It takes me four or five days to recover, during which time I live off tea and toast from the dining hall. Luckily Hedeon caught it too, so I don’t have to drag myself too far to keep an eye on him. Leo hates laying around, so he pretends to be recovered, though he still sounds like an asthmatic seal. Hedeon looks like walking death—he’s been so sick that he hasn’t even been trying to “accidentally” sit by Cara at every single meal.
Every minute I’m expecting a call or text from my mom. When she does update me, her messages are encouraging but vague. She met up with Adrik and they’re gathering information, trying to make absolutely certain that we’ve found the right place. We’ll only get one shot at this.
I’m dying to see Nix. My constant excuses to her so that I can keep tracking Hedeon are really starting to piss her off. She thinks I don’t want to see her, when in reality I could peel my own flesh off my bones out of sheer desperation.
Finally my mother texts me late in the afternoon, telling me to find a private spot so we can speak.
As soon as I call her, she says, “It’s time.”
The word “time” vibrates in my ear like a bell. I’m frozen in place, hearing my lips say, “You found him? He’s there?”
“I’m certain of it,” she says, quietly.
I’ve never been so excited and so scared. All the clarity of what we’re doing here comes rushing back to me.
“What do I have to do?”
“Marko is here, and Kuzmo too. We need one of them to open the cell door—you can guess which one I’d prefer.”
“I’ll call in my favor with Miles Griffin,” I say. “The timing is perfect—Marko is due to see his accountant at the Four Seasons. Miles could meet him there.”
“Set it for tomorrow night. Take the Chancellor’s boat and meet me in Dubrovnik. Dom, Adrik, and Freya will pick us up with a plane. Don’t forget the scuba gear.”
“Do I tell Hugo I need to borrow his boat?”
My mother laughs. “Let it be a nice surprise for him.”
I leave the cluster of bare-branched trees in which I sequestered myself, walking in a daze across the chill, snowless ground. I almost plough into Nix, who’s striding with her usual aggressive speed, bright patches of color whipped into her cheeks from the wind.
“There you are!” she cries. “What are you doing way over here? It’s fucking freezing.”
“Artillery class,” I lie. “What about you?”
“Environmental Adaptation,” she says, abruptly adding, “Are you avoiding me?”
“No, of course not. I’m sorry, I’ve just had so much—”
“Oh, save it,” she says. “Do you want to see me tonight or not?”
She tilts up her chin in her usual forthright way, demanding an honest answer of me. Her nose has a slight upward tilt to it, like a ski jump, which prevents her features from ever seeming truly severe.
I’d love to run my finger down that adorable curve.
But she’d probably bite my hand off.
“I want to see you,” I tell her. “Badly.”
I know it’s wrong, but I can’t help myself. I want one last night with Nix where she looks at me with those fierce green eyes, and kisses me with that relentless hunger, and blurts out one of her awfully penetrating comments that makes me feel like she pulled another private file out of my brain, rifled through, and read it back to me in question form.
I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow night.
All I know for certain is that things will never be the same between Nix and me.
She’ll know that I lied. That I used her. That I was her enemy all along.
After tomorrow, she’ll fucking despise me.
So tonight might well be our last night together. And I’m not missing it, not for anything, not even if it’s fucked up to do this to her.
Hedeon shouldn’t be a problem, he could hardly hold his spoon up at breakfast. I bet he’s asleep by 8:00.
“Meet me at the underground pool tonight,” I tell her.
I want one last look at my rusalka in her natural habitat.
All that afternoon and evening, I can hardly sit still.
“What’s up with you?” Leo rasps, still barely able to speak.
“Gonna see Nix tonight,” I mutter.
“That’s great, man. I’m really happy for you,” Leo says.
God I wish I deserved that congratulations.
I fucking hate what I’m about to do to Nix. I regret that I ever allowed things to go this far. But at the same time . . . how in the fuck can I regret anything at all? I’m crazy about her. I can’t wish we never met.
I have no choice in any of this.
I have to help my father. That one goal has been the center of my universe for three and a half years now. I can’t stop this close to the finish line. I can’t even slacken my pace—not for a single step, not even for Nix.
So that night, I watch while Hedeon picks at his dinner, his eyes ringed with dark circles. He says, sleepily, to the table at large, “I’m going to bed, I feel like shit.”
“Good night,” Cara Wilk calls from across the table.
Hedeon doesn’t even look up.
I look across at Nix, catching her eye and mouthing, “One hour.”
She grins.
I spend that time in the Octagon Tower, making absolutely certain that Hedeon really went to sleep and won’t come wandering out looking for tea or another blanket.
I’m mildly concerned that Kenzo Tanaka might wake him up when he goes to bed.
“You planning to stay up studying?” I ask Kenzo, seeing the pile of books spread across the common room table.
“I’m gonna sleep right here,” Kenzo says, nodding to the blanket stolen off his bed, and the artfully arranged cushions on the sofa. “I’m the only one in this whole damn tower who hasn’t caught the flu yet, and I sure as fuck don’t want whatever strain is trying to kill Hedeon.”
Inwardly rejoicing, I head back to my room to grab my swimsuit.
Leo’s out with Anna, who apparently doesn’t share Kenzo’s fear of germs. She hasn’t stopped swapping spit with Leo for a single day, though apparently her constitution is stronger—she hasn’t caught so much as a sniffle.
Pulling on the rest of my clothes to counteract the cold, I hurry down to the Armory.
I don’t see Nix in the water yet. The shimmering, pale green surface of the pool is as smooth as a mirror.
I strip off my clothes. Then, following a strange impulse that wants nothing between my skin and the water, I pull off my suit, too, before descending the steps.
Compared to the chilly, windy night, the underground pool feels warm as blood. I walk down into the water, the pale limestone steps rough against the soles of my feet.
This pool is a hundred meters deep at least. We took scuba lessons here our first year at Kingmakers.
I’ve sunk all the way down to the bottom, the column of water as heavy as a building on top of us.
The floodlights set in the walls only illuminate so far down. They can have a blinding effect, shining upward. Anything could be beneath my feet.
At that very moment, something seizes me by the legs and yanks me down.
I’m so surprised that I don’t even close my eyes. The saltwater burns as I stare into the pale, unearthly face of Nix Moroz, her crimson hair floating around her head in a corona.