Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo
“Why?”
“I’m not that good a Tailor. It’s part of all Corporalki training now, but I just don’t have an affinity for it.”
Matthias snorted.
“What?” she asked.
“I’ve never heard you admit you’re not good at something.”
“Well, it happens so rarely.”
He was horrified to find his lips curling in a smile, but it was easy enough to quell when he thought of his face being changed. “What does Brekker want you to do to me?”
“Nothing radical. I’ll change your eye color, your hair—what you have of it. It won’t be permanent.”
“I don’t want this.” I don’t want you near me.
“It won’t take long, and it will be painless, but if you want to argue about it with Kaz…”
“Fine,” he said, steeling himself. It was pointless to argue with Brekker, not when he could simply taunt Matthias with the promise of the pardon. Matthias picked up a bucket, flipped it over, and sat down. “Can I have the key now?”
She handed it over to him and he unshackled his wrists as she rooted around in a box she’d brought over. It had a handle and several little drawers stuffed with powders and pigments in tiny jars. She extracted a pot of something black from a drawer.
“What is it?”
“Black antimony.” She stepped close to him, tilting his chin back with the tip of her finger. “Unclench your jaw, Matthias. You’re going to grind your teeth down to nothing.”
He crossed his arms.
She started shaking some of the antimony over his scalp and gave a rueful sigh. “Why does the brave drüskelle Matthias Helvar eat no meat?” she asked in a theatrical voice as she worked. “’Tis a sad story indeed, my child. His teeth were winnowed away by a vexatious Grisha, and now he can eat only pudding.”
“Stop that,” he grumbled.
“What? Keep your head tilted back.”
“What are you doing?”
“Darkening your brows and lashes. You know, the way girls do before a party.” He must have grimaced because she burst out laughing. “The look on your face!”
She leaned in, the waves of her brown hair brushing against his cheeks as she bled the color from the antimony into his brows. Her hand cupped his cheek.
“Shut your eyes,” she murmured. Her thumbs moved over his lashes, and he realized he was holding his breath.
“You don’t smell like roses anymore,” he said, then wanted to kick himself. He shouldn’t be noticing her scent.
“I probably smell like boat.”
No, she smelled sweet, perfect like … “Toffee?”
Her eyes slid away guiltily. “Kaz said to pack what we needed for the journey. A girl has to eat.” She reached into her pocket and drew out a bag of toffees. “Want one?”
Yes. “No.”
She shrugged and popped one in her mouth. Her eyes rolled back, and she sighed happily. “So good.”
It was a humiliating epiphany, but he knew he could have watched her eat all day. This was one of the things he’d liked best about Nina—she savored everything, whether it was a toffee or cold water from a stream or dried reindeer meat.
“Eyes now,” she said around the candy as she pulled a tiny bottle from her case. “You’ll have to keep them open.”
“What is that?” he asked nervously.
“A tincture developed by a Grisha named Genya Safin. It’s the safest way to change eye color.”
Again she leaned in. Her cheeks were rosy from the cold, her mouth slightly open. Her lips were bare inches from his. If he sat up straighter, they’d be kissing.
“You have to look at me,” she instructed.
I am. He shifted his gaze to hers. Do you remember this shore, Nina? he wanted to ask, though he knew she must.
“What color are you making my eyes?”
“Shhh. This is difficult.” She dabbed the drops onto her fingers and held them close to his eyes.
“Why can’t you just put them in?”
“Why can’t you stop talking? Do you want me to blind you?”
He stopped talking.
Finally, she drew back, gaze roving over his features. “Brownish,” she said. Then she winked. “Like toffee.”
“What do you intend to do about Bo Yul-Bayur?”
She straightened and stepped away, her expression shuttering. “What do you mean?”
He was sorry to see her easy manner go, but that didn’t matter. He glanced over his shoulder to make sure no one was listening. “You know exactly what I mean. I don’t believe for a second you’ll let these people hand Bo Yul-Bayur over to the Kerch Merchant Council.”
She put the bottle back in one of the little drawers. “We’ll have to do this at least two more times before we get to the Ice Court so I can deepen the color. Get your things together. Kaz wants us ready to leave on the hour.” She snapped the top of the case closed and picked up the shackles. Then she was gone.
* * *
By the time they bid their goodbyes to the ship’s crew, the sky had turned from pink to gold.
“See you in Djerholm harbor,” Specht called. “No mourners.”
“No funerals,” the others replied. Strange people.
Brekker had been frustratingly tight-lipped about how exactly they were going to reach Bo Yul-Bayur and then get out of the Ice Court with the scientist in tow, but he’d been clear that once they had their prize, the Ferolind was their escape route. It had papers bearing the Kerch seal and indicating that all fees and applications had been made for representatives of the Haanraadt Bay Company to transport furs and goods from Fjerda to Zierfoort, a port city in south Kerch.
They began the march from the rocky shore up the cliff side. Spring was coming, but ice was still thick on the ground, and it was a tough climb. When they reached the top of the cliff, they stopped to catch their breath. The Ferolind was still visible on the horizon, its sails full of the wind that whipped at their cheeks.
“Saints,” said Inej. “We’re actually doing this.”
“I’ve spent every minute of every miserable day wishing to be off that ship,” said Jesper. “So why do I suddenly miss it?”
Wylan stamped his boots. “Maybe because it already feels like our feet are going to freeze off.”
“When we get our money, you can burn kruge to keep you warm,” said Kaz. “Let’s go.” He’d left his crow’s head cane aboard the Ferolind and substituted a less conspicuous walking stick. Jesper had mournfully left behind his prized pearl-handled revolvers in favor of a pair of unornamented guns, and Inej had done the same with her extraordinary set of knives and daggers, keeping only those she could bear to part with when they entered the prison. Practical choices, but Matthias knew that talismans had their power.
Jesper consulted his compass, and they turned south, seeking a path that would lead them to the main trading road. “I’m going to pay someone to burn my kruge for me.”
Kaz fell into step beside him. “Why don’t you pay someone else to pay someone to burn your kruge for you? That’s what the big players do.”
“You know what the really big bosses do? They pay someone to pay someone to…”
Their voices trailed off as they tromped ahead, and Matthias and the others followed after. But he noticed that each of them cast a final backward glance at the vanishing Ferolind. The schooner was a part of Kerch, a piece of home for them, and that last familiar thing was drifting farther away with every moment.
Matthias felt some small measure of sympathy, but as they trekked through the morning, he had to admit he enjoyed seeing the canal rats shiver and struggle a bit for once. They thought they knew cold, but the white north had a way of forcing strangers to reevaluate their terms. They stumbled and staggered, awkward in their new boots, trying to find the trick of walking in hard-crusted snow, and soon Matthias was in the lead, setting the pace, though Jesper kept a steady eye on his compass.
“Put your…” Matthias paused and h
He pushed ahead, feeling almost at peace, as if here Djel could hear him and ease his troubled mind. The ice brought back memories of childhood, of hunting with his father. They’d lived farther south, near Halmhend, but in the winters that part of Fjerda didn’t look much different from this, a world of white and gray, broken by groves of black-limbed trees and jutting clusters of rock that seemed to have risen up from nowhere, shipwrecks on a bare ocean floor.
The first day trekking was like a cleansing—little talk, the white hush of the north welcoming Matthias back without judgment. He’d expected more complaints, but even Wylan had simply put his head down and walked. They’re all survivors, Matthias understood. They adapt. When the sun began to set, they ate their rations of dried beef and hardtack and collapsed into their tents without a word.
But the next morning brought an end to the quiet and Matthias’ fragile sense of peace. Now that they were off the ship and away from its crew, Kaz was ready to dig into the details of the plan.
“If we get this right, we’re going to be in and out of the Ice Court before the Fjerdans ever know their prize scientist is gone,” Kaz said as they shouldered their packs and continued to push south. “When we enter the prison, we’ll be taken to the holding area beneath the men’s and women’s cellblocks to await charges. If Matthias is right and the procedures are still the same, the patrols only pass through the holding cells three times a day for head counts. Once we’re out of the cells, we should have at least six hours to cross to the embassy, locate Yul-Bayur on the White Island, and get him down to the harbor before they realize anyone is gone.”
“What about the other prisoners in the holding cells?” Matthias asked.
“We have that covered.”
Matthias scowled, but he wasn’t particularly surprised. Once they were in those holding cells, Kaz and the others would be at their most vulnerable. It would take only a word to the guards for Matthias to put an end to all their scheming. That was what Brum would do, what an honorable man would choose. Some part of Matthias had believed that coming back to Fjerda would return him to his senses, give him the strength to forsake this mad quest; instead it had only made his longing for home, for the life he’d once lived among his drüskelle brothers, more acute.
“Once we’re out of the cells,” Kaz continued, “Matthias and Jesper will secure rope from the stables while Wylan and I get Nina and Inej out of the women’s holding area. The basement is our meet. That’s where the incinerator is, and no one should be in the laundry after the prison shuts down for the night. While Inej makes the climb, Wylan and I scour the laundry for anything he can use for demo. And just in case the Fjerdans decided to stash Bo Yul-Bayur in the prison and make life easy on us, Nina, Matthias, and Jesper will search the top level cells.”
“Nina and Matthias?” Jesper asked. “Far be it from me to doubt anyone’s professionalism, but is that really the ideal pairing?”
Matthias bit down on his anger. Jesper was right, but he hated being discussed in this way.
“Matthias knows prison procedure, and Nina can handle any guards without a noisy fight. Your job is to keep them from killing each other.”
“Because I’m the diplomat of the group?”
“There is no diplomat of the group. Now listen,” Kaz said. “The rest of the prison isn’t like the holding area. Patrols in the cellblock rotate every two hours, and we don’t want to risk anyone sounding an alarm, so be smart. We coordinate everything to the chiming of the Elderclock. We’re out of the cells right after six bells, we’re up the incinerator and on the roof by eight bells. No exceptions.”
“And then what?” asked Wylan.
“We cross to the embassy sector roof and get access to the glass bridge through there.”
“We’ll be on the other side of the checkpoints,” said Matthias, unable to keep a hint of admiration from his voice. “The guards on the bridge will assume we passed through the embassy gate and had our papers scrutinized there.”
Wylan frowned. “In prison uniforms?”
“Phase two,” said Jesper. “The fake.”
“That’s right,” said Kaz. “Inej, Nina, Matthias, and I will borrow a change of clothes from one of the delegations—and a little something extra for our friend Bo Yul-Bayur when we find him—and stroll across the glass bridge. We locate Yul-Bayur and get him back to the embassy. Nina, if there’s time, you’ll tailor him as much as possible, but as long as we don’t trigger any alarms, no one is going to notice one more Shu among the guests.”
Unless Matthias managed to get to the scientist first. If he was dead when the others found him, Kaz couldn’t hold Matthias responsible. He’d still get his pardon. And if he never managed to separate from the group? A shipboard accident might still befall Yul-Bayur on the journey back.
“So what I’m getting from this,” said Jesper, “is that I’m stuck with Wylan.”
“Unless you’ve suddenly acquired an encyclopedic knowledge of the White Island, the ability to pick locks, scale unscalable walls, or flirt confidential information out of high level officials, yes. Besides, I want two sets of hands making bombs.”
Jesper looked mournfully at his guns. “Such potential wasted.”
Nina crossed her arms. “Let’s say this all works. How do we get out?”
“We walk,” Kaz said. “That’s the beauty of this plan. Remember what I said about guiding the mark’s attention? At the embassy gate, all eyes will be focused on guests coming into the Ice Court. People leaving aren’t a security risk.”
“Then why the bombs?” asked Wylan.
“Precautions. There are seven miles of road between the Ice Court and the harbor. If someone notices Bo Yul-Bayur is missing, we’re going to have to cover that territory fast.” He drew a line in the snow with his walking stick. “The main road crosses a gorge. We blow the bridge, no one can follow.”
Matthias put his head in his hands, imagining the havoc these low creatures were about to wreak on his country’s capital.
“It’s one prisoner, Helvar,” said Kaz.
“And a bridge,” Wylan put in helpfully.
“And anything we have to blow up in between,” added Jesper.
“Everyone shut up,” Matthias growled.
Jesper shrugged. “Fjerdans.”
“I don’t like any of this,” said Nina.
Kaz raised a brow. “Well, at least you and Helvar found something to agree on.”
* * *
Farther south they traveled, the coast long gone, the ice broken more and more by slashes of forest, glimpses of black earth and animal tracks, proof of the living world, the heart of Djel beating always. The questions from the others were ceaseless.
“How many guard towers are on the White Island again?”
“Do you think Yul-Bayur will be in the palace?”
“There are guard barracks on the White Island. What if he’s in the barracks?”
Jesper and Wylan debated which kinds of explosives might be assembled from the prison laundry supplies and if they could get their hands on some gunpowder in the embassy sector. Nina tried to help Inej estimate what her pace would have to be to scale the incinerator shaft with enough time to secure the rope and get the others to the top.
They drilled each other constantly on the architecture and procedures of the Court, the layout of the ringwall’s three gatehouses, each built around a courtyard.
“First checkpoint?”
“Four guards.”
“Second checkpoint?”
??
“Ringwall gates?”
“Four when the gate is non-operational.”
They were like a maddening chorus of crows, squawking in Matthias’ ear: Traitor, traitor, traitor.
“Yellow Protocol?” asked Kaz.
“Sector disturbance,” said Inej.
“Red Protocol?”
“Sector breach.”
“Black Protocol?”
“We’re all doomed?” said Jesper.
“That about covers it,” Matthias said, pulling his hood tighter and trudging ahead. They’d even made him imitate the different patterns of the bells. A necessity, but he’d felt like a fool chanting, “Bing bong bing bing bong. No, wait, bing bing bong bing bing.”
“When I’m rich,” Jesper said behind him. “I’m going someplace I never have to see snow again. What about you, Wylan?”
“I don’t know exactly.”
“I think you should buy a golden piano—”
“Flute.”
“And play concerts on a pleasure barge. You can park it in the canal right outside your father’s house.”
“Nina can sing,” Inej put in.
“We’ll duet,” Nina amended. “Your father will have to move.”
She did have a terrible singing voice. He hated that he knew that, but he couldn’t resist glancing over his shoulder. Nina’s hood had fallen back, and the thick waves of her hair had escaped her collar.
Why do I keep doing that? he thought in a rush of frustration. It had happened aboard the ship, too. He’d tell himself to ignore her, and the next thing he knew his eyes would be seeking her out.
But it was foolish to pretend that she wasn’t in his mind. He and Nina had walked this same territory together. If his calculations were right, they’d washed up only a few miles from where the Ferolind had put into shore. It had started with a storm, and in a way, that storm had never ended. Nina had blown into his life with the wind and rain and set his world spinning. He’d been off balance ever since.
* * *
The storm had come out of nowhere, tossing the ship like a toy on the waves. The sea had played along until it had tired of the game, and dragged their boat under in a tangle of rope and sail and screaming men.