City of Spells (Into the Crooked Place #2) - Alexandra Christo Page 0,29
wasn’t taking on Uskhanya a city at a time, starting with their home before making his way across the realm.
He was doing it all, everywhere, right now.
LESS THAN ten minutes later,Tavia pushed Nolan onto the ground.
Around her, the two dozen buskers she had woken from their night’s sleep for backup smiled in that same slow and deadly way that Wesley had taught them.
The way only a Creijen could.
She didn’t wake Saxony or Karam. She didn’t want them to be here to see the side of her that she needed to show.
“Shall we kill him?” one busker asked.
“Nah,” said another. “Let’s just cut out his tongue so he can’t talk.”
Nolan tried to sit up a little more, but it looked like the dizziness from all the alcohol was getting to him. So instead he slumped back onto his elbows and glared like he didn’t fear death half as much as he feared losing.
“You,” he said to Tavia, still a little drunk. “This is your holier-than-thou alternative to the Kingpin?” He spat on the ground by her feet. “You dirty traitor.”
Tavia picked the dirt from her nails with her knife, unfazed. “This is a trial by your peers,” she said. “You might want to stop being so volatile. I could lose my temper.”
Nolan’s laugh was like a gunshot. “Like you scare me.”
Except, she needed to do just that if she was going to lead these buskers. Wesley had taught her well what it meant to be feared, and right now the buskers were looking to Tavia to stand in his shoes as a worthy replacement. She couldn’t risk not being feared by someone like Nolan, even if it meant she had to become someone worse.
Tavia took a step toward him. “Tell us what you know about Ashwood’s plans and maybe you’ll get out of this alive.”
“You think I know anything about the Kingpin?” Nolan asked. “That’s above my pay.”
Tavia knelt down and pressed her knife to his neck. She felt the buskers around her smile, heard one lick his lips in the anticipation of a kill. They all wanted revenge for their lives being uprooted and an enemy busker was the perfect avenue for their anger.
“Tell me what you know about the Loj elixir,” Tavia said. “How did it find its way onto the streets of Rishiya? Is it anywhere else beyond here and Creije?”
Nolan laughed out a shaking breath. “What’s wrong?” he asked.”Creije’s best busker afraid of a little magic? From what I’ve heard, that elixir is a one-way ticket to being on the right side of this war. It’s happiness. Ljoisi uf hemga, right? It’s a bloody suit of armor.”
Tavia’s heart screamed against her chest as her mother’s voice echoed in her ears.
Please, ciolo. You have to be strong.
The thought of the same elixir that had poisoned her muma’s mind and stolen her from the world being touted as happiness made her blood boil.
The elixir destroyed lives, long before it took minds.
Tavia pressed the tip of the knife harder against Nolan’s throat. “It strips you of your free will,” she said. “And it’s a one-way ticket to losing your sanity.”
Can’t you see them, ciolo? her mother’s memory begged. My ghosts, Tavia. Can’t you hear them screaming?
“I made a deal with your underboss,” Tavia said. “Casim promised to align with us. He told me that your comrades would be here in a few days. Was he lying? Has he been working with Ashwood this whole time?”
Nolan laughed again, and Tavia was beginning to think that it was the worst sound in the realms.
“Casim is a traitor,” Nolan said. “And he doesn’t see what’s going on right under his nose.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning that I’m not aligning myself with the losing team,” Nolan said. “You lot are going to burn. If not by the Kingpin’s hand, then you’ll get yours in the fire-gates.”
Tavia tried to hold her anger in, but it was rising to the surface quicker than she’d thought possible.”How many people in Rishiya have you sold the elixir to? Who gave it to you? Who else has it?”
She wasn’t about to let anyone else be driven to madness by mind magic, and if the Loj had gotten ahold of Rishiya, too, then they didn’t have time to spare. Tavia had seen what this sort of thing did to people. She had seen the first iterations of the Loj—the experiments, Ashwood had called them—disguised as a magic sickness, infecting countless people in the slums of Creije.