by Sarah Fine
Jaspar rubs his stomach and chuckles. “You’re even faster than you were.”
“Or you’re slower.” I swipe my hand over my sweaty face, glad that for once the heat is only caused by exertion—not magic. It’s nestled in the pit of my stomach, quiet for now as I focus on the slam of body against body, on dodging blows and landing strikes. Or perhaps it burned itself out by torturing me last night. A flash of the dream jolts me—Thyra, her pale skin clammy and reddened with heat, her hand outstretched—you can only blame yourself. . . .
“And clearly your words hit just as hard.” Jaspar draws his shoulders up as a gust of wind makes him sway. We’re up at the top of the tower again, and the Torden blows us frigid and forceful kisses.
“Or your skin has thinned.” I say it quickly, clinging to the animal simplicity of this time with him, eager to chase away the haunting tremors in my bones, even as they swell into my consciousness once again. Please, control yourself, she whispered as her hair caught fire, as her skin wept and split. I can’t, I screamed as she died right in front of me, just as Aksel did.
“Are you all right, Ansa?” Jaspar asks, and I snap back to the moment, blinking in the daylight.
“Fine,” I say. “Though I didn’t sleep well.”
He sighs. “I thought it might be hard for you, after you’d spoken with Thyra.”
“Why?”
“She twists what should be straight,” he says. “Including you.”
“Do I seem so easy to manipulate?”
“Of course not.” He turns away, leaning on the low stone wall and gazing out over the squalid city. “But I knew that seeing her again would move you.” He gives me a sidelong glance. “I just didn’t know the direction.”
I can’t admit to him that I don’t know, either. I’m still angry at her—for what she’s doing to herself, for what she’s done to us, for how she said she loved me and for how badly I want to believe her. “Neither of us budged,” I say lightly.
“But not because your feelings for her have changed.”
No, because we are opposites, and we crash and crash and always end up in the same place. She peels away my armor and pokes what’s underneath. Part of me hates it. And the rest of me doesn’t want it to stop. “Do my feelings matter, Jaspar? She has her strange and lofty ideas to keep her warm.” I let out a bitter laugh. “And I have fire magic.”
He touches the back of my hand with his fingertip. “Is it getting any easier to control? You’ve been spending hours each day with Kauko. Every time I come looking for you, it seems you’re with the Kupari wielders.”
My fist clenches. “I’m doing my best. And I think I’m getting a little better at it.” How I wish that were true.
“Good. Because we need to leave here, Ansa. We’ve been within these walls too long.”
From here, it is possible to see the gate through which we walked six weeks ago, and the road and forest beyond. But between us and all that open space is nothing but mud and ice and thousands of suffering people. “You were here for three seasons before we arrived. If it was so terrible, why stay? And why bring us into it, crowding everyone even more?”
“We arrived here at the end of winter—nearly a year ago. We were so glad of warmth and shelter that our desperation made us fiercer, I think. We were a terrifying sight, I have no doubt. And in the spring and summer and fall, we rode out to hunt and spar in the fields, slowly regaining health and strength. So we could at least leave the city. But now, with the snow drifting high, we’ve all been stuck in this stinking warren for nearly two months. I never imagined how it would feel. I doubt any of us did.”
“Then I suppose no one is content within these walls. And the Vasterutians will be glad to have their kingdom back when we’re done with it, I’m sure.” I wonder if that is why Halina made that suggestion to Nisse, to venture out to find the refugee wielders—perhaps she is eager to see us defeat Kupari and to be more quickly rid of us, especially since her hope that our rebel warriors would join a Vasterutian resistance force to take back the city has been dashed.
“Oh, we’re not giving Vasterut back,” Jaspar says. “My father will leave ten squads behind to hold the city, and the andeners will remain here. Many of them are with child, anyway. They shouldn’t be marching.”
The news sits like a stone inside me. Thyra had told me to ask about how the widowed andeners were being treated, and I recall that Nisse was going to bind them to his warriors, even though the men already had mates. “Have you heard word of Gry?”
“Cyrill’s andener? She was claimed by Kresten. I believe I heard she’s to be blessed with a child.”
My stomach turns. “She wasn’t even given a month to grieve her mate. She can’t have entered that bond willingly.”
Jaspar shrugs. “She was willing enough as the winter descended.”
Meaning she made the choice to save her children from the cold, and now she is to have another. “So a new generation of Krigere will grow up within a city wall?”
“They’ll grow up as rulers,” Jaspar says. “They will know their place on this earth.”
“Because the Vasterutians will be the mud beneath their feet,” I mutter, thinking of Halina’s sharp wariness, of the way Efren and Ligaya watched me that night out in the city. “Do you really think these people will stand for that?”
“They’ll have no choice. We’ll have many of their young men and women with us in Kupari, so hopefully they will realize that any rebellion would be met with the slaughter of their best and strongest.”
“So they’re not just to be attendants for the warriors. They are to be hostages.”
“It will save many lives.”
I can’t get Halina’s curly-haired little boy out of my head, or her words—Think I won’t fight? Think I won’t die? “Krigere ones, at least.”
He turns to me, his brow furrowed. “Thyra did twist you up. What did she tell you? Did she make you ashamed to be Krigere?”
“No.” But she and Sander made it impossible to convince myself that is all I am.
“I told my father it was a mistake to ask you to speak to her. If he’d talked to me first, I would have—”
“Why, Jaspar, do you think I’m weak?” A trickle of ice makes its way up my back, a warning.
He takes me by the shoulders, unaware or unheeding of the danger. “I could never think you were weak. But I do think she shames you. She makes you question who and what you are.”
“Should I never question who and what I am—or the things I do?” I ask.
“My heaven, you sound just like her! No wonder you can’t control your magic—your strength is sapped by all this doubt.”
I wrench myself out of his grasp. “I wish people would stop telling me how to fix myself,” I shout, my words accompanied by a thunderous burst of icy wind that knocks Jaspar back against the low wall. His arms reel as he tries to keep his balance. Horror lances through me, and I grab his hand as he nearly falls. We collapse to the ground.
“I’m sorry,” he says, panting, his hands fisted in the sides of my tunic. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how to help. And I want to help.” His hand wraps around the back of my neck, his fingers sliding into my hair. “My father reconsidered your attendant’s suggestion about sending out Vasterutian scouts to search for the Kupari priests and apprentices that fled into the Loputon.”
I go very still, tightening every muscle to keep my fear from forcing frost through every pore. “What?” I whisper. “He changed his mind?”
When I pull away, Jaspar looks worried, like he’s sorry he mentioned it. “No, I’m sure he hasn’t, not about you, anyway. He thinks you’re very important. It’s just . . . we’re running out of time. We got word late last night that the impostor queen of Kupari is definitely raising an army—including rebel wielders from their outer territories. We don’t know how powerful they are, but Father wants every advantage. And if we were to march into Kupari with hundreds of warriors and dozens of trained wield
ers in our force? The battle will be over before it even begins, especially if we act quickly. The elder thought it was a good plan.”
The elder. Thyra’s words about him slink into my head unbidden—what if he’s leading us into a trap? “Do you . . . do you ever wonder why he’s helping us?”
“He wants to oust the rebels from his temple, I imagine,” Jaspar says, pulling back to look down at me. “He seems eager to reclaim his seat of power. And we can help him with that.”
“But once we do, then what happens? Is the elder likely to want to share that power with us?”
Jaspar grins. “Wait—you think my father actually trusts that old man?”
“He certainly makes a good show of it.”
“Oh, Ansa.” He laughs. “Kauko is a means to an end. We need him right now, but that won’t always be true. And as soon as it’s not . . .”
I stare at him, my fragile hope shifting and cracking like ice over the marsh. “As soon as he’s not useful, Nisse will find a way to end him,” I say.
Jaspar pulls me to my feet. “Don’t tell me you feel pity for that elder.”
“No,” I say. “I don’t feel pity for him.” I smile, though it’s flickering, a candle flame in a cruel wind. “But I’m late for my lesson with him, so I’d better go.”
I practically dive for the hatch that opens to the stairs. “Thanks for sparring with me.”
I don’t hear if he replies—the door slams above me and I jump halfway down the stairs, turning my ankle as I land. I want to beat my head against the wall to rid myself of the look on Jaspar’s face just now, how much he resembled his father, and his complete lack of awareness of the truth he’d just revealed.
Kauko is a tool for Nisse, to be used and discarded.
What makes me think I’m any different?
* * *
After the evening meal, I tell Halina I’m tired and need to sleep. I don’t tell her I know Nisse has followed her advice and sent scouts into the Loputon Forest to find more magical allies for our invasion, because I’m afraid it would stir up my anger and desperation. Especially after the look Kauko gave me after I failed yet again to control the magic inside me this afternoon—like a child mourning a broken toy. The ice and fire simmer beneath my surface tonight, begging release. I feel like I did last night, when Thyra collapsed under the heat of my jagged, rage-driven fire and needed Kauko to revive her, and I spent a night roiling with nightmares that brought it back over and over, sharper and hotter and more devastating each time.
Her eyes, staring. Refusing to let me hide. Her words. Refusing to let me blame my crimes on a curse that never was. You can only blame yourself. . . .
The guilt makes me sick, and I don’t need the weight of Halina to make it worse.
I also don’t trust her, though. It was childish to ever have trusted her at all.
“Maybe you could go check with the tailor and find out when my new cloak and tunic will be ready,” I suggest.
I expect her to argue, but perhaps she senses my mood, if not my plan, because she immediately heads for the door. “Of course,” she says. “I know you’ll probably be glad to have some clothes that fit.”
I grin. “You have no idea.” I don’t either, really. I don’t actually care. I wave her out the door with a yawn, telling her I plan to sleep like a bear in the winter. But as soon as the noise of her footsteps fades, I’m peeking into the corridor and praying Sig hasn’t given up on me like Nisse and Kauko have.
My heart beats unsteadily as I jog up the corridor, through the maze of dim, dank stone, until I reach the hallway where Sig sleeps—both of us are kept here, away from sunlight and wood. Before I make it two steps toward his door, he loops his arm around my waist and hauls me into an empty chamber. I buck against him instinctively, and he clenches his teeth over a groan of pain. As I turn to him, he’s lifting the fabric of his shirt off his back—where only a day ago I saw oozing wounds from a whip. “Did Kauko do that to you?” I ask, gesturing at his back.
Sig’s eyes go half closed. He nods.
“You have power,” I say. “Fire.” His chin lifts when he hears the familiar word. He glances at an unlit torch in a bracket on the wall, and it bursts into flame. I step away as the flames flutter toward the ceiling. “So why would you allow him to whip you?”
I’m not sure he understands all my words, but he seems to hear the question, and guesses the meaning as I stare at the fire he brought to life with a mere thought. “Only fire, no ice,” he says quietly, looking away. “Kauko . . . both. Both ice and fire. Like you. Very strong. But . . . you are strongest.”
I snort. “If I am, it doesn’t matter. I can’t control it.”
“The Valtia is strong. The Valtia is magic.” His Kupari accent mangles the words, but he speaks slowly so I can understand. There’s something almost pleading in his voice, and it’s tinged with frustration. I can tell by the way he’s looking at me that there is so much more he wants to say. Does he want me to help him get away from Kauko?
“I’ll be stronger if you teach me. You said you could.”
“Teach.” He arches an eyebrow and points to the torch. “Make dark. With ice.”
“Are you insane?” He’s seen me fail at tasks like this before. “I’ll fill this entire room with a blizzard and make your blood turn to frost.” And even then, the torch will probably remain lit.
He laughs, and flames dance in his eyes. “Try, Valtia.”
I shove him. “Call me that again, and I’ll cut your tongue out.”
He’s still laughing, and he taps his fingers to his thumb, as if telling me he’s not impressed by my talk. Or maybe that he doesn’t understand it. And then he crooks his finger at the torch flame, and a tendril of fire slides from its center, snaking toward my face. “Make dark with ice,” he repeats.
Already regretting taking this risk just to fail yet again, I glare at the flame, wishing for a cold so pure that there is no escaping it. The ice grows along my bones, frosting my skin and making me shudder, and as the fire twinkles merrily, even Sig gets goose bumps along the pale skin of his throat. But then he winks, and the room grows hotter again. “More,” he whispers as the flame creeps closer, making me wince.
He’s using his fire to counterbalance my cold. Battling a swoop of frustration, I redouble my plea to the ice. “Come on,” I mutter. “Ouch!”
The flame shrinks back after licking my cheek, and Sig sighs. He says a word in Kupari as if he expects me to understand it. Terah, it sounds like. He says it over and over, and finally I step back from him, from the heat he’s radiating and the undulating torch flame. Both are making me sweat despite my ice. “I have no idea what you’re saying, you idiot!”
Sig makes an irritated noise in his throat, then bends over and swipes the dagger from my leg, the dull training blade I used in my sparring session with Jaspar this morning. I forgot to take it off in my desperation to get away from him. Sig waves it in the air and points to the blade. I don’t strip it from him because he’s clearly not threatening me with it—he’s tapping his fingers along the edge and saying that same word again.
“Blade?” I ask, touching the edge of the dagger. “Is that what you’re saying?”
He closes his fingers around the metal. “Blade?” he asks.
I nod, and so does he. “Blade magic,” he says. Before I can move, he presses the dagger into my hand, then steps behind me. He places one hand on my waist and closes the other around mine, lifting the weapon and pointing it at the torch.
I gaze down the length of my arm, down the edge of the blade, which is now aimed right at the center of the fire. If it was my enemy, all I’d have to do is lunge, and I’d stab it right in the heart. “Oh, heaven,” I whisper. This, I understand. This, I know how to do.
“Ice,” he murmurs, shaking my hand a little and making the tip of the blade tremble. “Blade.”
I concentrate on the ice inside me, drawing it up from the bottomless well where it hides. And this time,
instead of begging, I command it. I imagine it sliding along my arm and into the blade, and I gasp as I feel the hilt turn frigid in my grasp. Sig’s hand is hot and clammy over mine, but he smiles as my own skin turns cold, as a lattice of frost begins to grow along the blade, heading for the tip, which is still pointing at the flame. The dull glint of the blood groove that runs the length of the blade focuses my gaze, giving me a path to the heart of my target. Joy bubbles up inside me at the sight of the metal turning white and my ice magic moving toward the fire. This is it. He put a dagger in my hand and it was all I needed. I push the magic forward with all my might, intent on darkness and bitter cold, and delight in watching it eat up the length of the blade.
The weapon shatters with a sharp crack, followed by the spatter of metal splinters pinging off the walls and floor. Sig cries out and stumbles back with his hands over his face, and when I pull them away, his cheek is pocked with two dark shards, blood welling around them. I grimace and pull each of them out as he clenches his jaw and fists, obviously trying not to scream. They plink coldly when I drop them into an empty, shallow stone basin. Failure makes my eyes sting as Sig does the same for me, tugging a needle of metal from my shoulder.
He presses the sleeve of his tunic to the wounds on his face and sighs. “Tomorrow.”
“What? Did you see what just happened?” I gesture at the bloody splinter of metal he pulled from my skin. “It got so cold it shattered like pottery! I could have killed you.”
His brows draw together. “Tomorrow,” he says, even louder. “Like this, tomorrow.” He offers me the splinter. “Magic. Like this.” When he sees the confusion on my face, he rolls his eyes and points to one of the shards in the basin. His nostrils flare as he aims his fingertip at it, and I watch in awe as it turns red hot before melting—while the one only a few inches away from it remains gray and unaltered. He holds up the blood-covered needle of metal again and stabs it at the basin. “Like this.”
Magic so focused that its target can be the size of the point of a needle. “I can’t hit a target the size of that entire basin, let alone something smaller!” The only time I even came close, when knives of ice danced on my palms, when I hurled fire, was in that fight circle—only moments before the magic turned on me like a mad wolf. “I can’t control it!”
