The Crown's Game (The Crown's Game, #1)(22)

The parchment hovered beside the tsar, and he read its timeworn instructions. “Bolshebnoie Duplo has been imbued with ancient enchantments that will bind you to the Game and to Russia. Now, reveal your true selves to me.”

Nikolai glanced at the girl. They would both have to maintain their shrouds but open up the enchantment so that only the tsar could see. He needed to know who his future enchanter was.

The girl looked at Nikolai, too.

Nikolai yanked his gaze away and faced forward. He focused on protecting his shadow veneer—he might know the girl’s identity, but she did not know his—and allowed a pathway for the tsar to see him.

Would the tsar recognize him as Pasha’s friend? Or not, given that the tsar gave hardly a whit about his son’s social affairs? He cared only to engage Pasha on matters important to his training as tsesarevich.

The tsar squinted as he looked upon Nikolai, as if trying to place him. A moment later, it seemed to click in his head where he had seen Nikolai before, and he frowned.

“Interesting.” The tsar drummed his fingers on the arm of his wooden throne. And then he cleared his throat and continued as if the presence of his son’s best friend in the midst of a magical battle to the death were nothing extraordinary at all. Of course, it made sense that the tsar would appear unruffled at this turn of events. Certainly he had encountered much greater surprises in his career. Or perhaps the tsar truly didn’t care that Nikolai was one of the enchanters. After all, who am I but a common boy who happened to befriend his son?

“Repeat after me,” the tsar said to both Nikolai and Vika as he read from the Russe Scroll.

“I hereby swear my loyalty to the tsar,

And promise to abide by the rules of the Game,

A duel of enchantment, until a winner is declared.

To this and all traditions here before established, I commit myself

As an enchanter in the Crown’s Game.”

Nikolai and Vika repeated the oath back to the tsar in unison. Nikolai kept his voice even, but hers carried and echoed throughout the cave, as if even in this inaugural moment of the Game, she was already trying to gain the upper hand.

But Nikolai had little time to think on that, for as soon as he uttered the last words of the oath, a searing heat bit into his skin, just below his left collarbone. “What the—!” He stopped himself before he let out a string of obscenities in front of the tsar, but not quickly enough to save his dignity.

A pair of crossed wands branded themselves onto Nikolai’s chest as if by an invisible iron. Even after the branding was over, the scar still glowed red-orange on his skin like live embers. Nikolai bit the inside of his cheek to stave off the pain.

The girl had not protested or screamed or made any sound other than a sharp inhale. Nikolai flushed, both at the heat of the fresh scar and at his weakness compared to this elfin girl.

“Who is Enchanter One?” the tsar asked.

“I am,” Nikolai managed to answer through gritted teeth, the scar still faintly orange on his skin.

The tsar nodded. “The wands will burn until you have made your first move in the Game. Then they will go dormant as Enchanter Two takes her turn. They will reawaken on your skin once her turn has been taken. That is how you will know it is your move again.

“The wands will grow steadily hotter the longer you take to execute your turn. As days pass, the pain will become more unbearable. And if too much time elapses—if you dally or for some reason refuse to complete the Game—the scar will eventually ignite and consume you.”

Nikolai shuddered. Forfeiture by flame.

“Is that how the Game ends?” the girl asked. The tsar didn’t even bother to look surprised that she’d interrupted. It would be more of a surprise at this point if she didn’t. “Does the losing enchanter combust?”

“Yes. The scar will incinerate the loser of the Game.”

“It will be quick,” her father said quietly. It occurred to Nikolai, though, that it was not the girl who needed assuring but rather the mentor himself.

The tsar nodded curtly. “Your mentors have taught you what they could, and now, as tradition dictates, and to ensure that your volleys in the Game are yours and yours alone, the mentors will be banished to the far reaches of the empire until a winner is declared. But first, they may give you a parting gift.” The tsar turned to Galina and her brother. “You have a minute to say your good-byes.”

The girl’s father rocked his weight from his heels to his toes, as if he were contemplating moving toward the girl, but then he rocked back on his heels and stood firmly in place. “Practice every day it is not your turn,” he said to her. “Get enough sleep and enough food to eat. Check our hiding place—you know where it is—if you need money . . .”

“Father—”

He held up his hand. “And wear this. Do not take it off.” He yanked a braid of leather off his wrist and pushed it at her.

She slipped it onto her wrist, and it immediately tightened itself to fit. She winced. “What is it?”

“A good luck charm, of sorts.” He turned his back to her, visibly swallowing back his emotions. “We will see each other again soon, my dearest.”

The girl touched the necklace at her throat. “I promise.”

Galina smirked in her brother’s direction. Then she snapped her fingers, and a dagger in its sheath appeared in Nikolai’s shadow hands. “The gift I leave you is a new knife,” she said. “When you find the right occasion to use it, it will not miss its target. Remember all the practice you’ve received; killing is not so difficult and is the most direct way.”