things.” His grin was dazzling. “You got them back!”

“The safe at the Cumulus is an easy crack.”

“Thank you, Kaz. Thank you.”

Any hint of the warmth Kaz had shown Jesper’s father was gone, as fleeting as the dream of those golden fields. “What good is a shooter without his guns?” Kaz asked, seemingly oblivious to the way Jesper’s smile collapsed. “You’ve been in the red too long. We all have. This is the night we start paying our debts.”

Now night had fallen and they were on their way to do just that, a waxing moon glaring down at them like a white and watchful eye. Nina shook out her sleeves. The cold snap had broken, and they were in the middle of a proper late spring. Or what passed for that in Kerch—the moist, claustrophobic warmth of an animal’s mouth relieved only by brief, unpredictable storms. Matthias and Jesper had left for the docks early to make sure the gondel was in place. Then they’d all headed to the launch point, leaving Kuwei on Black Veil with Rotty and Specht.

The boat cut silently through the water. Ahead, Nina could see the gleam of lights guiding them onward.

Jesper’s revolvers were back at his hips, and both he and Matthias had rifles slung across their shoulders. Kaz had a pistol in his coat and that demonic cane, and Nina saw Wylan rest a hand on his satchel. It was packed with explosives, flash bombs, and who knew what else.

“We better be right about all this,” Wylan said on a sigh. “My father is going to be ready.”

“I’m counting on it,” Kaz replied.

Nina let her fingers brush against the grip of the pistol tucked into the pocket of her light spring coat. She had never needed a gun before, never wanted to carry one. Because I was the weapon. But she didn’t trust herself now. Her control over her power felt flimsy, like she kept reaching for something that was just a bit farther away than she’d thought. She needed to know it would be there tonight. She couldn’t make a mistake, not when Inej’s life depended on it. Nina knew that if she’d been on Vellgeluk, the battle would have gone differently. Inej never would have been taken if Nina had been strong enough to face Van Eck’s henchmen.

And if she’d had parem? No one could have stood against her.

Nina gave her head a firm shake. If you’d had parem, you’d be completely addicted and well on your way to the Reaper’s Barge.

No one spoke as they reached shore and disembarked as quickly and quietly as possible. Kaz gestured for them to get to their positions. He would approach from the north, Matthias and Wylan from the east. Nina and Jesper would be responsible for the guards on the western edge of the perimeter.

Nina flexed her fingers. Silence four guards. That should be easy. A few weeks ago it would have been. Slow their pulses. Send them quietly into unconsciousness without ever letting an alarm sound. But now she wondered if it was the damp or her own nervous perspiration that made her clothes cling so uncomfortably to her skin.

Too soon, she saw the shapes of the first two guards at their post. They leaned against the low stone wall, rifles propped beside them, their conversation rising and falling in a lazy hum. Easy.

“Take ’em shut-eye,” said Jesper.

Nina focused on the guards, letting her own body become attuned to theirs, seeking out their heartbeats, the rushing rhythm of their blood. It was like stumbling blind through the dark. There was simply nothing there. Dimly, she was aware of the suggestion of their frames, a trace of knowing, but that was all. She saw them with her eyes, heard them with her ears, but the rest was silence. That other sense inside her, the gift that had been there for as long as she could remember, the heart of the power that had been her constant companion since she was a child, had simply ceased to beat. All she could think of was parem, the exhilaration, the ease, as if the universe lay at her fingertips.

“What are you waiting for?” said Jesper.

Alerted by some sound or simply their presence, one of the guards glanced in their direction, peering into the shadows. He lifted his rifle and signaled to his companion to follow.

“They’re headed this way.” Jesper’s hands went to his guns.

Oh, Saints. If Jesper had to shoot, the other guards would be alerted. The alarm would be raised, and this whole endeavor might go straight to hell.

Nina focused with all her will. The hunger for parem seized her, quaking through her body, digging into her skull with determined talons. She ignored it. One of the guards faltered, went to his knees.

“Gillis!” said the other guard. “What is it?” But he was not foolish enough to lower his weapon. “Halt!” he shouted in their direction, still trying to support his friend. “Identify yourselves.”

“Nina,” Jesper whispered furiously. “Do something.”

Nina clenched her fist, trying to squeeze the guard’s larynx shut to prevent him from calling for help.

“Identify yourselves!”

Jesper drew his gun. No, no, no. She was not going to be the reason this went wrong. Parem was supposed to kill her or leave her alone, not stick her in this miserable, powerless purgatory. Rage swept through Nina, clean, perfect, focusing anger. Her mind reached out and suddenly, she had hold of something, not a body, but something. She caught a movement from the corner of her eye, a dim shape emerging from the shadows—a cloud of dust. It shot toward the standing guard. He swatted at it as if trying to drive away a swarm of mosquitoes, but it whirred faster, faster, a nearly invisible blur. The guard opened his mouth to scream and the cloud vanished. He let out a grunt and toppled backward.

His compatriot was still balancing woozily on his knees. Nina and Jesper strode forward, and Jesper gave the kneeling guard a whack to the back of the head with the butt of his revolver. The man slumped to the ground, unconscious. Cautiously, they examined the other guard. He lay with eyes open, staring up at the starry sky. His mouth and nostrils were choked with fine white dust.

“Did you do that?” said Jesper.

Had she? Nina felt like she could taste the dust in her own mouth. This shouldn’t be possible. A Corporalnik could manipulate the human body, not inorganic matter. This was the work of a Fabrikator—a powerful one. “It wasn’t you?”

“I appreciate the vote of confidence, but this was all you, gorgeous.”

“I didn’t mean to kill him.” What had she meant to do? Just keep him quiet. Dust dribbled from the corner of his parted lips in a fine line.

“There are two more guards,” said Jesper. “And we’re already running late.”

“How about we just knock them over the head?”

“Sophisticated. I like it.”

Nina felt a strange crawling sensation all over her body, but the need for parem wasn’t screaming through her any longer. I didn’t mean to kill him. It didn’t matter. It couldn’t right now. The guards were down and the plan was in motion.

“Come on,” she said. “Let’s go get our girl.”