The Orphan Queen (18 page)

“I've never tried the fiddle, but I think I'd be good at it.” I smacked the bow across the man's neck. Wood stung skin with a loud
clap
. “That was a nice sound. Let me try again.”

He swore and staggered back a step.

With long, steady strides, I advanced on the man, striking his cheeks and throat and shoulders in quick succession. He grimaced each time until his hand shot out and he gripped the bow before it hit him again. The wood snapped.

I tried to jerk back, but he was stronger and yanked the bow out of my grasp.

“Who are you?”

I didn't want to talk. I wanted to fight.

Wraithy wind gusted through the dark streets, and I pushed aside all thought of consequence and let instinct take over. I punched him hard in the jaw. Kicked him in the gut. Shoved him against a building like he'd done to the girl, and brought the heel of my palm against his teeth. Something cracked in his mouth, and blood oozed down his chin.

He grunted and drew back to hit me, but I grabbed his wrist and shoulder and kneed him between the legs. With a shout, he doubled over, clutching his groin.

I smirked and scooped up the broken fiddle bow on my way back to the girl. “You're going to need a new one.” I tossed her the bow parts and the silver bracelet I'd lifted earlier, and she caught everything in fumbling hands. “Now run.”

“Thank you!” She stopped only to collect her instrument before racing down the street.

Pain flared across the back of my head, and white flashed in my vision as the man hit me.

I drew my daggers and spun to face him. Nothing could stop me now.

The sharp odor of his blood dripped through the street, a contrast to the putrid stench of waste and rot and decay. I left thin slices in his hands and forearms, anywhere I could quickly reach as he struggled to block his throat and face.

The man had no proper training; he was just a thug who liked intimidating people with the palm of his hand. He didn't back off, though, even when I laid a gash in his chest. His shirt hung in tatters.

Harder and harder, I kicked him and sliced him, driving him back against the stone wall of a shop. He was wearing down, gasping and gulping for air. He wouldn't last much longer. Already he slumped, and blood smeared across his face and soaked his clothes. The copper stink of it filled my nose.

“Hold him,”
I whispered to the wall.
“Wake up and hold him.”

The surface of the stone heated and liquefied. The man howled wordlessly as the wall grew hotter, boiling against his body. The reek of scalding cloth and flesh made my eyes water, but I swallowed the faint nausea as the rock cooled again and became solid, holding him by his shirt and the outer layers of his skin. He groaned, and was unconscious.

“Sleep,”
I told the wall.

Thunder rattled the street as I drew back my dagger and steeled myself. The tip pointed to his abdomen. All I had to do was thrust.

A black-gloved hand caught my wrist.

“Don't.” It was a man's voice, low and dangerous.

I spun and kicked, connecting with a lean figure all in black. He stumbled backward and drew his sword from his back; he was but an outline in the darkness. I lunged for him, and metal clashed against metal as he blocked. My dagger slid down the length of his sword as I reached around to stab with the other. He caught my wrist again and heaved me away.

With a wild cry, I charged him again. His sword arced through the air, forcing me back again. I couldn't get inside his guard.

“Stop!” He took three long strides so that my back was against the stone wall, next to the thug.

I kept my eyes on the sword as I feinted and ducked beneath his guard. Pebbles dug against my palms and thighs as I rolled to my feet again. Strands of sweat-dampened hair obscured my vision. I dragged my arm across my forehead to peel back the hair, and the figure in black took advantage of my distraction and batted my dagger out of my right hand.

“Stop,” he said again. “You're not a killer.” He knocked the other dagger away from me. Both of my blades whumped onto the hard-packed dirt.

My hands fell to my sides as clarity shrieked through me.

It was Black Knife.

And I'd just used magic.

I swayed on my feet and stared at him, heart hammering with the surge of adrenaline. “Stop following me.”

“Are you all right?” He stayed where he was, sword loose in his grip. I wanted to run, but it wouldn't take much for him to pin me against the wall, sword point at my throat. The man already stuck there—stuck by
my magic
—groaned. His head lolled, but he didn't wake.

Lightning flared and thunder rolled through Skyvale. I willed my legs to move, to get me out of here before Black Knife realized what I'd done.

Could he have seen it? No, it was too dark. Heard? Unlikely, given the wind gusting and cutting around corners. The air was heavy with moisture and that
waiting
sensation. Waiting for the storm. Waiting for Black Knife to make a move.

“What did you do to him?” Only the vigilante's eyes were visible as he stepped around me—toward the man I'd almost killed.

As Black Knife sheathed his sword and inspected the man, I gathered my weapons and backed away. Long, silent steps. Shoulders hunched. Daggers ready. I kept my breath slow and quiet, desperate to soothe the frantic beating of my heart. No matter how I tried, I couldn't force myself to calm down. Not with Black Knife right there, with evidence of my magic.

I made it five steps: across the street, to where the fiddler had been.

“He's been fused to the wall.” Black Knife swore and spun around. In heartbeats, he closed the distance between us. “Did
you
do this?”

“I'm leaving.” I dared another step away, but Black Knife caught my elbow and ducked my dagger when I swung it around. “I'm
leaving
.”

“I can't let you.” He trapped both of my wrists in his hand as he drew a length of black cord from a pouch on his belt. “You could have killed him. He'll probably die anyway, if I don't find someone to help him.”

My whole body trembled as I tried to jerk my arms away. I couldn't even pull my dagger around to cut him.

When an icy wind cut through the street, I shook so hard that my blades fell from my hands again, and Black Knife had me bound—wrists and ankles. He was
fast.

Or my mind was slow. Maybe both.

The man melted to the wall, the girl with her fiddle, the report about Quinn and Ezra, Patrick's declaration of our future together—

It was all too much.

A heavy sob choked out of me.

At least if Black Knife turned me in to the Indigo Order, I wouldn't have to face Melanie. I wouldn't have to bother chasing the rumor about the lake.

I wouldn't have to worry about ruling a kingdom when I didn't know how.

“What's wrong with you?” He stood and looked down at me.

I sat in the street, hunched over myself. I couldn't remember dropping, but now my thighs were pressed against my chest, and my wrists and ankles were bound together. When I tugged, there was no slack. It wouldn't be long before I lost feeling in my hands and feet.

“What happened?” He loomed over me, a tall, dark shadow in the night. The sky shuddered with another peal of thunder. Black Knife knelt, sighing heavily. “I'm going to find help for your friend over there. If he dies—” The vigilante shook his head. “Pray he doesn't die. Then I'll come back and decide what to do with you.”

I pulled against my bonds, but they only tightened.

“Stay put.”

It started to rain as Black Knife vanished down the street. Heavy drops soaked my clothes, making me shiver, and the man on the wall groaned loudly.

I'd never used my power to hurt anyone. I'd thought about it—sometimes letting the fantasies play a little too long—but I'd never given in to the impulse before.

If he died . . .

As rain fell in deafening sheets, I pushed my face into the crevice between my body and my knees, taking deep breaths to
clear my thoughts. I couldn't worry about that man—whether he'd deserved it or I'd crossed a line. I had to free myself. I had to get back to the palace and form some kind of plan.

I had to
think
.

Carefully, I felt around the cords binding my hands and feet. The knots were unfamiliar, though, at least by touch, and it was too dark to see. Pulling on any loop or end might result in a worse tangle. Dare I use magic again? No; he'd smell the wraith on the air and know what I'd done. He'd begin developing a theory about what, exactly, I could do.

If only I could reach my daggers.

I could scoot. I pulled up my head and waited for the next flash of lightning.

It took two flares before I spotted light shimmering off the rain-dulled metal. Scooting with my hands and feet tied was incredibly awkward, but eventually I began to make progress. The distance to the nearest dagger grew shorter, even as the rain grew harder. Water soaked my clothes and plastered my hair against my head. My teeth chattered as I stretched my fingers and brushed the hilt of my dagger.

“Trying to cut your way free?” A dark shape detached from the rest of the shadows, and Black Knife knelt in front of me again. One toe of his knee-high boots pinned the blade to the ground, and my fingers scraped off the wooden hilt. “The police are coming, so answer me quickly.”

I stared at him, my jaw tense as I forced myself motionless.

“What did you do to that man?”

Silence had always been my favorite response, but if I kept quiet, he'd leave. I'd be arrested for magic.

“I hurt him.” Rain clattered all around us, steady and unceasing. A chill-wrought shudder in my chest echoed. “I tried to kill him.”

This, not even an hour after insisting to Patrick that Ospreys weren't murderers.

“I saw what you did, saving that girl.” He shifted his weight and braced one knee on the muddy ground; he kept my dagger pinned, and out of my reach. “You are an intriguing puzzle. A thief. A sister. A warrior. More than that.” He paused and cocked his head, as though to study me from a slightly different angle. “Now you rescue a girl and maim her attacker with magic. I don't know what to do with you, nameless girl.”

“Let me go.” In spite of my best efforts, my voice shook with cold. My hands and feet ached as blood circulation slowed. I clenched and unclenched my fists, struggling to maintain feeling in my fingers.

“Are you going to use your magic again?” His voice deepened, and his words were almost lost beneath the cacophony of rain and thunder. “Do you like burning things? Because this didn't look like a last resort.”

“I have as many reasons as you to want the wraith stopped.” Maybe that was true. I didn't know his reasons, after all. But mine were strong. I had an entire kingdom to protect.

“Perhaps so.” He touched my bonds, a pale contact I could barely feel through the cold and wet. It took all my will not to jerk back, away from him. “I'm going to free you,” he said almost gently, “but I want something in exchange.”

“I'm not telling you my name unless you tell me yours.” A shiver racked through me.

A note of weary humor touched his voice. “Fortunately, I wasn't going to ask your name. No, I want something else. I saw the way you rushed to help that girl. You were fast getting there—faster than I was. And she'll live because of what you did.”

Quinn wouldn't live, though. Neither would Ezra. They were my people, and they were dead.

The rain slammed harder and I fought off another violent shiver. Black Knife shivered, too.

“That girl will live, and she doesn't have to be the only one.” Black Knife leaned closer, lifting his voice to be heard over the pounding of rain. “Come with me. Help me tonight. Help me save others.”

I
had
saved that girl. It had been selfish, driving pain that had compelled me down from the rooftops. Knowing she would live to fix her fiddle and play again because of my intervention—I liked that. Not enough to want to accompany Black Knife, but if it was the vigilante—who didn't seem to want me arrested—or the police, I'd choose the enemy I knew.

“You won't turn me in for what I did?”

He hesitated. The percussion of rain made the seconds linger on, but at last he shook his head. “Not this time. I think you deserve a second chance.”

I nodded toward my hands and feet, still caught up in the silk. “Untie me.”

There was something in his tone, like relief. “I hoped you'd say that.” He got to work quickly.

A few moments later, I stood, stretching my arms and legs. Sharp sensation assaulted my hands and feet.

Rain obscured the man fused to the wall, still unconscious, thankfully.

I'd almost killed him.

I'd almost
killed
him.

“The police will get him out.” Black Knife grabbed my daggers, flipped them, and caught the flats of the blades. He offered the hilts to me, like he believed I wouldn't attack him. “You should, perhaps, wear a mask.”

I took my daggers and slid them into their sheaths at my hips. “I don't have one.”

“I have an extra.” Black Knife felt around his belt and pulled free a damp slip of pitch cloth. He pressed it into my hands, this thin, delicate thing; it was a hood that went over the whole of one's head, not just the face. “I keep a spare in case I lose mine.”

When I slid the silk over my head, it smelled faintly of boy and musk. It was light enough to breathe through, even when waterlogged, and kept the bite of chill off my face and throat. I adjusted my hair under the hood. “Thank you.” The words were strange and soft under the rumble and racket of the storm, but he must have heard anyway, because he nodded.

“Let's go find someone who needs our help,” he said. “Before the police arrive.”