: Chapter 13

When I first learned to fight, my early lessons were always about making a decision instantly and carrying it out. No hesitation. Taking any opportunity available. I spent hours in Worwick’s dusty arena learning footwork, memorizing all the different paths a blade could travel. Learning how to parry, how to dodge, how to attack. How to defend myself—and, ultimately, how to kill. I was young, and small for my age, but I was quick. Grey taught me how to use that. “When you’re afraid, thinking takes longer,” he said. “You have to teach your body to act without thought.”

Now I’m waiting at the edge of this arena, glad for my years of training, because my thoughts are spinning. I’ve had to sit through hours of mounted games and sword fights, and nervous energy has my hand twitching toward my weapons.

Journ put me up first, which I suspect was done as a favor to me. But it also means I haven’t yet seen the scraver, so I’m not sure what I’m up against. It’s been four years since I last saw one, when Iisak’s son had taken an arrow through his wing. When I tried to help Nakiis, his claws sliced right through the buckles on my bracer.

The crowd is impatient, feet stomping on the wooden floorboards. Metal bars are being erected and chained together to form a massive cage, the first part of this that’s given me pause.

“Does the scraver try to escape?” I say to the steward at my back.

“Nah,” he says, his voice bored. “That thing’s on a chain. It’s mostly the men who try to run.” He coughs and hitches his pants up as he nods at the bars. “Those keep it out of the crowd.”

My heart beats steady and hard as I process this information. “Oh.”

“Don’t grab the chain, though. It tore some poor sap’s hand off.” He swipes at his nose. “You ready?”

I nod, and he unchains a bar to let me in. Once I’m through, the metal clinks back into place and the crowd erupts with cheers. The first bit of fear pricks at my heart.

I turn to look at the steward. “Which way does the scraver—” I begin to say, but an earsplitting screech tears through the tourney, bringing an ice-cold blast of wind with it.

I cringe involuntarily, looking for the source. It’s been years, but I forgot they can sound like that. I forgot their magic that brings a chill to the air.

I see nothing, though. The cheers from the crowd redouble, mixing with the shrieks, until the sound is deafening. I move to the center of the arena and turn in a circle, looking for an opening, but the crowd seems to press in around the cage, until I can’t see a break in the faces.

Without warning, the shriek is closer. A chain rattles at my back. A dark shape rockets into the arena, and I register coal-black eyes, wings the color of night, and then nothing else because the scraver slams right into me.

I swear and hit the ground rolling. A claw slices through my upper arm, but I draw my sword as I roll to my feet. I sense more than see his second attack, so I spin a tight circle with my blade, barely nicking his forearms.

The scraver shrieks and retreats to the air, wings beating hard as it prepares to attack again. Blood is a bright-red streak against the darkness of his skin. The chain is attached to a manacle around his ankle, trailing all the way to the side of the arena.

I don’t know if it’s Nakiis. It’s been too long.

“I don’t want to fight you,” I say in Syssalah. The crowd is so loud, but I keep my voice low. I know he can hear me. “I just want—”

He dives for me, heedless of my sword, his claws outstretched, fangs bared.

I don’t want to hurt him. I swing my sword but duck under the movement, and he sails past. Claws drag against my armor anyway, tearing through the buckles at my shoulder. The crowd gasps as I stumble to a knee. Blood slips down my back, but stars flare in my vision as I call for the power in my ring. The injury closes just as the scraver tackles me again, and I crash into the dirt. My sword goes skittering away.

I roll quickly, before he can pin me. My sword is just out of reach.

But the chain is right there.

I grab hold as he takes to the air. The chain jerks taut, but he must be used to this tactic, because he changes course to round on me before I can blink. His shriek echoes through the arena, so loud it hurts. He’s too fast, too hostile.

It tore some poor sap’s hand off. Silver hell.

I don’t duck this time. I let go of the chain and leap for him.

Those claws slice through the straps on the left side of my breastplate and drive into the skin below. But my arms close on his rib cage, and I can feel his shock. His wings beat hard, but he can’t support my weight. We crash into the ground, but I don’t let go.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” I gasp. “I just—”

His fangs sink right into my jaw. The pain steals my vision, my thoughts, my grip.

This was perhaps a bad idea.

“We’ve reached three minutes!” the announcer calls, and the crowd cheers. “Can he go for five?”

There’s a good chance I’ll be dead in five. I throw a punch, and it dislodges the scraver. Skin and muscle tear, robbing me of breath. But it gives me the tiniest bit of leverage, and I’m able to flip him onto his back. I’m panting, blood dripping from my jaw, soaking into my shirt beneath the armor, but I brace my arm across his neck. He’s struggling, his claws digging for purchase, but now he’s scrabbling at my bracers. My vision is still spotty from blood loss, but I can feel the magic in my ring working. I just need to stay conscious long enough for it to knit my skin back together.

The scraver’s wings beat against the dirt floor as he struggles, but this close, I can see the scarring on the underside of one, where he was once taken down by an arrow.

“You are Nakiis,” I say in surprise, and for a fraction of a second, he stops struggling. His eyes fix on my jaw, which has stopped bleeding.

“I can help you escape,” I say in a rush. The crowd is roaring now. “I can—”

“No magesmith can help me,” he growls, and then his claws sink into my upper arm, digging deep, severing muscle and tendon. I cry out and jerk back—and it’s all he needs to wrench free.

I am quickly reconsidering my vow not to hurt him.

He’s in the air before I can blink, those chain links rattling. I scramble to get my sword before he can pounce on my arm.

But he doesn’t. He’s ten feet above me, clinging to ice-coated bars, his chest rising and falling rapidly. Blood drips from the small slices along his forearms. I’m breathing hard, too, and my armor is holding on by nothing more than a few strips of leather and a prayer to fate. I can taste my own blood.

“We’ve reached five minutes!” the announcer cries. “Will this man be the first to make it to ten?”

The crowd screams, but I don’t take my eyes off Nakiis.

“I used to spar with your father,” I say, and my voice is still low. “I’m not going to let you hit me again.”

A light sparks in his eyes, and he launches himself off the bars. He’s fast, but so am I. He dodges my blades, but he can’t get close enough to make another critical hit. Still, I earn a few slices across my arms—and so does he. The air has turned so cold that my breath fogs, and frost has formed along the ground. I leap the chain so many times it begins to feel like a second adversary. We begin a dance of advance and retreat, and my entire focus narrows to this moment, this battle.

Nakiis soars low, darting under my dagger arm. He takes a swipe at my legs, but I block him and spring out of his way.

The chain catches my ankle. I go down hard on my back.

He’s on me instantly, all but crouched on my chest. One foot pins my sword arm. Those clawed fingers close around my throat. Each individual point digs into the muscle. I hold my breath, but he doesn’t break the skin.

The magic in my ring won’t help if I’m dead before I can use it.

He leans close, until I can feel the chill of his breath against my face.

“I remember you now,” he says.

“Oh good.” I draw a ragged breath, then wince as his claws tighten. “I trust you’ve been well?”

“Foolish magesmith,” he says. “Enjoy your silver.”

I frown. “What?”

A bell rings, the crowd cheers, and chains rattle. His fingers scrape free of my throat as he’s dragged off me by the chain. Suddenly I’m lying in the dirt, and he’s being forced backward through a gap in the bars, toward a waiting cage.

My heart is pounding. “Stop!” I find my feet and sheathe my sword. “Stop!” But my voice is drowned out by the cheering crowd.

Journ appears beside me. He claps me hard on my shoulder, and I wince again. “That was incredible. I thought it was going to rip your head off.”

I rub at my throat, and my fingers come away with blood. “Me too.”

Journ claps me on the shoulder again. “Let’s go.”

“Go?” I still feel a bit stunned.

“To get your silver, boy! You’ve set a standard for the rest of them, I’ll say.” He gives me a firm shove in the opposite direction, but I can’t help glancing over my shoulder. I’ve lost sight of the scraver altogether.

There’s a man waiting at the gap in the gates, and the steward looks equally bored.

“What’s happening next?” I say to Journ. My thoughts are spinning.

“You didn’t think you were the only one, did you?” The bars clang closed behind us, and they’re chained shut.

The crowd roars, and Nakiis shrieks. Journ propels me forward, into the crowd, but at my back, the scraver’s second match begins.

I watch Nakiis fight nine more men. I should be buying ale and spreading gossip about what the queen intends, but instead, I sit on a wooden bench and lock my eyes on each match. The scraver is swift and brutal, and while some men last five minutes and call for the match to end, many others try for ten—and suffer for the effort. By the end of the night, Nakiis has a dozen bleeding stripes on his limbs, but the men have more. The dust underfoot has turned to mud in some spots where blood—and worse—has spilled.

When it’s all done, they lock him back in a cage and drag it out of sight.

I’ve been entertaining the thought of asking Journ to release Nakiis. But he doesn’t own the tourney, and I’m not even sure he’d do it.

What did Journ say? The scraver fights pull in a lot of silver. I heard the way the attendants talked about Nakiis, the way they dragged the cage out of the arena. He’s an asset, not an individual.

Journ wouldn’t turn him loose.

If this tourney is anything like Worwick’s, the next hour will be spent cleaning up spilled ale, washing tankards, oiling tack, and locking up the weapons. There’s no sense in me lingering now.

But if I’m going to free Nakiis, I’m going to have to come back prepared.

I return to the inn, but not to sleep. I need food, and while I’m eating, I buy scraps of leather off some of the men there, then use it to lace my armor closed in spots. Several buckles are completely missing, and there are gouges everywhere, many that go down into the steel. I’m close to the Syhl Shallow border, probably a full day’s ride from the Crystal Palace, but that’s still a lot of ground to cover.

Guilt pricks at me. Rhen’s return letter to Grey and Lia Mara is still wrapped in leather and strapped to my chest, untouched. It’s not the most secret letter I’ve ever carried, but it’s a document that would’ve been uncovered if I’d been killed. I wonder if Grey would have faced Nakiis in the arena too, or if he would have considered it an unnecessary risk.

It’s hours past midnight now, and the common room in the inn has emptied, leaving no one but me and the barkeep and a dwindling fire.

“Will you be needing anything else, my lord?” the barkeep calls, his voice low.

“No. Thank you.” I pause. “I don’t think I’ll be needing the room after all.” I leave a coin on the bar and go to fetch Mercy.

By the time I return to the tourney, it’s dark and silent, nighttime cold pressing down around us. The moon hangs high overhead, a narrow crescent that doesn’t provide much light. Mercy’s hooves clop on the frozen ground rhythmically, her breath streaming in two long clouds. I don’t expect guards, so I’m not surprised when I find none. Outside of the weapons, which are kept locked in the armory, there’s generally not much worth stealing from a tourney, especially not one this small. I tether Mercy out of sight and find a rear door. Even that is unlocked. I slip inside and creep through the darkness.

I’ve come through on the side where the stables are kept, and one of the horses offers a soft whicker. I stroke a hand across its muzzle and ease down the aisle, my feet silent on the straw-littered ground. I’m not sure where they’d keep the scraver here, so I let stars flare in my blood and my vision as I send seeking magic into the ground. The power tugs at me, drawing me down the aisle, easing past horse after horse.

The space is small, and the scraver isn’t far, tucked away at the opposite end of the stables under a low overhang. I don’t make a sound, but his eyes flick open as if he sensed the magic. He’s in a cage, which I expected, nowhere near big enough. His wings are tucked tight against his back, but they still spill between the bars. He uncurls slowly from the ground to sit up and face me. In the dark, he moves like a shadow.

“You’re more foolish than I thought,” he says, and a cold wind slithers through the stable to make me shiver.

“Probably.” I step closer to the cage, but his hands flex against the bars. Something in his focus tightens, shifts.

I stop and lift my hands. “I can break the lock.”

“You can keep your distance.” I see the edge of his fangs.

I frown. “You don’t want to be freed?”

“Freed.” He scoffs, those fangs fully bared now. “I’ve had many offers of freedom, boy. None were true.”

“The king freed you once. He healed your wing and let you go.”

“I remember the magesmiths and their dealings,” Nakiis says. “He will collect one day. I have no doubt.”

I shake my head. “He won’t.” I pause. “I would offer you freedom, too.”

“You will not trick me,” he growls.

“It’s not a trick.” I take a step closer. “I have no chain. No ropes. I’m not a magesmith. I’ll break the lock and you’ll be—”

He shrieks at me, and a cold blast of wind tears through the stables. I cringe. The horses pace nervously in their stalls.

“The king kept my father bound,” Nakiis snaps. “I saw it.”

“He wasn’t bound! Iisak was a friend—”

He shrieks at me again, and I shiver. His magic makes frost form along the knives in my bracers and the hilt of my sword. Ice crawls up the walls of the stables.

I glare at him. “You’d rather stay in a cage?”

“Their demands are few,” he growls. “I’m treated well. I cannot say the same of you or your magesmith king.”

“Your father once said that nothing in a cage is ever truly well.”

Nakiis says nothing to that.

I sigh. It’s the middle of the night, and I’ve got a long day of riding ahead of me.

“Fine,” I say to him. “Stay here if you want. But I’m going to break the lock, and then it can be your choice.”

I expect him to shriek at me again, but he goes very still.

I draw my dagger. His eyes widen.

I lift my hand to slam it against the steel—but then I hesitate. “My name is Tycho,” I tell him. “If you choose to leave, you are welcome to accompany me to the Crystal Palace in Syhl Shallow.”

He hisses like he’s caught me in a lie. “Scravers are unwelcome in Syhl Shallow.”

“Not anymore,” I say. “Lia Mara is queen. She would welcome Iisak’s son, as would King Grey.”

“Liar.”

“Fine. Suit yourself.” I slam the dagger against the lock with all my strength. Then a second time. The steel twists but doesn’t quite give. Once more will do it. I raise the dagger for a third strike, just when I hear a small voice behind me.

“What are you doing?”

Nakiis growls, and I whirl.

Bailey, the boy I saved from a beating earlier, stands by the edge of the stables. He’s shirtless and barefoot, with mussed-up hair and a cloak thrown haphazardly over his shoulders. His eyes are wide, and he’s frozen as if he’s unsure if he should run or scream.

At my back, the scraver shrieks again, and the bars of the cage make a loud clang as they give way. The door swings wide enough to slam into me, and then he’s free, tearing past me as if I’m going to make a move to stop him.

Bailey gasps and shivers as Nakiis soars through—and then the scraver is gone.

I’m breathless. So is the boy. He’s wide-eyed and staring at me. I watch as his gaze snaps from my face to the dagger in my hand, and he swallows.

“I—I didn’t see anything, m-my lord—”

“Good,” I say. The sack of coins I won earlier is heavy in the purse at my belt, and I tug it free, then sheathe the dagger. “Here.”

His eyes widen farther, but he takes the coins and clutches them to his chest, then hesitates. “He used to talk to me,” he whispers, his voice so low that I almost can’t make out the words. “No one believed me.” He pauses. “But you talked to him.”

“I did.”

He frowns. “I would’ve let him go. I couldn’t break the lock.”

“You can let him go now.” I offer half a smile. “Me as well.”

He nods quickly. “Yes, my lord.”

“Go back to sleep,” I say.

He scurries off, his bare feet silent as he slips into the stables. I don’t know if he’ll keep this secret, but it won’t matter. I’ll be gone in minutes, and it would be hard to prove that the King’s Courier had been liberating mythical creatures in the middle of the night.

I find my way through the stables back to Mercy. I listen for the scraver’s shrieks in the night sky, but I hear nothing. There’s no sign of him.

I sigh. “Come on, girl,” I say quietly, clucking to her with my tongue. “Let’s go home.”