Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
NIKO
“Let her go,” Alexei roared, struggling to rip his Dimi from Niko’s grasp. But it wasn’t happening, not in this life nor the next.
If Niko hadn’t woken in time, the next life would’ve been the only one in which Ana existed. If she had succeeded in strangling Katerina, then he would have killed her to avenge his Dimi. And then he would have had to kill Alexei, which didn’t bear thinking about.
By the Saints, what was happening here?
“Let her go!” Alexei tugged at Niko’s arm, solid as an iron bar across Ana’s chest. “You have no right to restrain her. Look, your Dimi lives.”
He gestured at Katerina, which did nothing to restore Niko’s sense of equanimity.
She sat in the dirt, coughing and wheezing.
By the firelight, he could make out the circle of bruises already beginning to ring her neck.
Damien knelt beside her, a gentle hand on her back, speaking in a low, soothing voice.
Over the tumult, Niko deciphered you’ll be all right and breathe.
It was infuriating that he could touch and comfort Katerina so easily, when Niko could not. But he could avenge her honor. That, he could do.
“I have no right?” he growled, his grip on Ana tightening.
“You look, Alexei. I woke to find Ana with her hands around my Dimi’s throat, choking the life out of her.
I’m within my rights to defend Katerina in any way I see fit.
Were Ana anyone else, I would have broken her neck and left her body for the crows. ”
Alexei fell silent, doubtless trying to muster his next defense, as Ana bucked against Niko, a wild thing.
The shades wanted nothing more than to devour her, to seep inside her and feed on her Light until she paid for what she’d done.
He gritted his teeth, commanding them to bide.
We need to know why she did this, he told them.
What good will it do to kill her, if the true source of her enmity goes unchecked?
He was trying to convince himself as much as the power that seethed inside him.
Because Saints, when he’d heard Katerina gasping for breath, when he’d woken to feel her panic and terror surging through the bond, all he’d wanted to do was eliminate the threat by any means necessary.
He’d leapt up, prepared to slaughter a host of demons, imagining Berezin’s hands around her throat.
But it had been Ana—Katerina’s best friend since the cradle.
And even in his altered state, he knew taking her life without getting answers first would be unforgivable.
The horses whickered in alarm, entirely discomposed, for which Niko couldn’t blame them.
With one last glance at Katerina, Damien rose and went to help Sofi calm them.
That left Ana, whose thrashing had finally begun to slow, her irate Shadow, Niko, and Katerina, who’d stopped coughing, thank the Saints.
“Are you all right?” he demanded.
His Dimi nodded. Bracing her hands on her knees, she struggled to her feet and made her way toward them.
Niko stepped backward, dragging Ana with him. “Don’t come too close.”
“I need to understand.”
Her voice was hoarse, clawing its way from her bruised throat, and rage surged within Niko anew. He forced himself to breathe deeply, to contain the shades that wanted nothing more than to seek revenge. “What’s to understand?” he snapped. “She tried to kill you.”
But Katerina, never one to prioritize her own self-preservation, kept on coming, with Alexei right behind her.
Niko backed up all the way to the treeline, until his only option was to flee into the forest with Ana, who’d gone limp against him.
He leaned against the trunk of an oak instead and tightened his grip, in case Ana was playing possum.
“Ana?” Katerina came to a stop in front of them. She peered into the other Dimi’s face, seeking answers. “What happened?”
Ana shuddered against Niko, as if waking from a deep sleep. She didn’t say a word.
“Ana?” It was Alexei this time. He stood shoulder to shoulder with Katerina, telegraphing a glance that, after all their years serving together, Niko could read clearly. If anything goes wrong, I will protect your Dimi, it meant. Even from my own.
The tension in Niko’s muscles eased the slightest bit, but Ana didn’t try to get away. If anything, she leaned against him for support.
“Alexei?” Confusion fogged her voice. “Who—where am I?”
“You’re safe.” Alexei spoke slowly, clearly, the way he might to one of the spooked horses. “Do you remember what happened?”
“Why am I being restrained? And by whom?” She twisted in Niko’s grasp, and he let her, until she was looking up at him. Her eyes were glassy, like she’d been drugged. “Niko?” Her eyebrows lowered in what he’d swear was genuine bewilderment. “Did—did I hurt someone?”
“Me.” Katerina tilted her head to the side, revealing the marks that bloomed beneath her skin. “You tried to strangle me.”
Ana shook her head against Niko’s chest. “No. I wouldn’t—I would never—”
“But you did.” Niko bit out the words. “Why?”
“I…I don’t know.” Tears thickened her voice.
He had never heard Ana sound so uncertain.
Her confidence was one of the reasons she and Katerina had always been so close; together, the two of them were a fearsome pair.
A thread of sympathy for her trickled through his rage.
After all, who better than he knew what it was like to do things you didn’t understand, driven by a force beyond your control?
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Alexei’s tone was urgent. “For the love of all the Saints, will you let her go now, Niko? You can see she’s not a threat.”
Grudgingly, Niko released his grip, prepared to lunge should she go for Katerina again. But Ana just stood there, her dark hair tangled and her shoulders slumped, looking like a small, perplexed child caught with her hand in a jar of sugary pryaniki.
“I mean I don’t know,” she repeated. “One moment I was keeping watch, like I was supposed to do. And the next, I was here. In between…it’s all fuzzy.”
“You don’t remember anything?” Niko asked, stepping away from the tree to stand on Katerina’s other side. Now he, Alexei, and Katerina all faced Ana, as if the Dimi were on trial.
Ana shook her head, then paused. “Snatches,” she said after a moment. “Images. I remember—I think I ran through the fire—” She lifted one foot to inspect the sole, then winced. “I must have. My feet sting, and the skin is red. But why would I do such a thing?”
“To get to me.” Katerina coughed. “I was on the opposite side of the fire. You must have run through it when you attacked me, rather than going around.”
Her voice died, and she pressed a hand to her throat, her lips compressing in pain.
Niko ached to comfort her, to press his lips to every one of the bruises, to hold her and reassure himself that she was all right.
He folded his arms across his chest instead, so he wouldn’t be tempted, and said, “That seems likely. When I pulled you off Katerina, there were sparks all around her. I stamped out as many as I could manage, but some of them still burn.”
He pointed, and Ana followed the line of his finger. Fiery twigs and small branches littered the campsite, in a direct line from where Ana had been keeping watch to where Katerina had slept.
Ana bit her lip. “But…why would I do such a thing? I swear, Katerina, I am loyal to you. I would never want to hurt you. You’re like a sister to me.”
Her voice broke, and next to Niko, Katerina flinched. “As you are to me,” she said. “I believe you. But there has to be a reason.”
“I don’t know,” Ana said again, scrubbing a hand across her face.
She dropped it and began picking at the bark of the oak, shredding bits of it between her fingers.
“I can see flashes, if I really try. Running through the fire, not caring if it burned me. And then gripping something soft in my hands…squeezing…” The color leached from her olive skin, turning her complexion ashen.
“Saints and demons, Katerina. Was that your throat?”
No one answered her.
Ana sank to the ground, keening. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so, so sorry.” Tears rolled down her face. “I could have killed you. My best friend, and you would’ve been dead at my hands.” Her gaze flicked upward, toward Niko. “And you could have killed me. I wouldn’t have blamed you.”
“Well, I would have.” Alexei’s voice was gruff. “There are things you can come back from, and things you can’t. Without you, Ana, I wouldn’t want to live.”
Silence fell over the campsite as his words sank in.
Niko was sure they were all thinking of the same thing: how Niko had given his life to save Katerina, and how Katerina had in turn ventured into the Underworld to bring him back.
Was it possible Alexei’s feelings for Ana were more than simply those that a Shadow should entertain for his Dimi?
Did Niko and Alexei have more in common than he’d ever dreamed?
He thought of Ana’s tales of her exploits, bedding half of Rivki when she and Alexei went to deliver the tithe. Alexei had never seemed to mind. But what if it had all been an act?
This was hardly the time to contemplate such things.
Dragging his attention back to the issue at hand, Niko said, his tone as flippant as he could manage, “Fortunately for both of us, I didn’t kill you.
And you didn’t kill Katerina. But why attack her in the first place? Were you sleepwalking? Dreaming?”
Ana shook her head, still looking down. “I don’t sleepwalk. I never have. And even if I did, there’s no part of me that would hurt her. Why would I help the two of you escape, only to strangle her? It makes no sense.”
No, it didn’t. Nor did it make sense that Gadreel would be behind this.
The Dark Angel of War wanted to use Katerina, not to eliminate her.
As for the Druzhina, even if such magic were within their grasp, they wouldn’t use it.
They would drag Katerina back to be publicly excoriated and executed, along with Niko and the rest. If Ana hadn’t been sleepwalking or dreaming, and neither Gadreel or the Druzhina had been behind this, then who? Who else wanted her dead?
He could think of one obvious choice. But it was impossible.
Wasn’t it?
“You have a lot of enemies,” Sofi signed to Katerina, coming to stand beside them, as if she’d read Niko’s mind. “Could one of them have acted through Ana, somehow?”
His Dimi bit her lip, her gaze flicking to Niko. “I suppose…” she said, and he wondered if she was thinking of that night in Rivki’s dungeons, when he had touched her without being there at all. He hadn’t had the opportunity—or the courage—to ask her if she recalled it.
Because what if she did, and he’d touched her against her will? What if she’d been repulsed by him? How would he go on, then?
“I do remember something,” Ana said slowly, disrupting his unwelcome line of thought, “but it makes no sense.”
“Anything will help,” Katerina urged. “Just tell us.”
“There was Darkness. So much Darkness.” She shredded a bit of bark between her fingers, letting it fall to the ground.
“And laughter, but none I would care to hear again. I saw the most beautiful mosaics, but everything in them was wrong. They depicted demon armies, victorious against the Light, and Darkness rising like a wave to smother us all. And I…I wanted.” The word came low, filled with shame, but audible nonetheless.
“What did you want?” Niko feared the answer, but the question had to be asked.
“Freedom. Katerina’s death. Power. But most of all…” She swallowed hard, her shoulders heaving. “I wanted you.”
The single syllable fell into the clearing like a lump of fiery coal and lay there, smoldering, between them. Niko tried to swallow, but his mouth had gone bone-dry.
No. No. No.
“I’m sorry,” Ana whispered again. She had begun to shiver.
Damien stood by Sofi’s side now, the five of them all looking down at Ana, who wrapped her arms around her knees as if trying to hold herself together.
“Is that all?” Katerina asked at last.
Heaving a deep, uneven breath, Ana shook her head. “Running through my mind was a single sentence. It was my voice, but not. I heard it over and over, as surely as if whoever said it stood beside me. I would’ve done anything to make it stop.”
“What was it?” Alexei squared his shoulders, like he was preparing to receive a missive from Gadreel himself.
“It’s nonsense. Gibberish.” Ana fidgeted, rolling the remaining shards of bark between her fingers.
“Please tell us.” Katerina’s voice was gentler than Niko could have managed in a thousand years.
He wanted to level the forest. To rip the trees from the earth. To Change and howl his fury to the unnatural moon, because no matter what he did, he could not keep his Dimi safe. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t escape the person he hated more than any other.
Ana lifted her head, and her tear-wet eyes met Katerina’s before she spoke.
“You are nothing but what I made of you.”