by Karen Kincy
“He’s going into shock,” Himmel said.
She leapt to her feet. “Is anyone here a doctor?”
The masquerade edged away, the circle widening around Wendel. Behind their masks, some of the women were sobbing.
The devil.
He stood at the outskirts of the crowd. Watching. A man in a grinning red mask, wicked horns curling over the hood of his cloak.
Leave Wendel now, and he would die alone.
Let the devil run, and she would never know his killer.
Ardis glanced at the pool of blood, then back at the devil. He backed away from the crowd, then slipped through the door.
“Damn it,” she said.
She charged after him; she looked left, right. Wind whipped her hair into her eyes. Where was the assassin? Her hand gripped the hilt of Chun Yi. Keeping her stance low, ready to fight, she prowled down the promenade deck.
Wendel II, in the wolf mask, stepped from the darkness. “Ardis!”
“Quiet,” she hissed. “The other Wendel–”
“Why am I still alive?” He stared at her with haunted eyes. “I felt him die.”
The world narrowed to a pinpoint. Her blood rushed through her ears.
“He’s dead?” she said.
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?” Stupid question.
“Yes.”
She remembered to breathe. “A man in a devil mask stabbed him.”
When she kept walking, Wendel flanked her. Her nerves felt raw, every drop of saltwater like the prick of a needle. They neared the bow of the yacht. Against the railing, the devil waited for them, his hands empty at his sides.
She stopped in her tracks. What else was he armed with?
“Ardis.” Wendel spoke in a strangled whisper.
She shot a glance sideways at him, but she couldn’t see his face behind the wolf mask. His shoulders looked rigid.
“Didn’t I just kill you?” said the man in the devil mask.
That voice…
Buying more time, she unsheathed Chun Yi, flames rushing down the length of the steel. Seafoam sizzled in the magic fire.
“We’re here to return the favor,” Ardis said, sounding much braver than she felt.
The devil began to laugh.
Wendel seized her wrist. “Run.”
“What–?”
“Run!”
Wendel dragged her into a sprint, running down the length of the yacht, crashing through the door to the dining room. He dropped her wrist and elbowed the crowd aside. She sheathed her sword before it could incite more panic. Konstantin and Himmel knelt by Wendel I, who lay unmoving on his sodden cloak.
How could his body have held so much blood? Looking at him, she went numb.
“Ardis.” Konstantin looked ashen. “I’m so sorry. We couldn’t–”
“Get out of my way,” Wendel II said.
He wrenched off his wolf mask. Now she could see his face, stark and white, his eyes glassy. He knelt by Wendel I and gripped his bloodstained hand. The muscles in Wendel II’s arm flexed, the veins standing in relief.
“Wake up,” he whispered.
Wendel I lurched from the floor with a gasp. Screams pierced the masquerade as guests scrambled back from the necromancers. Ardis pressed her fingers to Wendel I’s neck. His pulse stuttered under his ice-cold skin. When she touched his stomach, she felt nothing more than a scar. Like he had survived the mortal wound.
If you killed a necromancer, he would come back ten times stronger.
His ability to cheat death still defied belief, even after Constantinople, when she revived him with borrowed necromancy.
“What happened?” Wendel I had a voice between gravel and barbed wire.
“You died,” his doppelgänger said.
Konstantin stared at them with open-mouthed shock. “Are you undead?”
“Not in the traditional sense,” Wendel I said, though his skin looked alabaster pale.
The masquerade evaporated as guests fled from the dining room. Apparently, they found necromancy less entertaining than violence.
“Where’s the Kaiser?” Dread clenched her stomach.
Himmel shook his head. “I haven’t seen him since the stabbing.”
“What if he sent the man in the devil mask?”
Both of the necromancers shared an inscrutable glance. If only she could read minds.
Wendel II curled his lip. “Doubtful.”
Why had the devil’s voice sounded so familiar?
Himmel wiped his bloody hands on the torn hem of his toga. “Let me talk to the captain. He must be altering our course.”
Trembling, Konstantin smoothed back his hair. “I’ll come with you.”
They both exited the dining room.
“Help me.” Wendel II dragged his twin onto his feet.
She ducked under Wendel I’s other arm, staggering under his weight. The cloak clung to them, sodden with blood. Grimacing, she untied it and flung it away. They hobbled toward the stairs, fallen masks crunching underfoot.
“You have a plan?” she said.
“Get off this yacht,” Wendel II said.
Wendel I forced out a laugh. “Forgive me if I’m too feeble to swim.”
“Lifeboats.” He didn’t bother with a witticism.
“Why aren’t we fighting?” She gritted her teeth. “Why not just kill the devil?”
Neither one of the Wendels deigned to reply. They struggled to the stairs. Masquerade guests scattered out of the corners.
“Like rats,” Ardis muttered.
While climbing to the upper deck, Wendel I wobbled on his feet. He looked as though he might pass out at any moment.
He grunted. “Lost too much blood.”
“Sit down for a second,” she said.
“No,” Wendel II said, “keep moving.”
“Yes, sir,” his twin said.
They halted before a hatch. “Get the door,” Wendel II said.
She leaned against the heavy steel, the hatch groaning open under her shoulder, and stumbled into the frigid night wind. On the top deck, lifeboats hung on winches along the port and starboard. She held the door open.
Wendel I’s teeth started chattering. “God, it’s cold.”
“How are you still conscious?” she said.
“Magic.”
She wasn’t about to argue the point.
The yacht tilted starboard, swinging toward the coast, waves crashing against its hull. She braced Wendel I by holding his elbow.
“Help him into that lifeboat,” Wendel II said.
After they lowered Wendel I into the boat, he propped his elbows on his knees. His breath fogged the air in pants.
“The winch,” Ardis said.
She strained against the crank, but Wendel II didn’t lend a hand. Instead, he clenched her arm, his fingers nearly bruising.
The man in the devil mask hauled himself over the railing.
“Ardis,” Wendel II said. “Go.”
The devil jumped onto the deck and strode toward them. She unsheathed her sword, Chun Yi spitting sparks into the night.
“I won’t abandon you,” she said.
“God damn it, Ardis. Go.”
Why was he so afraid? They had fought shoulder-to-shoulder in many battles. But now he blocked her from their enemy.
Wind ruffled the devil’s cloak. He flipped a dagger from his belt, the design familiar.
“None of you will leave this yacht alive,” he said.
Cold panic trickled into her veins like ice water, but it still hadn’t flooded her brain, his name floating just out of her reach.
“London,” she whispered.
Wendel II locked gazes with her. “What?”
“He tried to kill me in London. He has the other dagger.”
His face twisted, his eyes dark with a pain old and deep. “Ardis, he–”
“Where did you fi
nd a lookalike?” The devil strolled nearer, as if relishing the hunt. “Another Wendel?”
Rage choked Wendel II’s voice. “I should have killed you in Constantinople.”
“God.” The word escaped her on an exhalation.
The Order of the Asphodel. Thorsten Magnusson.
Her mistake hit her like a tsunami, drowning her thoughts with panic. She had spared Thorsten’s life, thinking that mercy would be Wendel’s salvation. Killing Thorsten might scar him forever. But Thorsten was unforgivable evil, unstoppable by anything but death. Wendel had told her, and told her again, since the first day they met.
A tiny part of her had never believed him.
“Nemesis never wanted to murder me,” she said. “You did.”
“Bravo.” The devil mask distorted Thorsten’s voice.
“You told me, ‘Nemesis never forgets,’ because you knew Wendel would revive me. You knew exactly how to play him.”
This time, the first Wendel spoke. “Kill him.”
She glanced over her shoulder. Swaying on his feet, he leaned against the lifeboat, his black dagger in his hand. He was half-dead, not ready to fight, but she recognized the desperate urge for annihilation burning in his eyes.
She stared down Thorsten. “You made me lose my baby.”
“Baby?” That stopped him in his tracks. “Don’t tell me you fornicated with the necromancer.” Disgust dripped from his voice.
“Now I have nothing to lose.”
Twenty
A raw scream ripped from her throat as she charged Thorsten. Pulse pounding in her ears, she swung her sword. He ducked, flames whirring overhead, as she expected. She checked the arc of her sword and angled it down toward his guts, lunging onto her toes with the force of the thrust. The tip of the blade nicked him.
Chun Yi crackled with enchanted flames. It craved more than a taste of blood.
“You’re going to die tonight,” she said.
Thorsten flicked away her sword with the flat of his dagger. “Amateur.”
Ardis danced out of his reach. A shadow circled them like a vulture–Wendel II, cloaked by the magic of Amarant. With luck, he would backstab the bastard. Wendel I staggered closer, knuckles white around his dagger.
“I made you what you are,” Thorsten said. “Your tactics are predictable, Wendel.”
“Did you predict two of them?” Ardis wanted to disorient him.
Behind his mask, Thorsten’s glacial blue eyes glittered. “How did you do it?”
“How about I tell you over your dead body?”
Thorsten laughed through the mask’s demonic grin. “Once I win, I will choose my favorite way to make you talk.”
Threatening Ardis lured Wendel II closer into the fight.
Thorsten spun around and lashed out at the shadow. Blood flew from the darkness, splattering across the deck.
Wendel II retreated, his wound invisible, the drops of crimson betraying his presence.
“You can’t cheat death forever, Wendel.”
Following the blood, Thorsten stalked the necromancer, his stance that of a coiled viper. Ardis flanked him, looking for an angle of attack. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed the black dagger whipping through the air.
Thorsten dove into a roll; the blade clattered on the deck.
“Damn.” Empty-handed, Wendel I curled his lip. “Ardis?”
She ducked for the dagger, snatching it from the slick deck. Armed with both Amarant and Chun Yi, she changed her stance. A dagger could be useful for blocking and deflecting, while the sword itself did the most damage.
Thorsten kept his back to the railing. His dagger gleamed red in the starlight.
“Maybe if you had stayed with my mother,” Ardis said, “you could predict my tactics.”
“You aren’t my daughter.”
“If only.”
He tilted his head, the devil mask sliding a little askew. “Your mother was a whore.”
She forced out a laugh. “And?”
“You have no hope of ever finding your father.”
Wendel II prowled in the shadows, the bloodfall still betraying him. He couldn’t stab Thorsten without a distraction.
“Where the hell did you come from, Thorsten?” she said.
“Constantinople.”
“Where did you really come from?” She had been asked so many times she expected it, but no one ever seemed to question a white man.
Thorsten edged along the railing. “Norway.”
“Nice there this time of year?” The sharkskin of her sword’s hilt imprinted her fist.
Wendel I laughed. “Why do you want his life story? It’s all bullies and wetting the bed. Poor little misunderstood Thorsten.”
The Grandmaster sighed. “You never succeeded at taunts.”
“Your teaching left much to be desired.”
“If only you–”
In the space between words, Ardis lunged into a sprint.
When she swung at Thorsten’s neck, aiming to take off his head, he blocked with the flat of his dagger. She counterattacked with Amarant, left-handed, and stabbed at his ribs. Dodging, he twisted her wrist; she tumbled into the rotation before leaping to her feet. One second more, and he would have disarmed her.
Thorsten waited for her next attack. He had little tension in his stance.
No more than a specter of darkness, Wendel II leapt to stab him in the back. Thorsten twisted, taking the dagger in his shoulder, wrenching the blade with him. Shadows faded from Wendel’s skin and bared him to the starlight. He flung his arms open at his sides. Blood dripped from the gash tattering his right arm.
“Kill me again,” Wendel II said.
Thorsten ignored the dagger still buried in his shoulder. “They were right about you.”
“Who?”
“Your family.”
Wendel II’s eyes glittered with intensity. “Have I disappointed everyone?”
“You were my best assassin.”
Ardis slid her boot along the deck, gripping her blades, looking for a chance to finish him. Her mouth felt dryer than dust.
Thorsten backed Wendel II toward the railing. “You betrayed me.”
“I escaped you.” The necromancer’s words rasped with raw pain.
Heartbeat thundering in her ears, she took another step.
“Escaped?” Thorsten laughed. “Look at you.”
The Grandmaster struck. His dagger flashed like a viper’s fang, aimed for Wendel II’s neck. Wendel caught the blade between his fingers. Baring his teeth, he tightened his grip on the dagger. Crimson seeped through his fist.
Thorsten threw a punch at his head. Wendel II dodged and dragged Thorsten closer.
They hit the railing of the yacht. Teetering, Wendel II glanced back, his eyes flashing, before he grabbed a fistful of Thorsten’s cloak and locked him into a perverse imitation of an embrace. Thorsten twisted the dagger free.
Wendel II flung them both overboard.
Water crashed under the impact. Ardis sprinted to the edge and hung onto the railing. Black waves burst into silver foam.
“Ardis.” The other Wendel struggled to her side.
“Do you see him?” she said.
“No.”
“Feel him?” Dying, though she couldn’t say it out loud.
“No,” he said again. “He’s too far away.”
The sea rippled beneath the stars. She peered at the yacht’s wake but saw nothing surface. No one could hold their breath for that long. They had to be locked together beneath the waves, sinking deeper into infinite darkness.
~
A week after the masquerade, only one Wendel remained.
In the cafe at Hotel am Meer, he watched goose-feather snow drift through the evening. Steam curled from his forgotten cup of tea. Nettle tea, to replenish blood. Though he looked pale, it was more of his usual coloring.
When Ardis sipped her own tea, she
scalded her tongue. “I wonder where he is?”
He didn’t ask who she meant. “Gone.”
“But you never felt him die.”
“We can’t wait here forever. Eventually, we need to leave.”
She swallowed past the ache in her throat. Jin Hua had already said the same, anxious to return to San Francisco. But Ardis knew she could never return to America. After traveling for years, she had no home to call her own.
“And go where?” she said.
Wendel traced his finger down the windowpane. “There’s always Switzerland.”
Her stomach lurched as if she were standing at the edge of a cliff. Switzerland had been nothing but a dream; making it a reality frightened her. They would be alone there, outside of the war, with no battles to fight.
What kind of life would they have without bloodstained hands?
“Are you feeling well enough to travel?” she said.
“Yes.”
His one-word answer didn’t satisfy her. “You died. Again.”
“And came back. Again.” A smirk tugged at his lips.
“Prove it.” She managed to sound lighthearted. “Go for a walk with me.”
“Gladly.”
“It’s cold tonight.”
He rolled his eyes. “It’s always cold in Prussia.”
Together, they walked through Kiel. Seabirds sliced the evening. They passed a row of townhouses, roofs capped with snow, the aromas of baked potatoes and roast beef mingling with the scent of saltwater. Through the windows, golden light spilled into the street, along with glimpses of families enjoying dinner.
“Will we ever be like that?” Ardis said.
Wendel glanced at the nearest window; a dog begged for scraps dangled by a toddler.
“I’m unconvinced by the dog,” he said. “A cat, perhaps.”
“I mean, will we ever be that domestic?”
“Domestic.” He wrinkled his nose. “Tamed? Wrangling the wild necromancer?”
“I forgot how Germans are obsessed with cowboys.”
“Are we?” He kept walking, snow crunching under his boots. “To answer your question, I would like to stop running someday.”
“Thorsten can’t hurt you.”
He shivered. “My doppelgänger dragged him to the bottom of the sea.”
She thought of Wendel II beneath the waves, his black hair drifting like seaweed, cold, though he couldn’t feel anything anymore.