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B L A C K P R O T O C O L
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"...THE DREGS HAVE COME TO call," Jesper said. He counted down from three, and he and Wylan began to turn the winch, carefully matching each other's pace, eyes on the weakened link that refused to give up despite Jesper's exhaustive efforts, Wylan's bloodied and blistered hands.
Jesper had expected some thunderous noise, but except for a few creaks and clanks, the machinery was silent.
Slowly, the ringwall gate began to rise. Five inches. Ten inches.
Just as Jesper was beginning to think Black Protocol wasn't real, a scare tactic at best, the bells of the Elderclock rang out, loud and panicked, high and demanding, an escalating tide of echoes, climbing one on top of another, booming over the White Island, the ice moat, the wall. There was no turning back now.
They released the handles of the winch in unison, letting the gate thunder down, but still the link didn't give.
"Come on," Jesper said, coaxing the stubborn metal. A better Fabrikator probably could have made quick work of it. A Fabrikator on parem probably could have turned the chain into a set of steak knives and had time for a cup of coffee. But Jesper was neither of those things, and he'd run out of finesse. Feta had always told him to practice more, to have fun with it so it wouldn't seem like a chore.
He'd told her he didn't find it fun.
Jesper grabbed hold of the chain, hanging from it, using all his weight to try to put pressure on the link. Wylan did the same, and for a moment they hung, pulling on the chain like a couple of crazed squirrels. Any minute now guards would be storming into the courtyard, and they'd have to leave off this insanity to defend themselves. The gate would still be operational.
They'd have failed.
"Maybe you should try singing at it."
"Jesper."
"That's right, you prefer the flute. Feta can sing—"
The link snapped.
Jesper and Wylan fell to the floor as the chain zipped through their hands, one end vanishing through the slot, the other sending the winch handles spinning.
"We did it!" Jesper shouted over the din of the bells, caught somewhere between excitement and terror. "I'll cover you. Deal with the winch!"
Jesper picked up his rifle, braced himself at a slit in the stone wall overlooking the courtyard, and prepared for all hell to break loose.
• • •
Inej smelled her perfume — lilies, rich and creamy, a dense golden smell. She wanted to gag. Heleen Van Houden, owner and proprietor of the Menagerie, the House of Exotics, where the world was yours for a price, was pushing her way through the crowd.
Hadn't she said Tante Heleen loved to make an entrance?
Inej stood perfectly still as Heleen clawed through her ruse in front of everyone, but not even she could vanish with nowhere to go.
The people around them turned to stare.
"How dare you come here under the auspices of my House? The house that clothed you and fed you? And where is Adjala?"
Inej opened her mouth, but panic rose up, tightening her throat, choking the words before they could come out. Her tongue felt useless, numb. Once more, she was looking into the eyes of the woman who had beaten her, threatened her, bought her once, and then sold her again and again.
Heleen grabbed Inej by the shoulders and shook her. "Where is my girl?"
Inej looked down at the fingers digging into her flesh. For a brief second, every horror came back to her, and she truly was a wraith, a ghost taking flight from a body that had given her only pain. No. A body that had given her strength. A body that had carried her over the rooftops of Ketterdam, that had served her in battle, that had brought her up six stories in the dark of a soot-stained chimney.
Her task was to find a gem strong enough to deal with their creative liberties. Kaz never said what side of the party she had to get it from. Inej knew she'd made the right choice.
Inej seized Heleen's wrist and twisted it hard to the right. Heleen yelped, her knees buckling as the guards surged forward.
"I threw your girl in the ice moat," Inej snarled, barely recognizing her own voice. Her other hand seized Heleen's throat, squeezing. "And she's better off there than with you."
Panting, heart racing, Inej didn't so much as feel the arms that removed her as she felt the absence of Heleen's terrified pulse from beneath her palm. I should have killed her.
Heleen got to her feet, whimpering and coughing as onlookers moved to help her. Always playing the fair lady, the damsel in distress. As if she didn't deserve a bloody, mangled end.
"If she's here, then Brekker is as well!" Heleen shrieked.
At that moment, as if in agreement, the bells of Black Protocol began to sound, loud and insistent. There was a stunned second of inertia. Then the entire rotunda seemed to explode into action as guards rushed to their posts and commanders began calling orders.
One of the guards, clearly a captain, said something in Fjerdan. The only word Inej recognized was prison. He grabbed the silk of her cape and shouted in Kerch, "Who is on your team? What is your target?"
"I will not speak," said Inej.
"You'll sing if we want you to," spat the guard.
You're thinking of the Siren, but even she does not sing just any song.
Heleen's laugh was low and rich with pleasure. "I'll see you hanged. And Brekker, too."
"The bridge is closed," someone declared. "No one else is getting on or off the island tonight!" Angry guests turned to anyone who would listen, demanding explanations.
The guards dragged Inej through the courtyard, past gaping onlookers, and out the ringwall gate as the bells continued to toll. They did not bother with gentleness or diplomacy now.
"I told you you'd wear my silks again, little lynx," Heleen called from the courtyard. The gate was already lowering, as the guards sealed it in accordance with Black Protocol. "You'll hang in them now."
The gate slammed closed, but Inej could swear she still heard Heleen's laughter.
• • •
The full weight of what Nina was doing hit her. She was alone with one of the deadliest men in Fjerda, a man who would gladly torture and murder her if he knew what she truly was. But perhaps they were both meant to survive that shipwreck for this moment. Perhaps she was destined to trick Fjerdans over and over.
"This should do," Jarl Brum said with a bow. "A bit of privacy and a bit of charm."
Not much charm in this laboratory — plenty of torture though.
Nina winked and sashayed past him. She'd expected some kind of office or retiring room for the guards. But there was no desk, no cot. The room was completely bare — except for the drain at the center of the floor.
She whirled in time to see the cell door slam shut.
She'd overshot Brum's arrogance. He remembered her from the slaving ship, he memorized her as one of Ravka's active Grisha. Really, this was the trick: Fjerdans were only repulsed by her power until they thought they could control it.
Even though Nina would have no chance against the jurda parem gas that would release at Brum's slightest brush of that brass button, she still took a deep breath of clean air. A futile gesture, even childish, but she was determined to hold it as long as she could.
Brum paused. "No. This vengeance is not mine to take. There is someone else who owes you so much more." His smug, cruel face vanished from the window and a moment later, Matthias' face filled the glass. He looked back at her, his eyes hard.
"How?" Nina whispered, not even sure if they could hear her through the door.
"Did you really believe I'd turn against my nation?" Matthias' voice was thick with disgust. "That I'd give up the cause I devoted my life to? I came to warn Brum as soon as I could."
"But you said—"
"Country before self, Zenik. It's something you've never understood."
Nina pressed a hand to her mouth. Maybe if she was lucky, she could smother her own sobs.
"I may never be druskelle again," he said. "I may live always with the charge of 'slaver' around my neck, but I'll find another way to serve Fjerda. And I'll get to see you dosed with jurda parem. I'll get to see you mow down your own kind and beg for the next fix. I'll get to see you betray the people you love as you asked me to betray my own."
"Matthias—"
He slammed his fist against the window. "Do not speak my name." Then he smiled, a smile as cold and unforgiving as the northern sea. "Welcome to the Ice Court, Nina Zenik. Now our debt is paid."
From somewhere outside, the bells of Black Protocol began to ring.
• • •
Matthias looked into the cell next to Nina's, then another, and another, moving down the hall as Brum followed. Some of the captive Grisha were agitated, pacing. Others had their faces pressed up against the glass. Others simply lay on the floor. Matthias fought down the sick feeling threatening to constrict his throat. "You can't have known about parem for more than a month. How long has this facility been here?"
"I had it built almost fifteen years ago with the blessing of the king and his council."
Matthias drew up short. "Fifteen years? Why?"
"We needed someplace to put the Grisha after the trials."
"After? When Grisha are found guilty, they're sentenced to death."
Brum shrugged. "It is still a death sentence, just one a little longer in the making. We discovered long ago that the Grisha could prove a useful resource."
A resource. "You told me they were to be eradicated. That they were a blight on the natural world."
"And they are — when they attempt to masquerade as men. They aren't capable of right thinking, of human morality. They are meant to be controlled."
"That's why you wanted parem?"
"We have tried our own methods for years with limited success."
"But you've seen what jurda parem can do, what Grisha can do when in its grip—"
"A gun is not evil. Nor is a blade. Jurda parem ensures obedience. It makes Grisha what they were always meant to be."
"A Second Army?" Matthias asked, his voice thick with scorn.
"An army is made of soldiers. These creatures were born to be weapons. They were born to serve the soldiers of Djel." Brum squeezed Matthias' shoulder. "Ah, Matthias, how I've missed you. Your faith was always so pure. I'm glad you're reluctant to embrace this measure, but this is our chance to strike a deathblow. Do you know why Grisha are so hard to kill? Because they're not of this world. But they are very good at killing each other. They call it 'like calls to like.' Wait until you see all we've achieved, the weapons their Fabrikators have helped us develop."
Matthias looked back down the hall. "Nina Zenik spent a year in Kerch trying to bargain for my freedom. I'm not sure those are the actions of a monster."
"Can a viper lie still before it strikes? Can a wild dog lick your hand before it snaps at your neck? A Grisha may be capable of kindness, but that does not change their fundamental nature."
Part of Matthias agreed with the man who had become his father and mentor. Part of Matthias knew them both to be wrong about this. The pride of wearing his druskelle colors came surging back, as did the shame over the things he'd felt for Nina. It was still with him, maybe it always would be. He'd spent too many years full of hate for it to vanish overnight. But now the shame was an echo, and all he felt was regret — for the time he'd wasted, for the pain he'd caused, and yes, even now, for what he was about to do.
He turned to Brum. "You taught me so much," Matthias said. "You taught me to value honor and strength. You gave me the tools for vengeance when I needed them most."
"And with those tools we will build a great future, Matthias. Fjerda's time has finally come."
Matthias returned his mentor's embrace.
"I don't know if you're wrong about the Grisha," he said gently. "I just know you're wrong about her."
He held Brum tight, in a hold Matthias had learned in the echoing training rooms of the druskelle stronghold, rooms he would never see again. He held Brum as he struggled briefly and as his body went slack.
When Matthias pulled away, Brum had slipped into unconsciousness, but Matthias did not think he imagined the rage that lingered on his mentor's features. He made himself memorize it. It was only right that he should remember that look — he was a true traitor at last.
Matthias thought it was disgusting enough how easily the lies had come to his lips when he'd approached Brum in the ballroom, but he could not have left Nina at Brum's mercy.
He looked at Brum now, mouth slightly open in sleep. He'd taken pleasure in what he'd done to these Grisha, what he would have gladly done to Nina and Jesper and Feta. Maybe the hard things had never been difficult for Brum the way they'd been for Matthias. They had not been a sacred duty on behalf of something better. They had been a desire.
Matthias slipped the master key from around Brum's neck and dragged him into an empty cell, propping him up so his chin flopped on his chest, legs sprawled in front of him, without dignity.
Matthias pressed his forehead once, briefly, against Brum's. He knew his mentor could not hear him, but he spoke the words anyway. "The life you live, the hate you feel — it's poison. I can drink it no longer."
Matthias locked the cell door and hurried down the passage toward Nina, toward something more.