The Shadow and Bone Trilogy
Shadow and Bone: The Collector’s Edition
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Shadow and Bone: The Collector’s Edition
The Shadow and Bone Trilogy
Shadow and Bone

Soldier. Summoner. Saint. Orphaned and expendable, Alina Starkov is a soldier who knows she may not survive her first trek across the Shadow Fold—a swath of unnatural darkness crawling with monsters. But when her regiment is attacked, Alina unleashes dormant magic not even she knew she possessed.
Now Alina will enter a lavish world of royalty and intrigue as she trains with the Grisha, her country’s magical military elite—and falls under the spell of their notorious leader, the Darkling. He believes Alina can summon a force capable of destroying the Shadow Fold and reuniting their war-ravaged country, but only if she can master her untamed gift.
As the threat to the kingdom mounts and Alina unlocks the secrets of her past, she will make a dangerous discovery that could threaten all she loves and the very future of a nation.
Welcome to Ravka . . . a world of science and superstition where nothing is what it seems.
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Shadow and Bone
Standing on the edge of a crowded road, I looked down onto the rolling fields and abandoned farms of the Tula Valley and got my first glimpse of the Shadow Fold. My regiment was two weeks’ march from the military encampment at Poliznaya and the autumn sun was warm overhead, but I shivered in my coat as I eyed the haze that lay like a dirty smudge on the horizon.
A heavy shoulder slammed into me from behind. I stumbled and nearly pitched face-first into the muddy road.
“Hey!” shouted the soldier. “Watch yourself!”
“Why don’t you watch your fat feet?” I snapped, and took some satisfaction from the surprise that came over his broad face. People, particularly big men carrying big rifles, don’t expect lip from a scrawny thing like me. They always look a bit dazed when they get it.
The soldier got over the novelty quickly and gave me a dirty look as he adjusted the pack on his back, then disappeared into the caravan of horses, men, carts, and wagons streaming over the crest of the hill and into the valley below.
I quickened my steps, trying to peer over the crowd. I’d lost sight of the yellow flag of the surveyors’ cart hours ago, and I knew I was far behind.
As I walked, I took in the green and gold smells of the autumn wood, the soft breeze at my back. We were on the Vy, the wide road that had once led all the way from Os Alta to the wealthy port cities on Ravka’s western coast. But that was before the Shadow Fold.
Somewhere in the crowd, someone was singing. Singing? What idiot is singing on his way into the Fold? I glanced again at that smudge on the horizon and had to suppress a shudder. I’d seen the Shadow Fold on many maps, a black slash that had severed Ravka from its only coastline and left it landlocked. Sometimes it was shown as a stain, sometimes as a bleak and shapeless cloud. And then there were the maps that just showed the Shadow Fold as a long, narrow lake and labeled it by its other name, “the Unsea,” a name intended to put soldiers and merchants at their ease and encourage crossings.
I snorted. That might fool some fat merchant, but it was little comfort to me.
I tore my attention from the sinister haze hovering in the distance and looked down onto the ruined farms of the Tula. The valley had once been home to some of Ravka’s richest estates. One day it was a place where farmers tended crops and sheep grazed in green fields. The next, a dark slash had appeared on the landscape, a swath of nearly impene- trable darkness that grew with every passing year and crawled with horrors. Where the farmers had gone, their herds, their crops, their homes and families, no one knew.
Stop it, I told myself firmly. You’re only making things worse. People have been crossing the Fold for years . . . usually with massive casualties, but all the same. I took a deep breath to steady myself.
“No fainting in the middle of the road,” said a voice close to my ear as a heavy arm landed across my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. I looked up to see Mal’s familiar face, a smile in his bright blue eyes as he fell into step beside me. “C’mon,” he said. “One foot in front of the other. You know how it’s done.”
“You’re interfering with my plan.”
“Oh really?”
“Yes. Faint, get trampled, grievous injuries all around.”
“That sounds like a brilliant plan.”
“Ah, but if I’m horribly maimed, I won’t be able to cross the Fold.”
Mal nodded slowly. “I see. I can shove you under a cart if that would help.”
“I’ll think about it,” I grumbled, but I felt my mood lifting all the same. Despite my best efforts, Mal still had that effect on me. And I wasn’t the only one. A pretty blond girl strolled by and waved, throwing Mal a flirtatious glance over her shoulder.
“Hey, Ruby,” he called. “See you later?”
Ruby giggled and scampered off into the crowd. Mal grinned broadly until he caught my eye roll.
“What? I thought you liked Ruby.”
“As it happens, we don’t have much to talk about,” I said drily. I actually had liked Ruby—at first. When Mal and I left the orphanage at Keramzin to train for our military service in Poliznaya, I’d been nervous about meet- ing new people. But lots of girls had been excited to befriend me, and Ruby had been among the most eager. Those friendships lasted as long as it took me to figure out that their only interest in me lay in my proximity to Mal.
Now I watched him stretch his arms expansively and turn his face up to the autumn sky, looking perfectly content. There was even, I noted with some disgust, a little bounce in his step.
“What is wrong with you?” I whispered furiously. “Nothing,” he said, surprised. “I feel great.”
“But how can you be so . . . so jaunty?”
“Jaunty? I’ve never been jaunty. I hope never to be jaunty.”
“Well, then what’s all this?” I asked, waving a hand at him. “You look like you’re on your way to a really good dinner instead of possible death and dismemberment.”
Mal laughed. “You worry too much. The King’s sent a whole group of Grisha pyros to cover the skiffs, and even a few of those creepy Heartrenders. We have our rifles,” he said, patting the one on his back. “We’ll be fine.”
“A rifle won’t make much difference if there’s a bad attack.”
Mal gave me a bemused glance. “What’s with you lately? You’re even grumpier than usual. And you look terrible.”
“Thanks,” I groused. “I haven’t been sleeping well.”
“What else is new?”
He was right, of course. I’d never slept well. But it had been even worse over the last few days. Saints knew I had plenty of good reasons to dread going into the Fold, reasons shared by every member of our regiment who had been unlucky enough to be chosen for the crossing. But there was something else, a deeper feeling of unease that I couldn’t quite name.
I glanced at Mal. There had been a time when I could have told him anything. “I just . . . have this feeling.”
“Stop worrying so much. Maybe they’ll put Mikhael on the skiff. The volcra will take one look at that big juicy belly of his and leave us alone.”
Unbidden, a memory came to me: Mal and I, sitting side by side in a chair in the Duke’s library, flipping through the pages of a large leather-bound book. We’d happened on an illustration of a volcra: long, filthy claws; leathery wings; and rows of razor-sharp teeth for feasting on human flesh. They were blind from generations spent living and hunting in the Fold, but legend had it they could smell human blood from miles away. I’d pointed to the page and asked, “What is it holding?”
I could still hear Mal’s whisper in my ear. “I think—I think it’s a foot.” We’d slammed the book shut and run squealing out into the safety of the sunlight. . . .
Without realizing it, I’d stopped walking, frozen in place, unable to shake the memory from my mind. When Mal realized I wasn’t with him, he gave a great beleaguered sigh and marched back to me. He rested his hands on my shoulders and gave me a little shake.
“I was kidding. No one’s going to eat Mikhael.”
“I know,” I said, staring down at my boots. “You’re hilarious.”
“Alina, come on. We’ll be fine.”
“You can’t know that.”
“Look at me.” I willed myself to raise my eyes to his. “I know you’re scared. I am, too. But we’re going to do this, and we’re going to be fine. We always are. Okay?” He smiled, and my heart gave a very loud thud in my chest.
I rubbed my thumb over the scar that ran across the palm of my right hand and took a shaky breath. “Okay,” I said grudgingly, and I actually felt myself smiling back.
“Madam’s spirits have been restored!” Mal shouted. “The sun can once more shine!”
“Oh will you shut up?”
I turned to give him a punch, but before I could, he’d grabbed hold of me and lifted me off my feet. A clatter of hooves and shouts split the air. Mal yanked me to the side of the road just as a huge black coach roared past, scattering people before it as they ran to avoid the pounding hooves of four black horses. Beside the whip-wielding driver perched two soldiers in charcoal coats.
The Darkling. There was no mistaking his black coach or the uniform of his personal guard.
Another coach, this one lacquered red, rumbled past us at a more leisurely pace.
I looked up at Mal, my heart racing from the close call. “Thanks,” I whispered. Mal suddenly seemed to realize that he had his arms around me. He let go and hastily stepped back. I brushed the dust from my coat, hoping he wouldn’t notice the flush on my cheeks.
A third coach rolled by, lacquered in blue, and a girl leaned out the window. She had curling black hair and wore a hat of silver fox. She scanned the watching crowd and, predictably, her eyes lingered on Mal.
You were just mooning over him, I chided myself. Why shouldn’t some gorgeous Grisha do the same?
Her lips curled into a small smile as she held Mal’s gaze, watching him over her shoulder until the coach was out of sight. Mal goggled dumbly after her, his mouth slightly open. “Close your mouth before something flies in,” I snapped.
Mal blinked, still looking dazed.
“Did you see that?” a voice bellowed. I turned to see Mikhael loping toward us, wearing an almost comical expression of awe. Mikhael was a huge redhead with a wide face and an even wider neck. Behind him, Dubrov, reedy and dark, hurried to catch up. They were both trackers in Mal’s unit and never far from his side.
“Of course I saw it,” Mal said, his dopey expression evaporating into a cocky grin. I rolled my eyes.
“She looked right at you!” shouted Mikhael, clapping Mal on the back.
Mal gave a casual shrug, but his smile widened. “So she did,” he said smugly.
Dubrov shifted nervously. “They say Grisha girls can put spells on you.”
I snorted.
Mikhael looked at me as if he hadn’t even known I was there. “Hey, Sticks,” he said, and gave me a little jab on the arm. I scowled at the nickname, but he had already turned back to Mal. “You know she’ll be staying at camp,” he said with a leer.
“I hear the Grisha tent’s as big as a cathedral,” added Dubrov.
“Lots of nice shadowy nooks,” said Mikhael, and actually waggled his brows.
Mal whooped. Without sparing me another glance, the three of them strode off, shouting and shoving one another. “Great seeing you guys,” I muttered under my breath. I readjusted the strap of the satchel slung across my shoulders and started back down the road, joining the last few stragglers down the hill and into Kribirsk. I didn’t bother to hurry. I’d probably get yelled at when I finally made it to the Documents Tent, but there was nothing I could do about
it now.
I rubbed my arm where Mikhael had punched me. Sticks. I hated that name. You didn’t call me Sticks when you were drunk on kvas and trying to paw me at the spring bonfire, you miserable oaf, I thought spitefully.
Kribirsk wasn’t much to look at. According to the Senior Cartographer, it had been a sleepy market town in the days before the Shadow Fold, little more than a dusty main square and an inn for weary travelers on the Vy. But now it had become a kind of ramshackle port city, growing up around a permanent military encampment and the dry-docks where the sandskiffs waited to take passengers through the darkness to West Ravka. I passed taverns and pubs and what I was pretty sure were brothels meant to cater to the troops of the King’s Army. There were shops selling rifles and crossbows, lamps and torches, all necessary equip- ment for a trek across the Fold. The little church with its
whitewashed walls and gleaming onion domes was in surprisingly good repair. Or maybe not so surprising, I considered. Anyone contemplating a trip across the Shadow Fold would be smart to stop and pray.
I found my way to where the surveyors were billeted, deposited my pack on a cot, and hurried over to the Documents Tent. To my relief, the Senior Cartographer was nowhere in sight, and I was able to slip inside unseen.
Entering the white canvas tent, I felt myself relax for the first time since I’d caught sight of the Fold. The Documents Tent was essentially the same in every camp I’d seen, full of bright light and rows of drafting tables where artists and surveyors bent to their work. After the noise and jostle of the journey, there was something soothing about the crackle of paper, the smell of ink, and the soft scratching of nibs and brushes.
I pulled my sketchbook from my coat pocket and slid onto a workbench beside Alexei, who turned to me and whispered irritably, “Where have you been?”
“Nearly getting trampled by the Darkling’s coach,” I replied, grabbing a clean piece of paper and flipping through my sketches to try to find a suitable one to copy. Alexei and I were both junior cartographers’ assistants and, as part of our training, we had to submit two finished sketches or renderings at the end of every day.
Alexei drew in a sharp breath. “Really? Did you actually see him?”
“Actually, I was too busy trying not to die.”
“There are worse ways to go.” He caught sight of the sketch of a rocky valley I was about to start copying. “Ugh. Not that one.” He flipped through my sketchbook to an elevation of a mountain ridge and tapped it with his finger. “There.” I barely had time to put pen to paper before the Senior Cartographer entered the tent and came swooping down
the aisle, observing our work as he passed.
“I hope that’s the second sketch you’re starting, Alina Starkov.”
“Yes,” I lied. “Yes, it is.”
As soon as the Cartographer had passed on, Alexei whispered, “Tell me about the coach.”
“I have to finish my sketches.”
“Here,” he said in exasperation, sliding one of his sketches over to me.
“He’ll know it’s your work.”
“It’s not that good. You should be able to pass it off as yours.”
“Now there’s the Alexei I know and tolerate,” I grumbled, but I didn’t give back the sketch. Alexei was one of the most talented assistants and he knew it.
Alexei extracted every last detail from me about the three Grisha coaches. I was grateful for the sketch, so I did my best to satisfy his curiosity as I finished up my elevation of the mountain ridge and worked in my thumb measurements of some of the highest peaks.
By the time we were finished, dusk was falling. We handed in our work and walked to the mess tent, where we stood in line for muddy stew ladled out by a sweaty cook and found seats with some of the other surveyors.
I passed the meal in silence, listening to Alexei and the others exchange camp gossip and jittery talk about tomorrow’s crossing. Alexei insisted that I retell the story of the Grisha coaches, and it was met by the usual mix of fascination and fear that greeted any mention of the Darkling.
“He’s not natural,” said Eva, another assistant; she had pretty green eyes that did little to distract from her piglike nose. “None of them are.”
Alexei sniffed. “Please spare us your superstition, Eva.”
“It was a Darkling who made the Shadow Fold to begin with.”
“That was hundreds of years ago!” protested Alexei. “And that Darkling was completely mad.”
“This one is just as bad.”
“Peasant,” Alexei said, and dismissed her with a wave. Eva gave him an affronted look and deliberately turned away from him to talk to her friends. I stayed quiet. I was more a peasant than Eva, despite her superstitions. It was only by the Duke’s charity that I could read and write, but by unspoken agreement, Mal and I avoided mentioning Keramzin.
As if on cue, a raucous burst of laughter pulled me from my thoughts. I looked over my shoulder. Mal was holding court at a rowdy table of trackers.
Alexei followed my glance. “How did you two become friends anyway?”
“We grew up together.”
“You don’t seem to have much in common.”
I shrugged. “I guess it’s easy to have a lot in common when you’re kids.” Like loneliness, and memories of par- ents we were meant to forget, and the pleasure of escaping chores to play tag in our meadow.
Alexei looked so skeptical that I had to laugh. “He wasn’t always the Amazing Mal, expert tracker and seducer of Grisha girls.”
Alexei’s jaw dropped. “He seduced a Grisha girl?” “No, but I’m sure he will,” I muttered.
“So what was he like?”
“He was short and pudgy and afraid of baths,” I said with some satisfaction.
Alexei glanced at Mal. “I guess things change.”
I rubbed my thumb over the scar in my palm. “I guess they do.”
We cleared our plates and drifted out of the mess tent into the cool night. On the way back to the barracks, we took a detour so that we could walk by the Grisha camp. The Grisha pavilion really was the size of a cathedral, covered in black silk, its blue, red, and purple pennants flying high above. Hidden somewhere behind it were the Darkling’s
tents, guarded by Corporalki Heartrenders and the Darkling’s personal guard.
When Alexei had looked his fill, we wended our way back to our quarters. Alexei got quiet and started cracking his knuckles, and I knew we were both thinking about tomorrow’s crossing. Judging by the gloomy mood in the barracks, we weren’t alone. Some people were already on their cots, sleeping—or trying to—while others huddled by lamplight, talking in low tones. A few sat clutching their icons, praying to their Saints.
I unfurled my bedroll on a narrow cot, removed my boots, and hung up my coat. Then I wriggled down into the fur-lined blankets and stared up at the roof, waiting for sleep. I stayed that way for a long time, until the lamplights had all been extinguished and the sounds of conversation gave way to soft snores and the rustle of bodies.
Tomorrow, if everything went as planned, we would pass safely through to West Ravka, and I would get my first glimpse of the True Sea. There, Mal and the other trackers would hunt for red wolves and sea foxes and other coveted creatures that could only be found in the west. I would stay with the cartographers in Os Kervo to finish my training and help draft whatever information we managed to glean in the Fold. And then, of course, I’d have to cross the Fold again in order to return home. But it was hard to think that far ahead.
Tap. Then again: Tap tap. Pause. Tap.
“What’s going on?” mumbled Alexei drowsily from the cot nearest mine.
“Nothing,” I whispered, already slipping out of my bedroll and shoving my feet into my boots.
I grabbed my coat and crept out of the barracks as quietly as I could. As I opened the door I heard a giggle, and a female voice called from somewhere in the dark room, “If it’s that tracker, tell him to come inside and keep me warm.”
“If he wants to catch tsifil, I’m sure you’ll be his first stop,” I said sweetly, and slipped out into the night.
The cold air stung my cheeks and I buried my chin in my collar, wishing I’d taken the time to grab my scarf and gloves. Mal was sitting on the rickety steps, his back to me. Beyond him, I could see Mikhael and Dubrov passing a bottle back and forth beneath the glowing lights of the footpath.
I scowled. “Please tell me you didn’t just wake me up to inform me that you’re going to the Grisha tent. What do you want, advice?”
“You weren’t sleeping. You were lying awake worrying.” “Wrong. I was planning how to sneak into the Grisha
pavilion and snag myself a cute Corporalnik.”
Mal laughed. I hesitated by the door. This was the hard- est part of being around him—other than the way he made my heart do clumsy acrobatics. I hated hiding how much the stupid things he did hurt me, but I hated the idea of him finding out even more. I thought about just turning around
and going back inside. Instead, I swallowed my jealousy and sat down beside him.
“I hope you brought me something nice,” I said. “Alina’s Secrets of Seduction do not come cheap.”
He grinned. “Can you put it on my tab?”
“I suppose. But only because I know you’re good for it.” I peered into the dark and watched Dubrov take a swig from the bottle and then lurch forward. Mikhael put his arm out to steady him, and the sounds of their laughter floated back to us on the night air.
Mal shook his head and sighed. “He always tries to keep up with Mikhael. He’ll probably end up puking on my boots.”
“Serves you right,” I said. “So what are you doing here?” When we’d first started our military service a year ago, Mal had visited me almost every night. But he hadn’t come by in months.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. You looked so miserable at dinner.”
I was surprised he’d noticed. “Just thinking about the crossing,” I said carefully. It wasn’t exactly a lie. I was terrified of entering the Fold, and Mal definitely didn’t need to know that Alexei and I had been talking about him. “But I’m touched by your concern.”
“Hey,” he said with a grin, “I worry.”
“If you’re lucky, a volcra will have me for breakfast tomorrow and then you won’t have to fret anymore.”
“You know I’d be lost without you.”
“You’ve never been lost in your life,” I scoffed. I was the mapmaker, but Mal could find true north blindfolded and standing on his head.
He bumped his shoulder against mine. “You know what I mean.”
“Sure,” I said. But I didn’t. Not really.
We sat in silence, watching our breath make plumes in the cold air.
Mal studied the toes of his boots and said, “I guess I’m nervous, too.”
I nudged him with my elbow and said with confidence I didn’t feel, “If we can take on Ana Kuya, we can handle a few volcra.”
“If I remember right, the last time we crossed Ana Kuya, you got your ears boxed and we both ended up mucking out the stables.”
I winced. “I’m trying to be reassuring. You could at least pretend I’m succeeding.”
“You know the funny thing?” he asked. “I actually miss her sometimes.”
I did my best to hide my astonishment. We’d spent more than ten years of our lives in Keramzin, but usually I got the impression that Mal wanted to forget everything about the place, maybe even me. There he’d been another lost refugee, another orphan made to feel grateful for every mouthful of food, every used pair of boots. In the army, he’d carved out a real place for himself where no one needed to know that he’d once been an unwanted little boy.
“Me too,” I admitted. “We could write to her.”
“Maybe,” Mal said.
Suddenly, he reached out and took hold of my hand. I tried to ignore the little jolt that went through me. “This time tomorrow, we’ll be sitting in the harbor at Os Kervo, looking out at the ocean and drinking kvas.”
I glanced at Dubrov weaving back and forth and smiled. “Is Dubrov buying?”
“Just you and me,” Mal said. “Really?”
“It’s always just you and me, Alina.”
For a moment, it seemed like it was true. The world was this step, this circle of lamplight, the two of us suspended in the dark.
“Come on!” bellowed Mikhael from the path.
Mal started like a man waking from a dream. He gave my hand a last squeeze before he dropped it. “Gotta go,” he said, his brash grin sliding back into place. “Try to get some sleep.”
He hopped lightly from the stairs and jogged off to join his friends. “Wish me luck!” he called over his shoulder.
“Good luck,” I said automatically and then wanted to kick myself. Good luck? Have a lovely time, Mal. Hope you find a pretty Grisha, fall deeply in love, and make lots of gorgeous, disgustingly talented babies together.
I sat frozen on the steps, watching them disappear down the path, still feeling the warm pressure of Mal’s hand in mine. Oh well, I thought as I got to my feet. Maybe he’ll fall into a ditch on his way there.
I edged back into the barracks, closed the door tightly behind me, and gratefully snuggled into my bedroll.
Would that black-haired Grisha girl sneak out of the pavilion to meet Mal? I pushed the thought away. It was none of my business, and really, I didn’t want to know. Mal had never looked at me the way he’d looked at that girl or even the way he looked at Ruby, and he never would. But the fact that we were still friends was more important than any of that.
For how long? said a nagging voice in my head. Alexei was right: things change. Mal had changed for the better. He’d gotten handsomer, braver, cockier. And I’d gotten . . . taller. I sighed and rolled onto my side. I wanted to believe that Mal and I would always be friends, but I had to face the fact that we were on different paths. Lying in the dark, waiting for sleep, I wondered if those paths would just keep taking us further and further apart, and if a day might come when we would be strangers to each other once again.
The Shadow and Bone Trilogy
Siege and Storm

Soldier. Summoner. Saint. Alina Starkov’s power has grown, but not without a price. She is the Sun Summoner—hunted across the True Sea, haunted by the lives she took on the Shadow Fold. But she and Mal can’t outrun their enemies for long.
The Darkling is more determined than ever to claim Alina’s magic and use it to take the Ravkan throne. With nowhere else to turn, Alina enlists the help of an infamous privateer and sets out to lead the Grisha army.
But as the truth of Alina’s destiny unfolds, she slips deeper into the Darkling’s deadly game of forbidden magic, and further away from her humanity. To save her country, Alina will have to choose between her power and the love she thought would always be her shelter. No victory can come without sacrifice—and only she can face the oncoming storm.
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Siege and Storm
Two weeks we’d been in Cofton, and I was still getting lost. The town lay inland, west of the Novyi Zem coast, miles from the harbor where we’d landed.
Soon we would go farther, deep into the wilds of the Zemeni frontier. Maybe then we’d begin to feel safe.
I checked the little map I’d drawn for myself and retraced my steps. Mal and I met every day after work to walk back to the boardinghouse together, but today I’d gotten completely turned around when I’d detoured to buy our dinner. The calf and collard pies were stuffed into my satchel and giving off a very peculiar smell. The shopkeeper had claimed they were a Zemeni delicacy, but I had my doubts. It didn’t much matter. Everything tasted like ashes to me lately.
Mal and I had come to Cofton to find work that would
finance our trip west. It was the center of the jurda trade, sur- rounded by fields of the little orange flowers that people chewed by the bushel. The stimulant was considered a luxury in Ravka, but some of the sailors aboard the Verrhader had used it to stay awake on long watches. Zemeni men liked to tuck the dried blooms between lip and gum, and even the women carried them in embroidered pouches that dangled from their wrists. Each store window I passed advertised dif- ferent brands: Brightleaf, Shade, Dhoka, the Burly. I saw a beautifully dressed girl in petticoats lean over and spit a stream of rust-colored juice right into one of the brass spittoons that sat outside every shop door. I stifled a gag. That was one Zemeni custom I didn’t think I could get used to.
With a sigh of relief, I turned onto the city’s main thorough- fare. At least now I knew where I was. Cofton still didn’t feel quite real to me. There was something raw and unfinished about it. Most of the streets were unpaved, and I always felt like the flat-roofed buildings with their flimsy wooden walls might tip over at any minute. And yet they all had glass win- dows. The women dressed in velvet and lace. The shop dis- plays overflowed with sweets and baubles and all manner of finery instead of rifles, knives, and tin cookpots. Here, even the beggars wore shoes. This was what a country looked like when it wasn’t under siege.
As I passed a gin shop, I caught a flash of crimson out of the corner of my eye. Corporalki. Instantly, I drew back, press- ing myself into the shadowy space between two buildings, heart hammering, my hand already reaching for the pistol at my hip.
Dagger first, I reminded myself, sliding the blade from my sleeve. Try not to draw attention. Pistol if you must. Power as a last resort. Not for the first time, I missed the Fabrikator-made gloves that I’d had to leave behind in Ravka. They’d been lined with mirrors that gave me an easy way to blind oppo- nents in a hand-to-hand fight—and a nice alternative to slic- ing someone in half with the Cut. But if I’d been spotted by a Corporalnik Heartrender, I might not have a choice in the matter. They were the Darkling’s favored soldiers and could stop my heart or crush my lungs without ever landing a blow.
I waited, my grip slippery on the dagger’s handle, then finally dared to peek around the wall. I saw a cart piled high with barrels. The driver had stopped to talk to a woman whose daughter danced impatiently beside her, fluttering and twirl- ing in her dark red skirt.
Just a little girl. Not a Corporalnik in sight. I sank back against the building and took a deep breath, trying to calm down.
It won’t always be this way, I told myself. The longer you’re free, the easier it will get.
One day I would wake from a sleep free of nightmares, walk down a street unafraid. Until then, I kept my flimsy dag- ger close and wished for the sure heft of Grisha steel in my palm.
I pushed my way back into the bustling street and clutched
at the scarf around my neck, drawing it tighter. It had become a nervous habit. Beneath it lay Morozova’s collar, the most powerful amplifier ever known, as well as the only way of identifying me. Without it, I was just another dirty, under- fed Ravkan refugee.
I wasn’t sure what I would do when the weather turned. I couldn’t very well walk around in scarves and high-necked coats when summer came. But by then, hopefully, Mal and I would be far from crowded towns and unwanted questions. We’d be on our own for the first time since we’d fled Ravka. The thought sent a nervous flutter through me.
I crossed the street, dodging wagons and horses, still scanning the crowd, sure that at any moment I would see a troop of Grisha or oprichniki descending on me. Or maybe it would be Shu Han mercenaries, or Fjerdan assassins, or the soldiers of the Ravkan King, or even the Darkling himself. So many people might be hunting us. Hunting me, I amended. If it weren’t for me, Mal would still be a tracker in the First Army, not a deserter running for his life.
A memory rose unbidden in my mind: black hair, slate eyes, the Darkling’s face exultant in victory as he unleashed the power of the Fold. Before I’d snatched that victory away.
News was easy to come by in Novyi Zem, but none of it was good. Rumors had surfaced that the Darkling had some- how survived the battle on the Fold, that he had gone to ground to gather his forces before making another attempt on the Ravkan throne. I didn’t want to believe it was possible,
but I knew better than to underestimate him. The other sto- ries were just as disturbing: that the Fold had begun to over- flow its shores, driving refugees east and west; that a cult had risen up around a Saint who could summon the sun. I didn’t want to think about it. Mal and I had a new life now. We’d left Ravka behind.
I hurried my steps, and soon I was in the square where Mal and I met every evening. I spotted him leaning against the lip of a fountain, talking with a Zemeni friend he’d met working at the warehouse. I couldn’t remember his name . . . Jep, maybe? Jef?
Fed by four huge spigots, the fountain was less decorative than useful, a large basin where girls and house servants came to wash clothes. None of the washerwomen were paying much attention to the laundry, though. They were all gawking at Mal. It was hard not to. His hair had grown out of its short military cut and was starting to curl at the nape of his neck. The spray from the fountain had left his shirt damp, and it clung to skin bronzed by long days at sea. He threw his head back, laughing at something his friend had said, seemingly oblivious to the sly smiles thrown his way.
He’s probably so used to it, he doesn’t even notice anymore, I thought irritably.
When he caught sight of me, his face broke into a grin and he waved. The washerwomen turned to look and then exchanged glances of disbelief. I knew what they saw: a scrawny girl with stringy, dull brown hair and sallow cheeks,
fingers stained orange from packing jurda. I’d never been much to look at, and weeks of not using my power had taken their toll. I wasn’t eating or sleeping well, and the nightmares didn’t help. The women’s faces all said the same thing: What was a boy like Mal doing with a girl like me?
I straightened my spine and tried to ignore them as Mal threw his arm around me and drew me close. “Where were you?” he asked. “I was getting worried.”
“I was waylaid by a gang of angry bears,” I murmured into his shoulder.
“You got lost again?”
“I don’t know where you get these ideas.”
“You remember Jes, right?” he said, nodding to his friend. “How do you go?” Jes asked in broken Ravkan, offering
me his hand. His expression seemed unduly grave.
“Very well, thank you,” I replied in Zemeni. He didn’t return my smile, but gently patted my hand. Jes was definitely an odd one.
We chatted a short while longer, but I knew Mal could see I was getting anxious. I didn’t like to be out in the open for too long. We said our goodbyes, and before Jes left, he shot me another grim look and leaned in to whisper something to Mal.
“What did he say?” I asked as we watched him stroll away across the square.
“Hmm? Oh, nothing. Did you know you have pollen in your brows?” He reached out to gently brush it away.
“Maybe I wanted it there.” “My mistake.”
As we pushed off from the fountain, one of the washer- women leaned forward, practically spilling out of her dress.
“If you ever get tired of skin and bones,” she called to Mal, “I’ve got something to tempt you.”
I stiffened. Mal glanced over his shoulder. Slowly, he looked her up and down. “No,” he said flatly. “You don’t.”
The girl’s face flushed an ugly red as the others jeered and cackled, splashing her with water. I tried for a haughtily arched brow, but it was hard to restrain the goofy grin pull- ing at the corners of my mouth.
“Thanks,” I mumbled as we crossed the square, heading toward our boardinghouse.
“For what?”
I rolled my eyes. “For defending my honor, you dullard.” He yanked me beneath a shadowed awning. I had a moment’s panic when I thought he’d spotted trouble, but then
his arms were around me and his lips were pressed to mine.
When he finally drew back, my cheeks were warm and my legs had gone wobbly.
“Just to be clear,” he said, “I’m not really interested in defending your honor.”
“Understood,” I managed, hoping I didn’t sound too ridicu- lously breathless.
“Besides,” he said, “I need to steal every minute I can before we’re back at the Pit.”
The Pit was what Mal called our boardinghouse. It was crowded and filthy and afforded us no privacy at all, but it was cheap. He grinned, cocky as ever, and pulled me back into the flow of people on the street. Despite my exhaustion, my steps felt decidedly lighter. I still wasn’t used to the idea of us together. Another flutter passed through me. On the fron- tier there would be no curious boarders or unwanted inter- ruptions. My pulse gave a little jump—whether from nerves or excitement, I wasn’t sure.
“So what did Jes say?” I asked again, when my brain felt a bit less scrambled.
“He said I should take good care of you.” “That’s all?”
Mal cleared his throat. “And . . . he said he would pray to the God of Work to heal your affliction.”
“My what?”
“I may have told him that you have a goiter.” I stumbled. “I beg your pardon?”
“Well, I had to explain why you were always clinging to that scarf.”
I dropped my hand. I’d been doing it again without even realizing.
“So you told him I had a goiter?” I whispered incre- dulously.
“I had to say something. And it makes you quite a tragic figure. Pretty girl, giant growth, you know.”
I punched him hard in the arm.
“Ow! Hey, in some countries, goiters are considered very fashionable.”
“Do they like eunuchs, too? Because I can arrange that.” “So bloodthirsty!”
“My goiter makes me cranky.”
Mal laughed, but I noticed that he kept his hand on his pistol. The Pit was located in one of the less savory parts of Cofton, and we were carrying a lot of coin, the wages we’d saved for the start of our new life. Just a few more days, and we’d have enough to leave Cofton behind—the noise, the pollen-filled air, the constant fear. We’d be safe in a place where nobody cared what happened to Ravka, where Grisha were scarce and no one had ever heard of a Sun Summoner.
And no one has any use for one. The thought soured my mood, but it had come to me more and more lately. What was I good for in this strange country? Mal could hunt, track, handle a gun. The only thing I’d ever been good at was being a Grisha. I missed summoning light, and each day I didn’t use my power, I grew more weak and sickly. Just walking beside Mal left me winded, and I struggled beneath the weight of my satchel. I was so frail and clumsy that I’d barely managed to keep my job packing jurda at one of the fieldhouses. It brought in mere pennies, but I’d insisted on working, on trying to help. I felt like I had when we were kids: capable Mal and use- less Alina.
I pushed the thought away. I might not be the Sun Sum- moner anymore, but I wasn’t that sad little girl either. I’d find a way to be useful.
The sight of our boardinghouse didn’t exactly lift my spir- its. It was two stories high and in desperate need of a fresh coat of paint. The sign in the window advertised hot baths and tick-free beds in five different languages. Having sampled the bathtub and the bed, I knew the sign lied no matter how you translated it. Still, with Mal beside me, it didn’t seem so bad.
We climbed the steps of the sagging porch and entered the tavern that took up most of the lower floor of the house. It was cool and quiet after the dusty clamor of the street. At this hour, there were usually a few workers at the pockmarked tables drinking off their day’s wages, but today it was empty save for the surly-looking landlord standing behind the bar.
He was a Kerch immigrant, and I’d gotten the distinct feeling he didn’t like Ravkans. Or maybe he just thought we were thieves. We’d shown up two weeks ago, ragged and grubby, with no baggage and no way to pay for lodging except a single golden hairpin that he probably thought we’d stolen. But that hadn’t stopped him from snapping it up in exchange for a narrow bed in a room that we shared with six other boarders.
As we approached the bar, he slapped the room key on the counter and shoved it across to us without being asked. It was tied to a carved piece of chicken bone. Another charming touch.
In the stilted Kerch he’d picked up aboard the Verrhader, Mal requested a pitcher of hot water for washing.
“Extra,” the landlord grunted. He was a heavyset man with thinning hair and the orange-stained teeth that came from chewing jurda. He was sweating, I noticed. Though the day wasn’t particularly warm, beads of perspiration had broken out over his upper lip.
I glanced back at him as we headed for the staircase on the other side of the deserted tavern. He was still watching us, his arms crossed over his chest, his beady eyes narrowed. There was something about his expression that set my nerves jangling.
I hesitated at the base of the steps. “That guy really doesn’t like us,” I said.
Mal was already headed up the stairs. “No, but he likes our money just fine. And we’ll be out of here in a few days.”
I shook off my nervousness. I’d been jumpy all afternoon. “Fine,” I grumbled as I followed after Mal. “But just so I’m
prepared, how do you say ‘you’re an ass’ in Kerch?” “Jer ven azel.”
“Really?”
Mal laughed. “The first thing sailors teach you is how to swear.”
The second story of the boardinghouse was in consider- ably worse shape than the public rooms below. The carpet was faded and threadbare, and the dim hallway stank of cab- bage and tobacco. The doors to the private rooms were all closed, and not a sound came from behind them as we passed. The quiet was eerie. Maybe everyone was out for the day.
The only light came from a single grimy window at the end of the hall. As Mal fumbled with the key, I looked down through the smudged glass to the carts and carriages rumbling by below. Across the street, a man stood beneath a balcony, peering up at the boardinghouse. He pulled at his collar and his sleeves, as if his clothes were new and didn’t quite fit right. His eyes met mine through the window, then darted quickly away.
I felt a sudden pang of fear.
“Mal,” I whispered, reaching out to him. But it was too late. The door flew open.
“No!” I shouted. I threw up my hands and light burst through the hallway in a blinding cascade. Then rough hands seized me, yanking my arms behind my back. I was dragged inside the room, kicking and thrashing.
“Easy now,” said a cool voice from somewhere in the cor- ner. “I’d hate to have to gut your friend so soon.”
Time seemed to slow. I saw the shabby, low-ceilinged room, the cracked washbasin sitting on the battered table, dust motes swirling in a slender beam of sunlight, the bright edge of the blade pressed to Mal’s throat. The man holding him wore a familiar sneer. Ivan. There were others, men and women. All wore the fitted coats and breeches of Zemeni merchants and laborers, but I recognized some of their faces from my time with the Second Army. They were Grisha. Behind them, shrouded in shadow, lounging in a rickety chair as if it were a throne, was the Darkling.
For a moment, everything in the room was silent and still. I could hear Mal’s breathing, the shuffle of feet. I heard a man calling a hello down on the street. I couldn’t seem to stop staring at the Darkling’s hands—his long white fingers rest- ing casually on the arms of the chair. I had the foolish thought that I’d never seen him in ordinary clothes.
Then reality crashed in on me. This was how it ended? Without a fight? Without so much as a shot fired or a voice raised? A sob of pure rage and frustration tore free from my chest.
“Take her pistol, and search her for other weapons,” the Darkling said softly. I felt the comforting weight of my fire- arm lifted from my hip, the dagger pulled from its sheath at my wrist. “I’m going to tell them to let you go,” he said when they were done, “with the knowledge that if you so much as raise your hands, Ivan will end the tracker. Show me that you understand.”
I gave a single stiff nod.
He raised a finger, and the men holding me let go. I stumbled forward and then stood frozen in the center of the room, my hands balled into fists.
I could cut the Darkling in two with my power. I could crack this whole saintsforsaken building right down the middle. But not before Ivan opened Mal’s throat.
“How did you find us?” I rasped.
“You leave a very expensive trail,” he said, and lazily tossed something onto the table. It landed with a plink beside the washbasin. I recognized one of the golden pins Genya had woven into my hair so many weeks ago. We’d used them to pay for passage across the True Sea, the wagon to Cofton, our miserable, not-quite-tick-free bed.
The Darkling rose, and a strange trepidation crackled through the room. It was as if every Grisha had taken a breath and was holding it, waiting. I could feel the fear com- ing off them, and that sent a spike of alarm through me. The Darkling’s underlings had always treated him with awe and respect, but this was something new. Even Ivan looked a little ill.
The Darkling stepped into the light, and I saw a faint tracery of scars over his face. They’d been healed by a Cor- poralnik, but they were still visible. So the volcra had left their mark. Good, I thought with petty satisfaction. It was small comfort, but at least he wasn’t quite as perfect as he had been.
He paused, studying me. “How are you finding life in hiding, Alina? You don’t look well.”
“Neither do you,” I said. It wasn’t just the scars. He wore his weariness like an elegant cloak, but it was still there. Faint smudges showed beneath his eyes, and the hollows of his sharp cheekbones cut a little deeper.
“A small price to pay,” he said, his lips quirking in a half smile.
A chill snaked up my spine. For what?
He reached out, and it took everything in me not to flinch backward. But all he did was take hold of one end of my scarf. He tugged gently, and the rough wool slipped free, gliding over my neck and fluttering to the ground.
“Back to pretending to be less than you are, I see. The sham doesn’t suit you.”
A twinge of unease passed through me. Hadn’t I had a similar thought just minutes ago? “Thanks for your concern,” I muttered.
He let his fingers trail over the collar. “It’s mine as much as yours, Alina.”
I batted his hand away, and an anxious rustle rose from the Grisha. “Then you shouldn’t have put it around my neck,” I snapped. “What do you want?”
Of course, I already knew. He wanted everything— Ravka, the world, the power of the Fold. His answer didn’t matter. I just needed to keep him talking. I’d known this moment might come, and I’d prepared for it. I wasn’t going to let him take me again. I glanced at Mal, hoping he under- stood what I intended.
“I want to thank you,” the Darkling said. Now, that I hadn’t expected. “Thank me?” “For the gift you gave me.”
My eyes flicked to the scars on his pale cheek.
“No,” he said with a small smile, “not these. But they do make a good reminder.”
“Of what?” I asked, curious despite myself.
His gaze was gray flint. “That all men can be made fools. No, Alina, the gift you’ve given me is so much greater.”
He turned away. I darted another glance at Mal.
“Unlike you,” the Darkling said, “I understand gratitude, and I wish to express it.”
He raised his hands. Darkness tumbled through the room.
“Now!” I shouted.
Mal drove his elbow into Ivan’s side. At the same moment, I threw up my hands and light blazed out, blinding the men around us. I focused my power, honing it to a scythe of pure light. I had only one goal. I wasn’t going to leave the Dark- ling standing. I peered into the seething blackness, trying to find my target. But something was wrong.
I’d seen the Darkling use his power countless times before. This was different. The shadows whirled and skittered around the circle of my light, spinning faster, a writhing cloud that clicked and whirred like a fog of hungry insects. I pushed against them with my power, but they twisted and wriggled, drawing ever nearer.
Mal was beside me. Somehow he’d gotten hold of Ivan’s knife.
“Stay close,” I said. Better to take my chances and open a hole in the floor than to just stand there doing nothing. I concentrated and felt the power of the Cut vibrate through
me. I raised my arm . . . and something stepped out of the darkness.
It’s a trick, I thought as the thing came toward us. It has to be some kind of illusion.
It was a creature wrought from shadow, its face blank and devoid of features. Its body seemed to tremble and blur, then form again: arms, legs, long hands ending in the dim sugges- tion of claws, a broad back crested by wings that roiled and shifted as they unfurled like a black stain. It was almost like a volcra, but its shape was more human. And it did not fear the light. It did not fear me.
It’s a trick, my panicked mind insisted. It isn’t possible. It was a violation of everything I knew about Grisha power. We couldn’t make matter. We couldn’t create life. But the creature was coming toward us, and the Darkling’s Grisha were cringing up against the walls in very real terror. This was what had so frightened them.
I pushed down my horror and refocused my power. I swung my arm, bringing it down in a shining, unforgiving arc. The light sliced through the creature. For a moment, I thought it might just keep coming. Then it wavered, glowing like a cloud lit by lightning, and blew apart into nothing. I had time for the barest surge of relief before the Darkling lifted his hand and another monster took its place, followed by another, and another.
“This is the gift you gave me,” said the Darkling. “The
gift I earned on the Fold.” His face was alive with power and a kind of terrible joy. But I could see strain there, too. What- ever he was doing, it was costing him.
Mal and I backed toward the door as the creatures stalked closer. Suddenly, one of them shot forward with astonishing speed. Mal slashed out with his knife. The thing paused, wavered slightly, then grabbed hold of him and tossed him aside like a child’s doll. This was no illusion.
“Mal!” I cried.
I lashed out with the Cut and the creature burned away to nothing, but the next monster was on me in seconds. It seized me, and revulsion shuddered through my body. Its grip was like a thousand crawling insects swarming over my arms.
It lifted me off my feet, and I saw how very wrong I’d been. It did have a mouth, a yawning, twisting hole that spread open to reveal row upon row of teeth. I felt them all as the thing bit deeply into my shoulder.
The pain was like nothing I’d ever known. It echoed inside me, multiplying on itself, cracking me open and scraping at the bone. From a distance, I heard Mal call my name. I heard myself scream.
The creature released me. I dropped to the floor in a limp heap. I was on my back, the pain still reverberating through me in endless waves. I could see the water-stained ceiling, the shadow creature looming high above, Mal’s pale face as he knelt beside me. I saw his lips form the shape of my name, but I couldn’t hear him. I was already slipping away.
The last thing I heard was the Darkling’s voice—so clear, like he was lying right next to me, his lips pressed against my ear, whispering so that only I could hear: Thank you.
The Shadow and Bone Trilogy
Ruin and Rising

Soldier. Summoner. Saint. The nation’s fate rests with a broken Sun Summoner, a disgraced tracker, and the shattered remnants of a once-great magical army.
The Darkling rules from his shadow throne while a weakened Alina Starkov recovers from their battle under the dubious protection of the zealots who worship her as a Saint. Now her hopes lie with the magic of a long-vanished ancient creature and the chance that an outlaw prince still survives.
As her allies and enemies race toward war, only Alina stands between her country and a rising tide of darkness that could destroy the world. To win this fight, she must seize a legend’s power—but claiming the firebird may be her ruin.
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Ruin and Rising
BEFORE
The monster’s name was Izumrud, the great worm, and there were those who claimed he had made the tunnels that ran beneath Ravka. Sick with appetite, he ate up silt and gravel, burrowing deeper and deeper into the earth, searching for something to satisfy his hunger, until he’d gone too far and lost himself in the dark.
It was just a story, but in the White Cathedral, people were careful not to stray too far from the passages that curled around the main caverns. Strange sounds echoed through the dim warren of tunnels, groans and unexplained rumblings; cold pockets of silence were broken by low hisses that might be nothing or might be the sinuous movement of a long body, snaking closer through a nearby passage in search of prey. In those moments, it was easy to believe that Izumrud still lived somewhere, waiting to be woken by the call of heroes, dreaming of the fi ne meal he would have if only some hapless child would walk into his mouth. A beast like that rests; he does not die.
The boy brought the girl this tale, and others too, all the new stories he could gather, in the early days when he was allowed near her. He would sit beside her bed, trying to get her to eat, listening to the pained whistle of her lungs, and he would tell the story of a river, tamed by a powerful Tidemaker and trained to dive through layers of rock, seeking a magic coin. He’d whisper of poor cursed Pelyekin, laboring for a thousand years with his magic pickaxe, leaving caverns and passages in his wake, a lonely creature in search of nothing but distraction, amassing gold and jewels he never intended to spend.
Locked in her cell, alone but for the drip of the water and the slow beat of her heart, the girl knew the stories of Izumrud were true. She had been swallowed whole, devoured, and in the echoing alabaster belly of the White Cathedral, only the Saint remained.
—
The saint woke every day to the sound of her name being chanted, and each day her army grew, its ranks swollen with the hungry and the hopeless, with wounded soldiers and children barely large enough to carry rifles. The priest told the faithful that she would be Queen one day, and they believed him. But they wondered at her bruised and mysterious court: the raven- haired Squaller with her sharp tongue, the Ruined One with her black prayer shawl and hideous scars, the pale scholar who huddled away with his books and strange instruments. These were the sorry remnants of the Second Army— unfit company for a Saint.
Few knew that she was broken. Whatever power had blessed her, divine or otherwise, was gone— or at least out of reach. Her followers were kept at a distance so they could not see that her eyes were dark hollows, that her breath came in frightened gasps. She walked slowly, tentatively, her driftwood bones fragile in her body, this sickly girl upon whom all their hopes rested.
On the surface, a new King ruled with his shadow army, and he demanded that his Sun Summoner be returned.
He offered threats and rewards, but the answer he received came in the form of a challenge— from an outlaw the people had dubbed the Prince of the Air. He struck along the northern border, bombing supply lines, forcing the Shadow King to renew trade and travel across the Fold with nothing but luck and Inferni fire to keep the monsters at bay.
Some said this challenger was a Lantsov prince. Some said he was a Fjerdan rebel who refused to fight alongside witches. But all agreed he must have powers of his own. The Saint rattled the bars of her underground cage.
This was her war, and she demanded freedom to fight it.
The priest refused.
But he’d forgotten that before she’d become a Grisha and a Saint, she’d been a ghost of Keramzin. She and the boy had hoarded secrets as Pelyekin hoarded trea sure. They knew how to be thieves and phantoms, how to hide strength as well as mischief. Like the teachers at the Duke’s estate, the priest thought he knew the girl and what she was capable of.
He was wrong.
He did not hear their hidden language, did not understand the boy’s resolve. He did not see the moment the girl ceased to bear her weakness as a burden and began to wear it as a guise.
—–
1
CHAPTER ONE
I stood on a carved stone balcony, arms spread, shivering in my cheap robes, and tried to put on a good show. My kefta was a patchwork, sewn together from scraps of the gown I was wearing the night we fled the palace and garish curtains that I’d been told came from a defunct theater somewhere near Sala. Beads from the lobby chandeliers made up the trim. The embroidery at the cuffs was already coming undone. David and Genya had done their best, but there were limited resources underground.
From a distance, it did the trick, sparkling gold in the light that seemed to emanate from my palms, sending bright glimmers over the ecstatic faces of my followers far below.
Up close, it was all loose threads and false shine. Just like me. The threadbare Saint.
The Apparat’s voice boomed through the White Cathedral, and the crowd swayed, eyes closed, hands raised, a field of poppies, arms like pale stalks shaken by some wind I couldn’t feel. I followed a choreographed series of gestures, moving deliberately so that David and whichever Inferni was helping him this morning could track my movements from their position in the chamber hidden just above the balcony. I dreaded morning prayers, but according to the priest, these false displays were a necessity.
“It is a gift you give your people, Sankta Alina,” he said. “It is hope.”
Actually, it was an illusion, a pale suggestion of the light I’d once commanded. The golden haze was really Inferni fire, reflected off a beaten mirror dish that David had fashioned from salvaged glass. It was something like the dishes we’d used in our failed attempt to stave off the Darkling’s horde during the battle in Os Alta. We’d been taken by surprise; and my power, our planning, all of David’s ingenuity, and Nikolai’s resourcefulness hadn’t been enough to stop the slaughter. Since then, I’d been unable to summon so much as a sunbeam. But most of the Apparat’s flock had never seen what their Saint could really do, and for now, this deception was enough.
The Apparat finished his sermon. That was the signal to end. The Inferni let the light fl are bright around me. It jumped and wavered erratically, then fi nally faded as I dropped my arms. Well, now I knew who was on fire duty with David. I cast a scowl up at the cave. Harshaw. He was always getting carried away. Three Inferni had made it out of the battle at the Little Palace, but one had died just days later from her wounds. Of the two that remained, Harshaw was the most powerful and the most unpredictable.
I stepped down from the platform, eager to be out of the Apparat’s presence, but my foot faltered and I stumbled.
The priest grasped my arm, steadying me.
“Have a care, Alina Starkov. You are incautious with your safety.”
“Thanks,” I said. I wanted to pull away from him, from the turned- soil and incense stench he brought with him everywhere.
“You’re feeling poorly today.”
“Just clumsy.” We both knew that was a lie. I was stronger than when I’d come to the White Cathedral— my bones had mended, I’d managed to keep down meals— but I was still frail, my body plagued by aches and constant fatigue.
“Perhaps a day of rest, then.”
I gritted my teeth. Another day confined to my chamber.
I swallowed my frustration and smiled weakly. I knew what he wanted to see.
“I’m so cold,” I said. “Some time in the Kettle would do me good.” Strictly speaking, it was true. The kitchens were the one place in the White Cathedral where the damp could be held at bay. By this time, at least one of the breakfast fires would be lit. The big round cavern would be full of the smells of baking bread and the sweet porridge the cooks made from stores of dried peas and powdered milk provided by allies on the surface and stockpiled by the pilgrims.
I added a shiver for good measure, but the priest’s only reply was a noncommittal “hmm.”
Movement at the base of the cavern caught my attention: pilgrims, newly arrived. I couldn’t help but look at them with a strategic eye. Some wore uniforms that marked them as First Army deserters. All were young and able- bodied.
“No veterans?” I asked. “No widows?”
“It’s a hard journey underground,” the Apparat replied.
“Many are too old or weak to move. They prefer to stay in the comfort of their homes.”
Unlikely. The pilgrims came on crutches and canes, no matter how old or sick. Even dying, they came to see the Sun Saint in their last days. I cast a wary glance over my shoulder. I could just glimpse the Priestguards, bearded and heavily armed, standing sentinel in the archway. They were monks, scholar priests like the Apparat, and belowground they were the only people allowed to carry weapons.
Above, they were the gatekeepers, ferreting out spies and unbelievers, granting sanctuary to those they deemed worthy. Lately, the pilgrims’ numbers had been dwindling, and those who did join our ranks seemed more hearty than pious. The Apparat wanted potential soldiers, not just mouths to feed.
“I could go to the sick and elderly,” I said. I knew the argument was futile, but I made it anyway. It was almost expected. “A Saint should walk amongst her people, not hide like a rat in a warren.”
The Apparat smiled— the benevolent, indulgent smile that the pilgrims adored and that made me want to scream.
“In times of trouble, many animals go to ground. That’s how they survive,” he said. “After fools wage their battles, it is the rats that rule the fields and towns.”
And feast on the dead, I thought with a shudder. As if he could read my thoughts, he pressed a hand to my shoulder.
His fingers were long and white, splaying over my arm like a waxen spider. If the gesture was meant to comfort me, it failed.
“Patience, Alina Starkov. We rise when the time is right and not before.”
Patience. That was always his prescription. I resisted the urge to touch my bare wrist, the empty place where the firebird’s bones were meant to reside. I had claimed the sea whip’s scales and the stag’s antlers, but the final piece in
Morozova’s puzzle was missing. We might have had the third amplifier by now if the Apparat had lent his support to the hunt or just let us return to the surface. But that permission would only come at a price.
“I’m cold,” I repeated, burying my irritation. “I want to go to the Kettle.”
He frowned. “I don’t like you huddling down there with that girl—”
Behind us, the guards muttered restlessly, and a word floated back to me. Razrusha’ya. I batted the Apparat’s hand away and marched into the passage. The Priestguards came to attention. Like all their brothers, they were dressed in brown and wore the golden sunburst, the same symbol that marked the Apparat’s robes. My symbol. But they never looked directly at me, never spoke to me or the other Grisha refugees. Instead, they stood silently at the edges of rooms and trailed me everywhere like bearded, rifle- wielding specters.
“That name is forbidden,” I said. They stared straight ahead, as if I were invisible. “Her name is Genya Safin, and I’d still be the Darkling’s prisoner if it weren’t for her.”
No reaction. But I saw them tense at even the sound of her name. Grown men with guns, afraid of a scarred girl.
Superstitious idiots.
“Peace, Sankta Alina,” said the Apparat, taking my elbow to shepherd me across the passage and into his audience chamber. The silver- veined stone of the ceiling was carved into a rose, and the walls were painted with Saints in their golden halos. It must have been Fabrikator craft because no ordinary pigment could withstand the cold and damp of the White Cathedral. The priest settled himself in a low wooden chair and gestured for me to take another. I tried to hide my relief as I sank down into it. Even standing for too long left me winded.
He peered at me, taking in my sallow skin, the dark smudges beneath my eyes. “Surely Genya can do more for you.”
It had been over two months since my battle with the Darkling, and I hadn’t fully recovered. My cheekbones cut the hollows of my face like angry exclamations, and the white fall of my hair was so brittle it seemed to float like cobwebs. I’d finally talked the Apparat into letting Genya attend me in the kitchens with the promise that she might work her craft and make me more presentable. It was the only real contact I’d had with the other Grisha in weeks.
I’d savored every moment, every bit of news.
“She’s doing her best,” I said.
The priest sighed. “I suppose we must all be patient. You will heal in time. Through faith. Through prayer.”
A surge of rage took hold of me. He knew damn well that the only thing that would heal me was using my power, but to do that, I needed to return to the surface.
“If you would just let me venture aboveground—”
“You are too precious to us, Sankta Alina, and the risk is far too great.” He shrugged apologetically. “You will not have a care for your safety, so I must.”
I stayed silent. This was the game we played, that we’d been playing since I’d been brought here. The Apparat had done a lot for me. He was the only reason any of my Grisha had made it out of the battle with the Darkling’s monsters.
He’d given us safe haven underground. But every day the White Cathedral felt more like a prison than a refuge.
He steepled his fingers. “Months gone by, and still you do not trust me.”
“I do,” I lied. “Of course I do.”
“And yet, you will not let me help you. With the firebird in our possession, all this might change.”
“David is working his way through Morozova’s journals. I’m sure the answer is there.”
The Apparat’s flat black gaze burrowed into me. He suspected I knew the location of the fi rebird— Morozova’s third amplifier and the key to unlocking the only power that might defeat the Darkling and destroy the Fold. And he was right. At least, I hoped he was. The only clue we had to its location was buried in my scant childhood memories and the hope that the dusty ruins of Dva Stolba were more than they seemed. But right or wrong, the firebird’s possible location was a secret I intended to keep. I was isolated underground, close to powerless, spied upon by the Priestguards. I wasn’t about to give up the one bit of leverage I had.
“I want only the best for you, Alina Starkov. For you and your friends. So few remain. If anything were to happen to them—”
“You leave them be,” I snarled, forgetting to be sweet, to be gentle.
The Apparat’s look was too keen for my liking. “I simply meant that accidents happen underground. I know you would feel each loss deeply, and you are so very weak.” On the last word, his lips stretched back over his gums. They were black like a wolf’s.
Again, rage coursed through me. From my first day in the White Cathedral, threat had hung heavy in the air, suffocating me with the steady press of fear. The Apparat never missed an opportunity to remind me of my vulnerability.
Almost without thinking, I twitched my fingers in my sleeves. Shadows leapt up the walls of the chamber.
The Apparat reared back in his chair. I frowned at him, feigning confusion. “What’s wrong?” I asked.
He cleared his throat, eyes darting right and left.
“It’s . . . it’s nothing,” he stammered.
I let the shadows fall. His reaction was well worth the wave of dizziness that came when I used this trick. And that’s all it was. I could make the shadows jump and dance but nothing more. It was a sad little echo of the Darkling’s power, some remnant left behind in the wake of the confrontation that had nearly killed us both. I’d discovered it when trying to summon light, and I’d struggled to hone it to something greater, something I could fight with. I’d had no success. The shadows felt like a punishment, ghosts of greater power that served only to taunt me, the Saint of shams and mirrors.
The Apparat rose, attempting to regain his composure.
“You will go to the archives,” he said decisively. “Time in quiet study and contemplation will help to ease your mind.”
“And the Kettle?” I asked, trying to hide the desperation in my voice.
“Later. Razru— Genya will wait,” he said as I followed him into the passage. “You needn’t scurry off to the Kettle, you know. You could meet with her here. In privacy.”
I glanced at the guards, who had fallen into step behind us. Privacy. That was laughable. But the idea of being kept from the kitchens was not. Maybe today the master flue would open for more than a few seconds. It was a slim hope, but it was all the hope I had.
“I prefer the Kettle,” I said. “It’s warm there.” I gave him my meekest smile, let my lip tremble slightly, and added, “It reminds me of home.”
He loved that— the image of a humble girl, huddling by a cookstove, hem trailing in ash. Another illusion, one more chapter in his book of Saints.
“Very well,” he said at last.
It took a long while to wend our way down from the balcony. The White Cathedral took its name from the alabaster of its walls and the massive main cavern where we held services every morning and evening. But it was much more than that— a sprawling network of tunnels and caves, a city underground. I hated every inch of it. The moisture that seeped through the walls, dripped from the ceilings, clustered in beads on my skin. The chill that couldn’t be dispelled. The toadstools and night flowers that bloomed in cracks and crevices. I hated the way we marked time: morning services, afternoon prayer, evening services, Saints’ days, days for fasting and half fasting. But mostly I hated the feeling that I really was a little rat, pale and red- eyed, scrabbling at the walls of my maze with feeble pink- tinged claws.
The Apparat led me through the caverns north of the main basin, where the Soldat Sol trained. People backed against the rock or reached out to touch my golden sleeve as we passed. We set a slow pace, dignified— necessary. I couldn’t move any faster without getting winded. The Apparat’s flock knew I was sick and said prayers for my health, but he feared there would be a panic if they discovered just how fragile— how very human— I was.
The Soldat Sol had already begun their training by the time we arrived. These were the Apparat’s holy warriors, sun soldiers who bore my symbol tattooed on their arms and faces. Most of them were First Army deserters, though others were simply young, fierce, and willing to die. They’d helped to rescue me from the Little Palace, and the casualties had been brutal. Holy or not, they were no match for the Darkling’s nichevo’ya. Still, the Darkling had human soldiers and Grisha in his service too, so the Soldat Sol trained.
But now they did it without real weapons, with dummy swords and rifles loaded with wax pellets. The Soldat Sol were a different kind of pilgrim, brought to the cult of the Sun Saint by the promise of change, many of them young and ambivalent about the Apparat and the old ways of the church. Since my arrival underground, the Apparat had kept them on a far tighter leash. He needed them, but he didn’t wholly trust them. I knew the feeling.
Priestguards lined the walls, maintaining a close eye on the proceedings. Their bullets were real, and so were the blades of their sabers.
As we entered the training area, I saw that a group had gathered to watch Mal spar with Stigg, one of our two surviving Inferni. He was thick- necked, blond, and utterly humorless— Fjerdan to the core.
Mal dodged an arc of fire, but the second spurt of flame caught on his shirt. The onlookers gasped. I thought he might draw back, but instead he charged. He dove into a roll, dousing the flames on the ground and knocking Stigg’s feet from beneath him. In a flash, he had the Inferni pinned facedown. He secured Stigg’s wrists, preventing another attack.
The watching sun soldiers broke into appreciative applause and whistles.
Zoya tossed her glossy black hair over one shoulder. “Well done, Stigg. You’re trussed and ready for basting.”
Mal silenced her with a look. “Distract, disarm, disable,” he said. “The trick is not to panic.” He rose and helped Stigg to his feet. “You all right?”
Stigg scowled, annoyed, but nodded and moved to spar with a pretty young soldier.
“Come on, Stigg,” the girl said with a wide grin. “I won’t go too rough on you.”
The girl’s face was familiar, but it took me a long moment to place her— Ruby. Mal and I had trained with her at Poliznaya. She’d been in our regiment. I remembered her as giggling, cheerful, the kind of happy, flirtatious girl who made me feel awkward and hopeless in my skin. She still had the same ready smile, the same long blond braid.
But even from a distance, I could see the watchfulness in her, the wariness that came with war. There was a black sun tattooed over the right side of her face. Strange to think that a girl who had once sat across from me in the mess hall now thought I was divine.
It was rare that the Apparat or his guards took me this way to the archives. What was different today? Had he brought me here so I could look over the shreds of my army and remember the price of my mistakes? To show me how few allies I had left?
I watched Mal pair sun soldiers with Grisha. There were the Squallers: Zoya, Nadia, and her brother Adrik. With Stigg and Harshaw, they made up the last of my Etherealki. But Harshaw was nowhere to be seen. He’d probably rolled back into bed after summoning flame for me during morning prayers.
As for the Corporalki, the only Heartrenders on the training floor were Tamar and her massive twin, Tolya. I owed them my life, but the debt didn’t rest easy with me.
They were close to the Apparat, charged with the instruction of the Soldat Sol, and they’d lied to me for months at the Little Palace. I wasn’t quite sure what to make of them. Trust was a luxury I could ill afford.
The remaining soldiers would have to wait for a turn to fight. There were simply too few Grisha. Genya and David kept to themselves, and weren’t much for combat, anyway.
Maxim was a Healer and preferred to practice his craft in the infirmary, though few of the Apparat’s flock trusted Grisha enough to take advantage of his services. Sergei was a powerful Heartrender, but I’d been told he was too unstable to be considered safe around students. He’d been in the thick of the fighting when the Darkling launched his surprise attack, had seen the girl he loved torn open by monsters. We’d lost our only other Heartrender to the nichevo’ya somewhere between the Little Palace and the chapel.
Because of you, said a voice in my head. Because you failed them.
I was drawn from my bleak thoughts by the Apparat’s voice. “The boy oversteps.”
I followed his gaze to where Mal was moving between the soldiers, speaking to one or correcting another. “He’s helping them train,” I said.
“He’s giving orders. Oretsev,” the priest called, beckoning him over. I tensed, watching Mal approach. I’d barely seen him since he’d been banned from my chamber. Aside from my carefully rationed interactions with Genya, the Apparat kept me isolated from potential allies.
He stopped before us and bowed. It was the closest we’d been allowed to each other in months.
“You are not the captain here,” said the Apparat. “Tolya and Tamar outrank you.”
Mal nodded. “They do.”
“So why are you leading the exercises?”
“I wasn’t leading anything,” he said. “I have something to teach. They have something to learn.”
True enough, I thought bitterly. Mal had gotten very good at fighting Grisha. I remembered him bruised and bleeding, standing over a Squaller in the stables of the Little Palace, a look of challenge and contempt in his eyes.
Another memory I could do without.
“Why haven’t those recruits been marked?” the Apparat asked, gesturing toward a group sparring with wooden swords near the far wall. None of them could have been more than twelve years old.
“Because they’re children,” Mal replied, ice in his voice.
“It’s their choice. Would you deny them the chance to show fealty to our cause?”
“I’d deny them regret.”
“No one has that power.”
A muscle ticked in Mal’s jaw. “If we lose, those tattoos will brand them as sun soldiers. They might as well sign up to face the firing squad now.”
“Is that why your own features bear no mark? Because you have so little faith in our victory?”
Mal glanced at me, then back at the Apparat. “I save my faith for Saints,” he said evenly. “Not men who send children to die.”
The priest’s eyes narrowed.
“Mal’s right,” I interjected. “Let them remain unmarked.”
The Apparat scrutinized me with that flat black gaze.
“Please,” I said softly, “as a kindness to me.”
I knew how much he liked that voice— gentle, warm, a lullaby voice.
“Such a tender heart,” he said, clucking his tongue. But I could tell he was pleased. Though I’d spoken against his wishes, this was the Saint he wanted me to be, a loving mother, a comfort to her people. I dug my fingernails into my palm.
“That’s Ruby, isn’t it?” I asked, eager to change the subject and divert the Apparat’s attention.
“She got here a few weeks back,” Mal said. “She’s good— came from the infantry.” Despite myself, I felt the tiniest twinge of envy.
“Stigg doesn’t look happy,” I said, bobbing my head toward where the Inferni seemed to be taking out his loss on Ruby. The girl was doing her best to hold her own, but she was clearly outmatched.
“He doesn’t like getting beaten.”
“I don’t think you even broke a sweat.”
“No,” he said. “It’s a problem.”
“Why is that?” asked the Apparat.
Mal’s eyes darted to me for the briefest second. “You learn more by losing.” He shrugged. “At least Tolya’s around to keep kicking my ass.”
“Mind your tongue,” the Apparat snapped.
Mal ignored him. Abruptly, he put two fingers to his lips and gave a sharp whistle. “Ruby, you’re leaving yourself open!”
Too late. Her braid was on fire. Another young soldier ran at her with a bucket of water and tossed it over her head.
I winced. “Try not to get them too crispy.”
Mal bowed. “Moi soverenyi.” He jogged back to the troops.
That title. He said it without any of the rancor he had seemed to carry at Os Alta, but it still hit me like a punch to the gut.
“He should not address you so,” complained the Apparat.
“Why not?”
“It was the Darkling’s title and is unfitting for a Saint.”
“Then what should he call me?”
“He should not address you directly at all.”
I sighed. “Next time he has something to say, I’ll have him write me a letter.”
The Apparat pursed his lips. “You’re restless today. I think an extra hour in the solace of the archives will do you good.”
His tone was chiding, as if I were a cranky child who had stayed up past her bedtime. I made myself think of the promise of the Kettle and forced a smile. “I’m sure you’re right.” Distract, disarm, disable.
As we turned down the passage that would take us to the archives, I looked over my shoulder. Zoya had flipped a soldier on his back and was spinning him like a turtle, her hand making lazy circles in the air. Ruby was talking to Mal, her smile broad, her expression avid. But Mal was watching me. In the ghostly light of the cavern, his eyes were a deep and steady blue, the color at the center of a flame.
I turned away and followed the Apparat, hurrying my steps, trying to temper the wheeze of my lungs. I thought of Ruby’s smile, her singed braid. A nice girl. A normal girl.
That was what Mal needed. If he hadn’t taken up with someone new already, eventually he would. And someday I’d be a good enough person to wish him well. Just not today.
—
We caught David on his way into the archives. As usual, he was a mess— hair going every direction, sleeves blotted with ink. He had a glass of hot tea in one hand and a piece of toast tucked into his pocket.
His eyes flickered from the Apparat to the Priestguards.
“More salve?” he asked.
The Apparat curled his lip slightly at this. The salve was David’s concoction for Genya. Along with her own efforts, it had helped to fade some of the worst of her scarring, but wounds from the nichevo’ya never healed completely.
“Sankta Alina has come to spend her morning in study,” the Apparat declared with great solemnity.
David gave a twitch that vaguely resembled a shrug as he ducked through the doorway. “But you’re going to the Kettle later?”
“I will have guards sent to escort you in two hours,” said the Apparat. “Genya Safi n will be waiting for you.”
His eyes scanned my haggard face. “See that she gives better attention to her work.”
He bowed deeply and vanished down the tunnel. I looked around the room and blew out a long, dejected breath. The archives should have been the kind of place I loved, full of the smell of ink on paper, the soft crackle of quills. But this was the Priestguards’ den— a dimly lit maze of arches and columns carved from white rock. The closest I’d come to seeing David lose his temper had been the first time he’d laid eyes on these little domed niches, some of them caved in, all of them lined with ancient books and manuscripts, their pages black with rot, their spines bloated with moisture. The caves were damp enough that puddles had seeped up through the floors. “You can’t . . . you can’t have kept Morozova’s journals in here,” he’d practically shrieked. “It’s a bog.”
Now David spent his days and most of his nights in the archives, poring over Morozova’s writings, jotting down theories and sketches in a notebook of his own. Like most other Grisha, he’d believed that Morozova’s journals had been destroyed after the creation of the Fold. But the Darkling would never have let knowledge like that go.
He’d hidden the journals away, and though I’d never been able to get a straight answer from the Apparat, I suspected the priest had somehow discovered them in the Little Palace and then stolen them when the Darkling had been forced to flee Ravka.
I slumped down on a stool across from David. He had dragged a chair and a table into the driest of the caves, and stocked one of the shelves with extra oil for his lanterns and the herbs and unguents he used to make Genya’s salve.
Usually, he hunched over some formula or bit of tinkering and didn’t look up for hours, but today he couldn’t seem to settle, fussing with his inks, fidgeting with the pocket watch he’d propped up on the table.
I thumbed listlessly through one of Morozova’s journals. I’d come to loathe the sight of them— useless, confusing, and most importantly, incomplete. He described his hypotheses regarding amplifiers, his tracking of the stag, his two- year journey aboard a whaler seeking the sea whip, his theories on the firebird, and then . . . nothing. Either there were journals missing or Morozova had left his work unfinished.
The prospect of finding and using the firebird was daunting enough. But the idea that it might not exist, that I might have to face the Darkling again without it? The thought was too terrifying to contemplate, so I simply shoved it away.
I made myself turn the pages. The only means I had of keeping track of time was David’s watch. I didn’t know where he’d found it, how he’d gotten it working, or if the time he’d set it to had any correlation to time on the surface, but I glared at its face and willed the minute hand to move faster.
The Priestguards came and went, always watching or bent to their texts. They were meant to be illuminating manuscripts, studying holy word, but I doubted that was the bulk of their work. The Apparat’s network of spies reached throughout Ravka, and these men considered it their calling to maintain it, deciphering messages, gathering intelligence, building the cult of a new Saint. It was hard not to compare them to my Soldat Sol, most of them young and illiterate, locked out of the old mysteries these men guarded.
When I couldn’t bear any more of Morozova’s ramblings, I twisted in my seat, trying to release a crick from my back. Then I pulled down an old collection of what were mostly debates on prayer, but that turned out to also contain a version of Sankt Ilya’s martyrdom.
In this one, Ilya was a mason, and the neighbor boy was crushed beneath a horse— that was new. Usually, the boy was cut down by a plow blade. But the story ended as all the tellings did: Ilya brought the child back from the brink of death, and for his trouble, the villagers threw him into the river, bound by iron chains. Some tales claimed he never sank but floated out to sea. Others vowed his body had emerged days later on a sandbank miles away, perfectly preserved and smelling of roses. I knew them all, and none of them said a word about the firebird or indicated that Dva Stolba was the right place to start looking for it.
All our hope for finding the firebird resided in an old illustration: Sankt Ilya in Chains, surrounded by the stag, the sea whip, and the firebird. Mountains could be glimpsed behind him, along with a road and an arch. That arch had long since fallen, but I thought the ruins could be found at Dva Stolba, not far from the settlements where Mal and I had been born. At least, that’s what I believed on my good days. Today, I felt less sure that Ilya Morozova and Sankt Ilya were the same man. I couldn’t bring myself to look at the copies of the Istorii Sankt’ya anymore. They lay in a moldy stack in a forgotten corner, seeming less like portents of some grand destiny than children’s books that had fallen out of fashion.
David picked up his watch, put it down, reached for it again, knocked over a bottle of ink then righted it with fumbling fingers.
“What’s with you today?” I asked.
“Nothing,” he said sharply.
I blinked at him. “Your lip is bleeding.”
He wiped his palm across it, and the blood beaded up again. He must have bitten it. Hard. “David—”
He rapped his knuckles against his desk, and I nearly jumped. There were two guards behind me. Punctual and creepy as always.
“Here,” David said, handing me a small tin. Before I could take it, a guard had snatched it up.
“What are you doing?” I asked angrily. But I knew.
Nothing passed between me and the other Grisha without being thoroughly inspected. For my safety, of course.
The Priestguard ignored me. He ran his fingers over the top and bottom of the tin, opened it, smelled the contents, investigated the lid, then closed it and handed it back without a word. I plucked it from his hand.
“Thanks,” I said sourly. “And thank you, David.”
He had already bent back over his notebook, seemingly lost in what ever he was reading. But he gripped his pen so hard I thought it might snap.
—
Genya was waiting for me in the Kettle, the vast, almost perfectly round cavern that provided food for all those in the White Cathedral. Its curved walls were studded with stone hearths, reminders of Ravka’s ancient past that the kitchen staff liked to complain weren’t nearly as convenient as the cookstoves and tile ovens above. The giant spits had been made for large game, but the cooks rarely had access to fresh meat. So instead they served salt pork, root vegetable stews, and a strange bread made from coarse gray fl our that tasted vaguely of cherries.
The cooks had nearly gotten used to Genya, or at least they didn’t cringe and start praying when they saw her anymore.
I found her keeping warm at a hearth on the Kettle’s far wall. This had become our spot, and the cooks left a small pot of porridge or soup there for us every day. As I approached with my armed escort, Genya let her shawl drop away, and the guards flanking me stopped short. She rolled her remaining eye and gave a catlike hiss. They dropped back, hovering by the entrance.
“Too much?” she asked.
“Just enough,” I replied, marveling at the changes in her. If she could laugh at the way those oafs reacted to her, it was a very good sign. Though the salve David had created for her scars had helped, I was pretty sure most of the credit belonged to Tamar.
For weeks after we’d arrived at the White Cathedral, Genya had refused to leave her chambers. She simply lay there, in the dark, unwilling to move. Under the supervision of the guards, I’d talked to her, cajoled her, tried to make her laugh. Nothing had worked. In the end, it had been Tamar who lured her out into the open, demanding that she at least learn to defend herself.
“Why do you even care?” Genya had muttered to her, pulling the blankets up.
“I don’t. But if you can’t fight, you’re a liability.”
“I don’t care if I get hurt.”
“I do,” I’d protested.
“Alina needs to watch her own back,” Tamar said. “She can’t be looking after you.”
“I never asked her to.”
“Wouldn’t it be nice if we only got what we asked for?” Tamar said. Then she’d pinched and prodded and generally harassed, until finally Genya had thrown off her covers and agreed to a single combat lesson— in private, away from the others, with only the Priestguards as audience.
“I’m going to flatten her,” she’d grumbled to me. My skepticism must have been evident, because she’d blown a red curl off her scarred forehead and said, “Fine, then I’ll wait for her to fall asleep and give her a pig nose.”
But she’d gone to that lesson and the next one, and as far as I knew, Tamar hadn’t woken up with a pig nose or with her eyelids sealed shut.
Genya continued to keep her face covered and spent most of her time in her chamber, but she no longer hunched, and she didn’t shy away from people in the tunnels. She’d made herself a black silk eye patch from the lining of an old coat, and her hair was looking distinctly redder. If Genya was using her power to alter her hair color, then maybe some of her vanity had returned, and that could only mean more progress.
“Let’s get started,” she said.
Genya turned her back to the room, facing the fire, then drew her shawl over her head, keeping the fringed sides spread wide to create a screen that would hide us from prying eyes. The first time we’d tried this, the guards had been on us in seconds. But as soon as they’d seen me applying the salve to Genya’s scars, they’d given us distance. They considered the wounds she bore from the Darkling’s nichevo’ya some kind of divine judgment. For what, I wasn’t sure. If Genya’s crime was siding with the Darkling, then most of us had been guilty of it at one time or another. And what would they say to the bite marks on my shoulder? Or the way I could make shadows curl?
I took the tin from my pocket and began applying salve to her wounds. It had a sharp green scent that made my eyes water.
“I never realized what a pain it is to sit still this long,” she complained.
“You’re not sitting still. You’re wriggling around.”
“It itches.”
“How about I jab you with a tack? Will that distract you from the itching?”
“Just tell me when you’re done, you dreadful girl.”
She was watching my hands closely. “No luck today?” she whispered.
“Not so far. There are only two hearths going, and the flames are low.” I wiped my hand on a grubby kitchen towel. “There,” I said. “Done.”
“Your turn,” she said. “You look—”
“Terrible. I know.”
“It’s a relative term.” The sadness in her voice was unmistakable. I could have kicked myself.
I touched my hand to her cheek. The skin between the scars was smooth and white as the alabaster walls. “I’m an ass.”
The corner of her lip pulled crookedly. Almost a smile.
“On occasion,” she said. “But I’m the one who brought it up. Now be quiet and let me work.”
“Just enough so that the Apparat lets us keep coming here. I don’t want to give him a pretty little Saint to show off .”
She sighed theatrically. “This is a violation of my most core beliefs, and you will make it up to me later.”
“How?”
She cocked her head to one side. “I think you should let me make you a redhead.”
I rolled my eyes. “Not in this lifetime, Genya.”
As she began the slow work of altering my face, I fiddled with the tin in my fingers. I tried to fi t the lid back on, but some part of it had come loose from beneath the salve.
I lifted it with the tips of my fingernails— a thin, waxy disc of paper. Genya saw it at the same time I did.
Written on the back, in David’s nearly illegible scrawl, was a single word: today.
Genya snatched it from my fingers. “Oh, Saints. Alina—”
That was when we heard the stomp of heavy- booted feet and a scuffle outside. A pot hit the ground with a loud clang, and a shriek went up from one of the cooks as the room flooded with Priestguards, rifles drawn, eyes seeming to blaze holy fire.
The Apparat swept in behind them in a swirl of brown robes. “Clear the room,” he bellowed.
Genya and I shot to our feet as the Priestguards roughly herded the cooks from the kitchen in a confusion of protests and frightened exclamations.
“What is this?” I demanded.
“Alina Starkov,” said the Apparat, “you are in danger.”
My heart was hammering, but I kept my voice calm. “Danger from what?” I asked, glancing at the pots boiling in the hearths. “Lunch?”
“Conspiracy,” he proclaimed, pointing at Genya. “Those who would claim your friendship seek to destroy you.”
More of the Apparat’s bearded henchmen marched through the door behind him. When they parted ranks, I saw David, his eyes wide and frightened.
Genya gasped and I laid a hand on her arm to keep her from charging forward.
Nadia and Zoya were next, both with wrists bound to prevent them from summoning. A trickle of blood leaked from the corner of Nadia’s mouth, and her skin was white beneath her freckles. Mal was with them, his face badly bloodied. He was clutching his side as if cradling a broken rib, his shoulders hunched against the pain. But worse was the sight of the guards who flanked him— Tolya and Tamar. Tamar had her axes back. In fact, they were both armed as thoroughly as the Priestguards. They would not meet my eyes.
“Lock the doors,” the Apparat commanded. “We will have this sad business done in private.”