*
After the evening meal, I tell Halina I’m tired and need to sleep. I don’t tell her I know Nisse has followed her advice and sent scouts into the Loputon Forest to find more magical allies for our invasion, because I’m afraid it would stir up my anger and desperation. Especially after the look Kauko gave me after I failed yet again to control the magic inside me this afternoon—like a child mourning a broken toy. The ice and fire simmer beneath my surface tonight, begging release. I feel like I did last night, when Thyra collapsed under the heat of my jagged, rage-driven fire and needed Kauko to revive her, and I spent a night roiling with nightmares that brought it back over and over, sharper and hotter and more devastating each time.
Her eyes, staring. Refusing to let me hide. Her words. Refusing to let me blame my crimes on a curse that never was. You can only blame yourself. . . .
The guilt makes me sick, and I don’t need the weight of Halina to make it worse.
I also don’t trust her, though. It was childish to ever have trusted her at all.
“Maybe you could go check with the tailor and find out when my new cloak and tunic will be ready,” I suggest.
I expect her to argue, but perhaps she senses my mood, if not my plan, because she immediately heads for the door. “Of course,” she says. “I know you’ll probably be glad to have some clothes that fit.”
I grin. “You have no idea.” I don’t either, really. I don’t actually care. I wave her out the door with a yawn, telling her I plan to sleep like a bear in the winter. But as soon as the noise of her footsteps fades, I’m peeking into the corridor and praying Sig hasn’t given up on me like Nisse and Kauko have.
My heart beats unsteadily as I jog up the corridor, through the maze of dim, dank stone, until I reach the hallway where Sig sleeps—both of us are kept here, away from sunlight and wood. Before I make it two steps toward his door, he loops his arm around my waist and hauls me into an empty chamber. I buck against him instinctively, and he clenches his teeth over a groan of pain. As I turn to him, he’s lifting the fabric of his shirt off his back—where only a day ago I saw oozing wounds from a whip. “Did Kauko do that to you?” I ask, gesturing at his back.
Sig’s eyes go half closed. He nods.
“You have power,” I say. “Fire.” His chin lifts when he hears the familiar word. He glances at an unlit torch in a bracket on the wall, and it bursts into flame. I step away as the flames flutter toward the ceiling. “So why would you allow him to whip you?”
I’m not sure he understands all my words, but he seems to hear the question, and guesses the meaning as I stare at the fire he brought to life with a mere thought. “Only fire, no ice,” he says quietly, looking away. “Kauko . . . both. Both ice and fire. Like you. Very strong. But . . . you are strongest.”
I snort. “If I am, it doesn’t matter. I can’t control it.”
“The Valtia is strong. The Valtia is magic.” His Kupari accent mangles the words, but he speaks slowly so I can understand. There’s something almost pleading in his voice, and it’s tinged with frustration. I can tell by the way he’s looking at me that there is so much more he wants to say. Does he want me to help him get away from Kauko?
“I’ll be stronger if you teach me. You said you could.”
“Teach.” He arches an eyebrow and points to the torch. “Make dark. With ice.”
“Are you insane?” He’s seen me fail at tasks like this before. “I’ll fill this entire room with a blizzard and make your blood turn to frost.” And even then, the torch will probably remain lit.
He laughs, and flames dance in his eyes. “Try, Valtia.”
I shove him. “Call me that again, and I’ll cut your tongue out.”
He’s still laughing, and he taps his fingers to his thumb, as if telling me he’s not impressed by my talk. Or maybe that he doesn’t understand it. And then he crooks his finger at the torch flame, and a tendril of fire slides from its center, snaking toward my face. “Make dark with ice,” he repeats.
Already regretting taking this risk just to fail yet again, I glare at the flame, wishing for a cold so pure that there is no escaping it. The ice grows along my bones, frosting my skin and making me shudder, and as the fire twinkles merrily, even Sig gets goose bumps along the pale skin of his throat. But then he winks, and the room grows hotter again. “More,” he whispers as the flame creeps closer, making me wince.