Crooked Kingdom by Leigh Bardugo
“Get out of my way, boy. I’m late for my game.”
“Hope the cards are hot.” Kaz moved aside. “But you may want these.” He held out his hand. Six bullets lay in his gloved palm. “In case of a tussle.”
Haskell whisked the pistol from his pocket and flipped open the barrel. It was empty. “You little—” Then Haskell barked a laugh and plucked the bullets from Kaz’s hand, shaking his head. “You’ve got the devil’s own blood in you, boy. Go get my money.”
“And then some,” murmured Kaz as he tipped his hat and limped back down the alley to the gondel.
* * *
Kaz kept sharp, relaxing only slightly when the boat slid past the boundaries of the Barrel and into the quieter waters that bordered the financial district. Here the streets were nearly empty and the stadwatch presence was thinner. As the gondel passed beneath Ledbridge, he glimpsed a shadow separating itself from the railing. A moment later, Inej joined him in the narrow boat.
He was tempted to steer them back to Black Veil. He’d barely slept in days, and his leg had never fully recovered from what he’d put it through at the Ice Court. Eventually, his body was going to stop taking orders.
As if she could read his mind, Inej said, “I can handle the surveillance. I’ll meet you back on the island.”
Like hell. She wasn’t going to be rid of him that easily. “What direction do you want to approach Van Eck’s house from?”
“Let’s start at the Church of Barter. We can get eyes on Van Eck’s house from the roof.”
Kaz wasn’t thrilled to hear it, but he took them up Beurscanal, past the Exchange and the grand facade of the Geldrenner Hotel, where Jesper’s father was probably snoring soundly in his suite.
They docked the gondel near the church. The glow of candlelight spilled from the doors of the main cathedral, left open and unlocked at all hours, welcoming those who wished to offer prayers to Ghezen.
Inej could have climbed the outer walls with little effort, and Kaz might have managed it, but he wasn’t going to test himself on a night when his leg was screaming with every step. He needed access to one of the chapels.
“You don’t have to come up,” Inej said as they crept along the perimeter and located one of the chapel doors.
Kaz ignored her and swiftly picked the lock. They slipped inside the darkened chamber, then took the stairs up two flights, the chapels stacked one on top of another like a layered cake, each commissioned by a separate merchant family of Kerch. One more lock to pick and they were scaling another damned staircase. This one curled in a tight spiral up to a hatch in the roof.
The Church of Barter was built on the plan of Ghezen’s hand, the vast cathedral located in the palm, with five stubby naves radiating along the four fingers and thumb, each fingertip terminating in a stack of chapels. They’d climbed the chapels at the tip of the pinky and now cut down to the roof of the main cathedral, and then up the length of Ghezen’s ring finger, picking their way along a jagged mountain range of slippery gables and narrow stone spines.
“Why do gods always like to be worshipped in high places?” Kaz muttered.
“It’s men who seek grandeur,” Inej said, springing nimbly along as if her feet knew some secret topography. “The Saints hear prayers wherever they’re spoken.”
“And answer them according to their moods?”
“What you want and what the world needs are not always in accord, Kaz. Praying and wishing are not the same thing.”
But they’re equally useless. Kaz bit back the reply. He was too focused on not plummeting to his death to properly engage in an argument.
At the tip of the ring finger, they stopped and took in the view. To the southwest, they could see the high spires of the cathedral, the Exchange, the glittering clock tower of the Geldrenner Hotel, and the long ribbon of the Beurscanal flowing beneath Zentsbridge. But if they looked east, this particular rooftop gave them a direct view of the Geldstraat, the Geldcanal beyond, and Van Eck’s stately home.
It was a good vantage point to observe the security Van Eck had put in place around the house and on the canal, but it wouldn’t give them all the information they needed.
“We’re going to have to get closer,” said Kaz.
“I know,” said Inej, drawing a length of rope from her tunic and looping it over one of the roof’s finials. “It will be faster and safer for me to case Van Eck’s house on my own. Give me a half hour.”
“You—”
“By the time you make it back to the gondel, I’ll have all the information we need.”
He was going to kill her. “You dragged me up here for nothing.”
“Your pride dragged you up here. If Van Eck senses anything amiss tonight, it’s all over. This isn’t a two-person job and you know it.”
“Inej—”
“My future is riding on this too, Kaz. I don’t tell you how to pick locks or put together a plan. This is what I’m good at, so let me do my job.” She yanked the rope taut. “And just think of all the time you’ll have for prayer and quiet contemplation on the way down.”
She vanished over the side of the chapel.
Kaz stood there, staring at the place she’d been only seconds before. She’d tricked him. The decent, honest, pious Wraith had outsmarted him. He turned to look back at the long expanse of roof he was going to have to traverse to get back to the boat.
“Curse you and all your Saints,” he said to no one at all, then realized he was smiling.
* * *
Kaz was in a decidedly less amused frame of mind by the time he sank into the gondel. He didn’t mind that she’d duped him, he just hated that she was right. He knew perfectly well that he was in no shape to try to slink into Van Eck’s house blind tonight. It wasn’t a two-person job, and it wasn’t the way they operated. She was the Wraith, the Barrel’s best thief of secrets. Gathering intelligence without being spotted was her specialty, not his. He could also admit that he was grateful to just sit for a moment, stretch out his leg as water lapped gently at the sides of the canal. So why had he insisted that he accompany her? That was dangerous thinking—the kind of thinking that had gotten Inej captured in the first place.
I can best this, Kaz told himself. By midnight tomorrow, Kuwei would be on his way out of Ketterdam. In a matter of days, they would have their reward. Inej would be free to pursue her dream of hunting slavers, and he’d be rid of this constant distraction. He would start a new gang, one built from the youngest, deadliest members of the Dregs. He’d rededicate himself to the promise he’d made to Jordie’s memory, the painstaking task of pulling Pekka Rollins’ life apart piece by piece.
And yet, his eyes kept drifting to the walkway beside the canal, his impatience growing. He was better than this. Waiting was the part of the criminal life so many people got wrong. They wanted to act instead of hold fast and gather information. They wanted to know instantly without having to learn. Sometimes the trick to getting the best of a situation was just to wait. If you didn’t like the weather, you didn’t rush into the storm—you waited until it changed. You found a way to keep from getting wet.
Brilliant, thought Kaz. So where the hell is she?
A few long minutes later, she dropped soundlessly into the gondel.
“Tell me,” he said as he set them moving down the canal.
“Alys is still in the same room on the second floor. There’s a guard posted outside her door.”
“The office?”
“Same location, right down the hall. He’s had Schuyler locks installed on all of the house’s exterior windows.” Kaz blew out an annoyed breath. “Is that a problem?” she asked.
“No. A Schuyler lock won’t stop any pick worth his stones, but they’re time-consuming.”
“I couldn’t make sense of them, so I had to wait for one of the kitchen staff to open the back door.” He’d done a shoddy job of teaching her to pick locks. She could master a Schuyler if she put her mind to it. “They were taking deliveries,” In
“Makes sense,” said Kaz. “He’ll act the role of the distraught father and get them to add more stadwatch to the search.”
“Will they oblige?”
“They have no reason to deny him. And they’re all getting fair warning to sweep their mistresses or whatever else they don’t want discovered in a raid under the rug.”
“The Barrel won’t go easy.”
“No,” said Kaz as the gondel slid past the shallow sandbar that abutted Black Veil and into the island’s mists. “No one wants the merchers poking around in our business. Any notion of what time this little meeting of the Council will take place?”
“The cooks were making noises about setting a full table for dinner. Could make for a good distraction.”
“Exactly.” This was them at their best, with nothing but the job between them, working together free of complications. He should leave it at that, but he needed to know. “You said Van Eck didn’t hurt you. Tell me the truth.”
They’d reached the shelter of the willows. Inej kept her eyes on the droop of their white branches. “He didn’t.”
They climbed out of the gondel, made sure it was thoroughly camouflaged, and picked their way up the shore. Kaz followed Inej, waiting, letting her weather change. The moon was starting to set, limning the graves of Black Veil, a miniature skyline etched in silver. Her braid had come uncoiled down her back. He imagined wrapping it around his hand, rubbing his thumb over the pattern of its plaits. And then what? He shoved the thought away.
When they were only a few yards from the stone hull, Inej halted and watched the mists wreathing the branches. “He was going to break my legs,” she said. “Smash them with a mallet so they’d never heal.”
Thoughts of moonlight and silken hair evaporated in a black bolt of fury. Kaz saw Inej tug on the sleeve of her left forearm, where the Menagerie tattoo had once been. He had the barest inkling of what she’d endured there, but he knew what it was to feel helpless, and Van Eck had managed to make her feel that way again. Kaz was going to have to find a new language of suffering to teach that smug merch son of a bitch.
Jesper and Nina were right. Inej needed rest and a chance to recover after the last few days. He knew how strong she was, but he also knew what captivity meant to her.
“If you’re not up for the job—”
“I’m up for the job,” she said, her back still to him.
The silence between them was dark water. He could not cross it. He couldn’t walk the line between the decency she deserved and the violence this path demanded. If he tried, it might get them both killed. He could only be who he truly was—a boy who had no comfort to offer. So he would give her what he could.
“I’m going to open Van Eck up,” he said quietly. “I’m going to give him a wound that can’t be sewn shut, that he’ll never recover from. The kind that can’t be healed.”
“The kind you endured?”
“Yes.” It was a promise. It was an admission.
She took a shaky breath. The words came like a string of gunshots, rapid-fire, as if she resented the very act of speaking them. “I didn’t know if you would come.”
Kaz couldn’t blame Van Eck for that. Kaz had built that doubt in her with every cold word and small cruelty.
“We’re your crew, Inej. We don’t leave our own at the mercy of merch scum.” It wasn’t the answer he wanted to give. It wasn’t the answer she wanted.
When she turned to him, her eyes were bright with anger.
“He was going to break my legs,” she said, her chin held high, the barest quaver in her voice. “Would you have come for me then, Kaz? When I couldn’t scale a wall or walk a tightrope? When I wasn’t the Wraith anymore?”
Dirtyhands would not. The boy who could get them through this, get their money, keep them alive, would do her the courtesy of putting her out of her misery, then cut his losses and move on.
“I would come for you,” he said, and when he saw the wary look she shot him, he said it again. “I would come for you. And if I couldn’t walk, I’d crawl to you, and no matter how broken we were, we’d fight our way out together—knives drawn, pistols blazing. Because that’s what we do. We never stop fighting.”
The wind rose. The boughs of the willows whispered, a sly, gossiping sound. Kaz held her gaze, saw the moon reflected there, twin scythes of light. She was right to be cautious. Even of him. Especially of him. Cautious was how you survived.
At last she nodded, the smallest dip of her chin. They returned to the tomb in silence. The willows murmured on.
13
NINA
Nina woke well before dawn. As usual, her first conscious thought was of parem, and as usual, she had no appetite. The ache for the drug had nearly driven her mad last night. Trying to use her power when the Kherguud soldiers attacked had left her desperate for parem, and she’d spent the long hours tossing and turning, digging bloody half-moons into her palms.
She felt wretched this morning, and yet a sense of purpose made it easier to rise from her bed. The need for parem had dimmed something in her, and sometimes Nina was afraid that whatever spark had gone out would never return. But today, though her bones hurt and her skin felt dry and her mouth tasted like an oven that needed cleaning, she felt hopeful. Inej was back. They had a job. And she was going to do some good for her people. Even if she had to blackmail Kaz Brekker into being a decent person to manage it.
Matthias was already up, seeing to their weapons. Nina stretched and yawned, adding a little extra arch to her back, pleased at the way his gaze darted over her figure before guiltily jumping back to the rifle he was loading. Gratifying. She’d practically thrown herself at him the other day. If Matthias didn’t want to take advantage of the offer, she could make damn sure he regretted it.
The others were awake and moving around the tomb as well—everyone except Jesper, who was still snoring contentedly, his long legs sticking out from beneath a blanket. Inej was making tea. Kaz was sitting at the table trading sketches back and forth with Wylan as Kuwei looked on, occasionally offering a suggestion. Nina let her eyes study those two Shu faces next to each other. Wylan’s manner and posture were utterly different, but when both boys were at rest, it was nearly impossible to tell them apart. I did that, Nina thought. She remembered the sway of the ship’s lanterns in the little cabin, Wylan’s ruddy curls, disappearing beneath her fingertips to be replaced by a sheaf of thick black hair, his wide blue eyes, afraid but stubbornly brave, turning gold and changing shape. It had felt like magic, true magic, the kind in the stories the teachers at the Little Palace had told to try to get them to sleep. And it had all belonged to her.
Inej came to sit beside her with two cups of hot tea in hand.
“How are you this morning?” she asked. “Can you eat?”
“I don’t think so.” Nina forced herself to take a sip of tea, then said, “Thank you for what you did last night. For standing by me.”
“It was the right thing to do. I don’t want to see anyone else made a slave.”
“Even so.”
“You’re very welcome, Nina Zenik. You may repay me in the customary way.”
“Waffles?”
“Lots of them.”
“You need them. Van Eck didn’t feed you, did he?”
“I wasn’t particularly obliging, but he tried for a while.”
“And then?”
“And then he decided to torture me.”
Nina’s fists clenched. “I’m going to string his innards up like party garlands.”
Inej laughed and settled her head on Nina’s shoulder. “I appreciate the thought. Truly. But that debt is mine to pay.” She paused. “The fear was the worst of it. After the Ice Court, I almost thought I was beyond fear.”
Nina rested her chin atop Inej’s silky hair. “Zoya used to say that fear is a phoenix. You can watch it burn
Matthias appeared in front of them. “We should go soon. We have little more than an hour before sunrise.”
“What exactly are you wearing?” Nina asked, staring at the tufted cap and woolly red vest Matthias had put on over his clothes.
“Kaz procured papers for us in case we’re stopped in the Ravkan quarter. We’re Sven and Catrine Alfsson. Fjerdan defectors seeking asylum at the Ravkan embassy.”
It made sense. If they were stopped, there was no way Matthias could pass himself off as Ravkan, but Nina could easily manage Fjerdan.
“Are we married, Matthias?” she said, batting her lashes.
He consulted the papers and frowned. “I believe we’re brother and sister.”
Jesper ambled over, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Not creepy at all.”
Nina scowled. “Why did you have to make us siblings, Brekker?”
Kaz didn’t look up from whatever document he was examining. “Because it was easier for Specht to forge the papers that way, Zenik. Same parents’ names and birthplace, and he was working to accommodate your noble impulses at short notice.”
“We don’t look anything alike.”
“You’re both tall,” Inej offered.
“And neither of us have gills,” said Nina. “That doesn’t mean we look related.”
“Then tailor him,” Kaz said coldly.
The challenge in Kaz’s eyes was clear. So he knew she’d been struggling. Of course he did. Dirtyhands never missed a trick.
“I don’t want to be tailored,” said Matthias. She had no doubt it was true, but she suspected he was also trying to salve her pride.
“You’ll be fine,” said Jesper, breaking the tension. “Just keep the soulful glances to a minimum and try not to grope each other in public.” She should be so lucky.
“Here,” Matthias said, handing her the blonde wig she’d used for the Smeet job and a pile of clothes.
“These better be my size,” Nina said grumpily. She was tempted to strip down in the middle of the tomb, but she thought Matthias might keel over from the sheer impropriety of it all. She grabbed a lantern and marched into one of the side catacombs to change. She didn’t have a mirror, but she could tell the dress was spectacularly dowdy, and she had no words for the little knitted vest. When she emerged from the passage, Jesper doubled over laughing, Kaz’s brows shot up, and even Inej’s lips twitched.