Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(59)

The dragon warmed on his chest, as if it needed the command of another to live. As if begging to be mastered. He’d kept his magic black as tar just as it had been when he’d trapped the magic, so maybe the dragon had protected him because it saw Alfie as one of its own—as a being of dark magic.

Still, it made no sense. Magic of the same shade never harmed its own, and yet this magic had frozen the crazed man before him. The only rule this magic seemed to follow was that whoever mastered it could use it in any way, without question.

Alfie looked at the man in front of him. He was still frozen, but pieces of him were beginning to thaw. His eyes were no longer stuck in one position. He watched Alfie intently, his eyes narrowing. The prince didn’t have time to think on it any longer. He needed to kill this man and seal the magic within him, put an end to all the trouble he’d caused.

Alfie dashed forward and pulled a blade of ice from the air. He would need to stab the man’s heart to free the magic within him. Fear thrilling through him, Alfie made to plunge the ice dagger into his chest. As his arm came forward in an arc toward the man’s heart, Ignacio unfroze and snatched him by the wrist.

“Very nice try,” he tutted with the tone of an amused teacher. “But not quite.”

Without another word he swung Alfie by the arm, throwing him as easily as one would a stick for a dog to fetch. Alfie rolled to a stop on his back beside Finn. The throw had jarred whatever control he’d had on the dark magic sealed in the dragon. Finn stirred to life, the terror written in her body in full motion again as she clapped her hands more tightly around her ears, as if trying to wish the present away into the past.

Alfie rolled onto all fours and crawled in front of Finn, kneeling ahead of her.

“Leave her alone!” he shouted. Ignacio only cocked his head at Alfie in curiosity, as if wondering what foolish request he would make next.

“Just run,” Finn whispered behind him. “Go.”

Alfie looked at her over his shoulder. She held her bleeding heel in her hands. The hopelessness on her face held him where he stood. She’d stayed with him in the pub when he could hardly breathe from fear; he would not leave her to weather this on her own.

Ignacio gave an annoyed sound. “You’ve overstayed your welcome, muchacho.”

Ignacio raised his hand, his fingers splayed, before squeezing it into a fist, and Alfie mourned the fact that this would be the last thing he ever saw.

Ignacio watched the boy kneel before Finn. His eyes were screwed shut, his face tight with fear as he waited for the inevitable. He could see his daughter over the boy’s shoulder, her eyes clinging resolutely to his back as if she were willing him to stay alive.

He smiled.

She was still the same girl, still wishing her father would show mercy when what she truly needed was discipline. He would kill this boy and bring her into line once more.

Ignacio squeezed his hand into a fist, willing his strings to tear through the boy, flaying him from the inside out.

Nothing happened. He tried again. Still nothing. Where had his power gone?

Ignacio . . . The dark magic spoke in his mind, its voice a braided tangle of whispers and hisses. We promised you the girl. We’ve allowed you a taste of her pain, but you shall have no more until you do as we asked, do as you promised.

“No, please just let me—”

No! The hisses came sharp and angry, sending a shock through his body. Ignacio stilled and waited for the blinding pain to pass. First we work to spread and take what is ours. Then the girl.

Ignacio gritted his teeth. “Fine.”

With a swipe of his hand the Brim filled with life once more. Finn and the boy looked around in shock as festive music sounded around them. Finn scuttled away like a wounded animal and Ignacio clutched the image tight in his mind to savor. “I’ll be back for you, Finn. You know how I love to find you.”

Ignacio stepped backward into the rushing crowds of the Brim, disappearing from sight.





20


The Prince and the Door


The black-eyed man had disappeared.

The Brim surged back to life, shoppers and merchants haggling once more. No one took notice of Alfie kneeling in the dirt when there was tequila to drink and songs to sing.

“He’s gone,” Alfie said, his voice hoarse. In the face of death, something had clotted his throat. When he stood, his body strained painfully beneath his weight, sore from the dark magic.

Behind him, Finn said nothing. She was too still, as if Ignacio had frozen her once more.

Alfie approached her slowly, his voice hushed. “Finn. Can you hear me?”

She started at that, her eyes finding his before darting away. Her throat was working. “I said I’d help you, but I can’t. Not if he’s here.” Her face twisted with an emotion that didn’t seem right for it. “I can’t.” She turned and dashed through the roaming crowds of the Brim.

“Finn!” Alfie shouted after her, following as she darted through an opening between stalls and burst out the other side into another stretch of the Brim. They had moved from the dress section into a lane of stalls that specialized in hand-carved wood.

“Finn, please,” he said as she ducked into a stone alley between two shops. “Wait!”

She stopped then but did not turn to look at him. Her back quivered and Alfie could think only of the last time they’d been in an alley, of her smirk as she’d fought him after the cambió game. She might as well have been a different person now.