But they hadn’t set foot on the gangway when Nina heard a voice say, “Just a moment.”
Birgir. Couldn’t they catch a bit of luck? The sun hadn’t even set. They should have had more time. Enok’s father hesitated on the gangway next to Leoni, and Adrik gave Nina the barest shake of his head. The message was clear: Don’t start trouble. Nina thought of the other Grisha fugitives packed into the hold of the ship and held her tongue.
Birgir stood between Casper and the other guard. He was short for a Fjerdan, his shoulders sloped like a bull’s, and his uniform fit so impeccably that Nina suspected it had been professionally tailored.
She kept behind Enok and whispered to the boys, “Go to your grandfather.” But they didn’t move.
“It was a hard day’s travel for all of us,” Enok said to Birgir amiably. “The boys are eager to get settled.”
“I’ll see your papers first.”
“We just showed them to your man.”
“Casper’s eyes aren’t nearly as good as mine.”
“But the money—” protested Enok.
“What money was that?”
Casper and the other guard shrugged. “I don’t know about any money.”
Reluctantly, Enok handed over the papers.
“Perhaps,” said his father, “we could reach a new arrangement?”
“Stay where you are,” ordered Birgir.
“But our ship is about to depart,” Nina tried from behind Enok’s shoulder.
Birgir glanced at the Verstoten, at the boys tugging restlessly on their father’s hands. “They’re going to be a handful cooped up for a sea journey.” Then he looked back at Enok and Nina. “Funny the way they cling to their father and not their mother.”
“They’re scared,” said Nina. “You’re frightening them.”
Birgir’s cold eyes traveled over Adrik and Leoni. He smacked the indenture papers against his gloved palm. “That ship isn’t going anywhere. Not until we’ve seen every inch of it.” He gestured to Casper. “There’s something off here. Signal the others.”
Casper reached for his whistle, but before he could draw breath to blow, Nina’s arm shot out. Two slender bone shards flew from the sheaths sewn into the forearms of her coat—everything she wore was laced with them. The darts lodged in Casper’s windpipe, and a sharp wheeze squeaked from his mouth. Nina twisted her fingers and the bone shards rotated. The guard dropped to the dock, clawing at his neck.
“Casper!” Birgir and the other guard drew their guns.
Nina shoved Enok and the children behind her. “Get them on the boat,” she growled. Don’t start trouble. She hadn’t, but she intended to finish it.
“I know you,” Birgir said, training his gun on her, his eyes hard and bright as river stones.
“That’s a bold statement.”
“You work at the salmon cannery. One of the barrel girls. I knew there was something wrong about you.”
Nina couldn’t help but smile. “Plenty of things.”
“Mila,” Adrik said warningly, using her cover name. As if it mattered now. The time for bribes and negotiations was over. She liked these moments best. When the secrets fell away.
Nina flicked her fingers. The bone shards dislodged from Casper’s windpipe and slid back into the hidden sheaths on her arm. He flopped on the dock, his lips wet with blood, his eyes rolling back in his head as he struggled for breath.
“Drüsje,” Birgir hissed. Witch.
“I don’t like that word,” Nina said, advancing. “Call me Grisha. Call me zowa. Call me death, if you like.”
Birgir laughed. “Two guns are pointed at you. You think you can kill us both before one of us gets a shot off?”
“But you’re already dying, Captain,” she crooned gently. The bone armor the Fabrikators had made for her in Os Alta was a comfort and had proven useful more times than she could count. But sometimes she could feel death already waiting in her targets, like now, in this man who stood before her, his chin jutting forward, the brass buttons on his fine uniform gleaming. He was younger than she’d realized, his golden stubble patchy in places, as if he couldn’t quite grow a beard. Should she be sorry for him? She was not.
Nina. Matthias’ voice, chiding, disappointed. Perhaps she was doomed to stand on docks and murder Fjerdans. There were worse fates.
“You know it, don’t you?” she went on. “Somewhere inside. Your body knows.” She drew closer. “That cough you can’t shake. The pain you told yourself was a bruised rib. The way food has lost its savor.” In the day’s fading light she saw fear come into Birgir’s face, a shadow falling. It fed her, and that strange sighing inside her grew louder, a whispering chorus that rose, as if in encouragement, even as Matthias’ voice receded.
“You work in a harbor,” she continued. “You know how easy it is for rats to get into the walls, to eat a place up from the inside.” Birgir’s pistol hand dipped slightly. He was watching her now, closely—not with his sharp policeman’s eyes but with the gaze of a man who didn’t want to listen, but who had to, who must know the end to the story. “The enemy is already inside you, the bad cells eating the others slowly, right there in your lungs. Unusual in a man so young. You’re dying, Captain Birgir,” she said softly, almost kindly. “I’m just going to help you along.”
The captain seemed to wake from a trance. He raised his pistol, but he was too slow. Nina’s power already had hold of that sick cluster of cells within him, and death unfurled, a terrible multiplication. He might have lived another year, maybe two, but now the cells became a black tide, destroying everything in their path. Captain Birgir released a low moan and toppled. Before the remaining guard could react, Nina flicked her fingers and drove a shard of bone through his heart.
The docks were curiously still. She could hear the waves lapping against the Verstoten’s hull, the high calls of seabirds. Inside her the whispering chorus leapt, the sound almost joyful.
Then one of Enok’s boys began to cry.
For a moment, Nina had stood alone with death on the docks, two weary travelers, longtime companions. But now she saw the way the others were watching her—the Grisha fugitives, Adrik and Leoni, even the ship’s captain and his crew leaning over the railing of the ship. Maybe she should have cared; maybe some part of her did. Nina’s power was frightening, a corruption of the Heartrender power she had been born with, twisted by parem. And still it had become dear to her. Matthias had accepted the dark thing in her and encouraged her to do the same—but what Nina felt was not acceptance. It was love.
Adrik sighed. “I’m not going to miss this town.” He called up to the ship’s crew. “Stop staring and help us get the bodies on board. We’ll dispose of them when we reach open water.”
Some men deserve your mercy, Nina.
Of course, Matthias. Nina watched Enok and his father lift Birgir’s body. I’ll let you know when I meet one of them.