Crooked Kingdom (The Six of Crows Duology #2) - Leigh Bardugo Page 0,113

his plan worked.

“I’ve never done this before,” said Kuwei.

Jesper winked at him. “That’s what makes it exciting.”

“Ready?” said Matthias.

He opened the packet. Jesper raised his hands, and with a light whump the powder rose in a cloud. It hung suspended in the air as if time had slowed. Jesper focused, sweat beading on his forehead, then shoved his hands forward. The cloud thinned and rolled over the heads of the Dime Lions, then caught in one of their torches in a burst of green.

The men surrounding the torch holder gasped.

“Kuwei ,” directed Matthias.

The Shu boy lifted his hands and the flame from the green torch crept along the handle, snaking up the arm of its bearer in a sinuous coil of fire. The man screamed, tossing the torch away, falling to the ground and rolling in an attempt to extinguish the flames.

“Keep going,” said Matthias, and Kuwei flexed his fingers, but the green flames went out.

“I’m sorry!” said Kuwei.

“Make another,” demanded Matthias. There was no time for cosseting.

Kuwei thrust his hands out again and one of the Dime Lions’ lanterns exploded, this time in a whorl of yellow flame. Kuwei shrank back as if he hadn’t intended to use so much force.

“Don’t lose your focus,” Matthias urged.

Kuwei curled his wrists and the flames of the lantern rose in a serpentine arc.

“Hey,” said Jesper. “Not bad.” He opened another packet of powder and tossed its contents into the air, then arced his arms forward, sending it to meet Kuwei’s flame. The twisting thread of fire turned a deep, shimmering crimson. “Strontium chloride,” the sharpshooter murmured. “My favorite.”

Kuwei flexed one of his fists and another stream of fire joined the flames of the lantern, then another, forming a thick-bodied snake that undulated over Black Veil, ready to strike.

“Ghosts!” one of the Dime Lions shouted.

“Don’t be daft,” replied another.

Matthias watched that red serpent coil and uncoil in trails of flame, feeling the old fear rise in him. He’d grown comfortable with Kuwei, and yet it had been Inferni fire that consumed his family’s village in a border skirmish. Somehow, he’d forgotten the power this boy held within him. It was a war , he reminded himself. And this is one too.

The Dime Lions were distracted, but it wouldn’t last long.

“Spread the fire to the trees,” Matthias said, and with a little grunt, Kuwei threw his arms wide. The green leaves fought the onslaught of devouring flame, then caught.

“They got a Grisha,” shouted Doughty. “Flank them!”

“To the shore!” said Matthias. “Now!” They sprinted past gravestones and broken stone Saints. “Kuwei, get ready. We need everything you have.”

They skittered down the bank, tumbling into the shallows. Matthias grabbed the violet bombs and smashed them open on the hulls of the wrecked boats. Slithering violet flame engulfed them. It had an eerie, almost creamy quality. Matthias had navigated to and from Black Veil enough times to know this was the shallowest part of the canal, the long stretch of sandbar where boats were most likely to run aground, but the opposite shore seemed impossibly far away.

“Kuwei,” he commanded, praying that the Shu boy was strong enough, hoping that he could manage the plan Matthias had outlined bare moments earlier, “make a path.”

Kuwei shoved his hands forward and the flames poured into the water, sending up a massive plume of steam. At first, all Matthias could see was a wall of billowing white. Then the steam parted slightly and he saw fish flopping in the mud, crabs skittering over the exposed bottom of the canal as violet flames licked at the water to either side.

“All the Saints and the donkeys they rode in on,” Jesper said on an awed breath. “Kuwei, you did it.”

Matthias turned back to the island and opened fire into the trees.

“Hurry!” he shouted, and they ran over a road that had not been there moments before, bolting for the other side of the canal, for the streets and alleys that might lend them cover. Unnatural , a voice clamored in his head. No , thought Matthias, miraculous .

“You do realize you just led your own little Grisha army?” said Jesper as they hauled themselves out of the mud and hurried through the shadowed streets toward Sweet Reef.

He had. An uncomfortable thought. Through Jesper and Kuwei, he had wielded Grisha power. And yet, Matthias did not feel tainted or somehow marked by it. He remembered what Nina had said about the construction of the Ice Court, that it must be the work of Grisha