W ylan hadn’t been on a browboat of this size since he’d tried to leave the city six months ago, and it was hard not to remember that disaster now, especially when thoughts of his father were so fresh in his mind. But this boat was considerably different from the one he’d tried to take that night. This browboat ran the market line twice a day. Inbound, it would be crowded with vegetables, livestock, whatever farmers were bringing to the market squares scattered around the city. As a child, he’d thought everything came from Ketterdam, but he’d soon learned that, though just about anything could be had in the city, little of it was produced there. The city got its exotics—mangoes; dragon fruit; small, fragrant pineapples—from the Southern Colonies. For more ordinary fare, they relied on the farms that surrounded the city.
Jesper and Wylan caught an outbound boat crammed with immigrants fresh from the Ketterdam harbor and laborers looking for farmwork instead of the manufacturing jobs offered in the city. Unfortunately, they’d boarded far enough south that all the seats were already taken, and Jesper was looking positively sulky about it.
“Why can’t we take the Belendt line?” Jesper had complained only hours before. “It goes past Olendaal. The boats on the market line are filthy and there’s never any place to sit.”
“Because you two will stand out on the Belendt line. Here in Ketterdam, you’re nothing to look at—assuming Jesper doesn’t wear one of his brighter plaids. But give me one good reason other than farmwork you’d see a Shu and a Zemeni traipsing around the countryside.”
Wylan hadn’t considered how conspicuous he might be outside the city with his new face. But he was secretly relieved Kaz didn’t want them on the Belendt line. It might have been more comfortable, but the memories would have been too much on the day he would finally see where his mother had been laid to rest.
“Jesper,” Kaz had said, “keep your weapons hidden and your eyes open. Van Eck has to have people watching all the major transportation hubs, and we don’t have time to fake up identification for Wylan. I’ll get the corrosive from one of the shipyards on Imperjum. Your first priority is to find the quarry and get the other mineral we need for the auric acid. You go to Saint Hilde if and only if there’s time.”
Wylan felt his chin lift, that simmering, stubborn feeling overtaking him. “I need to do this. I’ve never been to my mother’s grave. I’m not leaving Kerch without saying goodbye.”
“Trust me, you care more than she does.”
“How can you say that? Don’t you remember your mother and father at all?”
“My mother is Ketterdam. She birthed me in the harbor. And my father is profit. I honor him daily. Be back by nightfall or don’t come back at all. Either of you. I need crew, not sentimental nubs.” Kaz handed Wylan the travel money. “Make sure you buy the tickets. I don’t want Jesper wandering off to take a spin at Makker’s Wheel.”
“This song is getting old,” muttered Jesper. “Then learn a new refrain.”
Jesper had just shaken his head, but Wylan could tell Kaz’s barbs still stung. Now Wylan looked at Jesper leaning back on the railing, eyes shut, profile turned to the weak spring sun.
“Don’t you think we should be more cautious?” Wylan asked, his own face buried in the collar of his coat. They’d barely dodged two stadwatch as they’d boarded.
“We’re already out of the city. Relax.”
Wylan glanced over his shoulder. “I thought they might search the boat.”
Jesper opened one eye and said, “And hold up traffic? Van Eck’s already making trouble at the harbors. If he jams up the browboats, there’ll be a riot.”
“Why?”
“Look around. The farms need laborers. The plants need workers. The
Kerch will only abide so much inconvenience for a rich man’s son, especially when there’s money to be made.”
Wylan tried to make himself relax and unbuttoned the roughspun coat Kaz had obtained for him. “Where does he get all the clothes and uniforms from anyway? Does he just have a giant closet somewhere?”
“Come here.”
Warily, Wylan sidled closer. Jesper reached for his collar and flipped it, giving it a tug so Wylan could twist around and just make out a blue ribbon pinned there.
“This is how actors mark their costumes,” Jesper said. “This one belonged to … Josep Kikkert. Oh, he’s not bad. I saw him in The Madman Takes a Bride .”
“Costumes?”
Jesper flipped the collar back, and as he did, his fingers brushed against the nape of Wylan’s neck. “Yup. Kaz cut a secret entrance into the wardrobe rooms of the Stadlied opera house years ago. That’s where he gets a lot of what he needs and where he stashes the rest. Means he can never be caught with a fake stadwatch uniform or house livery in a raid.”
Wylan supposed it made sense. He watched the sunlight flashing off the water for a while, then focused on the railing and said, “Thanks for coming with me today.”
“Kaz wasn’t going to let you go by yourself. Besides, I owe you. You came with me to meet my dad at the university, and you stepped in when he started getting inquisitive.”
“I don’t like lying.”
Jesper turned around, balancing his elbows on the railing and gazing out at the grassy banks that sloped down to the canal. “So why did you do it?”
Wylan didn’t really know why he’d made up that crazy story about luring Jesper into a bad investment. He hadn’t even been totally sure what he was going to say when he opened his mouth. He just couldn’t stand to see Jesper—confident, smiling Jesper—with that lost look on his face, or the terrible mix of hope and fear in Colm Fahey’s gaze as he waited for an answer from his son. It reminded Wylan too much of the way his own father had looked at him, back when he’d still believed Wylan could be cured or fixed. He didn’t want to see the expression in Jesper’s father’s eyes change from worry to anguish to anger.
Wylan shrugged. “I’m making a habit of rescuing you. For exercise.”
Jesper released a guff aw that had Wylan looking frantically over his shoulder again, afraid of drawing attention.
But Jesper’s mirth was short-lived. He shifted his position at the rail, scrubbed his hand over the back of his neck, fiddled with the brim of his hat. He was always in motion, like a lanky piece of clockwork that ran on invisible energy. Except clocks were simple. Wylan could only guess at Jesper’s workings.
At last Jesper said, “I should have gone to see him today.” Wylan knew he was talking about Colm. “Why didn’t you?” “I have no idea what to say to him.”
“Is the truth out of the question?” “Let’s just say I’d rather avoid it.”
Wylan looked back at the water. He’d started to think of Jesper as fearless, but maybe being brave didn’t mean being unafraid. “You can’t run from this forever.”
“Watch me.”
Another farmhouse slid by, little more than a white shape in the early morning mist, lilies and tulips stippling the fields before it in fractured constellations. Maybe Jesper could keep running. If Kaz kept coming along with miracle scores, maybe Jesper could always stay one step ahead.
“I wish I’d brought flowers for her,” Wylan said. “Something.”
“We can pick some on the way,” said Jesper, and Wylan knew he was seizing the change in subject with both hands. “Do you remember her much?”
Wylan shook his head. “I remember her curls. They were the most beautiful reddish gold.”
“Same as yours,” said Jesper. “Before.”
Wylan felt his cheeks pink for no good reason. Jesper was just stating a fact, after all.
He cleared his throat. “She liked art and music. I think I remember sitting at the piano bench with her. But it might have been a nanny.” Wylan lifted his shoulders. “One day she was sick and going to the country so her lungs could recover, and then she was gone.”
“What about the funeral?”
“My father told me she’d been buried at the hospital. That was all. We just stopped talking about her. He said it didn’t pay to dwell on the past. I
don’t know. I think he really loved her. They fought all the time, sometimes about me, but I remember them laughing a lot together too.”
“I have trouble imagining your father laughing, even smiling. Unless he’s rubbing his hands together and cackling over a pile of gold.”
“He isn’t evil.”
“He tried to kill you.”
“No, he destroyed our ship. Killing me would have been an added benefit.” That wasn’t entirely true, of course. Jesper wasn’t the only one trying to keep a step ahead of his demons.
“Oh, then you’re absolutely right,” said Jesper. “Not evil at all. I’m sure he also had good reasons for not letting you grieve for your mother.” Wylan tugged at a thread unraveling from the sleeve of his coat. “It wasn’t all his fault. My father seemed sad most of the time. And far away. That was around the same time he realized I wasn’t … what
he’d hoped for.”
“How old were you?”
“Eight, maybe? I’d gotten really good at hiding it.” “How?”
A faint smile touched Wylan’s lips. “He would read to me or I’d ask one of the nannies to, and I’d memorize whatever they said. I even knew when to pause and turn the pages.”
“How much could you remember?”
“A lot. I sort of set the words to music in my head like songs. I still do it sometimes. I’ll just claim I can’t read someone’s writing and get them to read the words aloud, set it all to a melody. I can hold it in my head until I need it.”
“Don’t suppose you could apply that skill to card counting.” “Probably. But I’m not going to.”
“Misspent gifts.” “You’re one to talk.”
Jesper scowled. “Let’s enjoy the scenery.”
There wasn’t much to look at yet. Wylan realized how tired he felt. He wasn’t used to this life of fear, moving from one moment of worry to the next.
He thought about telling Jesper how it had all started. Would it be a relief to have the whole shameful story out in the open? Maybe. But some part of him wanted Jesper and the others to keep believing that he’d left his father’s house intending to set up in the Barrel, that he’d
chosen this life.
As Wylan got older, Jan Van Eck had made it increasingly clear that there was no place for his son in his house hold, especially after his marriage to Alys. But he didn’t seem to know what to do with Wylan. He took to making pronouncements about his son, each one more dire than the last.
You can’t be sent to seminary because you can’t read.
I can’t apprentice you somewhere because you may reveal yourself to be defective.
You are like food that spoils too easily. I can’t even put you on a shelf somewhere to keep without making a stink.
Then, six months ago, Wylan’s father had summoned him to his office. “I’ve secured you a position at the music school in Belendt. A personal secretary has been hired on and will meet you at the school. He will handle any mail or business beyond your capabilities. It is a ridiculous waste of both money and time, but I must accept what is possible where you are concerned.”
“For how long?” Wylan had asked.
His father shrugged. “As long as it takes people to forget I had a son. Oh, don’t look at me with that wounded expression, Wylan. I am honest, not cruel. This is best for both of us. You’ll be spared the impossible task of trying to step into the role of a merchant’s son, and I’ll be spared the embarrassment of watching you attempt it.”
I treat you no more harshly than the world will. That was his father’s refrain. Who else would be so frank with him? Who else loved him enough to tell him the truth? Wylan had happy memories of his father reading him stories—dark tales of forests full of witches and rivers that spoke. Jan Van Eck had done his best to care for his son, and if he’d failed, then the defect lay with Wylan. His father might sound cruel, but he wasn’t just protecting himself or the Van Eck empire, he was protecting Wylan as well.
And everything he said made perfect sense. Wylan could not be trusted with a fortune because he would be too easily swindled. Wylan could not go to university because he’d be the target of mockery. This is best for both of us. His father’s ire had been unpleasant, but it was his logic that haunted Wylan—that practical, irrefutable voice that spoke in Wylan’s head whenever he thought about attempting something new, or trying to learn to read again.
It had hurt to be sent away, but Wylan had still been hopeful. A life in Belendt sounded magical to him. He didn’t know much about it other than that it was the second-oldest city in Kerch and located on the shores of the Droombeld River. But he’d be far away from his father’s friends and business associates. Van Eck was a common enough name, and that far from Ketterdam, being a Van Eck wouldn’t mean being one of those Van Ecks.
His father handed him a sealed envelope and a small stack of kruge for travel money. “These are your enrollment papers, and enough money to see you to Belendt. Once you’re there, have your secretary see the bursar. An account has been opened in your name. I’ve also arranged for chaperones to travel with you on the browboat.”
Wylan’s cheeks had flooded red with humiliation. “I can get to Belendt.”
“You’ve never traveled outside Ketterdam on your own, and this is not the time to start. Miggson and Prior have business to see to for me in Belendt. They’ll escort you there and ensure that you’re successfully situated. Understood?”
Wylan understood. He was unfit to even board a boat out of the city by himself.
But things would be different in Belendt. He packed a small suitcase with a change of clothes and the few things he would need before his trunks arrived at the school, along with his favorite pieces of sheet music. If he could read letters as well as he read a tablature, he’d have no problems at all. When his father had stopped reading to him, music had given him new stories, ones that unfolded from his fingers, that he could write himself into with every played note. He tucked his flute into his satchel, in case he wanted to practice on the trip.
His goodbye to Alys had been brief and awkward. She was a nice girl, but that was the whole problem—she was only a few years older than Wylan. He wasn’t sure how his father could walk down the street beside her without shame. But Alys didn’t seem to mind, maybe because around her, his father became the man Wylan remembered from his childhood— kind, generous, patient.
Even now, Wylan could not name the specific moment when he knew his father had given up on him. The change had been slow. Jan Van Eck’s patience had worn quietly away like gold plate over cruder metal, and when it was gone, it was as if his father had become someone else
entirely, someone with far less luster.
“I wanted to say goodbye and wish you well,” Wylan said to Alys. She had been seated in her parlor, her terrier dozing at her feet.
“Are you going away?” she asked, looking up from her sewing and noticing his bag. She was hemming curtains. Kerch women—even the wealthy ones—didn’t bother with anything as frivolous as embroidery or needlepoint. Ghezen was better served by tasks that benefited the household.
“I’ll be traveling to the music school at Belendt.”
“Oh, how wonderful!” Alys had cried. “I miss the country so much. You’ll be so glad of the fresh air, and you’re sure to make excellent friends.” She’d set down her needle and kissed both his cheeks. “Will you come back for the holidays?”
“Perhaps,” Wylan said, though he knew he wouldn’t. His father wanted him to disappear, so he would disappear.
“We’ll make gingerbread then,” Alys said. “You will tell me all your adventures, and soon we’ll have a new friend to play with.” She patted her belly with a happy smile.
It had taken Wylan a moment to understand what she meant, and then he’d just stood there, clutching his suitcase, nodding his head, smiling mechanically as Alys talked about their holiday plans. Alys was pregnant. That was why his father was sending him away. Jan Van Eck was to have another heir, a proper heir. Wylan had become expendable. He would vanish from the city, take up occupation elsewhere. Time would pass and no one would raise a brow when Alys’ child was groomed to be the head of the Van Eck empire. As long as it takes people to forget I had a son. That hadn’t been an idle insult.
Miggson and Prior arrived at eight bells to see Wylan to the boat. No one came to say a last goodbye, and when he’d walked past his father’s office, the door was closed. Wylan refused to knock and plead for a scrap of affection like Alys’ terrier begging for treats.
His father’s men wore the dark suits favored by merchants and said little to Wylan on the walk over to the dock. They purchased tickets for the Belendt line, and once they were aboard the boat, Miggson had buried his head in a newspaper while Prior leaned back in his seat, hat tilted downward, lids not quite closed. Wylan couldn’t be sure if the man was sleeping or staring at him like some kind of drowsy-eyed lizard.
The boat was nearly empty at that hour. People dozed in the stuffy
cabin or ate whatever dinner they’d packed, ham rolls and insulated flasks of coffee balanced on their laps.
Unable to sleep, Wylan had left the heat of the cabin and walked to the prow of the boat. The winter air was cold and smelled of the slaughter- houses on the outskirts of the city. It turned Wylan’s stomach, but soon the lights would fade and they’d be in the open country. He was sorry they weren’t traveling by day. He would have liked to see the windmills keeping watch over their fields, the sheep grazing in their pastures. He sighed, shivering in his coat, and adjusted the strap of his satchel. He should try to rest. Maybe he could wake up early and watch the sunrise.
When he turned, Prior and Miggson were standing behind him. “Sorry,” Wylan said. “I—” And then Prior’s hands were tight around
his throat.
Wylan gasped—or he tried to; the sound that came from him was barely a croak. He clawed at Prior’s wrists, but the man’s grip was like iron, the pressure relentless. He was big enough that Wylan could feel himself being lifted slightly as Prior pushed him against the railing.
Prior’s face was dispassionate, nearly bored, and Wylan understood then that he would never reach the school in Belendt. He’d never been meant to. There was no secretary. No account in his name. No one was expecting his arrival. The supposed enrollment papers in his pocket might say anything at all. Wylan hadn’t even bothered to try to read them. He was going to disappear, just as his father had always wanted, and he’d hired these men to do the job. His father who had read him to sleep at night, who’d brought him sweet mallow tea and honeycomb when he’d been sick with lung fever. As long as it takes people to forget I had a son. His father was going to erase him from the ledger, a mistaken calculation, a cost that could be expunged. The tally would be made right.
Black spots filled Wylan’s vision. He thought he could hear music. “You there! What’s going on?”
The voice seemed to come from a great distance. Prior’s grip loosened very slightly. Wylan’s toes made contact with the deck of the boat.
“Nothing at all,” said Miggson, turning to face the stranger. “We just caught this fellow looking through the other passengers’ belongings.”
Wylan made a choked sound.
“Shall I … shall I fetch the stadwatch then? There are two officers in the cabin.”
“We’ve already alerted the captain,” said Miggson. “We’ll be dropping him at the stadwatch post at the next stop.”
“Well, I’m glad you fellows were being so vigilant.” The man turned to go.
The boat lurched slightly. Wylan wasn’t going to wait to see what happened next. He shoved against Prior with all his might—then, before he could lose his nerve, he dove over the side of the boat and into the murky canal.
He swam with every bit of speed he could muster. He was still dizzy and his throat ached badly. To his shock, he heard another splash and knew one of the men had dived in after him. If Wylan showed up somewhere still breathing, Miggson and Prior probably wouldn’t get paid.
He changed his stroke, making as little noise as possible, and forced himself to think. Instead of heading straight to the side of the canal the way his freezing body longed to, he dove under a nearby market barge and came up on its other side, swimming along with it, using it as cover. The dead weight of his satchel pulled hard at his shoulders, but he couldn’t make himself relinquish it. My things , he thought nonsensically, my flute . He didn’t stop, not even when his breathing grew ragged and his limbs started to turn numb. He forced himself to drive onward, to put as much distance as he could between himself and his father’s thugs.
But eventually, his strength started to give out and he realized he was doing more thrashing than swimming. If he didn’t get to shore, he would drown. He paddled toward the shadows of a bridge and dragged himself from the canal, then huddled, soaked and shaking in the icy cold. His bruised throat scraped each time he swallowed, and he was terrified that every splash he heard was Prior coming to finish the job.
He needed to make some kind of plan, but it was hard to form whole thoughts. He checked his trouser pockets. He still had the kruge his father had given him tucked safely away. Though the cash was wet through, it was perfectly good for spending. But where was Wylan supposed to go? He didn’t have enough money to get out of the city, and if his father sent men looking for him, he’d be easily tracked. He needed to get somewhere safe, someplace his father wouldn’t think to look. His limbs felt weighted with lead, the cold giving way to fatigue. He was afraid that if he let himself close his eyes, he wouldn’t have the will to open them again.
In the end, he’d simply started walking. He wandered north through the city, away from the slaughter houses, past a quiet residential area where lesser tradesmen lived, then onward, the streets becoming more crooked and more narrow, until the houses seemed to crowd in on him. Despite the late hour, there were lights in every window and shop front. Music spilled out of run-down cafés, and he glimpsed bodies pressed up against each other in the alleys.
“Someone dunk you, lad?” called an old man with a shortage of teeth from a stoop.
“I’ll give him a good dunking!” crowed a woman leaning on the stairs. He was in the Barrel. Wylan had lived his whole life in Ketterdam, but he’d never come here. He’d never been allowed to. He’d never wanted to. His father called it a “filthy den of vice and blasphemy” and “the shame of the city.” Wylan knew it was a warren of dark streets and hidden passages. A place where locals donned costumes and performed unseemly acts, where foreigners crowded the thoroughfares seeking vile entertainments, where people came and went like tides. The perfect place
to disappear.
And it had been—until the day the first of his father’s letters had arrived.
With a start, Wylan realized Jesper was pulling at his sleeve. “This is our stop, merchling. Look lively.”
Wylan hurried after him. They disembarked at the empty dock at Olendaal and walked up the embankment to a sleepy village road.
Jesper looked around. “This place reminds me of home. Fields as far as the eye can see, quiet broken by nothing but the hum of bees, fresh air.” He shuddered. “Disgusting.”
As they walked, Jesper helped him gather wildflowers from the side of the road. By the time they’d made it to the main street, he had a respectable little bunch.
“I guess we need to find a way to the quarry?” Jesper said. Wylan coughed. “No we don’t, just a general store.”
“But you told Kaz the mineral—”
“It’s present in all kinds of paints and enamels. I wanted to make sure I had a reason to go to Olendaal.”
“Wylan Van Eck, you lied to Kaz Brekker .” Jesper clutched a hand to his chest. “And you got away with it! Do you give lessons?”
Wylan felt ridiculously pleased—until he thought about Kaz finding out. Then he felt a little like the first time he’d tried brandy and ended up spewing his dinner all over his own shoes.
They located a general store halfway up the main street, and it took them only a few moments to purchase what they needed. On the way out, a man loading up a wagon exchanged a wave with them. “You boys looking for work?” he asked skeptically. “Neither of you looks up to a full day in the field.”
“You’d be surprised,” said Jesper. “We signed on to do some work out near Saint Hilde.”
Wylan waited, nervous, but the man just nodded. “You doing repairs at the hospital?”
“Yup,” Jesper said easily.
“Your friend there don’t talk much.” “Shu,” said Jesper with a shrug.
The older man gave some kind of grunt in agreement and said, “Hop on in. I’m going out to the quarry. I can take you to the gates. What are the flowers for?”
“He has a sweetheart out near Saint Hilde.” “Some sweetheart.”
“I’ll say. He has terrible taste in women.” Wylan considered shoving Jesper off the wagon.
The dirt road was bordered on each side by what looked like barley and wheat fields, the flat expanses of land dotted occasionally by barns and windmills. The wagon kept up a fast clip. A little too fast , Wylan thought as they jounced over a deep rut. He hissed in a breath.
“Rains,” said the farmer. “No one’s got around to laying sand yet.” “That’s okay,” said Jesper with a wince as the wagon hit another bone-
rattling divot in the ground. “I don’t really need my spleen in one piece.” The farmer laughed. “It’s good for you! Jogs the liver!”
Wylan clutched his side, wishing he’d shoved Jesper out of the wagon after all and jumped right down with him. Luckily, only a mile later, the wagon slowed before two stone posts that marked a long gravel drive.
“This is as far as I go,” said the farmer. “Not a place I want truck with. Too much suffering. Sometimes when the wind blows right, you can hear ’em, laughing and shrieking.”
Jesper and Wylan exchanged a glance. “You saying it’s haunted?” asked Jesper.
“I suppose.”
They said their thanks and gratefully slid down to the ground. “When you’re done here, head up the road a couple miles,” said the driver. “I got two acres still need working. Five kruge a day and you can sleep in the barn instead of out in the field.”
“Sounds promising,” said Jesper with a wave, but as they turned to make their way up the road to the church, he grumbled, “We’re walking back. I think I bruised a rib.”
When the driver was gone from view, they shrugged out of their coats and caps to reveal the dark suits Kaz had suggested they wear underneath, and tucked them behind a tree stump. “Tell them you were sent by Cornelis Smeet,” Kaz had said. “That you want to make sure the grave is being well maintained for Mister Van Eck.”
“Why?” Wylan had asked.
“Because if you claim to be Jan Van Eck’s son, no one is going to believe you.”
The road was lined with poplars, and as they crested the hill, a building came into view: three stories of white stone fronted by low, graceful stairs leading to an arched front door. The drive was neatly laid with gravel and bordered by low yew hedges on either side.
“Doesn’t look like a church,” said Jesper.
“Maybe it used to be a monastery or a school?” Wylan suggested. He listened to the gravel crunch beneath his shoes. “Jesper, do you remember much about your mother?”
Wylan had seen a lot of different smiles from Jesper, but the one that spread across his face now was new, slow, and as closely held as a winning hand. All he said was, “Yeah. She taught me to shoot.”
There were a hundred questions Wylan wanted to ask, but the closer they drew to the church, the less he seemed able to capture a thought and hold it. On the left of the building, he could see an arbor covered with new-blooming wisteria, the sweet scent of the purple blossoms heavy on the spring air. A little past the church’s lawn and to the right, he saw a wrought-iron gate and a fence surrounding a graveyard, a tall stone figure at its center—a woman, Wylan guessed, probably Saint Hilde.
“That must be the cemetery,” Wylan said, clutching his flowers tighter. What am I doing here? There was that question again, and suddenly he didn’t know. Kaz had been right. This was stupid, sentimental. What good would seeing a gravestone with his mother’s name on it do? He
wouldn’t even be able to read it. But they’d come all this way. “Jesper—” he began, but at that moment a woman in gray work
clothes rounded the corner pushing a wheelbarrow mounded with earth. “Goed morgen ,” she called to them. “Can I help you?”
“And a fine morning it is,” said Jesper smoothly. “We come to you from the offices of Cornelis Smeet.”
She frowned and Wylan added, “On behalf of the esteemed Councilman Jan Van Eck.”
Apparently she didn’t notice the quaver in his voice, because her brow cleared and she smiled. Her cheeks were round and rosy. “Of course. But I confess to being surprised. Mister Van Eck has been so generous with us, yet we hear from him so rarely. Nothing’s wrong, is it?”
“Not at all!” said Wylan.
“Just a new policy,” said Jesper. “More work for everyone.”
“Isn’t that always the way?” The woman smiled again. “And I see you brought flowers?”
Wylan looked down at the bouquet. It seemed smaller and more straggly than he’d thought. “We … yes.”
She wiped her hands on her shapeless smock and said, “I’ll take you to her.”
But instead of turning in the direction of the graveyard, she headed back toward the entrance. Jesper shrugged, and they followed. As they made their way up the low stone steps, something cold crawled over Wylan’s spine.
“Jesper,” he whispered. “There are bars on the windows.” “Antsy monks?” Jesper offered, but he was not smiling.
The front parlor was two stories high, its floor set with clean white tiles painted with delicate blue tulips. It looked like no church Wylan had ever seen. The hush in the room was so deep, it felt almost suffocating. A large desk was placed in the corner, and on it was set a vase of the wisteria Wylan had seen outside. He inhaled deeply. The smell was comforting.
The woman unlocked a large cabinet and sifted through it for a moment, then removed a thick file.
“Here we are: Marya Hendriks. As you can see, everything is in order. You can have a look while we get her cleaned up. Next time you can avoid a delay if you notify us ahead of your visit.”
Wylan felt an icy sweat break out over his body. He managed a nod.
The woman removed a heavy key ring from the cabinet and unlocked one of the pale blue doors that led out of the parlor. Wylan heard her turn the key in the lock from the other side. He set the wildflowers down on the desk. Their stems were broken. He’d been clutching them too tightly. “What is this place?” Wylan said. “What did they mean, get her cleaned up ?” His heart ticked a frantic beat, a metronome set to the
wrong rhythm.
Jesper was flipping through the folder, his eyes skimming the pages.
Wylan leaned over his shoulder and felt a hopeless, choking panic grip him. The words on the page were a meaningless scrawl, a black mess of insect legs. He fought for breath. “Jesper, please,” he begged, his voice thin and reedy. “Read it to me.”
“I’m sorry,” Jesper said hurriedly. “I forgot. I …” Wylan couldn’t make sense of the look on Jesper’s face—sadness, confusion. “Wylan … I think your mother’s alive.”
“That’s impossible.”
“Your father had her committed.”
Wylan shook his head. That couldn’t be. “She got sick. A lung infection—”
“He states that she’s a victim of hysteria, paranoia, and persecution disorder.”
“She can’t be alive. He—he remarried. What about Alys?”
“I think he had your mother declared insane and used it as grounds for divorce. This isn’t a church, Wylan. It’s an asylum.”
Saint Hilde. His father had been sending them money every year—but not as a charitable donation. For her upkeep. For their silence. The room was suddenly spinning.
Jesper pulled him into the chair behind the desk and pressed against Wylan’s shoulder blades, urging him forward. “Put your head between your knees, focus on the floor. Breathe.”
Wylan forced himself to inhale, exhale, to gaze at those charming blue tulips in their white tile boxes. “Tell me the rest.”
“You need to calm down or they’re going to know something’s wrong.”
“Tell me the rest.”
Jesper blew out a breath and continued to flip through the file. “Son of a bitch,” he said after a minute. “There’s a Transfer of Authority in the file. It’s a copy.”
Wylan kept his eyes on the tiled floor. “What? What is that?”
Jesper read, “This document, witnessed in the full sight of Ghezen and in keeping with the honest dealings of men, made binding by the courts of Kerch and its Merchant Council, signifies the transfer of all property, estates, and legal holdings from Marya Hendriks to Jan Van Eck, to be managed by him until Marya Hendriks is once again competent to conduct her own affairs. ”
“‘The transfer of all property,’” Wylan repeated. What am I doing here? What am I doing here? What is she doing here?
The key turned in the lock of the pale blue door and the woman—a nurse , Wylan realized—sailed back through, smoothing the apron of her smock.
“We’re ready for you,” she said. “She’s quite docile today. Are you all right?”
“My friend’s feeling a bit faint. Too much sun after all those hours in Mister Smeet’s office. Could we trouble you for a glass of water?”
“Certainly!” said the nurse. “Oh, you do look a bit done under.”
She disappeared behind the door again, following the same routine of unlocking and locking it. She’s making sure the patients don’t get out.
Jesper squatted in front of Wylan and put his hands on his shoulders. “Wy, listen to me. You have to pull yourself together. Can you do this?
We can leave. I can tell her you’re not up to it, or I can just go in myself. We can try to come back some—”
Wylan took a deep, shuddering breath through his nose. He couldn’t fathom what was happening, couldn’t understand the scope of it. So just do one thing at a time. It was a technique one of his tutors had taught him to try to keep him from getting overwhelmed by the page. It hadn’t worked, particularly not when his father was looming over him, but Wylan had managed to apply it elsewhere. One thing at a time. Stand up. He stood up. You’re fine. “I’m fine,” he said. “We are not leaving.” It was the one thing he was certain of.
When the nurse returned, he accepted the water glass, thanked her, drank. Then he and Jesper followed her through the pale blue door. He couldn’t bring himself to gather the wilting wildflowers scattered on the desk. One thing at a time.
They walked past locked doors, some kind of exercise room. From somewhere, he heard moaning. In a wide parlor, two women were playing what looked like a game of ridderspel.
My mother is dead. She’s dead. But nothing in him believed it. Not anymore.
Finally the nurse led them to a glassed-in porch that had been located on the west side of the building so it would capture all the warmth of the sun’s setting rays. One full wall was composed of windows, and through them the green spill of the hospital’s lawn was visible, the graveyard in the distance. It was a pretty room, the tiled floor spotless. A canvas with the beginnings of a landscape emerging from it leaned on an easel by the window. A memory returned to Wylan: his mother standing at an easel in the back garden of the house on Geldstraat, the smell of linseed oil, clean brushes in an empty glass, her thoughtful gaze assessing the lines of the boathouse and the canal beyond.
“She paints,” Wylan said flatly.
“All the time,” the nurse said cheerily. “Quite the artist is our Marya.”
A woman sat in a wheeled chair, head dipping as if she was fighting not to doze off, blankets piled up around her narrow shoulders. Her face was lined, her hair a faded amber, shot through with gray. The color of my hair , Wylan realized, if it had been left out in the sun to fade . He felt a surge of relief. This woman was far too old to be his mother. But then her chin lifted and her eyes opened. They were a clear, pure hazel, unchanged, undiminished.
“You have some visitors, Miss Hendriks.”
His mother’s lips moved, but Wylan couldn’t hear what she said.
She looked at them with sharp eyes. Then her expression wavered, became vague and questioning as the certainty left her face. “Should I … should I know you?”
Wylan’s throat ached. Would you know me , he wondered, if I still looked like your son? He managed a shake of his head.
“We met … we met long ago,” he said. “When I was just a child.” She made a humming noise and looked out at the lawn.
Wylan turned helplessly to Jesper. He was not ready for this. His mother was a body long buried, dust in the ground.
Gently, Jesper led him to the chair in front of Marya. “We have an hour before we have to start the walk back,” he said quietly. “Talk to her.”
“About what?”
“Remember what you said to Kaz? We don’t know what may happen next. This is all we’ve got.” Then he rose and crossed to where the nurse
was tidying up the paints. “Tell me, Miss … I’m ashamed to say I didn’t catch your name.”
The nurse smiled, her cheeks round and red as candied apples. “Betje.”
“A charming name for a charming girl. Mister Smeet asked that I have a look at all the facilities while we’re here. Would you mind giving me a quick tour?”
She hesitated, glancing over at Wylan.
“We’ll be fine here,” Wylan managed in a voice that sounded too loud and too hearty to his ears. “I’ll just run through some routine questions. All part of the new policy.”
The nurse twinkled at Jesper. “Well then, I think we might have a quick look around.”
Wylan studied his mother, his thoughts a jangle of misplayed chords. They’d cut her hair short. He tried to picture her younger, in the fine black wool gown of a mercher’s wife, white lace gathered at her collar, her curls thick and vibrant, arranged by a lady’s maid into a nautilus of braids.
“Hello,” he managed.
“Did you come for my money? I don’t have any money.” “I don’t either,” Wylan said faintly.
She was not familiar, exactly, but there was something in the way she tilted her head, the way she sat, her spine still straight. As if she was at the piano.
“Do you like music?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yes, but there isn’t much here.”
He pulled the flute from his shirt. He’d traveled the whole day with it tucked up against his chest like some kind of secret, and it was still warm from his body. He’d planned to play it beside her grave like some kind of idiot. How Kaz would have laughed at him.
The first few notes were wobbly, but then he got control of his breath. He found the melody, a simple song, one of the first he’d learned. For a moment, she looked as if she was trying to remember where she might have heard it. Then she simply closed her eyes and listened.
When he was finished, she said, “Play something cheerful.”
So he played a Kaelish reel and then a Kerch sea shanty that was better suited to the tin whistle. He played every song that came into his head, but nothing mournful, nothing sad. She didn’t speak, though
occasionally, he saw her tap her toe to the music, and her lips would move as if she knew the words.
At last he put the flute down in his lap. “How long have you been here?”
She stayed silent.
He leaned forward, seeking some answer in those vague hazel eyes. “What did they do to you?”
She laid a gentle hand on his cheek. Her palm felt cool and dry. “What did they do to you?” He couldn’t tell if it was a challenge or if she was just repeating his words.
Wylan felt the painful press of tears in his throat and fought to swallow them.
The door banged open. “Well now, did we have a good visit?” said the nurse as she entered.
Hastily, Wylan tucked the flute back into his shirt. “Indeed,” he said. “Everything seems to be in order.”
“You two seem awfully young for this type of work,” she said, dimpling at Jesper.
“I might say the same for you,” he replied. “But you know how it is, the new clerks get stuck with the most menial tasks.”
“Will you be back again soon?”
Jesper winked. “You never do know.” He nodded at Wylan. “We have a boat to catch.”
“Say goodbye, Miss Hendriks!” urged the nurse.
Marya’s lips moved, but this time Wylan was close enough to hear what she muttered. Van Eck.
On the way out of the hospital, the nurse kept up a steady stream of chatter with Jesper. Wylan walked behind them. His heart hurt. What had his father done to her? Was she truly mad? Or had he simply bribed the right people to say so? Had he drugged her? Jesper glanced back at Wylan once as the nurse gibbered on, his gray eyes concerned.
They were almost to the pale blue door when the nurse said, “Would you like to see her paintings?”
Wylan jerked to a halt. He nodded.
“I think that would be most interesting,” said Jesper.
The woman led them back the way they’d come and then opened the door to what appeared to be a closet.
Wylan felt his knees buckle and had to grab the wall for balance. The nurse didn’t notice—she was talking on and on. “The paints are expensive, of course, but they seem to bring her so much pleasure. This is just the latest batch. Every six months or so we have to put them on the rubbish heap. There just isn’t space for them.”
Wylan wanted to scream. The closet was crammed with paintings— landscapes, different views of the hospital grounds, a lake in sun and shadow, and there, repeated again and again, was the face of a little boy with ruddy curls and bright blue eyes.
He must have made some kind of noise, because the nurse turned to him. “Oh dear,” she said to Jesper, “your friend’s gone quite pale again. Perhaps a stimulant?”
“No, no,” said Jesper, putting his arm around Wylan. “But we really should be going. It’s been a most enlightening visit.”
Wylan didn’t register the walk down the drive bordered by yew hedges or retrieving their coats and caps from behind the tree stump near the main road.
They were halfway back to the dock before he could bring himself to speak. “She knows what he did to her. She knows he had no right to take her money, her life.” Van Eck , she’d said. She was not Marya Hendriks, she was Marya Van Eck, a wife and mother stripped of her name and her fortune. “Remember when I said he wasn’t evil?”
Wylan’s legs gave out and he sat down hard, right there in the middle of the road, and he couldn’t bring himself to care because the tears were coming and there was no way he could stop them. They gusted through his chest in ragged, ugly sobs. He hated that Jesper was seeing him cry, but there was nothing he could do, not about the tears, not about any of it. He buried his face in his arms, covering his head as if, were he to only will it strongly enough, he could vanish.
He felt Jesper squeeze his arm. “It’s okay,” Jesper said.
“No, it’s not.”
“You’re right, it’s not. It’s rotten, and I’d like to string your father up in a barren field and let the vultures have at him.”
Wylan shook his head. “You don’t understand. It was me. I caused this. He wanted a new wife. He wanted an heir. A real heir, not a moron who can barely spell his own name.” He’d been eight when his mother had been sent away. He didn’t have to wonder anymore; that was when
his father had given up on him.
“Hey,” Jesper said, giving him a shake. “Hey. Your father could have made a lot of choices when he found out you couldn’t read. Hell, he could have said you were blind or that you had trouble with your vision. Or better yet, he could have just been happy about the fact that he had a genius for a son.”
“I’m not a genius.”
“You’re stupid about a lot of things, Wylan, but you are not stupid. And if I ever hear you call yourself a moron again, I’m going to tell Matthias you tried to kiss Nina. With tongue.”
Wylan wiped his nose on his sleeve. “He’ll never believe it.”
“Then I’ll tell Nina you tried to kiss Matthias. With tongue.” He sighed. “Look, Wylan. Normal people don’t wall their wives up in insane asylums. They don’t disinherit their sons because they didn’t get the child they wanted. You think my dad wanted a mess like me for a kid? You didn’t cause this. This happened because your father is a lunatic dressed up in a quality suit.”
Wylan pressed the heels of his hands to his swollen eyes. “That’s all true, and none of it makes me feel any better.”
Jesper gave his shoulder another little shake. “Well, how about this?
Kaz is going to tear your father’s damn life apart.”
Wylan was about to say that didn’t help either, but he hesitated. Kaz Brekker was the most brutal, vengeful creature Wylan had ever encountered—and he’d sworn he was going to destroy Jan Van Eck. The thought felt like cool water cascading over the hot, shameful feeling of helplessness he’d been carrying with him for so long. Nothing could make this right, ever. But Kaz could make his father’s life very wrong. And Wylan would be rich. He could take his mother from this place. They could go somewhere warm. He could put her in front of a piano, get her to play, take her somewhere full of bright colors and beautiful sounds. They could go to Novyi Zem. They could go anywhere. Wylan lifted his head and wiped away his tears. “Actually, that helps a lot.”
Jesper grinned. “Thought it might. But if we don’t get on that boat back to Ketterdam, no righteous comeuppance.”
Wylan rose, suddenly eager to return to the city, to help bring Kaz’s plan to life. He’d gone to the Ice Court reluctantly. He’d aided Kaz grudgingly. Because through all of it, he’d believed that he deserved his father’s contempt, and now he could admit that somewhere, in some
buried place, he’d hoped there might still be a way back to his father’s good favor. Well, his father could keep that good favor and see what it bought him when Kaz Brekker was finished.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go steal all my dad’s money.” “Isn’t it your money?”
“Okay, let’s go steal it back.”
They headed off at a run. “I love a little righteous comeuppance,” said Jesper. “Jogs the liver!”
