Fearless
Nerron emptied a purse of red moonstone on to the spotless white counter. The smile grew even wider.
‘That might be enough. It was quite a challenge to find the merchandise. But I have my sources.’
The apothecary turned around and opened one of the enamelled drawers behind him. It contained hearts of every size and shape; some were as small as hazelnuts, and the biggest one looked like the well-preserved heart of a Giant.
‘You won’t find a finer collection in all of Vena.’ Another smile, proud, like that of a florist praising his roses. ‘The spell that keeps my merchandise fresh is quite complicated and not without hazards, but that’s, of course, not necessary for this heart. This, after all, is the heart of a Warlock. And I probably don’t have to explain what that means.’
He reached for a silver case next to the Giant heart. The heart the case contained was no bigger than a fig and had the consistency of black opal. Guismond’s heraldic animal was etched into the smooth surface: the crowned wolf.
‘As you can see, it’s in pristine condition. It was, after all, in the possession of the imperial family these past centuries.’
The undertaker first, Nerron.
Nerron spun around and smashed the man’s head into the wall before the dolt even realised what was happening.
‘How stupid does one have to be to try and sell a fake stone to a Goyl?’ he hissed at the apothecary. ‘Do you think we’re as ignorant as you people and can’t tell an opal from a petrified heart? One stone’s like any other, right? What do you think my skin’s made of? Jasper?’
He swiped the case off the counter. Disappointing. Very disappointing. Your own fault, Nerron. You’re trying to find the heart of a King, and here you are, searching in the gutters. Reckless never would’ve been so stupid.
He pointed his pistol at the trembling apothecary and nodded towards the glass jar by the register. Floating among the human and Dwarf eyes were also two Goyl eyeballs.
‘Try the golden ones,’ Nerron said as he poured the moonstone back into the purse. ‘I’m sure they taste better. And who knows, maybe you’ll end up seeing my kind with fresh eyes.’ The idea came to him as the apothecary was forcing down the first eye. It was a dirty idea, but he’d been looking for the heart for more than a week now, and patience had never been his strong suit. Nerron grabbed the pale shaking hand before it went into the eye jar again. ‘You can skip the second one. Do you have a Witch tongue? But no fake this time!’
The apothecary hastily pulled open another drawer. He used a pair of pliers to pick out a tongue that differed from a human tongue only by a small slit at the tip. Nerron poured the fake heart out of the case and put the tongue inside.
But he never came after Nerron.
A GAME
It was less than a half hour’s walk from the train station to the state archives, but all the big avenues leading to the palace were cut off by police blocks. The crowds on the sidewalks were nearly as thick as on the day of the Blood Wedding, and Jacob felt himself being washed along by the throng, like a piece of driftwood. Kami’en was in Vena. There was going to be a parade to celebrate the pregnancy of his human wife. The new Empress’s guards were decorating the streetlights and facades with garlands. The guards were, without exception, Goyl. Amalie left her protection to her husband’s soldiers. It was said she preferred to pick ones that had Kami’en’s carnelian skin. The garlands were strung with moonstone flowers, and the barricades along the streets were decorated with silver branches. Yet all Jacob saw was Troisclerq as he pinned a flower to Fox’s dress. What was going on with him? You’re jealous, Jacob. Don’t you have enough problems already?
He turned into the next alley – and ended up in front of another roadblock. Damn. Who was he fooling? The Bastard had long since found the heart. Stop it, Jacob! But he couldn’t remember ever having felt so tired. Not even the fear of death penetrated the fog in his head.
He pulled out the city guide he’d bought at the station. It was an unwieldy, chatty thing, as thick as a novel and filled with tiny print. But the Goyl had changed Vena so much that he hardly knew the place any more. The archive was on a street that was also on the parade route. Maybe he should try the mausoleum first. He leafed through the densely printed pages – holding Earlking’s card in one hand.
YOU’RE WASTING YOUR TIME, JACOB.
MUSEUM OF AUSTRIAN HISTORY.
HALL 33.
THE MAN WHO WAS GUISMOND’S EYES ALSO KNEW HIS HEART.
Jacob looked down the street. The pain in his chest was now constant, like a wound that wouldn’t heal. The price should be payable. He flagged down a cab and gave the driver the address of the museum.
Columns shaped like the bodies of tethered Giants. The entrance a frieze of vanquished Dragons. Dwarfs and Heinzel as chiselled ornaments beneath the windows. The building that housed the Museum of Austrian History had originally been a palace. One of the Empress’s ancestors had designed every detail himself. In his day he was called the Alchemist Prince, but it wasn’t his statue in front of the museum; it was that of his great-grandson, flanked by the equestrian statues of two victorious generals. Jacob pushed through the stream of uniformed schoolchildren flooding down the steps. He put the entrance fee in front of the ticket lady. Luckily, a goldsmith had agreed to change a few of the pathetic coins Jacob’s handkerchief still produced for brand-new guilders. The currency now bore Kami’en’s profile instead of the Empress’s.
Unlike the imperial Chambers of Miracles, the museum held no magical objects, but in its halls Jacob had learnt more about the Mirrorworld than many who were born there ever did. Weapons and armour of Austrian knights, long spears for fighting Giants, Ogre claws, gilded Dragon saddles, a copy of the original Emperor’s throne, and the head of the horse that had warned the Empress’s mother of a poisoned apple. Thousands of objects brought the history of Austry to life. Jacob remembered his first visit very well. Chanute had taken him to find information on a castle that had sunk into a lake more than a century before. Jacob had stopped in front of every display until Chanute grabbed him by the neck and shoved him along. But Jacob had snuck back every time they stopped in Vena, usually while Chanute was sleeping off his cheap wine. Jacob could find his way through the halls blind, but the Goyl hadn’t just changed the map of Vena. They’d done the same to Austry’s history.
The room where Jacob stopped had, until a few months earlier, housed the robes of state of the deposed Empress. Now the room was dominated by her daughter’s bloody wedding gown. The wax doll wearing it looked eerily like Amalie. The wax rendering of Kami’en’s stone skin was not half as convincing. Jacob approached the wax figure next to the King. The Jade Goyl stared at him through golden glass eyes. It looked so much like Will that Jacob could hardly bear to look at it. There was, of course, also a wax effigy of the Dark Fairy. She was standing a little aside. Wax corpses covered with black moths were strewn around her feet.
It’s in the past, Jacob. Like everything else here. Yet for a few breaths, he was transported back to the cathedral. Clara was again lying among the dead, Will was wearing the grey uniform soaked in Goyl blood, and his own tongue was forming the name that had planted death in his chest.