Of Ice and Shadows

by Audrey Coulthurst

  “They took a right on Halvard Street,” Fadeyka said.

  I looked down at her, surprised she’d so easily picked up on my mission. “How do you know?”

  “Sometimes my magic gives me hints,” she said.

  A little shiver of unease went through me. Grateful as I was for Fadeyka’s help, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit the mention of magic made me a little nervous, especially knowing she didn’t have it fully under control. I knew I was supposed to be working against the stereotypes of my homeland, but the burn on my side was a constant reminder of how dangerous magic could be. Denna hadn’t meant to hurt me, but I also couldn’t change the fact that she had, or that it was so easy for people like her to hurt those of us who didn’t have powers. Guilt nagged on the heels of my thoughts. I couldn’t help the way I felt about magic, and I was trying as hard as I could to be accepting and open-minded. But my best efforts weren’t enough to keep Denna from feeling like I didn’t support her and, ultimately, from leaving. In the end, it was my fault that she had, and I had only myself to blame for destroying the most important relationship in my life.

  Fadeyka and I pushed our way past a vendor shouting the prices of fruits and vegetables and took a right on Halvard. Sure enough, I caught a glimpse of Varian’s reddish hair several horse lengths ahead of us.

  “Is it like your mother’s gift?” I asked, remembering that Laurenna could trace magical energy back to its source. “Water magic?”

  “It might be, but I’m not sure,” Fadeyka said. “Usually you can tell what your Affinity is before you have even ten winters,” she said. “My friend Turi always loved the gardens and had a way with plants. Earth Affinity. My mother grew up swimming in Lake Vieri from the time she was small. Her family called her Fish. Water Affinity. Me? I don’t know. Sometimes I get a vague sense of where people are. Sometimes I can walk through rain without getting wet. Every once in a while, I think maybe I made the wind blow harder. Then there was that thing that happened in the salle by accident. Mother isn’t sure if I have a multi-Affinity or if my magic hasn’t settled yet. She thinks once I have my manifes, it will become clearer.”

  We took a sharp left to continue following Varian and Eronit but had to drop back from them a bit. Traffic was thinning, and our presence would become obvious if we weren’t careful. The street we walked on ended in a T facing a small city park. Cobbled pathways meandered between a few tall evergreens, lined with hedges of neatly trimmed holly. Eronit and Varian took a right. I extended my arm to hold Fadeyka back and peered carefully around the corner before following them. Eronit and Varian had stopped at the door of a boardinghouse or residence immediately beyond the turn. I slipped back around the corner quickly, hoping I hadn’t been seen.

  “Varian, Roni!” a man’s voice greeted them enthusiastically. “You have the papers?”

  “Yes, everything is in order,” Eronit said.

  “Praise the sands!” the man inside said. “I’ve got twenty people waiting for work and a shipment coming in just a few days. Bless you both.”

  Varian asked a question I couldn’t quite make out.

  “Yes, of course. The loans are already in order,” the other man said. “Come in for a few minutes. Our cousin sent a box of fine mesquite with the last shipment. A bit of ephedra, too.” I could hear the sly smile in his voice and knew from his tone that the cousin he spoke of wasn’t really family.

  Eronit and Varian accepted the invitation, and I heard the door shut behind them. I cursed the cold weather and the fact that no one’s windows were open. There was no way to get any idea of the conversation going on inside. What businesses? What shipments?

  “Let’s cross over to the park,” I said. We could hide behind one of the holly hedges and wait for Eronit and Varian to reemerge.

  “You’re acting very strange, even for someone who’s sneaking around after people,” Fadeyka said. “What exactly are you trying to do?”

  “I need to know what Eronit and Varian are doing at the Winter Court,” I said.

  “That’s simple. They’re scholars,” Fadeyka said.

  “Scholars who obtain business papers for mysterious ‘relatives’?” I asked.

  “I suppose?” She looked uncertain. “But Eronit is a historian and horticulturist and Varian is an expert on tribal politics in Sonnenborne. I heard them discussing those things with my mother.”

  “They told me they were studying magic and plants,” I said, my mistrust increasing. “Besides, why would an expert on tribal politics come to Kartasha to further his studies?” Everything he needed to know should have been in his homeland. “And why would they also be helping other Sonnenbornes open new businesses here?”

  “We’ve always traded with Sonnenborne and allowed them to operate sanctioned businesses.” Fadeyka shrugged. “Kartasha is known for its neutrality.”

  “I’m all for open markets, but doesn’t the attack on Duvey seem like a threat to that?” I said. “Not to mention that they outright took over a city in my homeland—a smaller trade city. What’s to say that won’t happen again on a larger scale?”

  Fadeyka frowned. “Nothing.”

  “Exactly.”

  I sat down on the cold stones of one of the paths, where I could peer through the holly to the door of the boardinghouse. The shrubs at least cut the wind a little bit, though the chill of the ground was already working its way into my bones. After at least half a sunlength of sitting on the hard ground until my rear was numb and Fadeyka was fidgety with boredom, Eronit and Varian finally emerged. I sat up in a crouch and leaned forward but couldn’t catch any of their parting words to the man at the door. Rather than heading back the way we’d come from the Winter Court, they continued down the street.

  “C’mon,” I said, pulling Fadeyka to her feet. I put up the hood of my cloak and tried to walk like I wasn’t in too much of a hurry. Varian and Eronit kept a quick pace, seemingly headed for a busier street on the other side of the park. We trailed them through a textile district, where shop assistants were pulling in their street displays for the evening. Among those working were many I recognized as Sonnenborne, but a few I wouldn’t have if I hadn’t heard them speaking to each other in their language. It seemed odd to me that so many strong, young Sonnenborne people were working in a textile district when they surely could have found better jobs. No one was elderly, and there were few children to be seen other than those hand in hand with their parents, who were heading home for the day.

  Past the textile district, a street curved sharply to the left. The buildings lining it teemed with activity, and lamps were being lit outside as the overcast sky began to dim. My footsteps slowed as we passed a whitewashed building where a woman was using her fingertip to light the lanterns hanging from the eaves. The flames licked harmlessly at her fingers, reminding me of the way I’d seen Denna touch fire so many times. A confused swell of emotion made it hard for me to breathe. How could something that frightened me remind me of someone I loved so much? The woman caught me staring and smiled. I quickly turned away.

  “Can you use that gift of yours again?” I asked Fadeyka.

  She took my wrist and pulled me forward, her face scrunching up with concentration. A few blocks later, we stopped in front of a well-kept building. The door swung open every few minutes as someone went in or out, and a sign on the door bore a cracked goblet and the words The Broken Cup.

  I hesitated. On the one hand, bringing a child into a drinking establishment seemed conspicuous. On the other, I could hardly leave Fadeyka out here by herself in the middle of the city. But before I had a chance to say anything, she was already through the door, leaving me to hurry after her.

  “Wait!” I said. The interior was well lit with oil lanterns, but noisy and crowded enough that my grab for her arm went unnoticed. Of course, I missed.

  To her credit, Fadeyka kept her hood pulled up and slipped between people like a shadow. She slowed when she got to the back of the room, waited until Eronit and Varian
were preoccupied with settling at a table, then ducked into a nearby alcove that was protected from the rest of the room by a heavy black curtain.

  “What are you doing?” I whispered as I slid in behind her. “What is this?”

  “The musicians’ closet,” she said, waving to some large objects behind us. “They don’t usually start up until after sunset.”

  I gave her a suspicious look that she either didn’t see or didn’t care about. She was obviously no stranger to sneaking about in places she wasn’t supposed to be—this clearly wasn’t her first time here. We had more in common than I cared to admit. I pushed the curtain aside just enough to let in a touch of light, which hit the pile of neatly stacked instrument cases behind us. A leather cello case leaned in the corner, towering above the other instruments. Other than the light oil finish on the case, it could have been my mother’s. My stomach clenched.

  “You look like you just saw a sword covered in blood instead of a musical instrument,” Fadeyka said.

  “I’m fine,” I said, turning back to peer out of the curtain and trying to shake off the memories.

  “Do you play?” Fadeyka asked.

  “My mother did,” I said, my voice tight. “She’s dead.” I didn’t want Fadeyka to ask any more questions.

  Both of us kept our eyes fixed on the room, but a small hand slipped into mine. Her understanding made my chest constrict as a deep wound reopened inside me. She knew exactly what it was like to lose a parent. So many years ago, my mother and I had visited places like this. Pulled an instrument just like that one out of the case to put on a show. Worn wigs and feathers and peasant clothes of all fashions to look like anything other than what we were—royalty. I could feel the hum of the cello’s notes even now, written into some deep place in my bones.

  A flash of dark hair at the bar just a few steps away jerked me from the well of memories threatening to drown me. Eronit purchased three drinks. Either she was very thirsty, or someone had joined her and Varian. The barmaid used magic to pour the beverages, teasing liquid from the bottles into the glasses in arching streams that defied gravity. I peered carefully around the curtain to get a better look at the table Eronit and Varian had claimed, which was just barely in earshot. She placed the drinks on the table, temporarily blocking my view, and then slipped into a chair beside Varian, giving his arm a squeeze. Then she smiled warmly at the person sitting across from her, whose familiar face made my blood turn to ice.

  Alek.

  “What the Six Hells is he doing here?” I murmured. Eronit and Varian had only just talked to him in the salle—why would they be having drinks here now?

  “Were you able to get it?” Alek asked, picking up a snifter that was dwarfed by his enormous hand.

  Varian nodded, and pulled a sheaf of papers out of his bag and passed them across the table to Alek.

  “Thank you,” Alek said, with a rare show of earnestness.

  “Please don’t let this information slip into the wrong hands,” Eronit said, her voice worried. “If anyone finds out that we took these papers . . .”

  “. . . it would compromise your position at court,” Alek finished. “Don’t worry. Trust is key here. I have nothing to gain by turning you in.”

  “The tribes have a very strong belief that this is the way to revitalize our kingdom,” Eronit said. “Reintroducing magic could change everything.”

  Varian leaned forward and added a comment of his own that I couldn’t make out. I looked down at Fadeyka, whose expression seemed to be warring between shock and anger.

  “Is Alek conspiring against Zumorda?” Fadeyka whispered.

  “It sounds like he’s at least been helping the Sonnenbornes,” I said grimly. For the first time, I wondered if he’d actually had something to do with the abductions in Duvey. Could he have been the one who tipped off the Sonnenbornes that the keep would be weak on defense after Wymund had sent soldiers to Kartasha for the queen? It all made too much sense.

  Fadeyka cursed, using language I dearly hoped she hadn’t picked up from me.

  “I think your mother is about to have another reason to hate Alek,” I said. We were going to have to turn him in.

  TWENTY

  Dennaleia

  THE ONLY PROBLEM WITH PLANNING TO TRACK DOWN Sigvar was that I needed some time in which to do it, and my grueling training schedule made that impossible for over a week. Finally, without letting myself think about it for long enough to feel guilty, I sent a page to tell Saia and Brynan I was unwell. Then I slipped out of my room and headed straight for the library. The prison had to be on the architectural drawings I’d found there.

  The dust and disarray were just as I’d left them previously; I was only about halfway through cleaning and organizing the bottom floor. I immediately went to the trunk full of architectural drawings and laid them all out from oldest to newest. Unfortunately, poring over them revealed nothing—the prison did not appear to be within the castle walls. Disappointment weighed me down as I packed the scrolls back into their trunk. How else was I going to find Sigvar and ask him about multi-Affinities? I hoped he would have some knowledge of how to better use and train mine—he’d seemed to have his well under control until the queen tore his powers away from him.

  I left the library and returned to my rooms, deciding to spend some time at the harp honing my Sight. If someone found out I’d been lying about being sick, it would be easier to ask for forgiveness for evading my lessons if I had spent some of the time working on related skills.

  I settled on the stool at the harp and set to warming up. At first my fingers were stiff and cold as I worked my way through ascending scales, eventually moving on to arpeggios and chords once I felt myself melting back into the familiarity of the instrument. Every time I flubbed a note, I thought of the disapproving look my harp instructor in Havemont would have given me, and slowly but surely, my accuracy and articulation improved.

  A study piece felt like the right choice for working on my Sight, so I began playing a D minor etude. I let my mind empty of everything but the music. When I unfocused my vision and let myself look through objects instead of at them, I could See all kinds of things. A small family of mice scurried through a passage in the wall, and the lamps in my room glittered with the enchantments that kept them bright.

  I didn’t pause in my playing until something else appeared in my Sight—a human figure with a purple glow I sensed on the other side of the door. I muted the harp strings and sat in silence, my heart pounding, hoping the person would go away. Instead, a knock sounded on the door. I cracked it open to reveal Tristan.

  “Abandoning us for a harp, eh?” he said with a wry smile.

  I blushed, embarrassed at being caught. Saia or Brynan must have realized I was lying about my reasons for skipping training and sent him to look for me.

  “I won’t tell,” he added. He swept his mop of shaggy black hair out of his eyes. “That you’re not sick, I mean. I managed to talk Evie out of checking on you.”

  “That was kind of Evie, though I appreciate you talking her out of it,” I said. “I didn’t have training in me today.”

  Tristan slumped into one of the chairs near the hearth. “I don’t have it in me most days.”

  I shook my head. He seemed to do fine in training, though he didn’t have the ambition and ruthlessness of Ikrie or Eryk. “Then why did you sign on for this?”

  “Well, I’m not stupid,” he said. “Turning down the best education available in Zumorda wouldn’t be very smart. Nor would defying the wishes of the queen.”

  “Fair,” I said. He had a point. “How did you find me?”

  “My shadow sense,” he said.

  “I don’t know what that is.”

  “I can sense people who have killed others,” he said. “Your shadow is darker than most.”

  My blood turned to ice in my veins. His gift so easily exposed the darkest part of me. Even if the people I’d killed with my gift had deserved it, thinking about them consu
med me with guilt and sorrow. I felt sick.

  “I didn’t do it on purpose,” I said, my voice soft.

  “I didn’t assume you had,” he said. “As for training, don’t worry—you didn’t miss much. Just Ikrie and Aela showing off for Saia. I think they’re still mad at each other after how badly the diplomacy exercise went for them. The collateral damage wasn’t pretty.” He held up his arm, which was bandaged just below the elbow.

  “Gods, this place is brutal,” I said. Everything here was too hard, the people too ruthless. A tiny part of me wondered if Mare was right to suggest that it wouldn’t be so bad for me to have my gift stripped, but the thought still made me sick.

  “We could get out of here for a while,” Tristan said with a sly smile.

  “What do you mean?” I said, taken aback.

  “I have a way we can leave the castle. Nobody would notice. Probably.” Tristan looked preemptively smug.

  “Yes, and no one would notice if you killed me and left me in a ditch somewhere,” I said. “The other trainees would probably be grateful.”

  “I don’t have any interest in doing them favors,” he said. “But I wouldn’t mind getting out of here, too.”

  I thought about what Mare would do in this situation. I’d already skipped my lessons, which was a classic Mare move. And now I was being offered the chance to escape the castle, even though the queen had explicitly forbidden it. I knew exactly what choice Mare would have made and how much regard she had for the rules. Maybe it was time for me to start acting a little less like myself and more like her.

  “All right, fine. But if there’s a bookshop in Corovja, we have to go.” Perhaps the bookstore would have a map of the city that would reveal the location of the prison. I still had a few silver pieces left over from our journey into Zumorda.

  Tristan wrinkled his nose. “If we must. And I need to pick up a bottle of ice wine.”