Six of Crows (Six of Crows #1)(58)

She claimed she’d tried to set things right. But even if that were true, what did it matter? Her kind had no honour. She’d proven that.

Someone had brewed coffee, and he saw the crew drinking it from copper mugs with ceramic lids.

The thought to bring Nina a cup entered his head, and he crushed it. He didn’t need to tend to her or tell Brekker that she could use relief. He clenched his fingers, looking at the scabbed knuckles. She had seeded such weakness in him.

Brekker gestured Matthias over to where he, Jesper, and Wylan had gathered on the forecastle deck to examine plans of the Ice Court away from the eyes and ears of the crew. The sight of those drawings was like a knife to his heart. The walls, the gates, the guards. They should have dissuaded these fools, but apparently he was as much a fool as the rest of them.

“Why aren’t there names on anything?” Brekker asked, gesturing at the plans.

“I don’t know Fjerdan, and we need the details right,” Wylan said. “Helvar should do it.” He drew back when he saw Matthias’ expression. “I’m just doing my job. Stop glaring at me.”

“No,” Matthias growled.

“Here,” Kaz said, tossing him a tiny, clear disk that winked in the sun. The demon had propped himself on a barrel and was leaning against the mast, his bad leg elevated on a coil of rope, that cursed walking stick resting on his lap. Matthias liked to imagine breaking it into splinters and feeding them to Brekker one by one.

“What is it?”

“One of Raske’s new inventions.”

Wylan’s head popped up. “I thought he did demo work.”

“He does everything,” said Jesper.

“Wedge it between your back teeth,” Kaz said as he handed the disks to the others. “But don’t bite dow—”

Wylan started to sputter and cough, clawing at his mouth. A transparent film had spread over his lips; it bulged like a frog’s gullet as he tried to breathe, eyes darting left and right in panic.

Jesper started laughing, and Kaz just shook his head. “I told you not to bite down, Wylan. Breathe through your nose.”

The boy took deep inhales, nostrils flaring.

“Easy,” said Jesper. “You’re going to make yourself pass out.”

“What is this?” asked Matthias, still holding the tiny disk in his palm.

Kaz pushed his deep into his mouth, wiggling it between his teeth. “Baleen. I’d planned to save these, but after that ambush, I don’t know what kind of trouble we may run into on the open sea. If you go over and can’t come up for air, wiggle it free and bite down. It will buy you ten minutes of breathing time. Less if you panic,” he said with a meaningful look at Wylan. He gave the boy another piece of baleen. “Be careful with that one.” Then he tapped the Ice Court plans.

“Names, Helvar. All of them.”

Reluctantly, Matthias picked up the pen and ink Wylan had laid out and began to scratch in the names of the buildings and surrounding roads. Somehow doing it himself felt even more treasonous.

Part of him wondered if he could simply find a way to separate from the group once they got there, reveal their location, and thereby win his way back into the good graces of his government. Would anyone at the Ice Court even recognise him? He was probably believed to be dead, drowned in the shipwreck that had killed his closest friends and Commander Brum. He had no proof of his true identity. He would be a stranger who had no business in the Ice Court, and by the time he got anyone to listen—

“You’re holding back,” Brekker said, his dark eyes trained on Matthias.

Matthias ignored the shiver that passed through him. Sometimes it was like the demon could read minds. “I’m telling you what I know.”

“Your conscience is interfering with your memory. Remember the terms of our deal, Helvar.”

“All right,” Matthias said, his anger rising. “You want my expertise? Your plan won’t work.”

“You don’t even know my plan.”

“In through the prison, out through the embassy?”

“As a start.”

“It can’t be done. The prison sector is completely isolated from the rest of the Ice Court. It isn’t connected to the embassy. There’s no way to reach it from there.”

“It has a roof, doesn’t it?”

“You can’t get to the roof,” Matthias said with satisfaction. “The drüskelle spend three months working with Grisha prisoners and guards as part of our training. I’ve been in the prison, and there’s no access to the roof for exactly that reason – if someone manages to get out of his cell, we don’t want him running around the Ice Court. The prison is totally sealed off from the other two sectors in the outer circle. Once you’re in, you’re in.”

“There’s always a way out.” Kaz pulled the prison plan from the stack. “Five floors, right?

Processing area, and four levels of cells. So what’s here? In the basement?”

“Nothing. A laundry and the incinerator.”

“The incinerator.”

“Yes, where they burn the convicts’ clothes when they arrive. It’s a plague precaution but—” As soon as the words left Matthias’ mouth he understood what Brekker had in mind. “Sweet Djel, you want us to climb six storeys up an incinerator shaft?”