Crooked Kingdom (The Six of Crows Duology #2) - Leigh Bardugo Page 0,128

“What if the dust was … well, bones? People’s remains?”

Nina set down her plate. “That’s almost enough to make me lose my appetite.” She picked it up again. “Almost.”

“This is why you asked about parem changing a Grisha’s power,” said Kuwei to Matthias.

Nina looked at him. “Can it?”

“I don’t know. You took the drug only once. You survived the withdrawal. You are a rarity.”

“Lucky me.”

“Is it so bad?” Matthias asked.

Nina plucked a few crumbs from her lap, returning them to her plate. “To quote a certain big blond lump of muscle, it’s not natural.” Her voice had lost its cheery warmth. She just looked sad.

“Maybe it is,” said Matthias. “Aren’t the Corporalki known as the Order of the Living and the Dead?”

“This isn’t how Grisha power is supposed to work.”

“Nina,” Inej said gently. “Parem took you to the brink of death. Maybe you brought something back with you.”

“Well, it’s a pretty rotten souvenir.”

“Or perhaps Djel extinguished one light and lit another,” said Matthias.

Nina cast him a sidelong glance. “Did you get hit on the head?”

He reached out and took Nina’s hand. Wylan suddenly felt he was intruding on something private. “I am grateful you’re alive,” he said. “I am grateful you’re beside me. I am grateful that you’re eating .”

She rested her head on his shoulder. “You’re better than waffles, Matthias Helvar.”

A small smile curled the Fjerdan’s lips. “Let’s not say things we don’t mean, my love.”

There was a light tapping at the door. Immediately, they all reached for their weapons. Colm sat frozen in his chair.

Kaz gestured for him to stay where he was and moved silently toward the door. He peered through the peephole.

“It’s Specht,” he said. They all relaxed, and Kaz opened the door.

They watched in silence as Kaz and Specht exchanged harried whispers; then Specht nodded and disappeared back toward the lift.

“Is there access to the clock tower on this floor?” Kaz asked Colm.

“At the end of the hall,” said Colm. “I haven’t gone up. The stairs are steep.”

Without a word, Kaz was gone. They all stared at one another for a moment and then followed, filing past Colm, who watched them go with weary eyes.

As they walked down the hall, Wylan realized that the entire floor was dedicated to the luxury of the Ketterdam Suite. If he was going to die, he supposed it wouldn’t be the worst place to spend his last night.

One by one, they climbed a twisting iron staircase to the clock tower and pushed through a trapdoor. The room at the top was large and cold, taken up mostly by the gears of a huge clock. Its four faces looked out over Ketterdam and the gray dawn sky.

To the south, a plume of smoke rose from Black Veil Island. Looking northeast, Wylan could see the Geldcanal, boats from the fire brigade and the stadwatch surrounding the area near his father’s house. He remembered the shocked look on his father’s face when they’d landed in the middle of his dining room table. If Wylan hadn’t been so terrified, he might well have burst out laughing. It’s shame that eats men whole. If only they’d set the rest of the house on fire.

Far in the distance, the harbors were teeming with stadwatch boats and wagons. The city was pocked with stadwatch purple, as if it had caught a disease.

“Specht says they’ve closed the harbors and shut down the browboats,” said Kaz. “They’re sealing the city. No one will be able to get in or out.”

“Ketterdam won’t stand for that,” said Inej. “People will riot.”

“They won’t blame Van Eck.”

Wylan felt a little ill. “They’ll blame us.”

Jesper shook his head. “Even if they put every stadwatch grunt on the street, they don’t have the manpower to lock up the city and search for us.”

“Don’t they?” said Kaz. “Look again.”

Jesper walked to the west-facing window where Kaz was standing. “All the Saints and your Aunt Eva,” he said on a gust of breath.

“What is it?” asked Wylan as they peered through the glass.

A crowd was moving east from the Barrel across the Zelver district.

“Is it a mob?” asked Inej.

“More like a parade,” said Kaz.

“Why aren’t the stadwatch stopping them?” Wylan asked as the flood of people passed unhindered from bridge to bridge, through each barricade. “Why are they letting them through?”

“Probably because your father told them to,” Kaz said.

As the throng drew closer, Wylan heard singing, chanting, drums. It really did sound like a parade. They poured over Zelverbridge, streaming past the hotel as they made