Six of Crows

by Leigh Bardugo

  They camped in a dry gully bordered by a tangle of shrubs, and took shifts dozing on the hard rock ground and keeping watch. Despite her fatigue, Inej hadn’t thought she would be able to sleep, but the next thing she knew, the sun was high above them, a bright pocket of glare in an overcast sky. It had to be past noon. Nina was beside her with a piece of one of the pepper wolf cookies she’d bought in Upper Djerholm. Inej saw that someone had made a low fire, and the sticky remnants of a block of melted paraffin were visible in its ashes.

  “Where are the others?” she asked, looking around the empty gully.

  “In the road. Kaz said we should let you sleep.”

  Inej rubbed her eyes. She supposed it was a concession to her injuries. Maybe she hadn’t hidden her exhaustion well at all. A sudden, crackling snap snap snap from the road had her on her feet with knives drawn in seconds.

  “Easy,” Nina said. “It’s just Wylan.”

  Jesper must have already raised the the signal. Inej took the cookie from Nina and hurried up to where Kaz and Matthias were watching Wylan fuss with something at the base of a thick red fir. Another series of pops sounded, and tiny puffs of white smoke burst from the tree’s trunk where it met the ground. For a moment it looked like nothing would happen, then the roots loosed themselves from the soil, curling and withering.

  “What was that?” asked Inej.

  “Salt concentrate,” said Nina.

  Inej cocked her head to the side. “Is Matthias … praying?”

  “Saying a blessing. Fjerdans do it whenever they cut down a tree.”

  “Every time?”

  “The blessings depend on how you intend to use the wood. One for houses, one for bridges.” She paused. “One for kindling.”

  It took less than a minute for them to pull the tree down so that its trunk lay blocking the road. With the roots intact, it looked as if it had simply been felled by disease.

  “Once the wagon stops, the tree will buy us about fifteen minutes and not much more,” Kaz said. “Move quickly. The prisoners should be hooded, but they’ll be able to hear, so not a word. We can’t afford to arouse suspicion. For all they know, this is a routine stop, and we want to keep it that way.”

  As Inej waited in the gully with the others, she considered all the things that might go wrong. The prisoners might not be wearing hoods. The guards might have one of their own in the back of the wagon. And if their crew succeeded? Well, then they’d be captives on their way into the Ice Court. That didn’t seem like a particularly promising outcome, either.

  Just when she started to wonder if Jesper had been wrong and sent up the flare too early, a prison wagon rumbled into view. It rolled past them, then came to a halt in front of the tree. She could hear the driver cursing to his companion.

  They both slid down from the box seat and made their way over to the tree. For a long minute, they stood there staring at it. The larger guard took off his hat and scratched his belly.

  “How lazy can they be?” Kaz muttered.

  Finally, they seemed to accept that the tree wasn’t going to move on its own. They strolled back to the wagon to retrieve a heavy coil of rope and unhitched one of the horses to help drag the tree out of the road.

  “Be ready,” Kaz said. He skittered over the top of the gully to the back end of the cart. He’d left his walking stick behind in the ditch, and whatever pain he might have been feeling, he disguised it well. He slipped his lockpicks from the lining of his coat and cradled the padlock gently, almost lovingly. In seconds, it sprang open, and he shoved the bolt to the side. He glanced around to where the men were tying ropes around the tree and then opened the door.

  Inej tensed, waiting for the signal. It didn’t come. Kaz was just standing there, staring into the wagon.

  “What’s happening?” whispered Wylan.

  “Maybe they aren’t hooded?” she replied. From the side, she couldn’t see. “I’ll go.” They couldn’t all bunch up around the back of the cart at once.

  Inej climbed out of the gully and came up behind Kaz. He was still standing there, perfectly still. She touched his shoulder briefly, and he flinched. Kaz Brekker flinched. What was going on? She couldn’t ask him and risk giving anything away to the listening prisoners. She peered into the wagon.

  The prisoners were all cuffed and had black sacks over their heads. But there were considerably more of them than in the wagon they’d seen at the checkpoint. Instead of being seated and chained to the benches at the sides, they were standing, pressed up against one another. Their feet and hands had been shackled, and they all wore iron collars that had been clipped to hooks in the wagon’s roof. Whenever one started to slump or lean too heavily, his or her breath would be cut off. It wasn’t pretty, but they were so tightly packed together it didn’t look like anyone could actually fall and choke.

  Inej gave Kaz another little nudge. His face was pale, almost waxen, but at least this time he didn’t just stand there. He pushed himself up into the wagon, his movements jerky and awkward, and began unlocking the prisoners’ collars.

  Inej signaled to Matthias, who leapt out of the gully to join them.

  “What’s happening?” one of the prisoners asked in Ravkan, his voice frightened.

  “Tig!” Matthias growled harshly in Fjerdan. A rustle went through the prisoners in the truck, as if they were all coming to attention. Without meaning to, Inej had straightened her spine, too. With that word, Matthias’ whole demeanor had changed, as if with a single sharp command he’d stepped back into the uniform of a drüskelle. Inej eyed him nervously. She’d started to feel comfortable with Matthias. An easy habit to fall into, but unwise.

  Kaz unlocked six sets of hand and foot shackles. One by one, Inej and Matthias unloaded the six prisoners closest to the door. There wasn’t time to consider height or build or even if they’d freed men or women. They led them to the edge of the gully, all while keeping an eye on the progress of the guards on the road. “What’s happening?” one of the captives dared to ask. But another quick “Tig!” from Matthias silenced him.

  Once they were out of view, Nina dropped their pulses, sending them into unconsciousness. Only then did Wylan remove the prisoners’ hoods: four men, one of them quite old, a middle-aged woman, and a Shu boy. It definitely wasn’t ideal, but hopefully the guards wouldn’t fret too much over accuracy. After all, how much trouble could a group of chained and shackled convicts be?

  Nina injected the prisoners with a sleeping solution to prolong their rest, and Wylan helped roll them into the gully behind the trees.

  “Are we just going to leave them there?” Wylan whispered to Inej as they hurried back to the wagon with the prisoners’ hoods in hand.

  Inej’s eyes were trained on the guards moving the tree, and she didn’t look at him when she said, “They’ll wake soon enough and make a run for it. They might even get to the coast and freedom. We’re doing them a favor.”

  “It doesn’t look like a favor. It looks like leaving them in a ditch.”

  “Quiet,” she ordered. This wasn’t the time or the place for moral quibbling. If Wylan didn’t know the difference between being in chains and out of them, he was about to find out.

  Inej cupped her hand to her mouth and gave a low, soft birdcall. They had four, maybe five minutes left before the guards cleared the road. Thankfully, the guards were raising quite a noise shouting encouragement at the horse and yelling to one another.

  Matthias locked Wylan into place first, then Nina. Inej saw him stiffen as Nina lifted her hair to accept the collar, revealing the white curve of her neck. As he fastened it around her throat, Nina met his eyes over her shoulder, and the look they exchanged could have melted miles of northern ice. Matthias moved away hurriedly. Inej almost laughed. So that was all it took to send the drüskelle scurrying and bring the boy back.

  Jesper was next, panting from his run back to the crossroads. He winked at her as she placed the sack over his head. They could hear the guards calling back and for
th.

  Inej locked Matthias’ collar and stood on tiptoe to place the hood on his head. But when she moved to pull Nina’s hood down, the Grisha fluttered her eyes rapidly, bobbing her head toward the wagon door. She still wanted to know how Kaz was going to lock them in.

  “Watch,” Inej mouthed.

  Kaz signaled to Inej, and she leapt down. She shut the wagon door, fastened the padlock, and slid the bolt home. A second later the opposite side of the door pushed open. Kaz had simply removed the hinges. It was a trick they’d used plenty of times when a lock was too complicated to pick quickly or they wanted to make a theft look like an inside job. Ideal for faking suicides, Kaz had once told her, and she’d never been sure if he was sincere.

  Inej took a last look at the road. The men had finished with the tree. The big one was dusting off his hands and slapping the horse’s back. The other was already approaching the front of the wagon. Inej gripped the lip of the door and swung herself up, squeezing inside. Immediately, Kaz started replacing the hinges. Inej shoved a hood over Nina’s surprised face, then took her place beside Jesper.

  But even in the dim light, she could tell Kaz was moving too slowly, his gloved fingers clumsier than she’d ever seen them. What was wrong with him? And why had he frozen at the wagon door? Something had made him hesitate, but what?

  She heard the ping of metal as Kaz dropped one of the screws. She peered at the wagon floor and kicked it back to him, trying to ignore the pounding of her heart.

  Kaz crouched down to replace the second hinge. He was breathing hard. She knew he was working in low light, by touch alone, in those cursed leather gloves he always insisted on wearing, but Inej didn’t think that was why he seemed so agitated. She heard footsteps on the right side of the wagon, one guard shouting to another. Come on, Kaz. She hadn’t taken the time to sweep away their footprints. What if the guard noticed? What if he pulled on the door, and it simply fell off its hinges, revealing Kaz Brekker, unhooded and unchained?

  She heard another ping. Kaz cursed once under his breath. Suddenly, the door shook as the guard gave the chained padlock a rattle. Kaz braced his hand against the hinge. The crack of light beneath the door widened. Inej sucked in a breath.

  The hinges held.

  Another shout in Fjerdan, more footsteps. Then the crack of the reins and the cart surged forward, rumbling over the road. Inej let herself exhale. Her throat had gone completely dry.

  Kaz took his place beside her. He shoved a hood over her head, and the musty smell filled her nostrils. He would put his own hood on next, then lock himself in. Easy enough, a cheap magician’s trick, and Kaz knew them all. His arm pressed along hers from shoulder to elbow as he locked the collar around his neck. Bodies shifted against Inej’s back and side, crowding up against her.

  For now they were safe. But despite the rattle of the wagon’s wheels, Inej could tell Kaz’s breathing had gotten worse—shallow, rapid pants like an animal caught in a trap. It was a sound she’d never thought to hear from him.

  It was because she was listening so closely that she knew the exact moment when Kaz Brekker, Dirtyhands, the bastard of the Barrel and the deadliest boy in Ketterdam, fainted.

  22

  KAZ

  The money Mister Hertzoon had left with Kaz and Jordie ran out the following week. Jordie tried to return his new coat, but the shop wouldn’t take it, and Kaz’s boots had clearly been worn.

  When they brought the loan agreement Mister Hertzoon had signed to the bank, they found that—for all its official-looking seals—it was worthless paper. No one knew of Mister Hertzoon or his business partner.

  They were evicted from the boarding house two days later, and had to find a bridge to sleep under, but were soon rousted by the stadwatch. After that, they wandered aimlessly until morning. Jordie insisted that they go back to the coffeehouse. They sat for a long time in the park across the street, but when night came, the watch began its rounds, and Kaz and Jordie headed south, into the streets of the lower Barrel, where the police did not bother to patrol.

  They slept beneath a set of stairs in an alley behind a tavern, tucked between a discarded stove and bags of kitchen refuse. No one bothered them that night, but the next they were discovered by a gang of boys who told them they were in Razorgull territory. They gave Jordie a thrashing and knocked Kaz into the canal, but not before they took his boots.

  Jordie fished Kaz out of the water and gave him his dry coat.

  “I’m hungry,” Kaz said.

  “I’m not,” Jordie replied. And for some reason that had struck Kaz as funny, and they’d both started laughing. Jordie wrapped his arms around Kaz and said, “The city is winning so far. But you’ll see who wins in the end.”

  The next morning, Jordie woke with a fever.

  In years to come people would call the outbreak of firepox that struck Ketterdam the Queen’s Lady Plague, after the ship believed to have brought the contagion to the city. It hit the crowded slums of the Barrel hardest. Bodies piled up in the streets, and sickboats moved through the canals, using long shovels and hooks to tumble corpses onto their platforms and haul them out to the Reaper’s Barge for burning.

  Kaz’s fever came on two days after Jordie’s. They had no money for medicine or a medik, so they huddled together in a pile of broken-up wooden boxes that they dubbed the Nest.

  No one came to roust them. The gangs had all been laid low by disease.

  When the fever reached full fire, Kaz dreamed he had returned to the farm, and when he knocked on the door, he saw Dream Jordie and Dream Kaz already there, sitting at the kitchen table. They peered at him through the window, but they wouldn’t let him in, so he wandered through the meadow, afraid to lie down in the tall grass.

  When he woke, he couldn’t smell hay or clover or apples, only coal smoke, and the spongy rotting vegetable stink of garbage. Jordie was lying next to him, staring at the sky. “Don’t leave me,” Kaz wanted to say, but he was too tired. So he laid his head on Jordie’s chest. It felt wrong already, cold and hard.

  He thought he was dreaming when the body men rolled him onto the sickboat. He felt himself falling, and then he was caught in a tangle of bodies. He tried to scream, but he was too weak. They were everywhere, legs and arms and stiff bellies, rotting limbs and blue-lipped faces covered in firepox sores. He floated in and out of consciousness, unsure of what was real or fever dream as the flatboat moved out to sea. When they tumbled him into the shallows of the Reaper’s Barge, he somehow found the strength to cry out.

  “I’m alive,” he shouted, as loud as he could. But he was so small, and the boat was already drifting back to harbor.

  Kaz tried to pull Jordie from the water. His body was covered in the little blooming sores that gave the firepox its name, his skin white and bruised. Kaz thought of the little wind-up dog, of drinking hot chocolate on the bridge. He thought that heaven would look like the kitchen of the house on Zelverstraat and smell like hutspot cooking in the Hertzoons’ oven. He still had Saskia’s red ribbon. He could give it back to her. They would make candies out of quince paste. Margit would play the piano, and he could fall asleep by the fire. He closed his eyes and waited to die.

  Kaz expected to wake in the next world, warm and safe, his belly full, Jordie beside him. Instead, he woke surrounded by corpses. He was lying in the shallows of the Reaper’s Barge, his clothes soaked through, skin wrinkled from the damp. Jordie’s body was beside him, barely recognizable, white and swollen with rot, floating on the surface like some kind of gruesome deep sea fish.

  Kaz’s vision had cleared, and the rash had receded. His fever had broken. He’d forgotten his hunger, but he was thirsty enough that he thought he would go mad.

  All that day and night, he waited in the pile of bodies, looking out at the harbor, hoping the flatboat would return. They had to come to set the fires that would burn the corpses, but when? Did the body men collect every day? Every other day? He was weak and dehydrated. He knew he wouldn’t last much longer.
The coast seemed so far away, and he knew he was too weak to swim the distance. He had survived the fever, but he might well die out here on the Reaper’s Barge. Did he care? There was nothing waiting for him in the city but more hunger and dark alleys and the damp of the canals. Even as he thought it, he knew it wasn’t true. Vengeance was waiting, vengeance for Jordie and maybe for himself, too. But he would have to go to meet it.

  When night came, and the tide changed direction, Kaz forced himself to lay hands on Jordie’s body. He was too frail to swim on his own, but with Jordie’s help, he could float. He held tight to his brother and kicked toward the lights of Ketterdam. Together, they drifted, Jordie’s distended body acting as a raft. Kaz kept kicking, trying not to think of his brother, of the taut, bloated feel of Jordie’s flesh beneath his hands; he tried not to think of anything but the rhythm of his legs moving through the sea. He’d heard there were sharks in these waters, but he knew they wouldn’t touch him. He was a monster now, too.

  He kept kicking, and when dawn came, he looked up to find himself at the east end of the Lid. The harbor was nearly deserted; the plague had caused shipping in and out of Kerch to grind to a halt.

  The last hundred yards were hard. The tide had turned once more, and it was working against him. But Kaz had hope now, hope and fury, twin flames burning inside him. They guided him to the dock and up the ladder. When he reached the top, he flopped down on his back on the wooden slats, then forced himself to roll over. Jordie’s body was caught in the current, bumping against the pylon below. His eyes were still open, and for a moment, Kaz thought his brother was staring back at him. But Jordie didn’t speak, he didn’t blink, his gaze didn’t shift as the tide dragged him free of the pylon and began to carry him out to sea.

  I should close his eyes, thought Kaz. But he knew if he climbed down the ladder and waded back into the sea, he would never find his way out again. He’d simply let himself drown, and that wasn’t possible anymore. He had to live. Someone had to pay.

  * * *