Crooked Kingdom (25 page)

“You could be a maiden on the first day of
Roennigsdjel.
”

“What is
Roennigsdjel
?” asked Kuwei.

“Some festival,” replied Nina. “I can't remember. But I'm pretty sure it involves eating a lot of elk. Let's go, you big goon—and I'm supposed to be your sister, stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I'm made of ice cream.”

“I don't care for ice cream.”

“Matthias,” Nina said, “I'm not sure we can continue to spend time together.” But she couldn't quite keep the satisfaction from her voice. Apparently she was going to have to stock up on ugly knitwear.

*   *   *

Once they were clear of Black Veil, they followed the canals northwest, slipping in with the boats heading to the morning markets near the Stadhall. The Ravkan embassy was at the edge of the government sector, tucked into a wide bend in the canal that backed on a broad thoroughfare. The thoroughfare had once been a marsh but had been filled in and bricked over by a builder who had intended to use the site for a large hotel and parade ground. He had run out of funds before construction could start. Now it was home to a teeming marketplace of wooden stalls and rolling carts that appeared every morning and vanished every evening when the
stadwatch
patrolled. It was where refugees and visitors, new immigrants and old expatriates came to find familiar faces and customs. The few cafés nearby served
pelmeni
and salted herring, and old men sat at the outdoor tables, sipping
kvas
and reading their Ravkan news sheets, weeks out of date.

When Nina had first been stranded in Ketterdam, she'd thought of seeking sanctuary at the embassy, but she was afraid that she'd be sent back home to where she was supposed to be serving in the Second Army. How could she possibly explain that she couldn't return to Ravka until she'd freed a Fjerdan
drüskelle
she'd helped to imprison on false charges? After that, she'd rarely visited Little Ravka. It was just too painful to walk these streets that were so much like home and so unlike home at the same time.

Still, when she glimpsed the golden Lantsov double eagle flying on its pale blue field, her heart leapt like a horse clearing a jump. The market reminded her of Os Kervo, the bustling town that had served as capital to West Ravka before the unification—the embroidered shawls and gleaming samovars, the scent of fresh lamb being cooked on a spit, the woven wool hats, and battered tin icons glinting in the early morning sun. If she ignored the narrow Kerch buildings with their gabled roofs, she could almost pretend she was home. A dangerous illusion. There was no safety to be had on these streets.

Homesick as she was, as Nina and Matthias passed peddlers and merchants, some small, shameful thing inside her cringed at how old-fashioned everything looked. Even the people, clinging to traditional Ravkan dress, looked like relics of another time, objects salvaged from the pages of a folktale. Had the year she'd spent in Ketterdam done this to her? Somehow changed the way she saw her own people and customs? She didn't want to believe that.

As Nina emerged from her thoughts, she realized that she and Matthias were attracting some very unfriendly glances. No doubt there was quite a bit of prejudice against Fjerdans among Ravkans, but this was something different. Then she glanced up at Matthias and sighed. His expression was troubled, and when he looked troubled, he looked terrifying. The fact that he was built like the tank they'd driven out of the Ice Court didn't help either.

“Matthias,” she murmured in Fjerdan, giving his arm what she hoped was a friendly, siblinglike nudge, “must you glower at everything?”

“I'm not glowering.”

“We're Fjerdans in the Ravkan sector. We already stand out. Let's not give everyone another reason to think you're about to lay siege to the market. We need to get this task done without drawing unwanted attention. Think of yourself as a spy.”

His frown deepened. “Such work is beneath an honest soldier.”

“Then pretend to be an actor.” He made a disgusted sound. “Have you ever even been to the theater?”

“There are plays every season in Djerholm.”

“Let me guess, sober affairs that last several hours and tell epic tales of the heroes of yore.”

“They're actually very entertaining. But I've never seen an actor who knows how to properly hold his sword.”

Nina snorted a laugh.

“What?” Matthias said, perplexed.

“Nothing. Really. Nothing.” She'd educate Matthias on innuendo another time. Or maybe she wouldn't. He was so much more fun when he was completely oblivious.

“What are those?” he asked, gesturing to one of the vendors' blankets. It was laden with tidy rows of what looked like sticks and chips of rock.

“Bones,” she said. “Fingers, knuckles, vertebrae, broken bits of wrists. Saints' bones. For protection.”

Matthias recoiled. “Ravkans carry around human bones?”

“You talk to trees. It's superstition.”

“Are they really meant to come from Saints?”

She shrugged. “They're bones sifted from graveyards and battlegrounds. There are plenty of those in Ravka. If people want to believe they're carrying Sankt Egmond's elbow or Sankta Alina's pinky toe—”

“Who decided Alina Starkov was a Saint anyway?” Matthias said grumpily. “She was a powerful Grisha. They're not the same thing.”

“Are you so sure?” Nina said, feeling her temper rise. It was one thing for her to think Ravkan customs seemed backward, quite another to have Matthias questioning them. “I've seen the Ice Court for myself now, Matthias. Is it easier to believe that place was fashioned by the hand of a god or by Grisha with gifts your people didn't understand?”

“That's completely different.”

“Alina Starkov was our age when she was martyred. She was just a girl, and she sacrificed herself to save Ravka and destroy the Shadow Fold. There are people in your country who worship her as a Saint too.”

Matthias frowned. “It's not—”

“If you say natural, I'll give you giant buck teeth.”

“Can you actually do that?”

“I can certainly try.” She wasn't being fair. Ravka was home to her; it was still enemy territory to Matthias. He might have found a way to accept her, but asking him to accept an entire nation and its culture was going to take a lot more work. “Maybe I should have come alone. You could go wait by the boat.”

He stiffened. “Absolutely not. You have no idea what might be waiting for you. The Shu may have already gotten to your friends.”

Nina did not want to think about that. “Then you need to calm down and try to look friendly.”

Matthias shook out his arms and relaxed his features.

“Friendly, not sleepy. Just … pretend everyone you meet is a kitten you're trying not to scare.”

Matthias looked positively affronted. “Animals love me.”

“Fine. Pretend they're toddlers. Shy toddlers who will wet themselves if you're not nice.”

“Very well, I'll try.”

As they approached the next stall, the old woman tending to it looked up at Matthias with suspicious eyes. Nina nodded encouragingly at him.

Matthias smiled broadly and boomed in a singsong voice, “Hello, little friend!”

The woman went from wary to baffled. Nina decided to call it an improvement.

“And how are you today?” Matthias asked.

“Pardon?” the woman said.

“Nothing,” Nina said in Ravkan. “He was saying how beautifully the Ravkan women age.”

The woman gave a gap-toothed grin and ran her eyes up and down Matthias in an appraising fashion. “Always had a taste for Fjerdans. Ask him if he wants to play Princess and Barbarian,” she said with a cackle.

“What did she say?” asked Matthias.

Nina coughed and took his arm, leading him away. “She said you're a very nice fellow, and a credit to the Fjerdan race. Ooh, look, blini! I haven't had proper blini in forever.”

“That word she used:
babink
,” he said. “You've called me that before. What does it mean?”

Nina directed her attention to a stack of paper-thin buttered pancakes. “It means sweetie pie.”

“Nina—”

“Barbarian.”

“I was just asking, there's no need to name-call.”

“No,
babink
means barbarian.” Matthias' gaze snapped back to the old woman, his glower returning to full force. Nina grabbed his arm. It was like trying to hold on to a boulder. “She wasn't insulting you! I swear!”

“Barbarian isn't an insult?” he asked, voice rising.

“No. Well, yes. But not in this context. She wanted to know if you'd like to play Princess and Barbarian.”

“It's a game?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then what is it?”

Nina couldn't believe she was actually going to attempt to explain this. As they continued up the street, she said, “In Ravka, there's a popular series of stories about, um, a brave Fjerdan warrior—”

“Really?” Matthias asked. “He's the hero?”

“In a manner of speaking. He kidnaps a Ravkan princess—”

“That would never happen.”

“In the story it does, and”—she cleared her throat—“they spend a long time getting to know each other. In his cave.”

“He lives in a cave?”

“It's a very nice cave. Furs. Jeweled cups. Mead.”

“Ah,” he said approvingly. “A treasure hoard like Ansgar the Mighty. They become allies, then?”

Nina picked up a pair of embroidered gloves from another stand. “Do you like these? Maybe we could get Kaz to wear something with flowers. Liven up his look.”

“How does the story end? Do they fight battles?”

Nina tossed the gloves back on the pile in defeat. “They get to know each other
intimately
.”

Matthias' jaw dropped. “In the cave?”

“You see, he's very brooding, very manly,” Nina hurried on. “But he falls in love with the Ravkan princess and that allows her to civilize him—”

“To
civilize
him?”

“Yes, but that's not until the third book.”

“There are three?”

“Matthias, do you need to sit down?”

“This culture is disgusting. The idea that a Ravkan could civilize a Fjerdan—”

“Calm down, Matthias.”

“Perhaps I'll write a story about insatiable Ravkans who like to get drunk and take their clothes off and make unseemly advances toward hapless Fjerdans.”

“Now
that
sounds like a party.” Matthias shook his head, but she could see a smile tugging at his lips. She decided to push the advantage. “
We
could play,” she murmured, quietly enough so that no one around them could hear.

“We most certainly could not.”

“At one point he bathes her.”

Matthias' steps faltered. “Why would he—”

“She's tied up, so he has to.”

“Be silent.”

“Already giving orders. That's very barbarian of you. Or we could mix it up. I'll be the barbarian and you can be the princess. But you'll have to do a lot more sighing and trembling and biting your lip.”

“How about I bite
your
lip?”

“Now you're getting the hang of it, Helvar.”

“You're trying to distract me.”

“I am. And it's working. You haven't so much as glared at anyone for almost two blocks. And look, we're here.”

“Now what?” Matthias asked, scanning the crowd.

They'd arrived at a somewhat ramshackle-looking tavern. A man stood out front with a wheeled cart, selling the usual icons and small statues of Sankta Alina rendered in the new style—Alina with fist raised, rifle in hand, the crushed bodies of winged volcra beneath her boots. An inscription at the statue's base read
Rebe dva Volkshiya
, Daughter of the People.

“Can I help you?” the man asked in Ravkan.

“Good health to young King Nikolai,” Nina replied in Ravkan. “Long may he reign.”

“With a light heart,” the man replied.

“And a heavy fist,” said Nina, completing the code.

The peddler glanced over his shoulder. “Take the second table to your left as you enter. Order if you like. Someone will be with you shortly.”

The tavern was cool and dark after the brightness of the plaza, and Nina had to blink to make out the interior. The floor was sprinkled with sawdust and at a few of the small tables, people were gathered in conversation over glasses of
kvas
and dishes of herring.

Nina and Matthias took a seat at the empty table.

The tavern door slammed shut behind them. Immediately, the other customers shoved away from their tables, chairs clattering to the floor, guns pointed at Nina and Matthias.
A trap.

Without pausing to think, Nina and Matthias leapt to their feet and positioned themselves back to back, ready to fight—Matthias with pistol raised and Nina with hands up.

From the back of the tavern, a hooded girl emerged, her collar drawn up to cover most of her face. “Come quietly,” she said, golden eyes flashing in the dim light. “There's no need for a fight.”

“Then why all the guns?” Nina asked, stalling for time.

The girl lifted her hand and Nina felt her pulse beginning to drop.

“She's a Heartrender!” Nina shouted.

Matthias yanked something from his pocket. Nina heard a pop and a
whoosh
, and a moment later the air filled with a dark red haze. Had Wylan made a duskbomb for Matthias? It was a
drüskelle
technique for obscuring the sight of Grisha Heartrenders. In the cover of the haze, Nina flexed her fingers, hoping her power would respond. She felt nothing from the bodies surrounding them, no life, no movement.