“This is necessary.” He was catching up to them now, his voice growing louder and more obnoxious by the second. The crunch of snow beneath his boots drew closer. “I’ll have to keep you both safe, especially if we run into Whitecloaks.”
Ana whirled around. His last sentence had set off a series of sparks in her head that ignited into fury. “Keep us safe?” she repeated, ignoring the way the compass arrow spun in her hands to readjust. “Listen, you arrogant man. May and I have survived this long by ourselves, and we don’t need you to keep us safe or whatever you think you need to do. This was a Trade, and I will hold you to getting your part of it done. No more, no less.”
She was breathing hard when she finished, and she realized she’d closed the distance between her and Quicktongue so that they were barely two steps apart. He’d stopped where he was, his face a mask frozen like the forest around them. His hazel eyes, however, watched her with the intent and cunning of a fox.
“All right,” he said softly, his breath unfurling in a small plume between them. “But let me ask you this: Have you ever been to Kyrov?”
Ana thought of all that she’d read of the trade town that thrived for its proximity to the Krazyast Triangle and its commerce of coveted blackstone. The truth was, she could recite an entire tome’s worth of facts about Kyrov…yet she had never seen it for herself.
“No,” she admitted sourly. “But I’ve studied it.”
Quicktongue’s face warped into a smile, and it was not a pleasant one. “The winners write history, love. Ever wondered why the topic of Affinite indenturement is so scarcely seen in a Cyrilian textbook?”
It felt like a slap to her face. She recalled the plush carpets of Salskoff Palace, the crackle of the fireplace and the smell of leather chairs and old books in Papa’s study. She and Luka had spent half their days sitting at his tall oak desk, listening to him read through Cyrilia’s histories with them in his low, steady voice.
Before he’d fallen sick, Papa had personally seen to her education. He hadn’t been able to love her Affinity…but he had loved her, in his own way.
She really believed he had.
“If you have a point, make it,” she found herself saying, though her heart wasn’t in the argument anymore.
“Kyrov’s a dangerous place. I’d normally caution any Affinite to stay away from it, but seeing as I’m being held to getting my part of the Trade done, it’s a risk I’m willing to take.” Quicktongue shrugged and plowed past her, snow flying in the wake of his steps. “Especially as I’m not an Affinite.”
He spoke as though there could be a large city in her own empire that was dangerous for an Affinite to cross into. Ana knew corruption existed in her empire, but it wasn’t as though Affinites were pulled off the streets.
The tip of the compass spun unsteadily as she turned to follow Quicktongue northeast, toward Kyrov.
Half a day’s journey left, by her calculations. Somehow the forest looked less peaceful, the sunlight cold and the pines’ shadows jarring as they stretched across the snow. It was only when May slipped a small hand in hers that Ana’s breathing steadied slightly.
A small ball of mud rose from the ground, hovering above May’s palm. With a flick of her fingers, it shot toward Quicktongue, hitting him squarely on his back.
“I know you like to hear yourself talk, arrogant man,” May said as they marched past him, “but speak again and I’ll aim for your face.” She paused and grinned viciously. “You’d look better, too.”
Ana’s first glimpse of Kyrov was a bundle of silver-white spires that rose above the snow-covered trees. After almost a day’s travel, the sun hung low in the west, painting the city in a sheen of dusky gold. When the red-brown bricks of the dacha cottages came into view, Ana thought of the gingerbread houses she used to make as a child every year in celebration of the arrival of the Deity of Winter.
Ana tugged at her hood as the dirt roads gradually turned to slate-gray cobblestones and the sounds of city life thrummed into existence. May kept close to her side, eyes wide and head turning from side to side. After they had fled from May’s employer, they’d kept to small villages and abandoned hunters’ cabins. The crowds and noise and