Anhaga

by Lisa Henry

  THE DAY wore on. Min watched as Kazimir’s pale nape became pink and then red as the sun beat down. The boy swayed in the saddle once, and then twice, jerking himself upright each time. He was fighting sleep, Min thought. When the boy’s shoulders slumped again, Min pressed his hand against his chest and applied enough gentle pressure to encourage him to lean back. He was obviously too tired to argue, possibly too tired to even register what Min was doing. He sagged back against Min, his head resting on Min’s shoulder, pale face lifted to the sun. His eyes were closed. His dark lashes rested against his cheeks. Min felt his heart thumping under his palm. The boy’s muscles would be knotted up like an old string when it came time to stop, but Min didn’t wake him. A slumbering abductee was a lot easier to manage than a conscious one. Min assumed. It wasn’t as though he kidnapped people regularly.

  Kazimir twitched a little in his awkward sleep and made a series of nonsensical little noises. What did necromancers dream of? Min wondered if there was anything in all of creation that could give them nightmares. Puppies and sunshine, probably, and the carefree laughter of tiny children.

  It was difficult, even though Min had seen the evidence, to think of Kazimir as a necromancer. Necromancers were things of legend. They inhabited nightmare worlds and horror stories. They walked the paths known only to the dead and breathed easily the bad air of rot and decay. Min had always imagined necromancers to be as grotesque and cadaverous as their victims. Not so… baby-faced. Snub-nosed. Kazimir was soft in sleep, almost pretty.

  A snort from Harry drew Min’s attention.

  Fine, yes, Kazimir was exactly Min’s type, and Min was as transparent as water and had been studying the boy’s face for too long.

  “Keep your hands out of his pants, Min,” Harry said. “He’s not yours to fuck, remember?”

  “Why are you such a vulgar child?”

  “I blame my upbringing,” Harry said, which was a completely fair call.

  Now might have been a good time to bring up the fact that Min had raised Harry smarter than to even think about fucking a Sabadine and that Min would never do something so stupid, but it would have been a low blow. If needling Min made Harry feel better about this whole mess, then Min could take a little.

  “Looking isn’t touching,” Min reminded him.

  “You’re touching him,” Harry pointed out.

  “Touching isn’t fucking.”

  Harry raised his eyebrows.

  “Which, by the way,” Min said, “are words to live by.”

  Harry’s grin was wry.

  Kazimir twitched again, and Min tightened his grip slightly. He liked the weight and the warmth of Kazimir leaning back against him. And why not? Kazimir was a good-looking boy, and Min had always enjoyed those. It was a shame Kazimir had been promised to Robert. A shame he was a necromancer as well. Those were two very good reasons for Min to keep his distance. But today, for a few more hours at least, Min could enjoy this for what it was: the warm body of a good-looking boy pressed against him.

  It lasted only as long as the next dip in the road, when Kazimir jolted awake and immediately leaned away from Min again. He hunched forward, the back of his neck suddenly pinker than his sunburn.

  Min smirked and glanced over at Harry only to find that Harry’s forehead was puckered with a frown as he stared at the road ahead.

  “Min, do you remember any of this?”

  Min forgot Kazimir and gazed at the landscape. The road. The trees. The scrubby ground. Every mile looked much the same as the last. That was the tragedy of nature.

  “I think something’s wrong,” Harry said.

  “Nothing’s wrong,” Min told him. “There’s one road south and we’re on it. It is literally impossible for us to be lost.”

  “Right,” Harry said and pointed ahead to where the road forded a little stream. “So why is that the exact same place we stopped this morning?”

  Min felt a sudden rush of sickening dizziness.

  Oh fuck.

  KAZIMIR STRUGGLED when Min hauled him off the horse, twisting to try to dig his elbows into Min’s stomach. Min shoved him to the ground, ignoring the boy’s yelp of pain as he hit the dirt.

  “I didn’t do anything!” he protested. He shook his shackled wrists in Min’s direction. “How could I?”

  “I don’t know,” Min said with a sneer. “Maybe the same way you could animate a fucking corpse for the past nine years and still be breathing yourself!”

  A Gift, he’d once heard someone say, was like a tiny spark inside a person, an ember. Sometimes, with the right training, that spark could be nurtured into a flame. But there was a very fine line between a controlled flame and a conflagration. And from what Min had seen of Kazimir’s Gift, the boy was long overdue being burned to a crisp from the inside out.

  “I didn’t do anything!” Kazimir yelled again, his cheeks red with indignation and his voice breaking. He hugged his right arm to his chest, cupping his left hand over his elbow. Min saw blood soaking through the sleeve.

  “Min!” Harry wrenched him away and then dropped to his knees beside Kazimir. He wrinkled his nose. “Sorry. He’s not always such an asshole.”

  Min turned away, refusing to feel guilty about knocking Kazimir into the dirt. He busied himself with the horse instead, scratching its mane in a way it seemed to enjoy enough to lean into and enabled Min to keep safely clear of both the kicking end and the bitey end. He concentrated on that for a few minutes. When he glanced over at Kazimir and Harry, they were crouched by the stream, and Harry was dabbing Kazimir’s bleeding elbow clean with the wet end of his sleeve.

  Min squinted at the sky, trying to guess how long they had until dusk. Long enough to get back to Anhaga? It was doubtful, even if Min could trust they weren’t trapped in some sort of… of whatever the fuck this was.

  He stalked over toward the boys. “If it wasn’t you, then what is it?”

  “The veil,” Kazimir said, voice shaky. “The fae have pierced the veil. Usually it only happens at night, when it’s thinner, easier to pass through.”

  “Why now?” Min asked, taking another step toward him. “Why today, Kazimir Stone?”

  Min didn’t believe in coincidences.

  Kazimir flinched, losing his balance. Harry reached out to steady him, but it was too late. Kazimir’s arms windmilled, and he toppled backward into the shallow stream, landing on his back in a flurry of limbs and an explosion of water.

  “Kaz!” Harry exclaimed, wide-eyed. “Fuck, Min! Can you stop pushing him around?”

  “I didn’t even touch him!” Min pointed out. “That time.”

  I don’t get to be his friend, kid. Because if we somehow survive this night, I’m the one who has to turn him over to the Sabadines. Not you. Me.

  Which was really too much to convey in a single glance to an unreceptive target.

  Harry held a hand out to Kazimir and helped him to his feet. Kazimir half turned away, wiping at his face with his hands. Water dripped from his clothes. The weight of it tugged his scruffy curls straight.

  That’s when Min saw it: the tip of one pale ear protruding from behind a wet, flattened shank of dark hair.

  He stepped forward, tugging Kazimir from Harry’s grasp. He held the boy’s chin in one hand and tilted his head. With his other hand, he wiped the wet hair away from the boy’s ear.

  His pointed fucking ear.

  It made a terrible sort of sense. The incredible power of Kazimir’s Gift. The way the fae stopped at one door in Anhaga and one door only. The way the Hidden Lord had only claimed Anhaga once Kazimir Stone had been sent there to prentice with Kallick Sparrow.

  Min felt the pieces slotting in together as inextricably as the tumblers in a lock. Every single one falling into place.

  “You’re fae.”

  Kazimir lifted his gaze long enough to meet Min’s, his eyes shining more gold than brown in the sunlight, and then looked away again. “It’s only blood.”

  Min rubbed his thumb along th
e pointed ridge. “What?”

  Kazimir’s tongue flicked out to swipe his lower lip. “Just because I’m half fae doesn’t mean I’m an enemy of the king.”

  “I’m the last man in the world to care about your loyalty to the king,” Min told him. “But I find it interesting the first thing you do is protest your innocence.”

  Kazimir pressed his mouth into a tight line.

  “Interesting,” Min explained slowly, “means, in your case, unconvincing. You say you are loyal to the king, but you did not come home when the king’s law required it. You made the Sabadines look bad. And the Sabadines don’t like to look bad, little necromancer.” He narrowed his eyes. “Ask Harry.”

  Kazimir glanced warily in Harry’s direction.

  “Your poor old grandad,” Min said. “Whose only crime is to serve the crown.”

  “He serves himself,” Kazimir said, gaze catching briefly on Min’s again.

  Min huffed out a humorless laugh and released Kazimir’s chin. “And you thought you’d hide in Anhaga where he couldn’t reach you? Looks like he found a way to pull you into the game after all.”

  “By pulling you in too.” Kazimir glanced at Harry and at the curse mark on his cheek.

  “That doesn’t mean we’re on the same team, kid,” Min warned him.

  “I know that,” Kazimir said and hugged his arms to his chest. “I know.”

  Min resisted the urge to reach out and touch his hair again. To grab something out of his bag and offer it to Kazimir to wear. To get him dry, get him warm. “You reanimated Kallick to protect yourself.”

  It was clever, Min supposed. Kazimir didn’t want to be a pawn of either the Sabadines or of the king they served. Pretending to be Kallick’s prentice had offered him the perfect solution, but not forever. Kazimir was overdue his return home. What a shame that binding him with iron had also served to destroy whatever wards Kazimir had wrought to protect himself from the fae. And what a shame—no, what a fucking tragedy—that Min was only discovering this now.

  “No. Well, yes.” Kazimir shook his head slightly. “But I was ten as well.”

  Harry made a humming sound. “You didn’t want to be alone.”

  Kazimir nodded, staring at the ground. “He was different, though, when he came back. It wasn’t him anymore.”

  Min closed his eyes briefly. He hated feeling like he was being played. And, oddly, he didn’t get that feeling from Kazimir right now. But the stench rolling off Edward Sabadine, all the way from Amberwich, was as putrid as always.

  “Your grandfather doesn’t know you’re a necromancer, but he knows you’re part fae. The second your mother spat you out with ears like those, of course he knew. Why the hell does he want you home so badly?”

  “I don’t know,” Kazimir said. “I don’t know anything about the war between the king and the Hidden Lord, but I think I might make a good hostage.”

  “For which side?” Harry blurted, wide-eyed.

  Kazimir squinted at the ground and shrugged. “Either? Both?”

  He sounded a lot younger than his nineteen years. Min wondered how much of it was artifice and how much was Kazimir’s self-imposed isolation. How much could anyone learn about the world through an open window and the glassy eyes of a dead man?

  “Not a hostage,” he said thoughtfully. “Leverage. If the Hidden Lord claims you for whatever dark purpose because you’re one of his, then if the king holds you, you become leverage. And if you are of use to the king, then you are of use to the Sabadines. No wonder they want to make sure of you, to bind you with both blood and marriage.”

  Kazimir jerked his chin up. “What marriage?”

  Whoops.

  “Didn’t they tell you? You’re marrying your uncle.”

  Kazimir’s face went slack, pale. “What?”

  “You’re marrying Robert.” Min suddenly hated the way Kazimir’s eyes shone with tears and his bottom lip trembled. “Cheer up, sweeting. I’m sure it’ll be a beautiful wedding.”

  Harry smacked him in the chest.

  “What?” Min asked. “There’ll be cake.”

  Kazimir turned away, shoulders rising and falling as he struggled to breathe.

  “You’re a fucking asshole sometimes, Min,” Harry said softly.

  Yeah.

  Point taken.

  “What’s the problem?” Min asked. He’d always believed the best form of defense was attack. “He’s not getting married, is he? Because we’re not going to make it back to Pran before the Hidden Lord catches us and takes our flesh apart with his teeth. So here we are, Harry. We rode for fucking hours, and yet here we are. And unless you read somewhere in one of your damned books about how to escape the shadow realm, then we’re fucked, aren’t we? We’re well and truly fucked.”

  Harry didn’t say anything. Just pushed past him and flung an arm around Kazimir’s shoulders. Muttered something that sounded half-soothing, half-accusatory in his ear—Min was sure the accusatory portion was for his benefit—and ran his fingers through Kazimir’s damp hair. He made a small noise of surprise and tugged a tiny black feather free. He released it, and it spiraled to the ground.

  “Harry,” Min said.

  Harry turned his head, scowled at him, and murmured something in an undertone to Kazimir.

  Min curled his lip.

  The scowl stung more than Min wanted to admit. He had a ridiculous soft spot for his adopted nephew. It’s why he was here, after all. A colder man, or a smarter one, would have cut his losses and let the curse take its course. Well, it’s not like they had to worry about the curse anymore either, did they? After tonight they wouldn’t have to worry about anything ever again. Eternal rest and all that. Min might have been more open to the idea had he not been absolutely certain of the horrific agony that would precede it.

  And the fact necromancers existed.

  Kallick the hedgewitch hadn’t rested, had he?

  “Iron,” Harry said suddenly. “We have iron and the fae hate iron. It causes them to sicken!”

  “Harry….”

  “No, it does,” Harry insisted. “The fae are creatures of magic, and iron weakens magic. Why else does the king live in the Iron Tower?”

  “To stop his own Gifted from stabbing him in the back, probably!” Min threw up his hands. “And clearly iron doesn’t hurt the fae much since Kazimir is still standing!”

  It was a logical deduction worthy of any scholar, and Min was proud of it. So of course that was the moment when Kazimir proved him a liar by shivering, stumbling, and keeling over facedown in the mud.

  IT TOOK Min and Harry a long time to get Kazimir back in the saddle, where he slumped forward, unconscious. Harry gathered up the reins of the horses, and Min walked alongside Kazimir, hoping to catch him if he had the good sense to fall off on the correct side. The iron shackle around Min’s wrist was heavy and reminded him of the weeks he’d spent in debtors’ prison. A time that, in retrospect, really didn’t seem so terrible after all.

  Harry wore the other shackle.

  Kazimir still wore the collar.

  “Which way?” he asked, wrinkling his nose.

  Min shrugged. “Does it matter?”

  “Probably not,” Harry admitted. “But we know going south doesn’t work, and we know we don’t have time to get back to Anhaga before nightfall.” He gazed along the shallow stream. “Inland?”

  “Why the hell not?” Min agreed.

  It was a motto that had always served him well in the past.

  They splashed through the water, heading west into the golden light of the late-afternoon sun.

  Chapter 7

  THE SETTING sun had never seemed so ominous. Min could feel the darkness behind him, gathering like the clouds of a coming storm. He tried to keep one eye on Harry, leading the horses, and one on Kazimir, still slumped forward in the saddle. Kazimir’s arms hung at his sides. Min could see a thick ring of abraded skin around his wrist where the iron cuff had been removed. It looked almost like a burn.
Min had no doubt his other wrist was similarly marked and that the collar, still locked around his throat, was hurting him.

  Min had never thought of himself as a cruel man, just a practical one. But here, in this moment, he let Kazimir suffer. He could not risk removing the collar and giving Kazimir back his Gift. He wouldn’t have risked it even for a hedgewitch’s prentice. To do so for a necromancer would be suicide. Even if Kazimir could not work his Gift directly on Min, he could work it on their surroundings—and on Harry.

  Kazimir murmured something into the mane of the horse. He shuddered, and Min put a hand on his thigh to steady him. If he noticed, he didn’t respond.

  And behind them, the darkness gathered.

  Harry drew the horses forward, having forsaken the stream for the narrow path that cut alongside it. It was a thin trail of dirt framed on either side by stringy grass. The path had clearly been formed by repeated use, but Min didn’t know if it was humans or animals who had made it. The way their luck had been so far, they’d follow the path all the way to a rabbit warren. Which a horse would then step in and snap a leg.

  “Come on, kid,” Min said to Kazimir as the boy swayed alarmingly. “Hang in there.”

  Kazimir made a small noise that might have been an answer and might have been a fluke.

  “Min!” Harry called out from ahead, his voice thin with excitement. “Min, look!”

  In front of them, in a clearing just above the bank of the creek, was a dwelling. It wasn’t much more than a hut, Min supposed, and the rush of relief that flooded through him—shelter, safety, sanctuary—was absurd. What were a thatched roof and a wooden door to the Hidden Lord?

  Still. Better than dying in the dirt, Min supposed.

  Slightly.

  Harry tugged on the reins of the horses, urging them toward the dour little hut.

  “Hello?” he called as they approached. “Hello?”

  Harry looped the reins around a scrubby bush and darted toward the door of the hut. He pushed it open—“Hello?”—and stepped inside.

  Min’s shoulders ached from keeping Kazimir more or less upright in the saddle, and with every passing minute, Kazimir was leaning more heavily to the side.