by Maya Motayne
Ignacio straightened and gazed down at her, his vile face outlined in a halo of sunlight. “The gods saw fit to grant me what I needed to find myself again,” he said with a flourish of his cloak. It had once been a sign of comfort for her. He’d wrapped her in it when she was small. Now she wondered if he would wrap her corpse in it. “And to find you.”
She didn’t speak. She buried her dagger in his foot. Ignacio looked down at her, disappointed. He didn’t even flinch. He pulled the bloody knife from his shoe, and within moments the boot knitted itself closed. She imagined his skin doing the same beneath.
“Don’t think that because I love you, I won’t hurt you. I can do both,” he said. “I would rather end you now and remember you as you once were, when you were my good little girl.”
“I was never good,” Finn spat. “You made sure of that.”
“I made sure you were clothed and fed and loved!” he thundered. “And you sliced through my eyes, left me with nothing! To think I was going to give you a gift.”
“I don’t want a maldito thing from you, and you never loved me, you filthy liar!” she shouted. The sting of his lies burned her more now that she’d spent so much time without him. She wouldn’t let him speak her truths for her. Not this time. “You put your voice in my head and made me whatever you wanted me to be.”
Ignacio shook his head as if she were a child lying about sneaking a cookie before dinner when her face was covered in crumbs. “Do you remember when I asked you if you loved me, and you said being with me was like suffocating in the middle of a crowd and no one noticing? Suffocating and not being able to scream. That’s what you said, isn’t it?”
He spun his fingers in a slow circle. Just like that, every time Finn drew in breath it pulled away from her lips. There was nothing to breathe. She clutched at her throat.
He looked down at her piteously. “Just lie down, Finny. It’ll be quicker that way.”
“Please,” she croaked with her last puff of breath. “Let me go.”
He knelt, reaching for her cheek, his face twisted with grief. “Can’t you see how hard this is for me? No parent should have to bury their child, and I will never join you in the next life.”
She wrenched away from his touch. He was still mad enough to think he couldn’t die like he’d told her when they’d first met, but now that he had this power, maybe he was right.
She tried to rise from the ground, but he held her down by the shoulder. She could see her shadow spasming on the ground beside her. The longer she choked, the grayer it became.
“All this time, I thought I wanted to hurt you. But I still want to save you. Just lie down,” he said softly. “It’ll be just like falling asleep, Mija.”
Finn could feel her body giving in. Her sight began to dwindle and blur. Ignacio’s mouth was moving, but she couldn’t hear him over the roar of her panicked heart.
Since the day she’d run away, part of her knew that this was how she would die. With him standing over her, smiling that maniacal, fatherly smile. Soft and jagged all at once. She’d known it. But her mind couldn’t stop protesting. Even at death’s door, she held her ground.
I don’t want to die. Not today. Not with him.
“Fuerza!” a voice called from behind her.
With bloodshot eyes, Finn watched Ignacio fly back into a vendor’s wooden shop. The force of the fall collapsed the ramshackle shop on top of him. Finn’s breath returned, and she gasped, her eyes tearing. Standing over her was a very haggard-looking prince.
“You were supposed to help me,” Alfie said, quickly kneeling beside her, his pulse roaring in his ears, “not leave me to bleed to death.”
He did not know if he’d killed the man or just incapacitated him, but he had a feeling that, had he waited a moment longer, Finn would be dead.
Between gasps, she said, “Just now—I was supposed—to be dead—give me—a break.”
“We need to get out of here,” he said, eyes wide with panic. The Brim was alive again. The gowns and capes in the market stalls swayed in the breeze. Merchants and shoppers loitered about as if a man had not put a stop to their every move with a flick of his hand.
Finn crawled to her feet, slapping his hand away when he reached to help. She staggered five paces before her leg gave. She flopped back onto her stomach with a pained cry. Alfie stared at the blood pooling around her heel.
“Be still!”
“I have to run,” she said, her voice hoarse. “Now.”
He pointed at her graying shadow. “You will die if you don’t stop bleeding.”
“I’m already dead,” she said, her voice threadbare. But she stopped trying to crawl. She fell still and pliant. He didn’t know her well, but it didn’t make sense for her to look this way. It was like taking a sip of cocoa only to find spoiled milk rolling down your throat.
The Brim fell silent once again, everyone freezing mid-movement.
Finn’s eyes flew wide with fear as she tried to crawl away again. The wooden rubble of the fallen shop exploded outward with a shattering crack. Alfie shielded his eyes from the debris.
“And who is this, Finny?” the man asked, his tone conversational as he emerged from the rubble, spotless. He smiled at Finn, a grin that looked more like a beast showing its teeth. “A resilient one, isn’t he? I thought that blow to the head would keep you quiet until I was ready to come for you. No matter, the more the merrier. I’m Ignacio, Finn’s fa—”
“Finn’s nothing,” Finn spat. Panic burning in her eyes, she looked at Alfie and whispered, “Run.”
Alfie wanted to. His body begged him to turn away from the smothering black magic that was pouring out of this man. But it would not have been released if not for him. If he had to die trying to stop it, then so be it.
“Leave her be.” Alfie knew his words would mean nothing to this man, but it was what he wanted to say. These might be his last moments alive, so he was going to say what he wished.
“You know how I feel about you making friends without my approval,” Ignacio said, his eyes never leaving Finn’s face. As if Alfie wasn’t worth a glance.
“Run, stupid,” she said again. “Just run.”
“Put pressure on the wound,” Alfie said to her, his eyes locked on the man in the gray cloak. “You still owe me a favor for the vanishing cloak. Live long enough to fulfill it.”
The dragon warmed against his chest. Was it responding to being this close to more black magic, more of itself? Alfie pushed away the thought and focused. He needed to stop this man.
A stall to his left sold blown glass vases, trinkets, and figurines.
“Romper,” he said. The glass items shattered. “Volar.” With a wave of his hand the shards shot toward the man. Alfie wanted to look away. He didn’t want to see the glass bury itself in the man’s skin. But nothing of the sort happened.
“No,” the man said. It was as simple as that. The shards slowed, stopping a hair away from him, suspended in midair. Alfie’s jaw fell slack. This man had stopped the glass without uttering a single word of magic. He had just said no. It should not have worked in the same way that breathing in water instead of air should not work. None of this could be possible.
The man smiled at him. “Have you ever felt as if your whole life has led up to a single moment, muchacho?” The glass quivered before shooting back at Alfie. Too shocked to defend himself, Alfie raised his arms uselessly over his face. A wall of rock shot up from the ground to guard him. He looked behind him to see Finn with her hand stretched forward. Their eyes met. He could not bring himself to speak, but he hoped his eyes spoke for him: Thank you.
“Finny, come now. Wait your turn, I’m talking to your friend.”
Alfie watched Finn’s face crease with agony as she fought to keep the wall of earth up. But with only a look from the man, it crumbled to sand. This was not the magic Alfie knew.
He turned his attention back to Alfie, a wicked grin on his face. “As I said, have you ever felt as if your whole
life has led up to a single moment? I suppose you wouldn’t; you look so young. So untried. Walk to me,” he said, beckoning. Alfie moved forward, one step after another. There was no struggle, no fight beyond the one in his mind. This magic was seamless, pulling him forward as if he were an element to be controlled. “Stop, and keep your arms at your sides,” he added, an afterthought, as if testing his power.
Ignacio watched with relish as Alfie’s arms lowered, palms flat against his sides. He could feel the dragon burning against his chest, as if trying to call his attention to something, but he couldn’t afford to be distracted. He thought of stunning spellwork that would give him a few moments to grab Finn and get away. Paralizar. Maybe it’d be enough. “Par—”
“Don’t talk.”
Alfie stopped. He couldn’t form a sound. If this man told him not to breathe, he would stop. He would stop until he died. He should have listened to the thief.
He should have run.
The man looked down at Alfie’s hand. “Let me see,” he said. Alfie felt his arm rise up of its own accord. The man hadn’t even given the magic a specific instruction or command to raise Alfie’s arm. It interpreted his words, his desires, and put them into action. There was no balance here, no rules, nothing. This was not right.
The man took Alfie’s hand and ran his fingers along the palm. “Soft as a dove. Don’t scream,” he said. He looked at Alfie’s hand and said, “Break.” Alfie’s index finger broke with a brittle snap. Alfie wanted to scream but he couldn’t, couldn’t fuel a roar with his pain, but he could whimper like a child. The man must have wanted to hear it, because the magic allowed it.
He smiled at Alfie as if they were about to play a very fun game.
Ignacio raised his arm and flexed his fingers. Then whirring through the air were fine white strings. They burrowed deep into Alfie’s skin at his knees, elbows. The man lifted his hand, made a fist, and pulled backward. Alfie felt as if his bones were going to pull free from his skin. The strings pulled him down onto his knees.
“When you were my little girl, you would only eat your fish if I took the bones out for you. You’d point them out and I would pull, do you remember?” When there was silence his eyes hardened, his light tone gone in a flash. “Answer me.”
“I remember,” Finn said, her voice quivering.
“Let’s play, then! Which bone should I take first?” he mused.
“No,” Alfie heard her say quietly behind him.
“What was that?”
“No!” she shouted. “I won’t!”
Sweat prickled on Alfie’s forehead. The dragon was searing against his chest now, scorching his skin.
“You will,” Ignacio said. “If I tell you to. But I won’t just yet. I’ll start. I say we start small—his little finger.”
He flicked his hand. A string whirred and burrowed itself in the tip of Alfie’s finger, wriggling under his nail. It sliced through the flesh at the tip of his finger over and over again, then the string nestled into the gash and pushed outward, parting the skin wide until blood poured out. Screams of pain grew and crested inside him, waves with no shore to break on. He could not speak, only endure. With a beckoning finger from Ignacio, the string began to pull and pull until Alfie could feel the bone rising. He could see the white, bloody tip of it bursting through his bleeding skin, like a tooth through gums. He couldn’t scream. Couldn’t move.
Ignacio cocked his head at Alfie. “Scream, if you like.”
Alfie’s mouth fell open, scream after scream tearing from his throat. He couldn’t tell if he was screaming because the man had told him to or because of the pain. All he wanted was for it to stop, for it all to stop. The pain, this man, the thief whimpering behind him as if she’d seen these horrors far too many times. He needed it to stop. The dragon pulsed rapidly against his chest in sync with his heartbeat. A sudden wave of pain tore through Alfie’s body, as if he were being wrung dry of every ounce of energy he had left. This pain was beyond what the man was doing; this was something else. It felt as if the pain had come from within and wriggled out of his skin, maggots bursting out of an abandoned corpse.
Then his wish came true. Everything stopped.
The man in the gray cloak stopped. Alfie could move again. He stood shakily, watching the bloodied strings fall from his body. A pained sob broke past his lips as he closed his hand over his bleeding finger, willing the flesh to close over the visible bone. He looked over his shoulder. Finn had her head tucked between her knees, her hands clapped over her ears, a look of anguish frozen on her face.
How did he do it? How did this happen? Every bone in his body rang with pain, as if a needle had punctured every inch of him simultaneously. What had he done?
The dragon was glowing black against his skin. He could feel the magic buzzing within it with renewed vigor, as if it had just been fed.
Alfie’s stomach clenched.
He’d used the magic. It had heard his desire to be free and listened. That must have been where the pain had come from, from using it. Magic usually bloomed from his fingertips, but this one had singed him from the inside out. What had he done? Was he now infected with the magic? He took stock of himself. His veins weren’t black and raised like the man before him. He didn’t feel different. He was in pain, but otherwise he felt the same.
The dragon warmed on his chest, as if it needed the command of another to live. As if begging to be mastered. He’d kept his magic black as tar just as it had been when he’d trapped the magic, so maybe the dragon had protected him because it saw Alfie as one of its own—as a being of dark magic.
Still, it made no sense. Magic of the same shade never harmed its own, and yet this magic had frozen the crazed man before him. The only rule this magic seemed to follow was that whoever mastered it could use it in any way, without question.
Alfie looked at the man in front of him. He was still frozen, but pieces of him were beginning to thaw. His eyes were no longer stuck in one position. He watched Alfie intently, his eyes narrowing. The prince didn’t have time to think on it any longer. He needed to kill this man and seal the magic within him, put an end to all the trouble he’d caused.
Alfie dashed forward and pulled a blade of ice from the air. He would need to stab the man’s heart to free the magic within him. Fear thrilling through him, Alfie made to plunge the ice dagger into his chest. As his arm came forward in an arc toward the man’s heart, Ignacio unfroze and snatched him by the wrist.
“Very nice try,” he tutted with the tone of an amused teacher. “But not quite.”
Without another word he swung Alfie by the arm, throwing him as easily as one would a stick for a dog to fetch. Alfie rolled to a stop on his back beside Finn. The throw had jarred whatever control he’d had on the dark magic sealed in the dragon. Finn stirred to life, the terror written in her body in full motion again as she clapped her hands more tightly around her ears, as if trying to wish the present away into the past.
Alfie rolled onto all fours and crawled in front of Finn, kneeling ahead of her.
“Leave her alone!” he shouted. Ignacio only cocked his head at Alfie in curiosity, as if wondering what foolish request he would make next.
“Just run,” Finn whispered behind him. “Go.”
Alfie looked at her over his shoulder. She held her bleeding heel in her hands. The hopelessness on her face held him where he stood. She’d stayed with him in the pub when he could hardly breathe from fear; he would not leave her to weather this on her own.
Ignacio gave an annoyed sound. “You’ve overstayed your welcome, muchacho.”
Ignacio raised his hand, his fingers splayed, before squeezing it into a fist, and Alfie mourned the fact that this would be the last thing he ever saw.
Ignacio watched the boy kneel before Finn. His eyes were screwed shut, his face tight with fear as he waited for the inevitable. He could see his daughter over the boy’s shoulder, her eyes clinging resolutely to his back as if she were willing him to stay alive.
He smiled.
She was still the same girl, still wishing her father would show mercy when what she truly needed was discipline. He would kill this boy and bring her into line once more.
Ignacio squeezed his hand into a fist, willing his strings to tear through the boy, flaying him from the inside out.
Nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing. Where had his power gone?
Ignacio . . . The dark magic spoke in his mind, its voice a braided tangle of whispers and hisses. We promised you the girl. We’ve allowed you a taste of her pain, but you shall have no more until you do as we asked, do as you promised.
“No, please just let me—”
No! The hisses came sharp and angry, sending a shock through his body. Ignacio stilled and waited for the blinding pain to pass. First we work to spread and take what is ours. Then the girl.
Ignacio gritted his teeth. “Fine.”
With a swipe of his hand the Brim filled with life once more. Finn and the boy looked around in shock as festive music sounded around them. Finn scuttled away like a wounded animal and Ignacio clutched the image tight in his mind to savor. “I’ll be back for you, Finn. You know how I love to find you.”
Ignacio stepped backward into the rushing crowds of the Brim, disappearing from sight.
20
The Prince and the Door
The black-eyed man had disappeared.
The Brim surged back to life, shoppers and merchants haggling once more. No one took notice of Alfie kneeling in the dirt when there was tequila to drink and songs to sing.
“He’s gone,” Alfie said, his voice hoarse. In the face of death, something had clotted his throat. When he stood, his body strained painfully beneath his weight, sore from the dark magic.
Behind him, Finn said nothing. She was too still, as if Ignacio had frozen her once more.
