I spent long hours in Baghra’s hut learning breathing exercises and holding painful poses that were supposed to help with my focus. She gave me books to read, teas to drink, and repeated whacks with her stick, but nothing helped. “Should I cut you, girl?” she would cry in frustration. “Should I have an Inferni burn you? Should I have them throw you back into the Fold to make food for those abominations?”
My daily failures with Baghra were matched only by the torture that Botkin put me through. He ran me all over the palace grounds, through the woods, up and down hills until I thought I would collapse. He put me through sparring drills and falling drills until my body was covered in bruises and my ears ached from his constant grumbling: too slow, too weak, too skinny.
“Botkin cannot build house from such little twigs!” he shouted at me, giving my upper arm a squeeze. “Eat something!”
But I wasn’t hungry. The appetite that had appeared after my brush with death on the Fold was gone and food had lost all its savor. I slept poorly, despite my luxurious bed, and felt like I was stumbling through my days. The work Genya had done on me had worn off, and my cheeks were once again sallow, my eyes shadowed, my hair dull and limp.
Baghra believed that my lack of appetite and inability to sleep were connected to my failure to call my power. “How much harder is it to walk with your feet bound? Or to talk with a hand over your mouth?” she lectured. “Why do you waste all of your strength fighting your true nature?”
I wasn’t. Or I didn’t think I was. I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. All my life I’d been frail and weak. Every day had felt like a struggle. If Baghra was right, all that would change when I finally mastered my Grisha talent. Assuming I ever did. Until then, I was stuck.
I knew that the other Grisha were whispering about me. The Etherealki liked to practice by the lakeside together, experimenting with new ways to use wind and water and fire. I couldn’t risk them discovering that I couldn’t even call my own power, so I made excuses not to join them, and eventually they stopped inviting me.
In the evenings, they sat around the domed hall, sipping tea or kvas, planning weekend excursions into Balakirev or one of the other villages near Os Alta. But because the Darkling was still concerned about assassination attempts, I had to remain behind. I was glad for the excuse. The more time I spent with the Summoners, the greater the chance that I would be found out.
I rarely saw the Darkling, and when I did it was from a distance, coming or going, deep in conversation with Ivan or the King’s military advisers. I learned from the other Grisha that he wasn’t often at the Little Palace, but spent most of his time traveling between the Fold and the northern border, or south to where Shu Han raiding parties were attacking settlements before winter set in. Hundreds of Grisha were stationed throughout Ravka, and he was responsible for all of them.
He never said a word to me, rarely even glanced my way. I was sure it was because he knew that I was showing no improvement, that his Sun Summoner might turn out to be a complete failure after all.
When I wasn’t suffering at the hands of Baghra or Botkin, I was sitting in the library, wading through books on Grisha theory. I thought I understood the basics of what Grisha did. (Of what we did, I amended.) Everything in the world could be broken down into the same small parts. What looked like magic was really the Grisha manipulating matter at its most fundamental levels.
Marie didn’t make fire. She summoned combustible elements in the air around us, and she still needed a flint to make the spark that would burn that fuel. Grisha steel wasn’t endowed with magic, but by the skill of Fabrikators, who did not need heat or crude tools to manipulate metal.
But if I understood what we did, I was less sure of how we did it. The grounding principle of the Small Science was “like calls to like,” but then it got complicated. Odinakovost was the “thisness” of a thing that made it the same as everything else. Etovost was the “thatness” of a thing that made it different from everything else. Odinakovost connected Grisha to the world, but it was etovost that gave them an affinity for something like air, or blood, or in my case, light. Around then, my head started swimming.
One thing did stand out to me: the word the philosophers used to describe people born without Grisha gifts, otkazat’sya, “the abandoned.” It was another word for orphan.
* * *
LATE ONE AFTERNOON, I was plodding through a passage describing Grisha assistance with trade routes when I felt someone’s presence beside me. I looked up and cringed back in my chair. The Apparat was looming over me, his flat black pupils lit with peculiar intensity.
I glanced around the library. It was empty except for us, and despite the sun pouring through the glass ceiling, I felt a chill creep through me.
He sat down in the chair beside me with a gust of musty robes, and the damp smell of tombs enveloped me. I tried to breathe through my mouth.
“Are you enjoying your studies, Alina Starkov?”
“Very much,” I lied.
“I’m so glad,” he said. “But I hope you will remember to feed the soul as well as the mind. I am the spiritual adviser to all those within the palace walls. Should you find yourself worried or in distress, I hope you will not hesitate to come to me.”
“I will,” I said. “Absolutely.”
“Good, good.” He smiled, revealing a mouth of crowded, yellowing teeth, his gums black like a wolf ’s. “I want us to be friends. It is so important that we are friends.”
“Of course.”
“I would be pleased if you would accept a gift from me,” he said, reaching into the folds of his brown robes and removing a small book bound in red leather.
How could someone offering you a present sound so creepy?
Reluctantly, I leaned forward and took the book from his long, blue-veined hand. The title was embossed in gold on the cover: Istorii Sankt’ya.
“The Lives of Saints?”
He nodded. “There was a time when all Grisha children were given this book when they came to school at the Little Palace.”
“Thank you,” I said, perplexed.
“Peasants love their Saints. They hunger for the miraculous. And yet they do not love the Grisha. Why do you think that is?”
“I hadn’t thought about it,” I said. I opened the book. Someone had written my name inside the cover. I flipped a few pages. Sankt Petyr of Brevno. Sankt Ilya in Chains. Sankta Lizabeta. Each chapter began with a full-page illustration, beautifully rendered in brightly colored inks.
“I think it is because the Grisha do not suffer the way the Saints suffer, the way the people suffer.”
“Maybe,” I said absently.
“But you have suffered, haven’t you, Alina Starkov? And I think … yes. I think you will suffer more.”
My head jerked up. I thought he might be threatening me, but his eyes were full of a strange sympathy that was even more terrifying.
I glanced back down at the book in my lap. My finger had stopped on an illustration of Sankta Lizabeta as she had died, drawn and quartered in a field of roses. Her blood made a river through the petals. I snapped the book closed and sprang to my feet. “I should go.”
The Apparat rose, and for a moment I thought he would try to stop me. “You do not like your gift.”
“No, no. It’s very nice. Thank you. I don’t want to be late,” I babbled.
I bolted past him through the library doors, and I didn’t take an easy breath until I was back in my room. I tossed the book of Saints into the bottom drawer of my dressing table and slammed it shut.
What did the Apparat want from me? Had his words been meant as a threat? Or as some kind of warning?
I took a deep breath, a tide of fatigue and confusion washing over me. I missed the easy rhythm of the Documents Tent, the comforting monotony of my life as a cartographer, when nothing more was expected of me than a few drawings and a tidy worktable. I missed the familiar smell of inks and paper. Mostly, I missed Mal.
I’d wri
tten to him every week, care of our regiment, but I hadn’t heard anything back. I knew the post could be unreliable and that his unit might have moved on from the Fold or might even be in West Ravka, but I still hoped that I would hear from him soon. I’d given up on the idea of him visiting me at the Little Palace. As much as I missed him, I couldn’t bear the thought of him knowing that I fit into my new life about as well as I’d fit into my old one.
Every night, as I climbed the stairs to my room after another pointless, painful day, I would imagine the letter that might be waiting for me on my dressing table, and my steps would quicken. But the days passed, and no letter came.
Today was no different. I ran my hand over the empty surface of the table.
“Where are you, Mal?” I whispered. But there was no one there to answer.
CHAPTER 11
WHEN I THOUGHT things couldn’t get any worse, they did.
I was sitting at breakfast in the domed hall when the main doors blew open and a group of unfamiliar Grisha entered. I didn’t pay them much attention. Grisha in the Darkling’s service were always coming and going at the Little Palace, sometimes to recover from injuries received at the northern or southern front, sometimes on leave from other assignments.
Then Nadia gasped.
“Oh no,” groaned Marie.
I looked up and my stomach lurched as I recognized the raven-haired girl who had found Mal so fascinating back in Kribirsk.
“Who is she?” I whispered, watching the girl glide among the other Grisha, saying her hellos, her high laugh echoing off the golden dome.
“Zoya,” muttered Marie. “She was a year ahead of us at school and she’s horrible.”
“Thinks she’s better than everyone,” added Nadia.
I raised my eyebrows. If Zoya’s sin was snobbery, then Marie and Nadia had no business making judgments.
Marie sighed. “The worst part is that she’s kind of right. She’s an incredibly powerful Squaller, a great fighter, and look at her.”
I took in the silver embroidery on Zoya’s cuffs, the glossy perfection of her black hair, the big blue eyes fringed by impossibly dark lashes. She was almost as beautiful as Genya. I thought of Mal and felt a pang of pure jealousy shoot through me. But then I realized that Zoya had been stationed at the Fold. If she and Mal had … well, she might know if he was there, if he was all right. I pushed my plate away. The prospect of asking Zoya about Mal made me a little nauseated.
As if she could feel my stare, Zoya turned from where she was chatting with some awestruck Corporalki and swept over to the Summoners’ table.
“Marie! Nadia! How are you?”
They stood to hug her, their faces plastered with huge, fake smiles.
“You look amazing, Zoya! How are you?” gushed Marie.
“We missed you so much!” squealed Nadia.
“I missed you, too,” Zoya said. “It’s so good to be back at the Little Palace. You can’t imagine how busy the Darkling’s kept me. But I’m being rude. I don’t think I’ve met your friend.”
“Oh!” Marie exclaimed. “I’m so sorry. This is Alina Starkov. The Sun Summoner,” she said with a little pride.
I stood up awkwardly.
Zoya swept me into an embrace. “It’s such an honor to finally meet the Sun Summoner,” she said loudly. But as she hugged me she whispered, “You stink of Keramzin.”
I stiffened. She released me, a smile playing on her perfect lips.
“I’ll see you all later,” she said with a little wave. “I’m frantic for a bath.” And with that she sailed from the domed hall and through the double doors to the dormitories.
I stood there, stunned, my cheeks blazing. I felt like everyone must be gaping at me, but no one else seemed to have heard what Zoya said.
Her words stayed with me the rest of the day, through another botched lesson with Baghra and an interminable lunch during which Zoya held forth on the journey from Kribirsk, the state of the towns bordering the Fold, and the exquisite lubok woodcuts she’d seen in one of the peasant villages. It might have been my imagination, but it seemed like every time she said “peasant” she looked directly at me. As she spoke, light glinted off the heavy silver bracelet gleaming at her wrist. It was studded with what looked like pieces of bone. An amplifier, I realized.
Things went from bad to dreadful when Zoya showed up at our combat lesson. Botkin hugged her, kissed both of her cheeks, and then proceeded to chatter back and forth with her in Shu. Was there anything this girl couldn’t do?
She’d brought along her friend with the chestnut curls, whom I remembered from the Grisha tent. They proceeded to giggle and whisper as I stumbled through the drills with which Botkin began every class. When we separated to spar, I wasn’t even surprised when Botkin paired me with Zoya.
“Is star pupil,” he said, grinning proudly. “Will help little girl.”
“Surely the Sun Summoner doesn’t need my help,” Zoya said with a smug smile.
I watched her warily. I wasn’t sure why this girl hated me so much, but I’d had just about enough for one day.
We took our fighting stances, and Botkin gave the signal to start.
I actually managed to block Zoya’s first jab, but not the second. It caught me hard on the jaw and my head snapped back. I tried to shake it off.
She danced forward and aimed a punch at my ribs. But some of Botkin’s training must have sunk in over the last few weeks. I dodged right and the blow glanced off me.
She flexed her shoulders and circled. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that the other Summoners had left off sparring and were watching us.
I shouldn’t have let myself get distracted. I took Zoya’s next punch hard to the gut. As I gasped for breath, she followed with an elbow. I managed to avoid it more by luck than skill.
She pressed her advantage and lunged forward. That was her mistake. I was weak and I was slow, but Botkin had taught me to make use of my opponent’s strength.
I stepped to the side, and as she came in close, I hooked my leg around her ankle. Zoya went down hard.
The other Summoners broke into applause. But before I had a chance to even register my victory, Zoya sat up, her expression furious, her arm slashing through the air. I felt myself lifted off my feet as I sailed backward through the air and slammed into the training room’s wooden wall. I heard something crack, and all the breath went out of my body as I slid to the ground.
“Zoya!” Botkin roared. “You do not use power. Not in these rooms. Never in these rooms!”
Dimly, I was aware of the other Summoners gathering around me, of Botkin calling for a Healer.
“I’m fine,” I tried to say, but I couldn’t gather enough breath. I lay in the dirt, panting shallowly. Every time I tried to breathe, pain tore through my left side. A group of servants arrived, but when they lifted me onto the stretcher, I fainted.
Marie and Nadia told me the rest when they came to visit me in the infirmary. A Healer had slowed my heart rate until I fell into a deep sleep, then mended my broken rib and the bruises Zoya had left on me.
“Botkin was furious!” Marie exclaimed. “I’ve never seen him so angry. He threw Zoya out of the training rooms. I thought he might hit her himself.”
“Ivo says he saw Ivan take her through the domed hall to the Darkling’s council rooms, and when she came out, she was crying.”
Good, I thought with satisfaction. But when I thought of myself lying in a heap in the dirt, I felt a burning wave of embarrassment.
“Why did she do it?” I asked as I tried to sit up. I’d had plenty of people ignore me or look down on me. But Zoya actually seemed to hate me.
Marie and Nadia gaped at me as if I’d taken a crack to the skull instead of the ribs.
“Because she’s jealous!” said Nadia.
“Of me?” I said incredulously.
Marie rolled her eyes. “She can’t bear the idea of anyone being the Darkling’s favorite.”
I laughed and the
n winced at the stab of pain in my side. “I’m hardly his favorite.”
“Of course you are. Zoya’s powerful, but she’s just another Squaller. You’re the Sun Summoner.”
Nadia’s cheeks flushed when she said this, and I knew I wasn’t imagining the tinge of envy in her voice. Just how deep did that envy go? Marie and Nadia talked like they hated Zoya, but they smiled to her face. What do they say about me when I’m not around? I wondered.
“Maybe he’ll demote her!” squealed Marie.
“Maybe he’ll send her to Tsibeya!” crowed Nadia.
A Healer appeared from the shadows to shush them and send them on their way. They promised to visit again the next day.
I must have fallen back asleep because, when I woke a few hours later, the infirmary was dark. The room was eerily quiet, the other beds unoccupied, the only sound the soft ticking of a clock.
I pushed myself up. I still felt a little sore, but it was hard to believe that I’d had a broken rib just a few hours before.
My mouth was dry, and I had the beginning of a headache. I dragged myself out of bed and poured a glass of water from the pitcher at my bedside. Then I pushed open the window and took a deep breath of night air.
“Alina Starkov.”
I jumped and whirled.
“Who’s there?” I gasped.
The Apparat emerged from the long shadows by the door.
“Did I startle you?” he asked.
“A bit,” I admitted. How long had he been standing there? Had he been watching me sleep?
He seemed to glide silently across the room toward me, his ragged robes slithering over the infirmary floor. I took an involuntary step backward.
“I was very sorry to hear of your injury,” he said. “The Darkling should be more watchful of his charges.”
“I’m fine.”
“Are you?” he said, regarding me in the moonlight. “You do not look well, Alina Starkov. It’s essential that you stay well.”
“I’m just a little tired.”
He stepped closer. His peculiar smell wafted over me, that strange mix of incense and mildew, and the scent of turned earth. I thought of the graveyard at Keramzin, the crooked headstones, the peasant women keening over new graves. I was suddenly very aware of the emptiness of the infirmary. Was the Corporalki Healer still nearby? Or had he gone somewhere to find a glass of kvas and a warm bed?
Grishaverse 01 - Shadow and Bone Page 11