Suddenly, it seemed as if the air grew thinner, and Vika’s head swam as she tried to make sense of everything Nikolai was saying, everything Vika wanted him to say. And to not say. But she had to ask.
“You love me, so you’re going to kill me?”
“I love you,” Nikolai said, “so I want you to live.”
“I don’t underst—”
“Galina said this knife would never miss.” He pointed the dagger at his chest. “This is my fifth move.”
No, he couldn’t mean to— “Nikolai! Stop!”
Vika lunged and threw a wave of magic at him.
But he was too quick. He thrust the knife deep into himself. It plunged up under his ribs on a direct path to his heart.
The violence of his act pierced through Vika, and she felt as if her heart, too, had been impaled. Her scream split the sky and shattered the morning’s remains.
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
Nikolai was still standing. He didn’t feel a thing, when he should have felt the blade slicing through muscle and grating against bone. When he should have been buckling in a pool of red. When Death was supposed to have come to claim him.
He looked down at himself. There was no knife in his hands. What? How?
And then he looked up at Vika, who had just screamed. Her eyes were wide, and a hilt protruded from her chest. Blood drenched the bodice of her dress.
“Nikolai . . . ,” she gasped.
“Vika!” Unlike the night along the canal, he was quick enough this time to catch her before she hit the ground. He cradled her tenderly against his body. Her breathing was already shallow.
Galina had said the knife would not miss. So how . . . ?
Nikolai drew in a guillotine-sharp breath. Galina. The conniving, venomous harpy. She had known before Nikolai did that his weakness—his compassion for the tiger, for the lorises, for Vika—might lead him to attempt to end the Game by killing himself. So Galina had charmed the knife to hit the target she thought it ought to. Like she’d said, the knife would never miss.
“Vika. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know . . . It was supposed to be me, not you.”
She turned her head toward him, but her eyes were far away. Even the green in them seemed diluted.
He pressed his fingers to her throat and felt her pulse beneath her skin. The beat faltered. Then it recovered, but the rhythm was uneven.
What have I done, what have I done, what have I done?
“Vika, listen to me. I’ll fix this. There must be some way to reverse it. You need to hold on. Hold on while I figure out how to right this.”
She wheezed and more blood gushed from her wound.
I have to close it, Nikolai thought. But he had never done anything like it before. Galina had trained him as a master of mechanics. But what good was shipbuilding and fabric manipulating at a time like this? And the only way she had taught him to handle life was to end it. Damn her and her blasted tigers.
If only Vika could heal herself, like she did for the animals on her island. But she hadn’t the strength. “Why can’t I give you mine?” Nikolai let out a tortured wail.
But why couldn’t he?
Sergei had channeled his energy into Vika. And Aizhana had taken life from other life. Nikolai didn’t know how it was done, but the fact was, it had been done. And now it was his only hope. He would have to cobble together a way how.
“I don’t know how to heal you, Vika, but I’m going to try to siphon some of my energy to you. And then . . . I don’t know. Then I hope you’ll have enough strength that you can heal yourself.”
She didn’t respond.
Nikolai squeezed his eyes shut for a second. “Please let this work.” Then he opened them again and gritted his teeth.
Go. He tried to command his energy, in the same way he ordinarily directed his thoughts toward objects he wanted to move. Go.
He waved his hands. Nothing.
He pointed with his fingers. No response.
He even tried blowing energy out through his mouth, to no avail.
Go, go, go.
Vika’s head drooped in his arms.
He propped her up and cradled her tighter, so close it was as if they were waltzing rather than dying. The panic rose in his chest; his own heartbeat accelerated to the speed of a mazurka.
And then . . . yes.
Like a dance. Like my enchantment at the masquerade.
But this time, instead of the rhythm of the orchestra, it would be the rhythm of Nikolai’s own heart. And instead of charming Vika’s feet to follow the tune of the mazurka, he would charm her stumbling pulse to follow his stronger one. Like any good dancer, he would lead her where he needed her to go.
Please work.
Nikolai closed his eyes. He focused on the steady beat of his heart. Ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-thump. He charmed Vika’s heart next, convincing himself it was the same as charming her feet, and he channeled the rhythm of his pulse like music into her veins.
Her heart tripped.
“Listen to the rhythm,” he whispered. Ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-thump.
Her heart stumbled again.
No. Like this: Ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-thump.