The Alchemist opened the door wide and stared in surprise at the load Ruxandra carried.
“Blankets,” Ruxandra said. “And food. You must be starving and exhausted and—”
The Alchemist stepped forward, put her hand on the back of Ruxandra’s head and pulled her in for a long, deep kiss. Then she pulled Ruxandra inside, shut the door and locked it. She kissed her again, her hands running up over Ruxandra’s breasts.
“Alchemist.”
“Shut up,” the Alchemist whispered. “You are alive, and I am alive, and I need this now.”
Ruxandra managed to spread the blankets on the floor while the Alchemist undressed her. She managed to kiss her back and caress her as they knelt together on the ground. The Alchemist brought her to climax first, with fingers inside her and her tongue caressing Ruxandra’s breasts. Then Ruxandra knelt between the Alchemist’s legs and stayed there until the other woman convulsed in passion. Why must there be pain and death when there is this? What is wrong with human beings? But that question led to questions of good and evil, of God and angels, and Ruxandra didn’t want to go there. She cleared her mind and scooted up to the Alchemist’s mouth. The woman shuddered, lips parting. Ruxandra bent to the task of pleasure.
Two hours later the Alchemist ate. The Beast inside Ruxandra was growling continuously now, demanding to be fed. Ruxandra forced it into silence and lay beside the Alchemist, watching over the other woman as she dozed.
“Ruxandra,” the Alchemist whispered at one point. “Sleep.”
Ruxandra shook her head. “I can’t. The Beast might escape.”
“The Beast?” The Alchemist’s eyes came open. “What Beast?”
And so Ruxandra told her everything, from her time at the convent to Elizabeth to Venice to her last conversation with Ishtar. The Alchemist listened to it all in silence, eyes never leaving Ruxandra’s face, and, when the story was over, pulled Ruxandra down with her again. They made slow, gentle love this time, and at the end of it, the Alchemist wrapped her arms around Ruxandra’s shoulders.
“Now sleep, my princess,” the Alchemist said. “My brave and magnificent princess. You will not hurt me, I know it. Not even with a Beast inside you.”
And so Ruxandra slept, and her dreams were sweet.
And when she woke, the world was on fire.
Chapter 22
The house wasn’t burning. No flames threatened them yet, but Ruxandra heard them crackling and smelled smoke. Outside, people cried in panic. Ruxandra went to the window and then jumped back with a yelp of pain as the sunlight touched her skin.
The gray-and-yellow haze of smoke that rolled through the streets dimmed the late-afternoon sun. The light smarted rather than burned—but it still hurt. Ruxandra peered out the window from the side, staying out of the sunlight’s direct path. The light outside hurt her eyes but didn’t burn. The buildings across the street were intact. Behind them huge columns of black smoke rose. She looked as far to the side as she could, then swore and ran for the Alchemist.
Ruxandra shook the Alchemist awake. “Get dressed, fast!”
The woman rolled to her feet even as she tried to blink the sleep from her eyes. “What’s going on?”
“Fire. Everywhere.” Ruxandra grabbed the top blanket, brought her talons out and shredded it into strips. A hundred twenty years before, she had done the same to fight Elizabeth in the daylight. The cloth would not completely protect her but would save her from the worst of the burns. She wrapped it over her arms, legs, and head, anywhere that her dress and stockings might not cover. She moved fast, finishing the strips and tying them off in the time it took the Alchemist to find her clothes. Then she put on her own clothes and her cloak on top.
“What do we do?” The Alchemist kept her voice steady, but there was panic in her eyes.
“We get away.”
“To where?”
“I don’t know.”
Ruxandra opened the door and peered out, squinting against the sun. Flames, twenty feet high, rose up at either end of the street, three blocks from the house. Ruxandra jumped to the roof of a two-story house across the street.
They had set fire to the entire neighborhood.
Houses all around blazed, their wooden frames catching and burning like so many funeral pyres. The heat was growing unbearable, even though the fires were still a block away on all sides.
Who would do this? Not the church or the secret police. They would have sent the magicians to trap me, not burned the city.
Ruxandra jumped straight up as high as she could to look beyond the flames. She spun in the air, taking in everything as she reached the apex of her jump. Lines of men with buckets ran from the Neglinka, but they weren’t trying to quench the flames. Instead they were wetting down the buildings outside the neighborhood, trying to keep the flames from engulfing them as well. Beyond them soldiers stood in ranks, muskets ready, on every street and intersection. Some wore the uniforms she’d seen on Belosselsky’s men the night before. Others wore different uniforms.
Khilkoff’s men, maybe. Belosselsky could have let them in.
Ruxandra landed on the roof and jumped down to the ground.
“Any good news?”
“It wasn’t the church or Anna,” Ruxandra said.
The Alchemist’s mouth twisted. “If that is all the good news, we are in trouble.”
“We are.” Ruxandra took her hand. “Cover your mouth and come with me. Try not to breathe too deep. We have to find a way past the flames.”
There wasn’t one.
The streets had been lined with hay and wagons and left to burn. Flames engulfed the buildings on all sides and had spread to others. It moved closer as they searched, like a relentless, starving animal, feeding on everything it could see.
I might be able to get out by myself. Ruxandra looked at the height and width of the fires, trying to calculate if she could escape with the Alchemist on her shoulder or back. But I don’t think I can break free with her, too.
“I take it we are in trouble?” The Alchemist attempted a light tone, but her voice shook.
“Yes,” Ruxandra said. “We need to get past the flames.”
The Alchemist pursed her lips and looked at the flaming mess in the streets. “How strong are you, Ruxandra?”
“Not strong enough to jump the flames with you on my back.”
“Not what I was asking.” The Alchemist broke into a coughing fit. When it stopped, she wiped her mouth. “This smoke will kill me before the flames. If I gave you instructions, could you rip the side off a building?”
Ruxandra’s mouth fell open.
The Alchemist grinned. “I am a genius, remember? We need to get over the flames, so we’ll build our own bridge. Now, find the place where the flames are thinnest. I’ll wait here.”
Ruxandra raced through the neighborhood and back to the Alchemist. “In the direction of the Neglinka. There are two streets where the flames are only ten feet high and thirty feet deep.”
As she said the words she heard the crash of a building coming down, and the roar of the flames grew louder.
“One now,” Ruxandra said.
“One is enough. Now take me there and listen.”
Ruxandra listened as she led the way. The roar of the fire was deafening, and the heat so great that Ruxandra’s skin blistered where it wasn’t covered by cloth. The Alchemist chose a three-story house right beside the flaming street and then retreated, unable to stand the heat. Ruxandra ran inside the house.
The wooden houses had been built around a solid frame of thick beams and posts, their cladding put on the outside. Inside, a second layer of wall protected against the cold of the winter.
Ruxandra’s talons ripped through the inner walls as if they were paper. They tore through the support beams in a series of vicious swipes. She cut through the bottom supports first, smashing wood planks with fists and boots, and hacking through the supports with her talons. On each floor above she did the same, leaving intact o
nly a few supports on the side nearest the flames.
When she was done, the entire front of the house leaned and swayed, ripping and popping as the frame began to buckle.
Not yet. Please, not yet.
Ruxandra ran back to the middle floor, grabbed the beam across the front of the building, and pushed hard.
Nails screeched, and wood protested and twisted. For a moment Ruxandra thought the wall was going to come crashing down.
It held together and swung wide, like a giant door, into the street.
Yes!
Ruxandra leaped up, hacked her talons through the nails that still held, and kicked the top of the wall. Slowly, ponderously, the wall fell forward, smashing onto the flaming wreckage in the street. Even over the noise of the fire, Ruxandra heard the Alchemist’s cheer, cut short by a coughing fit. Ruxandra ran to her, grabbed her, and tossed her over her shoulder.
“Take a deep breath!” Ruxandra shouted.
Soldiers converged around the falling building. Ruxandra turned unnoticed. Smoke rose from under the fallen wall as it began to smolder. The flames beyond it still rose high and wide but were no longer insurmountable. Ruxandra raced to the end of the building, bent her knees and jumped.
She landed just short of their bayonets.
She went through the soldiers, scattering them like leaves. Several shots followed her as she ran, but the men could not see their target. She turned a corner and went another dozen blocks before she let the Alchemist off her shoulder.
“Where to now?” the Alchemist gasped.
“The library,” Ruxandra said. “Michael has a spell to get rid of Ishtar.”
She held tight to the Alchemist’s hand as they walked through the streets, keeping them both unnoticed. The sun beat down on her, heating her body though the cloak and the cloth strips. The spots blistered by the fire burned and itched like fresh wasp stings.
The troops were gone from the library, the streets around it empty. Ruxandra and the Alchemist dashed down the steps and into the library proper.
“We should wash,” the Alchemist said. “Get the stink of smoke off us before anything else.”
“A lovely idea,” said Alexi. “Unfortunately, there is no time.”
Ruxandra pulled the Alchemist behind her. She breathed deep, smelling for other secret police.
“I’m alone,” Alexi said. “You don’t have to be afraid of me. In fact, you need to help me.”
“No.” Ruxandra looked around for something to throw. “I don’t.”
“Here.” Alexi tossed a heavy bag toward her. It hit the ground with a clang rather than a thud. “Open it.”
Ruxandra glared at him. She could not feel his emotions, nor read any deception in the expression on his face. She knelt and opened the bag. Inside were fifteen lead shot, each two inches across.
“I heard what you did to the priest,” Alexi said. “I thought these would be better for throwing, next time.”
Ruxandra’s eyes went from the shot to Alexi. “Why?”
“Because we have a common enemy. And I don’t think I can defeat her without your help.”
Ruxandra rose. “Ishtar?”
“Ishtar.” Alexi looked around. “Michael! Derek! Come out!”
The two magicians emerged from the stacks, watching him with wary eyes.
“I told you earlier that I have spies everywhere,” Alexi said. “I have spies in the church and the court, and here I had Eduard.”
“What?” The Alchemist’s voice rose so high it became a screech. “Eduard?”
“In exchange for not arresting Kurkov and charging them both with sodomy—punishable by death, by the way—Eduard agreed to be my eyes and ears in the library. That was how we knew about the ritual and all your other plans.”
“That bastard,” Derek growled. “I will end him. With a knife in his bowels.”
“You don’t need to. He died fighting for Kurkov. Stabbed three guards before they shot him. The two were together in a kabak in a room that I understand is one of their favorites. And do you know why they were there?”
Ruxandra felt her blood heating up with rage. “Ishtar told them to go someplace safe.”
“Exactly. She suggested they go well away from the riots before they started. Eduard left a note with one of my men saying this and where they would be.”
“Wait.” Michael frowned. “How did Ishtar know when the riots were going to start?”
“That is the question, isn’t it?”
“She started them.” Ruxandra closed her eyes, trying to calm her mind even as it filled with the sounds of gunshots and the screams of the wounded and dying. “She tipped off the church about what was going to happen.”
“And Prince Belosselsky and Princess Khilkoff, I suspect,” Alexi said. “Everyone was prepared except the empress. The attacks forced Anna’s troops back to the Kremlin, and now Ishtar is helping her plan a counterattack which, while it appears to be a stroke of brilliance, will result in a great deal of destruction and loss of life.”
“To sow chaos and fear,” Michael said, his eyes now beyond weary. He looked at Ruxandra. “To make humans kneel in terror and to ravage the world. That’s what you told us.”
“We were starry-eyed fools,” Derek said heavily. “And so was your empress.”
“Yes,” Ruxandra said, wishing she could take more joy in their realization. “You were.”
“As in Moscow, so in the rest of Russia,” Alexi said. “We must stop the insurrection before it grows worse, and that starts with getting rid of Ishtar.”
“Will Anna support us?”
“No, nor will she give me my magicians. Ishtar came to her last night saying that you had become unstable and wanted to kill her, so Anna keeps the magicians with her at all times.”
Ruxandra frowned, thinking. “What about Kade?”
“He has been sent out to an army camp, fifty miles from the city. Anna has decided that a show of force, rather than diplomacy, is the order of the day. Kade should have reached the camp early this morning. They will bring troops to reinforce Anna and drive away Khilkoff’s army from the walls.”
“I think Khilkoff’s army is inside the walls,” Ruxandra said. “We saw soldiers in different uniforms beside Belosselsky’s troops.”
Alexi’s expression went from anxious to grim. “This will be bad. Can you command them to put down their weapons?”
“Probably,” Ruxandra said. “If I can get close enough.”
Alexi nodded. “Right. We remove Ishtar and disperse the rebel armies before the counterattack. You and I will get the other magicians. Michael, Derek and the Alchemist will make copies of the scroll for them.”
“It will be done,” Michael said. “They will be ready when you return.”
“You forget,” Ruxandra said. “I can’t get into the Kremlin.”
“I did not forget,” Alexi said. “There is another way in.”
Ruxandra’s eyebrows rose.
One side of Alexi’s mouth quirked up. “You didn’t think I shared all my secrets, did you? Now come. We must go quickly.”
“What about Kurkov?” Derek asked. “Can we not help him?”
“Anna won’t risk the troops to save him,” Alexi said. “Even if he wasn’t surrounded by a mob and priests. His only hope would be if our armies can take the church before they kill him.”
“What are the chances of that?” the Alchemist asked, her voice trembling.
“None,” Alexi said gently. “There is no hope for him.”
The Alchemist bit her lip. “Ruxandra, you cannot get near him?”
Ruxandra shook her head. The Alchemist looked to Michael and Derek. Both men had tears in their eyes. They saw the Alchemist’s expression and went white. Then they nodded. The Alchemist went to her knees and wrapped her arms around Ruxandra’s legs.
“Please,” she begged. “Do not let him burn.”
Ruxandra put her hands on the Alchemist’s shoulders. “I can’t get near him. I cann
ot help him.”
“I know.” The Alchemist clung tighter to her legs. She looked up, tears gleaming on her face, dripping off her chin. “But please, don’t let him burn. Can you do that?”
Ruxandra’s heart lurched at the grief in the Alchemist’s face. She thought of Kurkov’s cheerful laugh and rough, ribald manner. She remembered his knowledge, deep and wide and always available to her. She remembered the love between him and Eduard, and the way he had begged her to rescue the Alchemist. Then she remembered his bloody, swollen face, and the chains on the post cutting into his arms.
“Yes,” Ruxandra said. “I can do that.”
The Alchemist pressed her face into Ruxandra’s legs, tears soaking the fabric of her dress. “Thank you.”
“Start copying the scroll,” Alexi said. “We will return as soon as we can.”
They left at once.
“Kurkov first,” Ruxandra said, her voice bleak.
“Of course.” Alexi walked in silence beside her for a time. “For what it is worth, I am sorry.”
“You would have tortured him if you could,” Ruxandra snarled, letting out some of her rage on him. “If it were not for you, none of this would have happened.”
“I did torture him,” Alexi said, his voice calm in the face of her rage. “I ordered him beaten and I made him watch his lover being beaten. And I would do it again if I thought it best for the country.”
“It is never best for the country!” Ruxandra said. “Why don’t any of you understand that? You’re a bastard, Alexi.”
“Yes.”
“So stay out of my way.”
The crowd around the church was smaller, but still large enough that no one could easily disperse it. Guards still surrounded Kurkov. His face was even more swollen, his eyes nearly shut. Two soldiers took turns poking him with the tips of their bayonets, to the amusement of the crowd. Kurkov swore and raged at them, his voice weak, but still carrying.
“The priests are here,” Alexi said. “Two beside the pyre. Can you see them?”
“No.” Ruxandra stared at Kurkov. She wanted to shout to him, wanted to pull him off the post and bring him back to the library, to heal him and tell him that all would be well again. Or, at the least, let him die with those who loved him. Not like this. Not alone.