He squeezed his eyes shut. He thought he had snuffed out that small sliver of goodness within him seven years ago. He’d sworn to himself that he would never be one of the weak again, that he would never give more than he took.
He drew in a deep breath. Opened his eyes. The room came back in crystal-clear view.
He had helped the witch this far. He had given. Now it was his time to take.
Ana had almost drowned twice in her life.
The first time was ten years ago, on the cusp of winter. The snow had painted the world a glittering sprawl of white, sprinkled with the ruby reds and emerald greens and sapphire blues of the Salskoff Winter Market. Ornaments winked silver and gold like small ice spirits as the Imperial family passed by on their annual city Parade to welcome the arrival of their Patron Deity. Tambourines jingled, music played, people whirled around outside in flurries of white gauze and silver sash.
The excitement had even diminished the headache that had kept Ana in bed for the past few days. She held Luka’s hand as they waited for their carriage to stop, for the walk through the near-fairy-tale town, heralded and beloved and showered with gifts by the citizens of their empire.
Yet as the doors opened and the smells of roast meats and spiced vegetables and baked fish rolled in, Ana felt a wave of nausea. There was something writhing beneath all the noise from the crowds, the colored ornaments and furs and jewels clasped around people’s throats, the scents and sights. It pounded at her head, throbbed at her temples.
She distinctly remembered the pot of beet soup, thick and bubbling and so vividly red.
And then that thrumming energy within her exploded, a sharp crimson that drenched every corner of her vision, rushing through her veins. The hot, pulsing beat of blood swept into her world, drowning out all else.
She only remembered the aftermath. The bodies in front of her carriage, twisted on the cobblestones; the red, blooming like poppy blossoms on a canvas of colorless snow.
Ana had killed eight people that day.
The Palace alchemist, a strange bald man with overly large eyes and a quiet demeanor, had diagnosed her that very evening. She remembered the cold glint of his silver Deys’krug as he raised a trembling hand to whisper in the Emperor’s ear.
An Affinite, he’d told Papa. A blood Affinite.
Papa had bowed his head, and Ana’s world had crumbled.
In a window across her room, she’d seen her reflection. Face still streaked with blood and tears from the market, her hair crusted with sweat and half-covering her eyes—her monstrous red eyes. Her arms had been heavy, the skin stretched taut over swollen, jagged veins.
That day, Ana had looked in the mirror and seen a monster.
She’d tried to run after that. Past the maids who screamed at her approach; past the guards who stepped aside, bewildered and at a loss for what to do. She hadn’t known where she was going; all she’d known was that she had to get away, away from the Palace, away from Mama and Papa and Luka and mamika Morganya, so that she couldn’t hurt them.
The Kateryanna Bridge had loomed out of the blur of her tears, statues of Deities watching over her like sentient guardians. The bridge was named after Mama, and Ana watched it every day from the windows of her chambers, roping over the icy Tiger’s Tail river that wound around the Palace.
It was a sign. It had to be.
Tears streaked Ana’s face as she lifted her gaze to the sky. I love you, Mama, she thought. Carry me somewhere safe.
Ana climbed over the stone handrail and hurled herself into the river.
The cold jarred her bones as soon as she hit the water, and the ruthless current pulled her under. Immediately, she realized that any hopes she had of being borne to distant lands by the river’s waters had been foolish. The water frothed around her, pummeling her in a way that aroused a different type of terror within her: uncontrollable and tumultuous. Instinctively, she opened her mouth to scream—but water rushed in, squeezing the air from her lungs.
Panic whitened her mind, and spots bloomed before her eyes even as she fought against the water.
She hadn’t wanted to die. But perhaps the Deities meant to claim her today after all.
Something gripped her across her midriff—something different from the pressure