Lukasz blinked and raised himself on his unwounded elbow.
“What the hell?” he muttered. He ran his hand over the bloodied shoulder, smearing it up his neck and flecking the ground with tiny red droplets.
Lukasz looked up at Ren.
“Did you do this?”
Ren stared back, eyes wide.
“No—” she stammered. “No, I did not touch you—”
“Amazing,” murmured Koszmar as he rubbed Lukasz’s blood between his fingertips.
Lukasz was still looking at Ren. He searched her lynx face for a moment, but she suspected his human eyes were unused to the expressions of animals’. A wave of heat swept over her. She was suddenly dizzy. It took Ren a moment to name the emotion. Relief.
The realization made her stagger backward, in line with Ry? and Czarn. Czarn nuzzled her cheek, his face wet and cold with blood.
“We have to get out of here,” he whispered.
“He’s right, Malutka,” echoed Ry?. “Let’s go home.”
At long last, the sky began to pale. Ren watched it turn from violet to purple over the treetops, and she could just make out the low shadow of the Mountains in the distance. If the nawia had been terrible, then Ren could only imagine what the Dragon might promise. She’d had her taste of fear. Her forest had surprised her. She’d needed these humans for the nawia. And now, looking at those low dark hills, she knew she needed them for more.
“No,” whispered Ren. “We need them.”
Rafa?
FIVE YEARS EARLIER
“‘NAWIA,’” READ FRANCISZEK, USING ONE finger to trace the letters as he went. There was no point; they all looked the same to Lukasz. “‘Or nav, in the singular, is a term often referring to lost and restless souls. Nawia encompass a vast array of apparitions, from those of demonic origin (e.g., witches, upiórs, strzygi) to pure souls who have died tragic or violent deaths . . .’”
Franciszek looked up.
“Raf!” he hissed. “Stop distracting him!”
“I’m not doing anything,” protested Rafa?, who had been using a slide rule to catapult spitballs onto unsuspecting library patrons below.
Lukasz snickered, and Franciszek whacked him.
“Ow!”
Ignoring him, Franciszek turned to Rafa?.
“My God, Rafa?.” He cast a nervous glance back at the librarian’s desk. “We’re guests here.”
They were spending the autumn in Kwiat, a small town in the southwest. The buildings were brick, the coffee was good, and the pipes were filled with dragons.
Well, not anymore.
“We’re guests of honor.” Rafa? grinned. “They can’t kick us out now.”
“They still could,” growled Franciszek.
Rafa? clutched his heart in mock disappointment, winking at Lukasz. Although, as much as he admired his eldest brother’s devil-may-care attitude, Lukasz tended to agree with Franciszek. The people of Kwiat may have been grateful, but if their library was anything to go by, then they were also colossal snobs.
Books lined every wall on the three-story Biblioteka Kwiatów, and there were even shelves built into the vaulted ceilings. These hard-to-reach books were retrieved by special white doves, who otherwise spent their time sitting on their assigned librarians’ shoulders and judging the patrons.
Among all this finery, the brothers looked out of place in their Faustian-fur vests and coarse brown trousers. The heavy broadswords on their belts had knocked against the stairs with every step up onto the balcony, and Lukasz had noticed the dirty looks the librarians were shooting in their direction.
“All right,” said Franciszek, apparently satisfied that Rafa? had been—for the time being—subdued. “Let’s try again.”
Lukasz groaned.
“‘A rare subset of nawia,’” read Franciszek, “‘are mavka. Of Ukrana origin, mavka have occasionally been sighted in eastern Welona, notably in forests of Kamieńa Kingdom. Mavka are of a particularly violent nature and prey on humans, luring their victims with a beautiful song and subsequently decapitating them.’”
Lukasz stared at the open book on the table. Franciszek had chosen a subject he hoped Lukasz would like: a book of monsters, complete with some delightfully gory illustrations. The current page showed a beautiful woman, dressed all in white with pure black eyes. In the long, spectral fingers of one hand, she held a man.
In the other hand, she held his head.
“‘Though typically classified under the larger umbrella of nawia, mavka are unique in the derivation of their souls. If a child dies without a baptism, that child’s soul remains trapped in a spiritual wasteland between life and death, bound to the earth. These souls have seven years to obtain a baptism; if they do not, then they are doomed to live forever as mavka. Their baptism may be performed by priests, monarchs, and sea captains and requires the use of a white cloth tossed