The Cursed Queen (The Impostor Queen #2)(87)

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.

He’s using his fire to counterbalance my cold. Battling a swoop of frustration, I redouble my plea to the ice. “Come on,” I mutter. “Ouch!”

The flame shrinks back after licking my cheek, and Sig sighs. He says a word in Kupari as if he expects me to understand it. Terah, it sounds like. He says it over and over, and finally I step back from him, from the heat he’s radiating and the undulating torch flame. Both are making me sweat despite my ice. “I have no idea what you’re saying, you idiot!”

Sig makes an irritated noise in his throat, then bends over and swipes the dagger from my leg, the dull training blade I used in my sparring session with Jaspar this morning. I forgot to take it off in my desperation to get away from him. Sig waves it in the air and points to the blade. I don’t strip it from him because he’s clearly not threatening me with it—he’s tapping his fingers along the edge and saying that same word again.

“Blade?” I ask, touching the edge of the dagger. “Is that what you’re saying?”

He closes his fingers around the metal. “Blade?” he asks.

I nod, and so does he. “Blade magic,” he says. Before I can move, he presses the dagger into my hand, then steps behind me. He places one hand on my waist and closes the other around mine, lifting the weapon and pointing it at the torch.

I gaze down the length of my arm, down the edge of the blade, which is now aimed right at the center of the fire. If it was my enemy, all I’d have to do is lunge, and I’d stab it right in the heart. “Oh, heaven,” I whisper. This, I understand. This, I know how to do.

“Ice,” he murmurs, shaking my hand a little and making the tip of the blade tremble. “Blade.”

I concentrate on the ice inside me, drawing it up from the bottomless well where it hides. And this time, instead of begging, I command it. I imagine it sliding along my arm and into the blade, and I gasp as I feel the hilt turn frigid in my grasp. Sig’s hand is hot and clammy over mine, but he smiles as my own skin turns cold, as a lattice of frost begins to grow along the blade, heading for the tip, which is still pointing at the flame. The dull glint of the blood groove that runs the length of the blade focuses my gaze, giving me a path to the heart of my target. Joy bubbles up inside me at the sight of the metal turning white and my ice magic moving toward the fire. This is it. He put a dagger in my hand and it was all I needed. I push the magic forward with all my might, intent on darkness and bitter cold, and delight in watching it eat up the length of the blade.

The weapon shatters with a sharp crack, followed by the spatter of metal splinters pinging off the walls and floor. Sig cries out and stumbles back with his hands over his face, and when I pull them away, his cheek is pocked with two dark shards, blood welling around them. I grimace and pull each of them out as he clenches his jaw and fists, obviously trying not to scream. They plink coldly when I drop them into an empty, shallow stone basin. Failure makes my eyes sting as Sig does the same for me, tugging a needle of metal from my shoulder.

He presses the sleeve of his tunic to the wounds on his face and sighs. “Tomorrow.”