Without another word, she unslung it from her shoulder. He snatched it from her, running back toward the cathedral. If he could just make it up to the arcade.
The siren sounded. Too late. He’d never make it in time. He was going to fail them all. What good is a shooter without his guns? What good was Jesper if he couldn’t make the shot? They’d be trapped in this city. They’d be jailed, probably executed. Kuwei would be sold to the highest bidder. Parem would burn a swath through the world and Grisha would be hunted with even more fervor. In Fjerda, the Wandering Isle, Novyi Zem. The zowa would vanish, pressed into military service, devoured by this curse of a drug.
The siren rose and fell. There were shouts inside the cathedral. People were running for the main doors; soon they’d spill over into the thumb, seeking another way out.
Anyone can shoot, but not everybody can aim. His mother’s voice. We’re zowa. You and me.
Impossible. He couldn’t even get eyes on Kuwei from here—and no one could shoot around a corner.
But Jesper knew the layout of the cathedral well enough. He knew it was a straight shot up the aisle to where the auction block stood. He could see the second button of Kuwei’s shirt in his mind’s eye.
Impossible.
A bullet had only one trajectory.
But what if that bullet could be guided?
Not everybody can aim.
“Jesper?” said Inej from behind him. He raised his rifle. It was an ordinary firearm, but he’d converted it himself. There was only a single round inside it—nonlethal, a mixture of wax and rubber. If he missed, someone could be hurt badly. But if he didn’t shoot, a lot of people would be hurt. Hell , Jesper thought, maybe if I miss Kuwei, I’ll take out one of Van Eck’s eyes .
He’d worked with gunsmiths, made his own ammunition. He knew his guns better than he knew the rules of Makker’s Wheel. Jesper focused on the bullet, sensed the smallest parts of it. Maybe he was the same. A bullet in a chamber, spending his whole life waiting for the moment when he would have direction.
Anyone can shoot.
“Inej,” he said, “if you have a spare prayer, this would be the time for it.”
He fired.
It was as if time slowed—he felt the kick of the rifle, the unstoppable momentum of the bullet. With all his will, he focused on its wax casing and pulled to the left, the shot still ringing in his ears. He felt the bullet turn, focused on that button, the second button, a little piece of wood, the threads holding it in place.
It’s not a gift. It’s a curse. But when it came down to it, Jesper’s life had been full of blessings. His father. His mother. Inej. Nina. Matthias leading them across the muddy canal. Kaz—even Kaz, with all his cruelties and failings, had given him a home and a family in the Dregs when Ketterdam might have swallowed him whole. And Wylan. Wylan who had understood before Jesper ever had that the power inside him might be a blessing too.
“What did you just do?” asked Inej.
Maybe nothing. Maybe the impossible. Jesper never could resist long odds.
He shrugged. “The same thing I always do. I took a shot.”
K az had been standing next to Kuwei when the bullet struck and had been the first to his side. He heard a smattering of gunfire in the cathedral, most likely panicked stadwatch officers with hasty trigger fingers. Kaz knelt over Kuwei’s body, hiding his left hand from view, and jabbed a syringe into the Shu boy’s arm. There was blood everywhere. Jellen Radmakker had fallen to the stage and was bellowing, “I’ve been shot!” He had not been shot.
Kaz shouted for the medik. The little bald man stood paralyzed beside the stage where he’d been tending to Wylan, his face horror-stricken. Matthias seized the medik’s elbow and dragged him over.
People were still pushing to get out of the church. A brawl had erupted between the Ravkan soldiers and the Fjerdans as Sturmhond, Zoya, and Genya bolted for an exit. The members of the Merchant Council had surrounded Van Eck with a clutch of men from the stadwatch . He wasn’t going anywhere.
A moment later, Kaz saw Inej and Jesper pushing against the tide of people trying to escape down the center aisle. Kaz let his eyes scan Inej once. She was bloody, and her eyes were red and swollen, but she seemed all right.
“Kuwei—” said Inej.
“We can’t help him now,” said Kaz.
“Wylan!” Jesper said, taking in the cuts and rapidly forming bruises. “Saints, is all that real?”
“Anika and Keeg did a number on him.”
“I wanted it to be believable,” said Wylan.
“I admire your commitment to the craft,” said Kaz. “Jesper, stay with Wylan. They’re going to want to question him.”
“I’m fine,” said Wylan, though his lip was so swollen it sounded more like, “I’b fibe.”
Kaz spared a single nod for Matthias as two stadwatch guards lifted Kuwei’s body onto a stretcher. Instead of fighting the crowds in the cathedral, they headed for the arch that led to Ghezen’s little finger and the exit beyond. Matthias trailed them, pulling the medik along. There could be no questions surrounding Kuwei’s survival.
Kaz and Inej followed them into the nave, but Inej paused at the archway. Kaz saw her look once over her shoulder, and when he tracked her gaze he saw that Van Eck, surrounded by furious councilmen, was staring right back at her. He remembered the words she’d spoken to Van Eck on Goedmedbridge, You will see me once more, but only once. From the nervous bob of Van Eck’s throat, he was remembering too. Inej gave the smallest bow.
They raced up the pinky nave and into the chapel. But the door to the street and the canal beyond was locked. Behind them, the door to the chapel banged shut. Pekka Rollins leaned back against it, surrounded by four of his Dime Lion crew.
“Right on time,” said Kaz.
“I suppose you predicted this too, you tricksy bastard?”
“I knew you wouldn’t let me walk away this time.”
“No,” Rollins conceded. “When you came to me looking for money, I should have gutted you and your friends and saved myself a lot of hassle. That was foolish of me.” Rollins began to shrug off his jacket. “I can admit I didn’t show you the proper respect, lad, but now you’ve got it. Congratulations. You’re worth the time it’s going to take me to beat you to death with that stick of yours.” Inej drew her knives. “No, no, little girl,” Rollins said warningly. “This is between me and this skivstain upstart.”
Kaz nodded to Inej. “He’s right. We’re long overdue for a chat.”
Rollins laughed, unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling up his sleeves. “The time for talk is over, lad. You’re young, but I’ve been brawling since long before you were born.”
Kaz didn’t move; he kept his hands resting on his cane. “I don’t need to fight you, Rollins. I’m going to offer you a trade.”
“Ah, a fair exchange in the Church of Barter. You cost me a lot of money and earned me a lot of trouble with your scheming. I don’t see what you could possibly have to offer that would satisfy me as much as killing you with my bare hands.”
“It’s about the Kaelish Prince.”
“Three stories of paradise, the finest gambling den on East Stave. You plant a bomb there or something?”
“No, I mean the little Kaelish prince.” Rollins stilled. “Fond of sweets, red hair like his father. Doesn’t take very good care of his toys.”
Kaz reached into his coat and drew out a small crocheted lion. It was a faded yellow, its yarn mane tangled—and stained by dark soil. Kaz let it drop to the floor.
Rollins stared at it. “What is that?” he said, his voice little more than a whisper. Then, as if coming back to himself, he shouted, “What is that? ”
“You know what it is, Rollins. And weren’t you the one who told me how much alike you and Van Eck are? Men of industry, building something to leave behind. Both of you so concerned with your legacy. What good is all that if there’s no one to leave it to? So I found myself asking, just who is he building for?”