“Count yourself lucky,” Kaz said grimly. “Hurry it up.”
She worked from memory, swelling and cracking the skin on Muzzen’s face and chest, raising blisters until the swelling and pustules were so bad that he was truly unrecognisable. The big man moaned.
“Why would you agree to do this?” Nina murmured.
The swollen flesh of Muzzen’s face quivered, and Nina thought he might be trying to smile.
“Money was good,” he said thickly.
She sighed. Why else did anyone do anything in the Barrel? “Good enough to get locked up in Hellgate?”
Kaz tapped his cane on the cell floor. “Stop making trouble, Nina. If Helvar cooperates, he and Muzzen will both have their freedom just as soon as the job is done.”
“And if he doesn’t?”
“Then Helvar gets locked back in his cell, and Muzzen still gets paid. And I’ll take him to breakfast at the Kooperom.”
“Can I have waffles?” Muzzen mumbled.
“We’ll all have waffles. And whisky. If this job doesn’t come off, no one’s going to want to be around me sober. Finished, Nina?”
Nina nodded, and Inej took her place to bandage Muzzen to look like Matthias.
“All right,” said Kaz. “Get Helvar on his feet.”
Nina crouched beside Matthias as Kaz stood over her with the bonelight. Even in sleep, Matthias’
features were troubled, his pale brows furrowed. She let her hands travel over the bruised line of his jaw, resisting the urge to linger there.
“Not the face, Nina. I need him mobile, not pretty. Heal him fast and only enough to get him walking for now. I don’t want him spry enough to vex us.”
Nina lowered the blanket and went to work. Just another body, she told herself. She was always getting late-night calls from Kaz to heal wounded members of the Dregs who he didn’t want to bring around to any legitimate medik – girls with stabbing punctures, boys with broken legs or bullets lodged inside them, victims of a scuffle with the stadwatch or another gang. Pretend it’s Muzzen, she told herself. Or Big Bolliger or some other fool. You don’t know this boy. And it was true. The boy she knew might have been the scaffold, but something new had been built upon it.
She touched his shoulder gently. “Helvar,” she said. He didn’t stir. “Matthias.”
A lump rose in her throat, and she felt the ache of tears threatening. She pressed a kiss to his temple. She knew that Kaz and the others were watching and that she was making an idiot of herself, but after so long he was finally here, in front of her, and so very broken. “Matthias,” she repeated.
“Nina?” His voice was raw but as lovely as she remembered.
“Oh, Saints, Matthias,” she whispered. “Please wake up.”
His eyes opened, groggily, palest blue. “Nina,” he said softly. His knuckles brushed her cheek; his rough hand cupped her face tentatively, disbelievingly. “Nina?”
Her eyes filled with tears. “Shhhh, Matthias. We’re here to get you out.”
Before she could blink he had hold of her shoulders and had pinned her to the ground.
“Nina,” he growled.
Then his hands closed over her throat.
PART 2
SERVANT AND LEVER
Matthias was dreaming again. Dreaming of her.
In all his dreams he hunted her, sometimes through the new green meadows of spring, but usually through the ice fields, dodging boulders and crevasses with unerring steps. Always he chased, and always he caught her.
In the good dreams, he slammed her to the ground and throttled her, watching the life drain from her eyes, heart full of vengeance – finally, finally. In the bad dreams, he kissed her. In these dreams, she didn’t fight him. She laughed as if the chase was nothing but a game, as if she’d known he would catch her, as if she’d wanted him to and there was no place she’d rather be than beneath him. She was welcoming and perfect in his arms. He kissed her, buried his face in the sweet hollow of her neck. Her curls brushed his cheeks, and he felt that if he could just hold her a little longer, every wound, every hurt, every bad thing would melt away.
“Matthias,” she would whisper, his name so soft on her lips. These were the worst dreams, and when he woke, he hated himself almost as much as he hated her. To know that he could betray himself, betray his country again even in sleep, to know that – after everything she’d done – some sick part of him still hungered after her … it was too much.
Tonight was a bad dream, very bad. She was wearing blue silk, clothes far more luxurious than anything he’d ever seen her in; some kind of gauzy veil was caught up in her hair, the lamplight glinting off of it like caught rain. Djel, she smelled good. The mossy damp was still there, but perfume, too. Nina loved luxury and this was expensive – roses and something else, something his pauper ’s nose didn’t recognise. She pressed her soft lips to his temple, and he could swear she was crying.
“Matthias.”
“Nina,” he managed.