Nocturna (A Forgery of Magic #1)(90)
She was caught.
“Gods,” the guard said, “where the hell did you come from, girl?”
As Finn unsheathed a dagger from her belt, the guard grinned down at her and brandished his long blade.
He bent forward, his hands on his knees as if he were addressing a child. “What’s a little thing like you gonna do with a little thing like that?”
Finn glared at him before snapping forward into a crouch and thrusting the dagger through his boot and into his foot. The man screamed as she leaned her weight on the dagger.
“I’m sure you know how annoying a little prick can be,” she growled before giving the blade a sharp twist.
The man cried out again and tried to swing his sword at her. She ducked, pulling her dagger from his foot and punching him in the nose with the same hand. The yowling guard stumbled back against the bars of a cell. The prisoner within grabbed him, holding him fast against the bars. The other inmates began to cheer and point.
The prisoner choking the guard shouted, “Let me out, muchacha! Let us all out!”
A chant broke out among the cells, growing stronger and stronger as more prisoners caught on.
“LET US OUT! LET US OUT!”
The four guards on the other side of the floor were rushing toward her. The ones on lower floors pointed up at her, leaning over the banisters to get a better look.
“LET US OUT! LET US OUT!”
The guards were closing in from both sides of the circular floor. Even if she pulled the hood up, she wouldn’t be able to get away without bumping into them. She needed a distraction. A big one.
The dragon warmed against her chest, pulsing like a second heartbeat.
Every set of fireworks she’d laid exploded in deafening booms, filling the tower with bursts of color.
Alfie stood beside one of the many kitchen sinks, slowly drying freshly washed bowls.
Finn had been right. Taking a break in the kitchen while she set the fireworks had made his spotty vision clearer. His head still ached, but the pain was dull now instead of piercing. Though he couldn’t help but wonder if Finn was all right. He’d been left with the other due?os in the kitchen for longer than he’d expected. Shouldn’t she be back by now? Then again, he reasoned, Finn was laying the fireworks on all eight floors of the central tower above him. No easy task.
Alfie put down his dishrag and worried the long sleeves of his due?o’s robes between his fingers. He looked up at the stone ceiling of the kitchen and imagined her at the top of the tower beneath that maddening ticking clock, eight floors above him. He wished he could turn to smoke and float up through the floors until he hovered at her side like a weightless ghost.
Alfie gasped, tipping forward as pain moved through him in widening ripples. With gritted teeth, he braced himself against the sink. Why did his body ring with pain again when he wasn’t using the magic? Was this just an echo from the last time he’d called upon it?
The raucous pops and squeals of fireworks rang out from above the kitchen.
Alfie stiffened. The due?os paused in their work, eyeing one another warily.
“Damn it,” Alfie cursed under his breath. How could she be so foolish? That thought stumbled in his mind, incorrect. Finn was reckless, but she was also a sleek criminal who could probably nail a fly to a tree with one of her daggers. She wasn’t one to make a mistake like this.
Had she set the fireworks off because she was in danger? Did she need help?
Alfie stood paralyzed, unsure of what to do. Should he use the distraction as they planned and go after Xiomara now or try to find Finn and make sure she was all right?
As the due?os began to call for the guards, Alfie dashed out of the kitchens, his mind made up. If the distraction was happening now, he needed to get to Xiomara’s cell. Finn was clever enough to know she should meet him there. He worried for her, but it could not trump his worry for his kingdom and this dark magic. There was no choice, he told himself, and yet part of him burned with the thought that he was choosing wrongly.
The sweaty stretch of hallway beyond the kitchen was empty, likely because no guards wanted to spend the day close to the stifling heat. He was on the bottom floor of the prison, and the more dangerous the criminal, the higher the floor—Xiomara’s cell was on the highest level of the prison. How was he going to get there before the fireworks stopped and the guards returned to their posts?
But then, there was a way. A risky way, but a way all the same.
Magic was fluid, it always had been. It was why when he’d said the words of a nursery song instead of words of healing magic, it was enough to heal Finn. It was the strength of the memory of his mother singing it to him when he was hurt that made the magic work. He had very strong memories of the hallway of the prisoner’s cell where Paloma had stopped him. The memories were potent because they were painful. He’d thrown one of his greatest mentors against a wall like some monster.
He could remember it so clearly it was as if he were standing in that corridor again, his fists shaking at his sides. The guard he’d paid to sneak him in had led him up endless flights of stairs.
When Alfie was finally brought to the prisoner’s door, only a pane of wood separating him from the woman who took his brother from him, Paloma was there waiting for him. Alfie’s heart had sputtered in his chest at the sight. He’d been so careful. How could she have known about his plans? Then a wave of anger replaced the shock. How could she stand in his way when he needed this so badly?