Alexei made her heart ache. He was dead now, along with everyone else she had known and loved. Kind Marina with her warm laugh, who would smuggle Nadya probov—flat, but tasty, flour cakes—when no one was looking. Dour but talented storyteller Lev, who could spin fables and legends that always made Nadya fear to go to bed at night.
One evening, he told her a story about a Tranavian monster known as Kashyvhes who drank blood and controlled victims with its mind. While she was walking through the dark halls of the monastery to her chambers that night, Kostya had jumped out of a closet. She punched him so hard he had to go to Ionna, the healer, for a split lip.
Now they were gone, and the monastery was empty. Its golden relics gutted and icons defaced. The altar probably lay shattered, the statues of saints had likely lost their heads and their hands. All that beauty—holiness—desecrated for the sake of magic and blood.
But she couldn’t force the feelings and so she sat with an empty heart and a blank mind and waited to see if her gods would talk to her. This time she was alone.
Ask the gods to do the impossible. The arrogance, Nadya thought. She wasn’t convinced they could do it, but if Malachiasz was right, there was nowhere for her to go. Maybe she should take that as a sign and accept that circumstance was forcing her into this situation that could very well end in disaster.
She was walking back to the church when she spied Malachiasz slipping through the trees. Curious, she followed, pulling at her prayer beads. She had only taken a few steps when he stopped. Her hand immediately dropped to her voryen.
“Are you going to put one of your pretty blades into my heart, towy d?imyka?”
“I’d like to,” she said. “Why do you call me that?”
He turned to face her, one hand lifting to rest against the spell book strapped to his hip. “What am I supposed to call you?”
She still hadn’t told them her name. She didn’t know why it felt important to keep it to herself; why she felt like giving this boy her name would be giving him more than he deserved. Maybe she was just being irrational.
“Nadezhda Lapteva,” she said, then added, “Nadya.”
Malachiasz looked almost relieved, but Nadya was probably just imagining things. He nodded.
“Well then, Nadya, please, you are welcome to join me.”
Her eyes narrowed. “So you can take me back into the woods and murder me?”
“You were following me,” he pointed out.
Heat rushed to her face.
He smiled, then turned to go. “We’re not enemies, Nadya.”
“Not right now, you mean.”
He paused, glanced back at her, then nodded. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
Yet. Nadya heard it in his tone, even if he didn’t mean it—even if he never meant it. He was a Tranavian mage and they were enemies by default.
She followed him.
The trees were thick in this stretch of the mountains and even with their leafless, snow-covered boughs it was hard to see through them. All was quiet except for the crackle of ice underneath their feet. Nadya was trying to figure out just where they were going when Malachiasz held out a hand, stopping her. He pressed a finger to his lips.
They had stopped at a high point on an overhang where the mountainside cut off precariously. Malachiasz shifted to the edge, dropping down into the snow. Nadya hesitated, then moved beside him.
It took her a second to parse out what she was seeing below, and when she did she nearly shot back to her feet and fled.
Malachiasz clamped his hand down on her shoulder, pressing her down into the snow. She froze like a startled rabbit; the only defense mechanism she had left. His fingers tensed against her, a pressure that maybe was supposed to be reassuring. He pulled his hand away.
He had led her straight to the High Prince.
Malachiasz leaned close to Nadya and she tensed as he tipped his face down to hers, lips at her ear.
“My magic will be felt the moment I use it.” His voice was a low murmur. “They won’t feel yours.”
She cast him a sidelong glare and then yanked her glove off and thumbed at her necklace until she found Zlatek’s bead.
The god of silence loathed granting Nadya power; he’d once voiced they should revoke her magic completely. It was a shame his power was so damn useful because he was so crotchety that Nadya avoided dealing