Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(67)

He wanted to keep the grisly reality from his best friend, but he found that he was too tired and too afraid to lie. His throat burning, Alfie told him the truth.

He told him everything—the poisoning, the release of the dark magic, the little servant boy’s earring, facing Ignacio, and what he’d learned of the magic’s goal to find Sombra’s bones from that horrid little song (Finn startled at this information; he had yet to talk to her about it). He hadn’t been this honest with Luka in months, and the information flew past his lips as if he were pulling colored scarves from his mouth, hand over hand, like a magician.

When Alfie finally fell quiet, Luka only stared at him, wide-eyed. He was too stunned to speak, which was very much a first for him.

When Alfie couldn’t bear the silence any longer he held his hands out, open-palmed. “What has happened is my fault, but I couldn’t let you go. I couldn’t lose you in that room.” Alfie whisked a hand over his eyes. “I know this is my responsibility and for once I don’t want to run away from my duties and my kingdom, I want to save it. Por favor, will you help me?”

Silence curdled between them once more and Alfie waited for the shock on Luka’s face to settle and change into something else.

Luka stepped forward and pulled Alfie into a fierce hug.

Alfie gripped him back, and the wave of relief that Luka was alive, here to be embraced and argued with, swept him away from his fear of what he’d done, if only for a moment.

“You’re a fool,” Luka said, his voice thick. He pulled back and took Alfie by the shoulders. “But I’m still here because of your foolishness. Tell me how I can help.”





22


The Plan


“So,” Luka began, his gaze darting between Alfie and Finn. “You’re telling me you two have absolutely no plan for how to stop this?”

Finn eyes rolled heavenward. “You’re a perceptive one, aren’t you?”

“We don’t,” Alfie said, before Finn could pull Luka into an argument. “Not quite. Not yet.”

Luka stared at him as if the answer were obvious. “Then we must go to Paloma; there’s no other choice. She will know what to do. She has to, doesn’t she?”

Panic pulled at Alfie’s stomach. He couldn’t disappoint Paloma again. He couldn’t tell her that he’d undone the work of the due?os before her for his own reasons. The thought alone had his palms slick with sweat.

“No, I can come up with a plan to fix this, and it’s not as if the due?os had this under control. That method that they used to hide the magic away did not stop me from finding it and setting it free. If I could do that, others will be able to as well. We need to find our own way to trap the magic and put it someplace completely untouchable, unfindable. A place where there is no life for it to feast on, no bodies for it to infect,” Alfie said, wringing his hands. “Just give me a moment.”

Alfie’s mind raced with possibilities, each one building only to burst at the slightest prodding, like a soap bubble. Each idea gave way to doubts, to flaws in his logic, to failure. Luka watched him, his eyes sharp. If Alfie didn’t come up with something now, then Luka would tell Paloma for sure.

Finn broke the silence, throwing her hands up in the air with a growl of frustration. “I can’t believe I was stupid enough to listen to you. I’m not going to wait here like some sitting duck for Ignacio to find while you come up with another half-baked plan. I should’ve known that some pampered bruxo like you would just pull me into more trouble without even an inkling of how to clean up your own maldito mess.”

The snap of her voice rubbed him raw. He gritted his teeth. “You know nothing about me.”

Her eyes swept over him, from head to toe and back again. “I know enough.”

Anger zipped through him, moving his feet until he was before her, nearly chest to chest. “Why do you enjoy making people feel small?”

She raised her chin. He couldn’t understand how she could be so much shorter than him yet make him feel as if she were looking down her nose at him.

“Don’t kid yourself,” she said, challenge written in every line of her face. “I didn’t make you small; you were small to begin with.”

Her words burned through him, pitting his stomach with nothing short of fury. “In my experience, those who do this only do it because they themselves feel small, insignificant.”

“Did your mamá tell you that after a long day of servants kissing your ass after they scrubbed it clean—”

“Hey!” Luka shouted. “Cállate! Both of you!”

Alfie tore his eyes from Finn’s smirking face, the anger inside of him falling to a crackling simmer. If they couldn’t even handle a conversation without screaming at one another, how were they going to get through this mess? He internally chided himself. Ignacio was terrorizing his kingdom with Sombra’s magic and he was letting himself get distracted by a bout of name-calling. He shuddered to think of what the black-eyed man was doing to his people while Alfie sat safe and sound in his palace. Shame pooled in him.

“Look,” Luka said. “I have an idea.” He glanced at Alfie then, his eyes skittish. “You’re not going to like it.”

Luka seldom looked this uncomfortable. A knot drew tight in Alfie’s stomach.