Chapter 35 Nes
Nes
It was noon by the time Nes made it back to the Siren’s Hair.
On a Monday, the place was empty. Even the staff had already finished cleaning from the night before and gone home to their beds.
The only other person downstairs was Genna, who, after being sequestered in Nes and Suri’s bedroom for a couple days, had deemed it safe to venture to the kitchen in search of food.
“Meet me upstairs when you’re finished,” Nes told her. Genna nodded before shoving a croissant in her mouth, puffing her cheeks. Nes ducked her head to hide her chuckle.
She took the stairs two at a time, one hand clutching the stuffed pillowcases Phineas had given her and the other on the bag at her hip.
Suri sat cross-legged on her bed, a deck of cards laid out in front of her.
She thought of the last conversation they’d had—when Suri had asked her if she was happy in Gadore.
She wanted to be. There were so many things in this city that could make her happy.
“Trying to teach yourself Blank?” Nes asked, striding into the room. She tossed the pillowcases onto her own bed.
Suri frowned at the cards. “I know how to play.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“I think this deck is cursed,” Suri said. “We’ve played six rounds, and Genna’s won every single one.”
Nes settled onto the bed across from her friend. She pulled her bag into her lap. “Maybe it’s time to face facts.”
Suri lifted her gaze from the cards to Nes.
“You suck at Blank.”
“Just because you beat me every time doesn’t mean I suck.”
Nes scrunched her lips. “Except Genna’s beating you, too, so it kind of does.”
Suri reached around behind her. Grabbing a pillow, she threw it at Nes. Hands still wrapped around the bag in her lap, Nes took Suri’s shot right in the face. When she opened her eyes again, Suri was grinning.
“Cheap shot,” Nes muttered.
Suri shrugged. “It’s the only way to take you by surprise.”
“Speaking of, I have a surprise for you.” Excitement trickled in, her mouth widening into a smile, as she opened her bag and pulled out the piece of parchment Phineas had given her. Handing it to Suri, she said, “Happy freedom day.”
Suri took the paper but didn’t unfurl it. “Freedom day?”
Nes nodded. “Wasn’t it a year ago today you left your fiancé at the altar and journeyed to Gadore on your own?”
“Yeah,” Suri said, though the word was slow and hesitant. “I guess it was.”
“I got you a present to mark the occasion.”
Suri’s fingers were careful as they pulled open the parchment. Nes held her breath, her own fingers tapping out a rhythm against her thumb, as Suri scanned the page. Seconds passed, and Suri didn’t speak. Nes couldn’t hold back.
“Well? What do you think?”
Suri blinked at the writing, her gaze focused on the bottom of the page where Nes knew Phineas had scrawled Suri’s name.
“How did you—” Suri cut off, shaking her head. “You got him to give up the Siren’s Hair?”
Nes was beaming. Her cheeks hurt from the strength of her smile. “I did. I finally figured out what makes Phineas tick.”
Suri chewed on her lip. “Why didn’t you have him sign it over to you?”
Nes’s smile dropped. A cold that had nothing to do with the temperature outside had crept into the bedroom. It left her fidgety—what had once been a comfortable position on the bed now felt awkward. “Because if it weren’t for you, I’d have never figured him out. And I thought you should have it.”
“You’re not staying, are you?”
“I can’t,” she forced herself to say. That was the plan. She had to stick to it. “Once Toran frees my father, we’re leaving.”
“Nes,” Suri started. “I won’t be staying, either.”
That took her by surprise. For as long as she’d known Suri, the girl had never talked about leaving Gadore. “You’re leaving? When?”
Suri tensed. “I suspect shortly after you do.”
“But why?”
Suri twisted the paper between her hands, crinkling the page. “There’s nothing for me in Gadore.”
“What are you talking about? You have friends and now the Siren’s Hair. You’ve built yourself a good life here.”
“This is not my life!”
Nes opened her mouth. Shut it again. Not once had she ever heard Suri shout. Her friend’s voice had always been a gentle melody in her ear, so much so that she’d doubted Suri could raise her voice. “What do you mean?”
Suri shook her head, her exhale coated in exasperation. “No, I— Never mind. Forget it. Thank you, Nes.”
“If you don’t want it, just say so,” she spat, reaching for the parchment. “I’ll take it back.”
“No!” Suri gripped the paper tight. “It’s fine. It’s great, I mean.”
The lie couldn’t have been clearer. Tension snaked between them, thick and fresh and alive. She couldn’t bring herself to look Suri in the eye; both of them stared heavily at the deck of cards splayed out on the bedspread.
“What did I miss?”
Nes looked up. Genna stood in the doorway, croissant crumbs on her chin. Nes quickly pushed up off the bed. “Nothing.”
Genna glanced between the two of them, but Nes knew Suri wouldn’t say anything more.
“You ready to get started?” Nes asked Genna. She grabbed one of the pillowcases from her bed.
Genna nodded.
With her dagger, Nes sliced open the stuffing. Inside the pillow, scattered among the feathers, were bits of bright green lichen. The green was brighter and more vibrant than Suri’s eyes. Even the afternoon sun seemed dim in comparison.
Genna plucked the pure magic from the pillow and deposited it in a shallow bowl Suri handed her.
Nes watched as Genna crushed the glowing lichen into a paste, then dribbled water from her canteen over it, swirling the two with her finger.
The magic’s alluring smell—one of a crisp first snowfall, elegant and cold—tickled Nes’s nose.
Genna swiped a finger through the glowing mixture, held it up to her face, and ran her finger down the length of her outstretched tongue. The scent of metal screeched within Nes as the magic sank into Genna.
Their plan was simple. Get Genna to create enough coins to spread the magic throughout the entire gambling den. If the magic wasn’t in a singular location, then when Damari showed up to steal it, she wouldn’t be able to take enough before Toran and Nes captured her.
Genna collapsed, knees slamming the floorboards, arms outstretched.
And then her lips were glowing with the magic.
She looked reverent with her head tilted back and her palms up, sun and magic alike aglow on her face.
But then she coughed, a great hacking cough, and doubled over, spewing the contents of her stomach across the floor.
Nes wrinkled her nose and stepped back, her own gut churning at the sight. Bits of half-digested food, coated in saliva and stomach bile, spread over the floor, seeping into the grain. Surely this wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. Something had to be wrong.
But then she caught a glint of metal.
A wave of shock slammed through her as she funneled out every sound but a soft clinking coming from where Genna sat. Coming from the contents falling from her glowing lips. She should have recognized it right away. It was a constant in the Siren’s Hair. The ringing sound of coin on coin.
Genna wasn’t only throwing up her stomach contents. She was vomiting gadots.
The pile of money grew steadily the more Genna heaved. The sight of it made Nes’s fingers itch. Of all the ways magic could react to a human body, she never would have imagined this. She watched, hungry and eager, as Genna’s shoulders shook and her body forced more money out into the world.
Several more gadots fell from her lips—the glow slowly fading as the magic made its escape—pinging against the mound of coin at her knees. At last, Genna took a deep breath and closed her mouth.
There had to be at least fifty gadots on the floor between them. Fifty. Melting metal, like that in a forge, replaced the snowfall scent in Nes’s nostrils as she breathed deep.
“Are you okay?” Suri asked. She’d swung her legs over the side of the bed and leaned toward Genna—who looked rather pale—to rest a hand on the guard’s shoulder.
Genna wiped her mouth on her sleeve and nodded to Suri.
Nes held the bowl of diluted magic out to Genna. “Ready to go again?” she asked. “We’re going to need a lot more where that came from.”
Genna dipped her finger in the bowl. Sticking out her tongue, she ran the green sludge down the length of it. And then the heaving started all over again.
Toran’s lieutenant—Quint, Nes recalled—appeared on the doorstep of the Siren’s Hair two hours later. By then, they had nearly five hundred gadots distributed between small pouches.
But Genna was slowing. The last time she’d consumed the diluted magic, she’d vomited nothing but stomach bile and two coins. Upon seeing this, Suri insisted they take a break and was quick to usher Genna onto her bed, where the sergeant had fallen asleep instantly.
It physically hurt Nes to hand over each pouch to Quint.
They aren’t real, she told herself every time she dropped a pouch into Quint’s bag. But the coins were real. As real as any others exchanging hands throughout the city. The only difference was these had been crafted by magic, while the others had been molded by presses.
She dropped the last pouch into Quint’s bag, and he folded the top over the opening.
“I’ll get these to Toran,” Quint promised. “Tonight, the King’s Guard celebrates the formation of Orlonea’s First Legion.”
“Is there even an anniversary for such a thing?”
“Probably. Not that any one of us knows it.” Quint shook his head. “But with all the death as of late, no guard is going to pass up a night on the town. Especially if Toran is paying.”
She wondered what she would have thought of Toran had she met him a couple of months back, when he couldn’t have balanced on the line of sobriety if he tried. Probably that he was an easy mark. But she had difficulty imagining him in such a way.
“I’ll be back for the rest later,” Quint told her as he turned to leave. “Good luck.”
“You too,” she said and shut the door behind him.
Tonight, they would finally capture Damari, and then Nes would leave Gadore forever. She couldn’t stick around for them to drown Damari and learn she wasn’t the true Witch. By the time everyone realized no green light was going to shoot into the sky, Nes had to be long gone. She had to be.
Tonight would be the last time she’d have to look over her shoulder in this Goddess-forsaken city and wonder if anyone suspected what she was. And tomorrow would be the first day of her father’s newfound freedom.
It would be the first day of her freedom.
She should be excited. All she’d dreamed about since her father was taken from her was about to come true. But as she weaved through the tables of the gambling den, she realized that for the first time in two years, the promise of freedom didn’t comfort her heavy heart.
It only made it sink faster.