Crooked Kingdom (The Six of Crows Duology #2) - Leigh Bardugo Page 0,86

in the way she tilted her head, the way she sat, her spine still straight. As if she was at the piano.

“Do you like music?” he asked.

She nodded. “Yes, but there isn’t much here.”

He pulled the flute from his shirt. He’d traveled the whole day with it tucked up against his chest like some kind of secret, and it was still warm from his body. He’d planned to play it beside her grave like some kind of idiot. How Kaz would have laughed at him.

The first few notes were wobbly, but then he got control of his breath. He found the melody, a simple song, one of the first he’d learned. For a moment, she looked as if she was trying to remember where she might have heard it. Then she simply closed her eyes and listened.

When he was finished, she said, “Play something cheerful.”

So he played a Kaelish reel and then a Kerch sea shanty that was better suited to the tin whistle. He played every song that came into his head, but nothing mournful, nothing sad. She didn’t speak, though occasionally, he saw her tap her toe to the music, and her lips would move as if she knew the words.

At last he put the flute down in his lap. “How long have you been here?”

She stayed silent.

He leaned forward, seeking some answer in those vague hazel eyes. “What did they do to you?”

She laid a gentle hand on his cheek. Her palm felt cool and dry. “What did they do to you?” He couldn’t tell if it was a challenge or if she was just repeating his words.

Wylan felt the painful press of tears in his throat and fought to swallow them.

The door banged open. “Well now, did we have a good visit?” said the nurse as she entered.

Hastily, Wylan tucked the flute back into his shirt. “Indeed,” he said. “Everything seems to be in order.”

“You two seem awfully young for this type of work,” she said, dimpling at Jesper.

“I might say the same for you,” he replied. “But you know how it is, the new clerks get stuck with the most menial tasks.”

“Will you be back again soon?”

Jesper winked. “You never do know.” He nodded at Wylan. “We have a boat to catch.”

“Say goodbye, Miss Hendriks!” urged the nurse.

Marya’s lips moved, but this time Wylan was close enough to hear what she muttered. Van Eck.

On the way out of the hospital, the nurse kept up a steady stream of chatter with Jesper. Wylan walked behind them. His heart hurt. What had his father done to her? Was she truly mad? Or had he simply bribed the right people to say so? Had he drugged her? Jesper glanced back at Wylan once as the nurse gibbered on, his gray eyes concerned.

They were almost to the pale blue door when the nurse said, “Would you like to see her paintings?”

Wylan jerked to a halt. He nodded.

“I think that would be most interesting,” said Jesper.

The woman led them back the way they’d come and then opened the door to what appeared to be a closet.

Wylan felt his knees buckle and had to grab the wall for balance. The nurse didn’t notice—she was talking on and on. “The paints are expensive, of course, but they seem to bring her so much pleasure. This is just the latest batch. Every six months or so we have to put them on the rubbish heap. There just isn’t space for them.”

Wylan wanted to scream. The closet was crammed with paintings—landscapes, different views of the hospital grounds, a lake in sun and shadow, and there, repeated again and again, was the face of a little boy with ruddy curls and bright blue eyes.

He must have made some kind of noise, because the nurse turned to him. “Oh dear,” she said to Jesper, “your friend’s gone quite pale again. Perhaps a stimulant?”

“No, no,” said Jesper, putting his arm around Wylan. “But we really should be going. It’s been a most enlightening visit.”

Wylan didn’t register the walk down the drive bordered by yew hedges or retrieving their coats and caps from behind the tree stump near the main road.

They were halfway back to the dock before he could bring himself to speak. “She knows what he did to her. She knows he had no right to take her money, her life.” Van Eck , she’d said. She was not Marya Hendriks, she was Marya Van Eck, a wife and mother stripped of her name and her