Wicked Saints

by Emily A Duncan

  “My daughter, Your Highness,” Krywicki said, with a laugh that was probably a normal volume but sounded uproarious to Serefin.

  He tried not to wince. He didn’t know if he succeeded or not.

  “Daughter?” Did I know Krywicki had a daughter? He glanced over his shoulder at Ostyia. She nodded encouragingly. Apparently, yes.

  “Felicíja!” Krywicki said. “Here, Highness, let me buy you another drink. Did you just return from the front?”

  Serefin was suddenly back in his seat with another tankard in front of him. Kacper and Ostyia exchanged a glance that Serefin barely noticed as he concentrated on the sweating glass in front of him.

  He should definitely not drink this.

  Well, sacrifices must be made, he thought as he picked up the tankard. Was this five or six? He had absolutely no idea.

  “The front, yes, we’ve only just returned,” Serefin said.

  “How goes the war?” Krywicki asked.

  “Same as it bloody ever has.” Serefin took a drink. “Barely anything has changed in the last, what, fifty years? I don’t expect anything ever will. It feels too optimistic to hope our victory at Voldoga will turn the tide.”

  Krywicki looked bewildered. Ostyia shot Serefin a wide-eyed look. Oh, he wasn’t supposed to express his disdain about the war out loud, right. Certainly not as the poster child for the war effort.

  “But we’ll beat the superstitious Kalyazi down,” he continued, now utterly self-conscious that he was backpedaling. “They’ll break soon.” He leaned across the table toward Krywicki, who unconsciously leaned toward him in return. “I can feel it. The war will end during my reign, if not sooner.” The signs were there: Voldoga, the appearance of the cleric implying desperation, that they were able to make it all the way to the Baikkle Mountains, and yet Serefin did not usually give in to hope.

  Krywicki raised his eyebrows. A Tranavian prince did not treat his upcoming reign as if it were a given. No Tranavian treated their future as though it were a given. Serefin had spent far too much time in Kalyazin.

  “So soon?” Krywicki asked.

  Serefin nodded emphatically. He frowned. Wasn’t Krywicki just talking about his daughter? Where was she? He realized he was inquiring after her before his brain had a chance to catch up to his mouth.

  He definitely should not have had that last drink.

  Krywicki looked all too delighted to introduce his daughter to the High Prince. He left the table, returning with a girl who looked like she was barely old enough to be free of her nursemaid.

  Serefin shot a desperate glance Kacper’s way. Kacper just shrugged.

  Felicíja looked nothing like her father. She had waves of blond hair and pale violet eyes. She looked gentle, pretty. Serefin would have to keep an eye on her.

  She bowed to Serefin. Court niceties would have her curtsy to him, but they weren’t at court.

  Blood and bone, she’s young, he thought. In reality she was likely only a year or two younger than Serefin. She just looked young. Dimly it occurred to him that by calling all of the potentially eligible slavhki into Grazyk, his father was weeding out the weak and settling the strong blood in the heart of Tranavia.

  “It’s a pleasure to finally meet you, Your Highness,” she said as he took her hand and pressed it lightly against his lips.

  He hoped it was lightly. He’d lost any real feeling in his hands two tankards ago. His vision was also far more blurry than usual, which only happened when he was really drunk.

  “The pleasure is mine,” he replied. “Is it safe to assume you are traveling to Grazyk?”

  Ostyia’s single eye widened in alarm. Serefin had no idea why until Krywicki answered for his daughter.

  “Of course we are,” he said. “There hasn’t been a Rawalyk in generations, it’s not to be missed. In fact, Your Highness, you are more than welcome to join us for the rest of the journey.”

  Oh, that’s why Ostyia is making that face. Serefin watched as Ostyia dropped her head onto the table. He didn’t particularly relish the idea of traveling with the lieutenant and his daughter, either. It would be rude of him to refuse the invitation, but he didn’t particularly care for being polite. Besides, this was an obvious ploy to get Felicíja on his good side before the Rawalyk.

  Serefin squirmed his way out of it. “I must beg your forgiveness, I have been riding all day and it’s late. It truly was a pleasure to meet you.”

  Serefin escaped to the second floor of the inn. He let out a groan as soon as they were in the hallway.

  “It is so disconcerting to watch you play the nobleman,” Kacper said.

  “I’m the prince,” Serefin replied. “I’m not supposed to be playing at anything.”

  But Kacper shot him a dry look, to which he waved a dismissive hand. He leaned back against the wall.

  “How old do you suppose Felicíja is?”

  “Seventeen or so,” Ostyia suggested.

  “There’s no chance she’ll last very long, not amongst anyone actually raised at court.”

  “No.”

  Serefin winced. He wanted to say more, but Ostyia gently pushed him toward the door to his room.

  “Go to bed, Serefin. We have to wake up early enough to leave before Krywicki notices, and you’re going to have a hangover tomorrow.”

  “I’m really not ready to begin dealing with the nobility again,” Serefin mused, frowning, as she pushed him down the hall.

  “Well, welcome home, Your Highness, you don’t have a damn choice.”

  10

  NADEZHDA

  LAPTEVA

  Krsnik, the god of fire, is quiet, calm, but ruthless, and when his followers call upon him—when he chooses to listen—his attention is destruction.

  —Codex of the Divine, 17:24

  Nadya stared at Malachiasz, horror trickling down her spine. He moved down the wall of the church, scrawling his blood onto the boards. She took a step back, then another, and another, until there was enough space between them, until she felt like she could flee. Her breath jolted in panicked gasps because this couldn’t be happening, he had to be lying.

  “What does that mean?” she asked, her voice hushed.

  “It doesn’t matter now.”

  Nadya clutched her prayer beads in a fist. Maybe she had been wrong to wait for an opportunity to put down this heretic. Her other hand twitched toward her knife.

  Prodding agreement came from Marzenya. A needling feeling to rid the world of this terrible boy before he spilled any more blood.

  His eyebrows were drawn in concentration and he had spent so much of his own blood that Nadya wasn’t sure how he was still standing. Horror flashed against his features and he stepped back from the wall, wavering on his feet.

  “Kien tomuszek,” he murmured. He ran a trembling hand down his face, streaking blood down his cheek.

  “What are the Vultures truly like? Could we fight them?” she asked. Surely the stories were exaggerated.

  Malachiasz coughed out a panicked-sounding laugh. His gaze was glassy. “Amplify an already talented blood mage’s power tenfold. Grind their bones into iron and salt their skin in darkness until nothing can break it but their will alone. Until their blood burns so hot in their veins that when it spills it creates magic of its own. Burn out every memory, every thought, until they can become nothing at all, until they are nothing at all. When there’s nothing left but magic and bloodlust and rage, then they are finished. When they are empty, they are ready.” His eyes closed, eyebrows furrowing. “No, towy dżimyka, we cannot fight them.”

  Nadya took a step back, heart thudding so hard in her chest that she shook. She shouldn’t have asked; she already knew the truth. Was that what he was? Or had he fled before any of that was done to him?

  He cut another line down his forearm, hissing through his teeth. “Do you trust me?” he asked.

  “No,” she said.

  He laughed, taking another spell book page and soaking it with blood. He slapped it again
st the door as he went into the church. She darted after him, feeling the threshold push against her. She shuddered at the close contact with his magic.

  It was like she could feel them just over her shoulder, lurking, waiting. She didn’t know if they were close, or how much time they had before the monsters struck.

  She almost ran into Malachiasz’s back when he stopped dead in the sanctuary.

  Parijahan jumped to her feet. “What is it?”

  He held out a hand, keeping Nadya from fully entering the room. His eyes were strangely cloudy, murky and dark. “I thought we had time,” he said, some thread of something else crackling in his voice.

  Cold panic pressed against Nadya, driving in between her ribs. The temperature seemed to plunge so quickly that Nadya wasn’t surprised to find her breath clouding out before her face.

  “Abominations,” Marzenya hissed.

  An earth-shattering crash resounded through the church, shaking it to its foundation. Nadya stumbled into Malachiasz and it was like slamming into a stone wall. She shoved away from him though it seemed like he didn’t even notice.

  He glanced up at the ceiling, head tilting. Nadya watched with horror as his eyes grew unfocused and a trickle of blood began to drip out of the corner of his eye. A small part of her had been convinced Malachiasz had fled the Vultures before he had been turned into a monster. Apparently that wasn’t the case.

  “You said we couldn’t fight them,” Nadya whispered.

  “We don’t have a choice,” he replied. “There are two of them inside: Ewa and Rafał.” His voice sounded different, dropping lower, grit scratching through. His lips twitched into a sneer. “And one in this room.”

  Nadya was almost knocked to her knees at the refrain of holy speech that slammed through the back of her head. Her hands were nowhere near her necklace.

  What is this?

  “What you need.”

  It was raw, unformed magic. This could kill me.

  “Yes, it could.”

  She was grateful for the odd collection of weapons scattered around the sanctuary because it meant the others moved fast and without questions. Anna shot Nadya a terrified look.

  Nadya could barely fathom that this was happening, that her elbow was an inch away from the arm of a boy who was everything she hated, everything she had been trained to destroy. A boy whose trembling had ceased to a stillness so complete it was like he’d turned to stone next to her.

  Malachiasz scanned the ceiling. His sneer turned into something closer to a smile. “Rozá.” The way he said the name sounded like a song, a tease, a challenge.

  Something materialized on the ceiling and began to drip down to the floor like blood. It was blood, Nadya realized. It dripped faster, becoming a torrent.

  Malachiasz finally noticed the blood leaking out of the corner of his eye. He shuddered and wiped at it with his thumb.

  Parijahan’s face was white as chalk. “Malachiasz…”

  What is going on?

  The blood moved as if it had a life of its own until it formed into the shape of a girl, materializing in the center of the room. Iron spikes wove through an auburn braid. A thick black book hung from straps on her hip. Her face was covered by a crimson mask crafted in strips. It left only her eyes visible, black as onyx. Blood dripped from her bony shoulders.

  “Perfect. Saves me a double trip to this wasteland,” the girl said. Her voice sounded wrong. Everything about her was off-putting and otherworldly, as though Nadya’s brain couldn’t comprehend she was even real.

  Blood was leaking from the corners of Malachiasz’s eyes again. He looked down at his hands with something too close to resignation, shaking as iron claws grew and lengthened from his nail beds. Blood fell from his lips, landing on the back of his hand—crimson on pale skin.

  Nadya was still too close to him and now there was nowhere for her to go. The Vulture girl stepped closer, her movements odd, too fast and jerky, like Nadya’s eyes lost seconds as they tried to track her.

  “Look at you,” the girl said. Nadya shuddered at the sound of her voice. It was like death and madness clashed in dissonant chords when she spoke. “Debased, unmasked, diminished.” Her hands looked perverse: the fingers too long and the joints thin and spindly. Her nails were also iron claws.

  A vein pulsed in Malachiasz’s neck. His gaze was flinty as he eyed her. There was blood dripping from his nose now, catching on his upper lip. Rozá stepped closer. Malachiasz was trembling. Not from fear, though, it wasn’t that. It took her longer to put a name to it: restraint.

  “How much further do I have to rile you before I can make you face me as you truly are?” Rozá asked.

  She was much shorter than him, probably Nadya’s height. Even so, she leveled to him, reaching up with an iron claw and trailing it down the side of his face. It opened a thread-line cut, welling blood.

  “Not much further,” he replied.

  He had said there were two other Vultures. Three of them was too many, Nadya knew, but at least the Vultures were outnumbered. She drew her voryens.

  Rozá’s head shifted, birdlike, her onyx gaze honing in on Nadya. There was no warning before she struck. She was there and then she was gone. Nadya didn’t have the opportunity to defend herself, she barely had enough time to realize the Vulture had moved.

  Then the world shifted. Two more Vultures materialized into the room, then a third. Nadya’s heart plummeted in horror as she realized there were more than just the three that Malachiasz named.

  The others jolted into motion. Rashid sidestepped a flash of dark magic and whipped two Akolan blades from the weapons rack. He spun one in a lazy arc, a smile on his face. Anna’s terror had chilled to something deadly.

  A split-second, a blink, and Rozá was impaled on Malachiasz’s long iron claws. He gritted his teeth and Nadya felt her chest tighten as metal glinted in his mouth; his teeth rows of iron nails, too-sharp canines now deadly fangs. Pale eyes darkening as his pupils dilated, expanding to swallow the ice of his irises, then more, further, until the whites of his eyes were gone.

  “It won’t count if I don’t kill you as you truly are,” Rozá said. There was no hint of pain in her voice, nothing to suggest she was even injured as she pulled herself almost elegantly off Malachiasz’s claws.

  He sneered.

  The air stirred behind Nadya and she whirled, drawing her voryens up in time to catch a second Vulture’s claws. Tall, probably male, likely Rafał. His mask was studded with jagged spikes and he retracted his claws and lashed out at her again so quickly that when she jumped away she jolted into Malachiasz’s back. Her magic swept out around her with her movement and it brushed against him. She shuddered involuntarily. The power roiling underneath his skin ached like a poison, a blackness that spread in his veins and coursed out into his aura. She didn’t want to be this close to him but if she was going to get out of this alive she was going to need a monster who knew how to fight monsters.

  Nadya gathered her divine magic around herself like a shield, throwing it back over Malachiasz as Rozá and Rafał struck at the same time. The magic only barely held against them.

  Malachiasz tilted his head back. Nadya felt him shift his footing and then suddenly he was leaning against her. She stumbled as a spray of blood precluded her spell shattering in front of her.

  Malachiasz had looked dizzy when they were outside the church. Blood mages could only press so far before their resources needed to be replenished. But then he straightened and moved away from her and Nadya frantically murmured words in holy speech as Rafał’s claws came perilously close to tearing open her chest. A sphere of light formed at the tip of her voryen and she flicked her wrist down, shooting it off into the Vulture in front of her, slamming him back into the wall.

  Rozá vaulted past Malachiasz to get to Nadya. For a tense heartbeat, Nadya thought he had let her, but he was moving toward the Vulture that had a defenseless Anna backed into a corner, her sword just out of reach.

  Nadya tu
gged her second voryen from her belt, fusing Krsnik’s heated magic into the metal. She spat out symbols of smoke and pulled threads from Marzenya’s death magic into her other blade.

  “This is what the Kalyazi have rested their hope upon?” Rozá said when she was steps away. “This is pathetic.”

  “You talk too much,” Nadya snapped. She pulled the essence of Bozetjeh’s power and cut the distance between her and the Vulture, slamming her flame-tinged voryen into her shoulder.

  The blade passed through as if the girl was made of blood and nothing more. Rozá’s clawed hands snapped toward Nadya’s torso, but she slipped out of her grasp, fluid with Bozetjeh’s power. She slammed the other blade—coated in the essence of the goddess of death and magic—into the Vulture’s stomach.

  Rozá choked, pain fluttering over her visible features. Her eyes closed and she pulled herself off Nadya’s blade. She took a step back, pressing her hand to her abdomen. There was blood pouring from the bottom of her mask.

  There was movement at Nadya’s side and she turned, but Malachiasz was already there. A spray of blood arced between his hands, shifting into blades, slamming into Rafał. He grabbed the Vulture by the front of his shirt, driving the nails of his other hand into the opening of his facial mask.

  The magic in her head was growing more insistent, aching to destroy. She was already pulling on so many threads. It was far more than she had ever used before and she didn’t know how much her body could take, how much divine abuse she could channel before it ruined her.

  But the Vultures were shaking off her attacks as if she was nothing but a mild irritant. Rashid grasped at Rozá’s moment of distraction and attacked; she slammed him into the wall where he crumpled like a discarded doll.

  Nadya heard Anna’s sword clatter to the ground, the sound too loud yet distant, as if it came from miles away.

  They’re here for me. Rozá’s claws sunk into Malachiasz’s chest. They’re here for him, too. One of the smaller Vultures slashed open Parijahan’s side.

  Malachiasz freed himself from Rozá’s grasp and staggered back. His inhuman, onyx eyes locked with Nadya’s and she experienced a moment of clarity. A passage of a singular thought between her and this nightmare of a boy she did not know and did not trust.