Ludmila sighed and looped her arms around Vika, pulling her into the bars for an embrace. “I may not be your mother, but like Sergei, I have watched you grow, and I consider you my own. You are strong and smart, and however this Game ends, know that you will have done me and Sergei proud. You are a wonder, Vika. I’m blessed to have had you in my life.” Ludmila sniffled, and Vika held her as tight as she could.
Then Ludmila released her and retreated into the middle of her cage. “Now go. Your fate awaits. I cannot keep you from it any longer.”
Renata leaned against her bars. “Be brave,” she said. “Both you and Nikolai.”
Vika blinked back tears and nodded. Then she, like Nikolai, hurried away. She understood now that it was impossible to leave any other way.
He waited for her at the end of Candlestick Point, his back to her, looking out onto the unmoving bay. His dark figure cut against the dawn light, an ominous silhouette from his top hat down to the sharp toe of his boot. Vika’s feet hardly touched the gravel as she approached, but they still stirred the air around her, and it was inconceivable that Nikolai would not have heard. Yet he did not acknowledge her until she was only a few yards away.
Nikolai turned to face her. The knife Galina had given him rested in his gloved hand.
Vika put up a double shield. Unlike Nikolai, she hadn’t put on her gloves this morning, improper as that might be. They had never before impeded her magic, but she was not taking any chances today.
“How have you been?” he asked. “I haven’t seen you in a while.”
Vika narrowed her eyes. Was he actually trying to have a conversation, right here, right now? Or was it a deceptive ploy? She kept her distance. “You saw me yesterday in the palace.”
“You ran away before we had a chance to talk. That hardly counts as seeing you.”
“I did not run, I glided away in a sled. And I did not want to talk.”
He gave her a wry smile. It might have been charming if it weren’t for the dagger he twirled in his hands. “I missed you,” he said. Then he corrected himself. “I missed your enchantments.”
The image of him kissing Renata flashed in Vika’s mind. “It was your move.”
“I was waiting for inspiration. But then Pasha changed the Game, and I had to hold on to my turn.” Nikolai clawed distractedly at the collar of his shirt, where the brand must have been searing into his skin. “But what I wanted to say, and did not get a chance to, was that I am sorry to hear about your father’s passing.”
Vika was dizzy with the conversation. Nikolai hadn’t even mentioned that she’d destroyed all his possessions. Were they enemies fighting a duel? Or were they friends making up for lost time? She didn’t know whether to protect herself or open up to him. “Um, thank you. But it turns out Sergei was not my father.”
“Oh . . . I’m sorry . . . that must have been quite a shock.”
Shock is a mighty understatement.
Nikolai scuffed the heel of his boot on the gravel. “My father also died recently. Although I didn’t know he was my father until after his death. Nearly the mirror opposite of your experience.”
Vika blinked at Nikolai. “Oh. That’s terrible. I’m sorry.”
He shrugged. “I hardly knew him. But thank you.” He looked at her and held her eyes. Vika thought she saw a flicker in his, a shape like a golden eagle, like an echo of their time together on the dream steppe. But then Nikolai looked down at his knife, and the memory of their shared moment evaporated into tense air.
The dagger gleamed. “I don’t want to do this,” he said.
“Then don’t.”
“It’s the only way.”
Vika jerked back to the reality of the Game. She checked her shields, and she began to pace along Candlestick Point, so as not to be too easy a target in a single static space. Who knew what that knife was capable of? Sergei’s simple leather bracelet had been enough to drain his life. Surely Galina’s gift would be equally as powerful, and likely much more vicious.
But Nikolai did not move to aim it at Vika.
“There’s one more thing,” he said.
“Yes?” Vika forced herself to continue walking. If only he would hurry and make his move. If he was going to kill her, she wanted him to end it now, before her own dread choked her.
“I love you,” he said.
“What?”
He smiled sadly. “I was lost from the moment I saw you on Ovchinin Island. It took a long while for me to realize it, but it’s true. I’ve spent my entire life scrambling to fit in and to change myself, Vika, but where I’ve belonged, and who I needed to be, has been right here the whole time. I love you.”
Vika stood in one place, no longer pacing. “But . . . but you kissed Renata.”
Nikolai shook his head. “She’s only a friend.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’ve never wanted anyone but you.”
Vika gasped as the invisible string that connected them pulled taut. She wanted to let it reel her in, to pull her to Nikolai, and him to her. And yet . . . the dagger. “Then what is the knife for?”
“To end the Game.” Nikolai gripped the handle, and sunlight glinted off the sharp edges of the blade.