Gulping down breaths, wondering whether she had anything to vomit in the first place, she scraped at the ground. Snarled. The ice was too thick, the gloves catching and tearing in places. Annoyed, she pulled off her gloves and used magic to reinforce the tips of her fingers into claws. The cold stung, turning them from red to purple, and with trembling hands she dug out the mirror from the ground.
"Nikolai," she called. He was already coming towards her, a half-stagger, half-crawl. "I've found the mirror. Breakfire's Glass." She held it up in the light and shrieked, her fingers searing. Dropping it, she sucked in a breath, blood splattering from the cuts on her fingers. Nikolai hesitated, glancing at the mirror, then grabbed her hands.
"Are you all right?"
"Don't touch it. Raw power," she growled, hissing in pain. She concentrated, and the cuts sealed to raised welts. The rest would heal on its own. She leaned over the mirror and coughed up spit, blowing it out from between her lips. It bubbled and sizzled where it met the mirror's edges, and then hardened into a glass frame. She reached over and picked it up. A pulse beat through her hands straight to her heart. It wanted to cut her. It wanted to rend her to pieces, to slice her up, to make her feel as hollow as—she clicked her tongue. Breakfire's thoughts. So similar to hers. She sighed and raised the mirror to her eyes—
"No!" Nikolai pushed her arm down. "You mustn't!"
She scowled at him. "It's not going to bite me, Nikolai." She wiggled her fingers in front of his face. "Let's not forget it already has. I've put a muzzle on the damned thing."
"Katerini, the mirror grants wishes at a price. You have not prepared yourself to pay a price, and it may take something you do not have the ability to give." His fingers tangled with hers around the mirror, his glittering eyes boring into hers. "You confirmed my suspicions earlier—that an exchange between a demon and a human is always skewed in the demon's favor."
Creeping dread spread like smoke throughout Katerini's body. She felt light-headed. Nikolai wanted the mirror for Ilya to restore his failing health. She had assumed the mirror would simply grant the wish. "You did not say anything about prices earlier, Nikolai," she hissed.
"I left it out," he said flatly. "I am cunning, after all." Her lips quivered with rage. She couldn't speak. Nikolai raised his other hand to her face, touching her cheek carefully. She was tempted to bite him. "Katerini," he said. "My wish is simple. I will pay Ilya's price."
She went numb. "You want to cure him. You want to chase off Quiet Death." She shook her head. "Nikolai, even if that wasn't a problem, Ilya has to ask to be cured. Him, not you. You cannot force him to ask for his health back." She used her other hand to rake through her hair. "And the mirror will know. Two wishes for one sacrifice? You will die!" Realization dawned on her face. "You will die. You knew?! Is that why you've been so adamant about using magic?!"
He flinched, keeping his fingers tangled with hers around the mirror's handle. "I have taken every precaution to trick the mirror." At this, he released her and whipped off his pack. Inside the spindles glowed steadily, unaffected by the blizzard or cold. She stared at them. "This is my life."
"What?" she breathed.
"My life," he repeated. "My magic, my memories, everything. I pulled it out of me like fleece—I'm sure you realized by now I have thread magic—and spun it into thread."
So that was why.
From the very beginning, this had been his plan. Tricky bastard. His wish was to fulfill Ilya's wish, essentially conning the mirror out of an exchange. Two wishes for the price of one. Still, the mirror wasn't stupid. The price of Nikolai's wish would be his life—or a mere fraction of it. She didn't know whether to be furious or impressed. She looked at him through her frozen lashes. The mirror wouldn't recognize the thread as living, only Nikolai. Only a small part of him would be killed. How did he plan to live again? She didn't understand. She opened her mouth, but he continued to talk, quick and fast, almost excited.
"I didn't have the time or magic to spin the rest of the fleece into thread," he said, pointing to the fleece tucked safely at the bottom of the bag. "I also stole the magic and memories of those close to me, little bits and pieces of those who cherished me most. Gavrila, Ilya, Totsye—my dog—my mother and father, even you. You were a gamble because I did not know if you liked me but I certainly like you, and more than that, like Gavrila—and you were so guarded, I was afraid to ask, so I took some of your hair—"
She punched him.
He slammed onto the ground as she roared, "You took my hair?! You took my hair?!" He yelped as she pounced on him, pummeling him with her fists. He didn't know, a small part of her mind sighed, that she was vain about her hair. Incredibly so. And, really, she was just angry at him. The hair was the final straw. No wonder her head had been sore, not to mention the strange fiber she had found in the fleece. It explained why he had been so flustered. No, no, she was furious with him. He was asking her to let him die like it was nothing, and it was not nothing, no matter how much he had prepared for it.
"Ka—Katerini! Katerini, stop, I understand!" Nikolai choked out. He was laughing. He sat up quickly and pinned her arms to her sides, squeezing so hard she could barely breathe. She cursed at him and he laughed again, his breath hot on her cheek. "I am properly scolded, Katerini, I am properly scolded. Calm yourself. I am sorry for putting you through this. Forgive me, my lovely Katerini, I have asked so much of you."
She snarled at him. "Let me go! I'm not done with you!"
Nikolai shifted and pressed a kiss to her cheek. "If this doesn't work, tell Ilya to be as selfish as I am for once in his life." He slumped against her.
Katerini froze.
She heard a clatter behind her. Her fingers were empty, she realized as Nikolai's body cooled rapidly. When had she lost the mirror?! When had he taken it from her?! She shook him and his head lolled to the side. The glitter was still in his lifeless eyes, and she couldn't breathe. She stared at his mouth, his lips pulled into a small smile. Her eyes burned.
"I'm not finished beating you," she said. Her hands trembled trying to hold him up as she shook him again. His head rolled. She screamed and shook him so hard he slipped from her grasp and tumbled to the ground. "I'm not finished yelling at you!" she shouted. "You impulsive ass, how dare you—" She grabbed her hair. The mirror. She looked around for it, saw it on the ground directly behind her. He must've held it up behind her, looked at it while she was distracted. She snatched it up, muttering, "I'm not done with you! You ass! How am I supposed to bring you back to life?! Huh?! How?! Bah! With what, I'm not a thread—"
She paused. Her reflection hovered right out of her view. If she turned the mirror any further, she'd see herself. He had sacrificed himself for Ilya's wish, not hers. What if the mirror used his sacrifice for her wish? Her cheeks flushed angrily. He had left her behind to clean up this mess. She could do what she wanted, she'd take the risk, it was her wish, she wanted him alive, she wanted him, she—
Desire.
Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath.
Then she slammed the mirror on the ground, over and over again, shrieking in frustration. This was what the stupid prophecy meant. This desire. Her instincts were never wrong, hadn't been wrong this entire mission. This was the desire that would doom the mission, would cause everything to fail. She could not bring back the life the mirror had taken. It didn't make sense. It was a waste. She would have to sacrifice her life. Stupid, stupid, stupid! No matter how hard she cracked the mirror against the ice, it never chipped. So she kept at it until her arms ached, screaming and yelling and crying, though she would never admit to the last one. Her head cleared with each hit.
Finally she sat back, her hands bruised, the mirror toppling to the ground. She eyed it. No good to put it with the threads. She would carry it in her cloak. She rubbed her face. The threads. Even with the threads and the leftover fleece, which she was not sure she could spin very well, or at all, she didn't know what to do. The prophecy was mostly behind her. S
he hadn't failed. She looked at Nikolai's body and tears burned her eyes. Was this a success? No, no, her journey wasn't over yet. She hadn't failed, but she hadn't succeeded either. She wiped her face roughly, sniffing. She was no thread mage. She didn't know anyone—
Her eyes widened.
Groaning, she looked at the sky and screamed, "You are killing me!" Then she looked at Nikolai and hissed, "You are killing me. You will be the death of me, Nikolai Irini. I will destroy you when this is over, you hear me?" He lay there, utterly still. Her lips quivered. This time when she cried, she did so sincerely, with no anger to scorch her tears. He was so cold, she kept thinking as she pressed her face against his. So cold.
Staggering up, she threw caution aside and encased Nikolai's body in glass. She could not carry him on her back. She was a twig compared to him. She nodded, biting her thumb between her teeth. Desperation would be her companion for the rest of this journey. She turned her back on his body, stuffed the mirror in her cloak, grabbed their packs, and braced herself. Flicking her fingers, a spindle's worth of thread wrapped securely around the case and attached itself to her body in a harness. She had no fears it would break. Life magic was strong, stronger than diamonds and rock and stupid mirrors. The threads would hold, and she would drag Nikolai to Kalinstad, where Porfiry and Vasiliy lived. Where Alexey lived. Then she would beg them to help her.
Because Alexey was a thread mage too.
Chapter Seven
She felt nothing.
She had lost her mask some time back, along with the feeling in her arms and legs. Her face was chapped and bleeding, large blisters on her cheeks and forehead. The days bled into nights bled into days. She didn't have the strength to shadow travel anymore, didn't have the strength to send out a call for help. Her power was so faint no Darkrow would sense her. Her molten magic was at its core, her life magic now freezing away in the endless cold. She had crossed over to land at one point; the subtle shifting beneath her legs had vanished, causing her to stumble. The land seemed to heave and jump. She vomited as she walked. At least the shrieking of the frozen ocean was gone, and the howling wind packed with ice died down to a mere blizzard. Every time she fell, she took longer to stand. She had not sat down for days. Lying down seemed a dream. What did it feel like to lie down? She didn't remember. She knew if she lay down, she would not get up. She would turn as cold as Nikolai, who seemed asleep in his glass coffin.
Nikolai, she thought with every step.
The threads never lost their shine. She briefly considered siphoning some of their magic to herself, then decided against it. No good would come of it. She would not be weak, she would not fail. She trudged on, cutting across the Queen of Cold's Wastelands to the edges of the Kalinard mountain range. She knew by the fizzle of strangeness she had crossed into the Kalinen. The air lingered with demon magic, which seared everything it touched. The air was warmer too, the scents of New Spring filling her nose. Had so much time passed? She didn't doubt it. The journey was endless.
She sank into a stupor, her eyes seeing nothing. The rhythmic dragging of Nikolai's coffin lulled her into a waking sleep, for which she was grateful. She didn't have the energy to focus. The daze was enough. She didn't notice the landscape changing, becoming tamer and less wild. She didn't notice the wildlife or the trees, ignored chances at shelter. She plodded through the snow with deathlike determination. And then her feet scraped the ground. Nikolai's coffin shrieked like the frozen ocean. She halted. Scraped? Shrieked? She looked down. Strange buzzing filled her ears. She was standing on a street.
Smooth, pebbled rocks depicted windswept seas, obscured by a dusting of snow here and there. She recognized this street, had walked it once. She raised her head. The buzzing noise was coming from the crowds of people staring at her, asking her questions, whispering and pointing to a red stain in the distance. Her eyes narrowed. She needed to get to that wretched stain. She needed to get to the Palace Dyed in Red, where her brothers resided.
She surged forward, the glass case screeching across the street. People jumped back and she trudged past them, panting with exertion, hardly aware of the terrifying appearance she presented. She cut a path through the city, her breath coming faster and faster as she realized she was near the end. A grim smile cut her lips.
She exited the city proper and trudged up the promenade, the spiked palisade on one side revealing a massive cliff. The city of Kalinstad was built straight out of the Kalinard Mountains, the strange pink and silver rock in most of the buildings. Except for that red monstrosity. Its golden domes flashed in her eyes and she ducked her head, grunting as she dragged Nikolai's coffin over a large golden square to the front steps of the Palace Dyed in Red.
Porfiry and Vasiliy were waiting for her, pressed against each other outside the Palace's great doors. Snowflakes fell on their cheeks and eyelashes, fluttering gently onto their pale lips. No rosy color touched their skin, neither did the flakes melt. They were cold and hard as stone, diamonds, ice. She dragged Nikolai up the steps, sweat freezing on her brow, and looked at them with wild eyes. They were still as stone, their black cloaks stains against the red of the Palace, and no emotion crossed their features. She hated them, hated their apathy, hated, hated—she stumbled and landed painfully on her knee, hearing a crack.
"Where is the warlock?" she hissed. "Where is the—where is he—" She could not finish.
"Katerini," Porfiry said, and he was next to her. Vasiliy was behind her, shattering the glass case and untangling the threads on her body. His hands were sharp and painful, and she realized her cloak was in shreds, most of her gear in tatters. The threads had rubbed through her clothes with their magic, huge welts lashing across her chest, back, and stomach.
"Katerini, calm yourself. You are delirious," Porfiry said. His fingers touched her chapped shoulders. His eyes traveled downwards. "You have something in your pocket, something you should not."
"He is not dead. Nikolai is not dead," she snarled at him. Blood dribbled from her mouth, too dry for words, her lips bleeding. Had she really deteriorated so much? She felt separated from her body as she curled her hands in Porfiry's cloak. "Weave a tapestry. I have not failed. I resisted, I resisted—" She fumbled through the torn pockets of her cloak and found the mirror still trapped there. Pulling it out, it was immediately snatched from her hand. "No! Give it back!"
Vasiliy held her in place gently. "Hush."
Porfiry was grinning from ear to ear, an expression she had never seen. "Is this what I think it is, Vasiliy? What do the humans call it? Breakfire's Glass?" Then he caught his reflection. The grin vanished. "Hmph. Seems as though something has been done which cannot be undone. Oh, enough!" he snarled at the mirror. "This wish is not meant for me."
"Give it back," Katerini hissed, jerking his cloak. "Nikolai—"
"Yes, Katerini, we know," Porfiry said. He wrapped one hand around her bleeding ones. His black eyes regarded her thoughtfully. "You have suffered greatly, haven't you? To travel this far…" His eyes moved past her to focus on Nikolai. "Where did you find this? In the Svarinard? You have eaten away most of your life. No, nearly all of it. I am surprised you have any left. Vasiliy—"
"It doesn't matter!" she screamed. He blinked in surprise as she began to cry. "Bring him back! Bring this idiot back so I can sleep! I haven't walked here from the Top of the World to have you talk at me, Porfiry!" She collapsed against him, her face buried in his cloak. Porfiry went stiff with surprise. "I am begging you. Do something. Weave a tapestry. Bring him back."
She was pried away by Vasiliy, who pressed against her, wrapped arms as thin and bony as hers around her exhausted body. She sagged against him, tears stinging her raw cheeks. Her knee throbbed painfully. She turned her face to the side and caught sight of the entrance to the Palace Dyed in Red. Another Darkrow stood there, half-hidden in the shadows.
Alexey.
Her fingers were slick with blood again. This time, however, it was her own. No hallucinations of guilt plagued her. Ni
kolai had quelled them. Now she could see Alexey clearly, timid and wearing a shabby old Darkrow uniform.
He was the same height as Porfiry. Thick, wavy black hair swept his furrowed eyebrows, and bright eyes stared at her. Eyes so similar to those of Ilya and Nikolai. She could never forget his face as he writhed with pain under her for such a brief moment, right before Porfiry had ripped her away and torn a hole through her stomach. His eyes jumped nervously back and forth between her, Porfiry, and Nikolai's body. His whole demeanor oozed confusion. He had never seen her cry. She was sure Porfiry and Vasiliy hadn't either. She turned her face back into Vasiliy's chest, then pushed away. Or tried to—Vasiliy held her at arm's length, but didn't let go. Bah.
Alexey must love seeing her like this, she thought. A wave of nausea hit her and she doubled over, coughing. Her head throbbed so painfully she saw white, then black spots. Every ache and pain in her body began to fade. She felt numb, winded, dizzy. Her lungs burned. Her body shook. She had to keep going. She had to reach the Palace Dyed in Red. Where had the straps gone? She looked behind her, Nikolai's body sprawled across the snow. No, steps. His glass coffin was gone. She felt vague. Liquid streamed from her mouth. Blood, or vomit. She hadn't eaten for weeks, months. What could she possibly have to vomit? Exasperating. She had to make Nikolai another glass coffin. She threw out a hand. Scorching magic seared through her veins and she froze, too pained to move or scream.
"Katerini," Porfiry said, his sharp fingers curling around her chin. He turned her face to look at him. "Have you forgotten where you are?"
"I'm at the Top of the World," she answered. Porfiry stared at her for a moment, then his eyes flicked to Vasiliy. "Bravka is dead, and Nikolai is mad, and I—I am so tired, Porfiry. I cannot sleep until Alexey makes Nikolai his tapestry. You know, I think Nikolai was betting on you two saving him, not me. Manipulative bastard." She laughed, her whole body shaking. "He made me realize I don't hate you. Ugh. Made me like him too…"
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