Peloyin ruled the gods with a hand that was not benevolent.
—The Books of Innokentiy
It wasn’t an entirely useless venture, the library. Now Nadya had more names of more old gods to worry about: Rohzlav, Nyrokosha, Valyashreva, Morokosh, and Chyrnog. A delightful prospect, to know that even stopping one might mean there were merely more on the horizon. That they were considered the purest of the gods. The oldest. A few thrown out during the last divine war. Some buried under the earth, bound in chains, waiting to be set free. Some killed, but, as Nadya read, nothing divine stays dead for long.
They returned to the palace, finding Katya, who extricated herself from a pack of boyar when they stumbled upon her in a wide hall and promptly ferried them into her rooms. Her dogs were fast at her heels. She looked ill and had a piece of paper clutched in her hand that she thrust at Nadya.
Nadya took it, her heart falling as she read. It was a long and angry screed about her. Again, how Kalyazin could no longer look to their clerics to save them. That she was in bed with the Vultures—her face heated—and only ever a false cleric.
A mad girl hearing the voices of devils, not our gods. A girl, deluded and broken.
A screed to turn to the Church, the only thing that would save them. That the heretics were being fought back but would return in their murderous quest for Kalyazi blood.
“What is it?” Anna asked. Nadya shifted the paper slightly so Anna could read. She paled. “Nadya.”
“I know,” Nadya snapped.
“It has the Church’s seal on it,” Katya said flatly.
“I know. How did they find out about him?” Nadya asked.
Katya shrugged. “You were traveling openly through Kalyazin. Didn’t you stop at a monastery?”
Nadya felt the blood drain from her face. “And that’s it?”
Katya chewed on her lip. “Together with everything else, yes. I’ve been accosted by too many boyar, here from their territories because of what’s happening out there.”
The monster attacks, the strange things happening with religious iconography, it was all going to spiral steadily into chaos until the final arresting moment when Chyrnog struck.
Nadya blinked back tears. She could feel the dark thing from before pushing at her thoughts. Maybe the propaganda was right.
Just a girl who talks with monsters.
What dwelled here, beneath the city, that recognized her? What dwelled in the swamps?
“You didn’t know about these?” Parijahan asked Anna.
Anna shook her head vehemently. “I knew the Church had sent out edicts. And I—I knew there were whispers about the cleric, but—Nadya, please.”
Nadya sat down heavily. All her irrational fears had come horribly true.
“A few boyar brought me others. As well as my father’s favorite pet, a holy man named Dimitry.” Distaste colored her voice. “They’ve been circulating for a while now,” Katya said softly. “They want someone to blame.”
There was a knock at the door and Katya called for them to enter. A servant came in, handing Katya a slip of paper. A slow smile broke across her face as she read.
“Go find Viktor Artamonov. Tell him I need to speak to the girl with one eye, then send her to the eastern courtyard.”
Nadya perked up at that.
Katya clapped her hands together. “New crisis! We’ve got to hide a king before word gets out and I’ve got a real mess on my hands.” Abruptly she got up and left the room.
Silence stretched out, Nadya, Parijahan, and Anna staring at each other in shock.
“What?” Nadya said incredulously, her mind reeling. “Katya, what?” She ran after her.
Katya walked swiftly through the palace and into a wing that Nadya hadn’t seen yet. She would get lost if she didn’t keep up. Eventually they spilled out into a back courtyard inaccessible from the outside.
A small company of Kalyazi soldiers waited there. Among them Nadya recognized Milomir.
It was deeply weird, to be searching for him. After what he’d done, after everything. But nevertheless, she pressed past the others to where the king of Tranavia stood.
It had only been a few months, but the gashes on his face had healed to scars and were more plentiful, and he wore an eye patch. His brown hair was tied back, making him look more like Malachiasz than Nadya remembered. It was silly they hadn’t known they were brothers. The two had the same knife-sharp cheekbones and ice-pale eyes—though Serefin’s single eye was a dark pupilless blue now. He tensed when he saw her, hand reaching reflexively for a spell book he didn’t have.
Before she realized what she was doing, she slammed into him. He let out a startled breath before he laughed, returning the embrace.
“I didn’t know we were friends like this,” Serefin said.
She buried her face against the furs on his collar. She hadn’t either, frankly. But she couldn’t fault him for what had happened on that mountain. “You’re an idiot.”
“True.” She felt him kiss the side of her head.
“I didn’t realize we were friends like this,” Nadya said wryly.
“Nadya, I can’t stand you.” He was quiet before murmuring, “I’m sorry.”
Her arms tightened around his neck. Then she leaned back, taking his face between her hands. She ran her thumb down a scar the length of his face and touched the eye patch.
“It’s bad, huh?” he asked.
“What happened?” The scars on his face were uncomfortably spaced, like they were made with human fingernails.
“I got Chyrnog out.”
It hit her all at once that he wasn’t wearing the eye patch because of his notoriously bad vision. “Oh,” she whispered.
He shrugged. “It wasn’t doing much for me anyway.”
She glanced over her shoulder at Katya. “I have a good sense of who’s responsible for you being here.”
“The one and only. I’m hoping to make an escape attempt before her father knows. Do you think it will work?”
“I love the thought of the king of Tranavia bolting in the night to avoid an uncomfortable meeting.”
“That was the exact reason I left Tranavia, what are you talking about? I want to discuss terms and treaties and it will be awful.”
Something grasped Nadya’s insides. “Really?”
Serefin was eyeing the activity around them as the soldiers started to disperse. “Hm?”
“Serefin, a peace treaty?”
He hesitated. “If he’ll agree. I’m led to believe he won’t. And it could take … years for it to be finalized.”
“But you’re going to try?” She grabbed his hand fiercely.
He lifted his eyebrows at her. She didn’t drop his hand.
“I’m going to try.”
She threw her arms around him.
“All right, you’ve expended your quota. Enough with the hugs,” he said with a laugh.
“You like it. You like anyone who’ll remind you that you’re just Serefin.”
He went very still against her before hugging her back. Warm and tight and earnest.
“I still can’t stand you.”
“The feeling is mutual.”
He stepped back, finally meeting Katya’s gaze. “You,” he said.
“Me!” She grinned. She turned to Milomir. “How did you get into the city?”
“Covertly,” Milomir assured her. “I don’t think we were seen, but there are no guarantees.”
“No, we should assume someone saw, it’s safer that way. There’s no real way to keep this from getting out.”
“Serefin!”
Serefin was promptly bowled over by a short girl with a bad haircut.
“Blood and bone, your face!” Ostyia said, her arms around Serefin’s neck.
Serefin’s expression wearied briefly, but he grinned, hugging her. “I was so worried.”
“About me?” Ostyia asked.
“Shut up.”
She left him to throw herself at Kacper, also knocking him over. Nadya eyed a wiry boy with black hair and a twitchy look to him, still under guard.
“Who’s he?” she asked Milomir.
He shifted uncomfortably. “It’s hard to explain. Also,” he glanced at Serefin, “we had the brother, but lost him.”
“What?” Katya’s voice cracked hard over the single word.
Nadya’s vision tunneled and she wavered on her feet, dizzy. She’d known, but she’d convinced herself it wasn’t true.
“You weren’t supposed to tell her that!” Serefin complained.
Milomir scowled. Katya’s fist was clenched so hard her knuckles were white.
“I thought you killed him,” she ground out through her teeth.
“I did.”
One eyebrow arched.
Serefin almost seemed to smile. “He’s resilient. Runs in the family.”
It struck Nadya very suddenly, what had happened, what she had been missing. She closed her eyes. The conversation continued on around her. When she opened them, Serefin was watching.
“Chyrnog,” she said softly.
Katya let out a disbelieving huff. “That’s impossible.”
Serefin frowned and pointed at the slash of scar tissue around his neck.
Katya conceded the point with a sigh. They couldn’t really act like the gods weren’t willing to claim Tranavians.
“We need to figure out what to do with them,” Milomir said quietly to Katya.
“My father isn’t in the city, so we have some time.”
Serefin sighed, looking very put out. He glanced at Nadya after Katya pulled Milomir away to discuss the other prisoner.
“I was going to tell you,” he said softly.
“I knew,” she replied. “I thought I was imagining it but … I knew.”
“You sound unsure.”
“I am unsure.”
He nodded. “Explains your greeting, though. I was certain you were going to stab me.”
“Was … how is…” No, she couldn’t do this. There had to be an end, it had to be over.
Serefin eyed her, clearly debating his answer. “He’s not well, but he’s alive.”
That had to be enough. She couldn’t ask for more.
“How do you feel about it?” she asked.
Serefin looked thoughtful. Something about him had changed. She saw a king standing before her, the weariness of lifetimes on his shoulders. A conscious choice had been made to stop running.
“I’m relieved,” he said simply. “Chyrnog was in control when it happened, and the regret would have killed me.”
She tilted her head, curious. His gaze strayed to Katya and his expression shifted.
“We can talk later, best not discuss him around the tsarevna. I didn’t want her to know he was alive but hopefully her attention can be diverted. We have enough to worry about as it is.”
Nadya agreed. She met Anna’s gaze from where she stood across the courtyard looking dazed. Nadya let out a breath and turned to Serefin. One of his scars tugged his lips into a permanent sneer. It fit the picture she’d had of the bloodthirsty prince. It didn’t fit the boy she actually knew.
“You should be upset with me,” she said.
His hand strayed to his empty waist again. “I should, yes.”
“Are you?”
“Are you asking if I’m waiting to put a blade in your heart?”
“More or less.”
Serefin shrugged. “I should.”
“You should.”
“Was that your intent all along? To destroy Tranavia like this?”
“No.” She had meant to strike a blow, yes. If she had known what Marzenya was planning, would she have done it, still? She liked to think she wouldn’t have, if only because she knew the true ramifications of taking away blood magic. Their magic used in everyday life wasn’t harming anyone, and without it, they might not survive. It was no longer as simple as ending a war.
“Why should I believe you, when you’ve lied to me for as long as you have?”
“Why should I believe that you didn’t intend to kill your brother?”
Serefin grinned. “Now there’s a conundrum.”
“I don’t think we can trade atrocities and call it even,” Nadya said dubiously.
“No? Well, of course I’m mad at you. And now you have to work with me to stop this before we don’t have countries left to bicker with each other. Your punishment is dealing with me.”
Truly, that would be a trial. Nadya nodded slowly. “Another thing.”
Serefin lifted an eyebrow.
Nadya glanced over her shoulder. Anna was staring at Serefin, her face chalky and pale. Serefin followed Nadya’s gaze, his expression faltering. She didn’t expect him to recognize Anna from the day he attacked the monastery. She couldn’t remember the faces she had struck down in battle, as much as they probably deserved it.
“I grew up with her,” she said, her voice soft. “She was there, that day, she was with me in the tunnels.”
“Ah,” Serefin said tonelessly.
Nadya did not expect Serefin to step past her and approach Anna. The priestess froze, eyes widening as she readied to bolt.
She followed Serefin, watching as he inclined his head to Anna, a bow no king should make, and said something very soft that she couldn’t quite catch.
Anna’s expression cleared some. “That doesn’t fix anything,” she snapped.
“No,” Serefin said. “There’s no fixing anything that has happened on the battlefield. All we have is what we choose moving forward, and I am weary of war.”
Katya turned from where she was talking with Milomir, looking Serefin over appraisingly.
“Nothing I say will bring back the lives I’ve taken,” Serefin continued. “But I was dragged across this entire country by your cleric and your tsarevna and … whatever he is,” he said, waving at Milomir, who made an affronted noise, “and all I saw was a country as tired and broken as my own. As seeded with monsters, as ravaged. You don’t have to forgive me, I don’t expect that, but I wanted to extend all I have to give at this point.”
Nadya exchanged a glance with Katya, whose eyebrows were raised. She was clearly thinking the same thing. When had the drunkard princeling decided to become a king? Maybe when he realized, like the rest of them, that they were fighting a war that none of them believed in anymore.
Nadya had spent so long fighting for a cause that had given her nothing in the end. The choice she made on the mountaintop had been the wrong one, and she could only hope it could turn things toward some kind of healing in the future.
But that likely wasn’t meant to be.
It was early afternoon, yet the sky had begun to grow viciously dark around them. Nadya frowned. Serefin turned, meeting Kacper’s gaze. He looked just as bewildered.
“Serefin?” Nadya said idly as dark acrid clouds roiled above them, a slow build until it became clear they were going to blot out the sky.
“Hm?”
“What did you bring with you?”
“Well, that’s the thing. I don’t know anymore,” he replied. He took a metal disc out, turning it in his fingers. “Huh, not him, though he’s not as far away as I expected. This is something else.” Milomir made a strangled sound and Serefin held the disc close to his chest.
Nadya tried to pretend she didn’t know who he was talking about.
Katya swore loudly. “Vashny Koroshvik, I hate you.”
Serefin grinned at her. “I wish this was my fault!” He dropped his pack and pulled his spell book out, holding out his other hand to Nadya.
She frowned dubiously but handed him a voryen, ignoring Katya’s protests. Serefin sliced the back of his forearm and bled onto his open spell book.
Nothing happened.
“In case you were concerned,” he said.
Kacper rolled his eyes.
Serefin turned to the dark-haired boy. “Is this you?”
“Your brother took my ring,” he snapped, but the way he watched the sky gave Nadya pause.
“Oh, so he did. Can you survive another claw to the chest without it?”
The boy’s hand ghosted over his chest, his face paling.
“Then, Rusya—”
“Don’t call me that.”
“—I suggest you help us however you can.”
Thunder cracked ominously and with it something pierced directly down Nadya’s spine.
“Ah, damn,” she said tonelessly. “Serefin, if we’re friends now, could you do me a favor?”
“Depends on the favor,” Serefin replied. “Don’t know if we’re friends like that.”
“Fair. Well, I’m about to pass out. Don’t let me break my head on the cobblestones.”
“Oh, I can manage that.”