by Sara Wolf
“You…” I look to Varia, my eyes working up her legs, her cloaked torso, to her firelit face at last. “You want to control them.”
Varia’s smile widens. “But whatever would I do with them, my cleverest Zera?”
The insult barely pierces through my disbelief. “You’re going to use them to force a standstill. An army of valkerax, poised between the humans and witches. No one would dare to fight.”
“No one would dare to fight,” she repeats softly after me. “Indeed.”
“You’re mad,” I blurt.
The princess’s eyes go cold, but her smile warms. “No, Zera. I’m simply realistic.”
“The valkerax nearly destroyed the world!” I throw my hands out. “They could break free someday and they’d raze it all over again! Even if you could keep control over this tree, over them, you’d be feared and reviled even more than witches, more than anyone—”
“Yorl.” Varia suddenly looks to him, breezing through my points like they don’t exist. “How soon can we send her in?”
“When the concoction is finished brewing.” Yorl squints into the darkness. “Which should be tomorrow morning.”
“I’m not doing this,” I snap. “I’m not helping you play with a power like this!”
“You will,” she says. That confidence again. I could rip it apart with my sheer anger, but I chew my lip and hold myself steady.
she holds us hostage like the last witch, the hunger whispers. I lift my chin.
“In no conceivable universe will I help you, Princess.”
I expect her to command me to help. But no words come out of her mouth, laced with the hunger or otherwise. With her non-firelit hand, she reaches into her cloak and pulls out something soft and pliable. It sags to one side in her wooden fingers. A bag—a small velvet sack, stitched with black letters; traitor.
Traitor. Just like Lucien called me.
It’s identical to the bag I saw Varia put Archduke Gavik’s heart in, though his read “leech.” She dangles it before me, her smile blazing hot and somehow ferocious on the edges.
“You will help me, Zera, because in return, I’m going to give you back the heart you’ve always wanted. The one you tried to kill and enthrall my brother for.”
My anger snuffs out as quickly as the bag in her hand moves, gently bumping into her palm in a steady rhythm. A heartbeat.
She slides the bag off, and there, in her fingers, rests a pink organ the size of a fist. That’s… Is that my heart? Just there, in her hands? The gap in my chest keens with an aching longing—the same one I felt each time I stared at my heart over Nightsinger’s fire.
She has it. Just as Varia took control of my reins, she’s standing right in front of me with my heart. No bars around it, no glass between it and me.
I can hear it beating. I can see every blue vein in it pulsing with my memories, my human life. The thing I came to Vetris for. The thing I suffered these three years and two long weeks for.
our heart, the hunger whimpers.
“My heart,” I whisper.
4
A Heart
Like a
Hunger
Before I can think, my hand darts out for it, but Varia’s command is instantaneous.
“Stand back.”
I go rigid, my body automatically making space between us. Yorl watches us with voraciously curious emerald eyes. My mouth still works, at least, even as my fingers are consumed with the maddening itch to snatch the heart from Varia’s palm.
“You’re lying,” I say, hard. I nearly killed her brother. There’s no way she would offer me my heart.
“I do many things, Zera,” Varia says to me, dully staring down at the bag. “I omit. I plan. But I don’t lie. If you teach the valkerax beyond that gate to Weep, I will return your heart and release you from my service.”
“You could just command me to teach it to Weep.” My words are lightning striking earth and making wildfire in its wake. “Why bother bribing me?”
“Because I can’t command you to teach it,” she lilts, tilting my heart and bringing her fire-touched finger closer to it, the arteries glowing brighter and hollower. A horrible heat blazes through my empty chest—like the fire is inside me—and I pull back, her command urging me on as the pain does. She nods lightly to Yorl, a command on her lips. “Tell him what dying feels like.”
My mouth suddenly bursts into movement. “Like nothing. Like a great, empty coldness. There’s a white behind your eyes, and then it’s like falling asleep, but all at once.”
Yorl’s gaze narrows slightly at me behind his glasses, his silver-armored tail swishing, but his expression never changes. Varia strokes my heart in her palm like a beloved creature, a pet, her featherlight touch emanating deep inside my chest.
“Now,” she commands. “Tell him what Weeping feels like.”
The hunger mirrors her voice, dark and imperative, and I can feel the magic moving through my unheart like an ocean current—racing for my throat. But unlike the earlier command where everything came out instantly, my body doesn’t obey. I expect my tongue to burst into movement and sound and explanation, but there’s…nothing. I move my jaw experimentally, waiting for words to pour forth. Absolute silence.
I could tell him if I wanted to. I could keep it to myself if I wanted to.
“See?” Varia stops petting my heart and looks up at me, the organ beating earnestly in the dimness. “Anything regarding Weeping is impossible to command. Or, trust me, I would’ve done exactly that the moment I led you down here. I don’t want to give you your heart—you don’t deserve it after what you did to my brother. I want to teach you exactly the consequences of hurting him. But I’m being magnanimous. I’m putting aside my own wants in order to stop this war.” She sighs. “But you…you don’t have to sacrifice anything for what you want. I’ll give you your heart. You’ll have your freedom. All you have to do is teach the valkerax first.”
“You could still be lying,” I insist, my eyes flickering over to my heart again. “Say I do teach the valkerax how to Weep. What’s stopping you from keeping me as your Heartless?”
“My honor as a d’Malvane?” she offers.
“Not good enough.” I deaden my gaze.
And then, in one swift motion, she’s beside me. She holds my shoulder and shoves her entire fist into my chest with no ceremony, no warning. Like an explosion from an epicenter, the pain radiates out from her fist and I tilt my head down—no blood, no flesh, no wound, only her whole fist, the skin there as black as midnight and embedded deep inside my ribs. Her dark eyes have grown darker from corner to corner, her lips reciting a wordless chant none of us can hear. She’s so close to me, I can see the beads of sweat dripping down her temple, her mouth moving faster as the pain inside me blooms.
The firelight on her other hand’s finger flickers with an abrupt wind, blowing out and engulfing us in darkness. Every muscle in my body goes limp, but her arm keeps me suspended in air, my entire frame hanging off her fist. My eyelids flutter rapidly, and suddenly I can see it—my life.
Mother’s soft, sweet face, her blond eyebrows knitting as she’s braiding my hair and laughing. Father’s large nose and larger smile, showing me how to tie a caravan knot. We traveled to Helkyris and spent a day rolling snowballs down a hill, the little orbs growing bigger and bigger and crashing into the trees below as we whooped with delight.
My birthday, the sparrows outside the caravan window as Mother brought a dish of sweetrounds covered in maple glaze to the table, the rich and sugary taste on my tongue.
Father and me in the driver’s seat, the horses moving at a lazy pace under the afternoon sun, the drakeflies buzzing over the nearby murky lake, and he put his wide-brimmed hat on my head and it was so big it fell over my eyes and all I could see was darkness—
Darkness as the pain recedes, as Varia lights he
r finger with fire again, her hand retreating from my chest and the memories slipping from my mind like desert sand. It’s no use; no matter how hard I try to hold on, they keep getting fainter. But for that moment—that one glorious moment—they were real. It was like I was there again, reliving it all at once. And that was only a second of my heart being inside me again.
If I could have the whole thing forever…
The urge to get my heart back gnawed at me in Nightsinger’s forest. But it was nothing like this. Back then, I didn’t remember anything of what my heart held. As the years passed, I got more and more numb to the idea of it—yes, I wanted my heart, but almost entirely for the freedom. I couldn’t remember what memories were inside or how dear they were to me.
But now they sing.
“No—no!” I grab Varia’s wrist, shrieking. “Put it back! Put it back!”
The princess wrenches out of my grip with a breathless laugh, sweat dripping down her temples and a cold gleam in her eyes as she relights her finger, the firelight dancing. “You’re right, Zera. There’s no reason for you to trust my word. But you will do this for me. You will teach this valkerax how to Weep, or you will never see your heart again.”
I pant, wildly searching for my heart in her palm. There—between her fingers! I can see the pinkness of it.
“You came to Vetris for your heart.” Varia breathes raggedly. “All Heartless want their hearts. But you’re not all Heartless, are you, Zera? In the clearing, I saw the way my brother looked at you. And I saw how you looked at him, too.”
She gently tosses my heart from one hand to the other, like a juggling ball. Like it means nothing to her. I lunge for it, but my body stops me before I can reach her—the command to stay away absolute.
“He will go to war to protect his people. He will be the target of every witch assassin in the kingdom.” Concern, genuine and fearful, creeps into her eyes. “But if I stop the war, if I find the Bone Tree and control all the valkerax, I could bring war in Cavanos to a standstill forever. He will be safe.”
Safe. Lucien could be safe—Fione and Malachite, too. Everyone in Cavanos will be safe; Crav and Peligli and Nightsinger and Y’shennria—all of them, safe from another devastating human-witch war like the Sunless War. A whine escapes my lips, bestial and pathetic and not of my own control. I can’t trust her. But what choice do I have? My heart is so close—it’s right there. The only thing between my humanity and me is the valkerax behind that gate. Not a lonely prince who must be seduced and deceived but a valkerax who must be taught.
I don’t have to hurt anyone. I just have to teach. It’s easier than anything Nightsinger ever asked of me. I’m not betraying or lying. I would be whole again; I could stop the war I promised to, without breaking anyone in the process.
Mother’s voice—it’s fading so quickly. Father’s smile—
“All right,” I spit. “I’ll do it.”
Varia’s whole demeanor changes in an instant. She straightens, all her haggardness and coldness disappearing. She puts my heart back in its bag, and I watch it go with a longing burn. She wipes her sweat on her sleeves, smooths her hair, and turns to Yorl.
“I’ll bring her to you tomorrow morning, then. Anything you need, I’ll provide you with. But as of now, we have a banquet to prepare for.” She brushes past him and looks at me over her shoulder. “Come.”
Without waiting for my response, she sweeps away, the firelight dimming upward as her boots ascend the spiral stairs to the surface. The command doesn’t force me to follow, but I do anyway, shuffling after the light.
“Make sure not to get eaten before then,” I call to Yorl.
“Make sure not to eat anyone before then,” he deadpans back. I scoff as Yorl and the gate disappear into total darkness, the valkerax’s breathing still echoing in my ears.
The irony doesn’t escape me. It rarely does—I chase irony down like an overzealous kitten hunting butterflies. Varia’s dangling in front of me a way to get my heart back, just like Nightsinger did. Is it the nature of witches to wield freedom like a bargaining chip?
Nightsinger struck the deal with me in the first place because I’d been asking to be released for so long. And because she wanted me to have some burning incentive to take Lucien’s heart, no doubt. She could’ve easily commanded me to obey Y’shennria, go with her, infiltrate the court, and take it. But she didn’t. She cares—cared—too much about me to do that.
In the carriage back to the palace, I ask, “Why choose me specifically for this? Are you that desperate?”
Varia moves her velvety dark eyes from the window and onto me. “I tried to find other Heartless. Helkyrisian Heartless. Avellish Heartless. Cavanos is the only place Weeping has ever made itself known—the constant wars and the Heartless exposed to battle evolved it naturally. As far as I’m aware, you’re the only one still alive who knows how to Weep. The others either died with their witches in the Sunless War or were shattered for their knowledge.”
So that’s why she looked at me so hungrily in the clearing. Her words gut me like a fish. I’m the only Heartless left who knows? Reginall—Y’shennria’s butler—definitely knows a bit about Weeping, but he’s a human now. Even if he understood it fully, it’d be difficult to teach without having first done it. So I’m…I’m really the only one.
alone. always alone.
“And then you found me in the clearing,” I mutter. “How were you going to locate the Bone Tree if you didn’t find a Weeping Heartless?”
Varia shifts, her silk skirts whispering as she folds one leg over the other. “Search high and low for it myself. What do you think I’ve been doing all these years in hiding—knitting baby clothes?”
“Then why haven’t you found it yet?”
The princess frowns, her full lips dour. Identical to Lucien’s frown, it hits my heart like unwelcome lightning. “The Bone Tree is…elusive,” Varia says. “The Old Vetrisians pumped it so full of magic, it’s developed some quirks of its own. It never stays long in one place.”
“It can move?” I marvel.
She nods. “It may look like a tree, but it’s more of a magical relic, really. That’s why I need a completely sane valkerax in control of itself. They’re the only ones who can tell me exactly where it is, when it is, with total accuracy.”
The carriage rumbles over the cobblestones of the familiar bridge that stretches across the common quarter to the noble quarter. I watch the river move like a lazy black-glass snake beneath the stone arch.
“It won’t just be Cavanos that fears you and your valkerax army,” I start. “It’ll be the whole world. Lucien. Fione. Your father. Everyone. You could use it to kill everyone.”
Varia speaks, staring placidly out the window. “You’ve read the Midnight Gifter, right?”
I’m quiet. Of course I have. A hugely popular book series, about a noble in the times of Old Vetris who steals from the rich and gives to the poor and dresses entirely in black. It’s the whole reason I thought Lucien, when I met him first as the leather-clad thief Whisper, was so amusing. The resemblance was clear.
“Book three,” Varia says. “Page one forty-five, line two. ‘That I could give the whole world of Arathess peace, I would. That there was some polymath contraption, some lever I could hit or button I could press that would give peace to all, know that I would die with my hand on it—’”
“‘And still in death my skeleton would go on, the bones moving of their own accord, and my flesh feeding its furnace,’” I finish. It’s not a common quote, but I remember it well because it struck me so deeply when I was younger. Varia turns to me and smiles faintly. It’s a smile different from the ones I’ve seen from her so far—something much gentler. Something that looks more human and less princess.
“I want my people to live in peace, Zera.”
It could be true. Her words, her tone, sound true. Still, I won�
��t let it go.
“The valkerax have had a thousand years to reproduce in the Dark Below,” I say. “We’re talking thousands of wyrms. Maybe hundreds of thousands. Can one witch really keep control over all the valkerax in Cavanos? By herself?”
“My flesh will feed its furnace,” Varia murmurs again, a fragment of the quote rearranged just so. The carriage jostles us in the uneasy silence.
“The banquet tonight is to celebrate my return.” Varia’s voice returns loud again. “Fione will be there. And Lucien. His bodyguard, too, I presume.”
My fear of the valkerax is buried by a sudden wave of anxiety. They all know now just how terrible I am. I can’t possibly face them.
i told you they would turn on us, the hunger taunts.
“I had your measurements taken while you were unconscious on the couch,” Varia says lightly. “And my personal tailor refitted several of my old garments for you. I think you’ll like them.”
A dress means only one thing in Vetris.
“As much as I enjoy a beautiful gown, I’m not going—”
“You don’t have to,” she interrupts me. “I’m not like the other witches, Zera. I’m not tyrannical. You’ve agreed to help me find the Bone Tree, so you can do precisely as you please. The guards have been informed, the court has been lied to—you’re simply a witness to the terrible murder of Gavik and his men. No one knows you’re Heartless except Father and me, and Lucien and his bodyguard. I’ll tell Fione tonight, though I’m sure she’s guessed as much by now, if Lucien hasn’t told her himself.”
It’s a small, cold relief. I couldn’t care less if the noble court knows what I am. They could throw stones and spears all they wanted, if only I could trade their ignorance for my friends’ knowledge.
were you ever really friends? The hunger cackles.
My unheart splits in half with pain. Were we ever really friends, if I lied to them about who I was the entire time? How can you be friends with someone who isn’t who they say they are?
