Leigh Bardugo - Siege and Storm

David nodded. “His son had all of Morozova’s journals and papers burned. He said they were too dangerous, too much of a temptation to any Grisha. That’s why I didn’t say anything at the meeting. I shouldn’t even know they ever existed.”

“So how do you?”

David looked around the almost empty workshop again. “Morozova was a Fabrikator, maybe the first, certainly the most powerful. He did things that no one’s ever dreamed of before or since.” He gave a sheepish shrug. “To us, he’s kind of a hero.”

“Do you know anything else about the amplifiers he created?”

David shook his head. “There were rumors of others, but the stag was the only one I’d ever heard of.”

It was possible David had never even seen the Istorii Sankt’ya . The Apparat had claimed that the book was once given to all Grisha children when they arrived at the Little Palace. But that was long ago. The Grisha put their faith in the Small Science, and I’d never known them to bother with religion. Superstition , the Darkling had called the red book. Peasant propaganda. Clearly David hadn’t made the connection between Sankt Ilya and Ilya Morozova. Or he had something to hide.

“David,” I said, “why are you here? You fashioned the collar. You must have known what he intended.”

He swallowed. “I knew he would be able to control you, that the collar would allow him to use your power. But I never thought, I never believed… all those people…” He struggled to find the words. Finally, he held out his ink-stained hands and said, almost pleadingly. “I make things. I don’t destroy them.”

I wanted to believe that he had underestimated the Darkling’s ruthlessness. I’d certainly made the same mistake. But he might be lying or he might just be weak. Which is worse? asked a harsh voice in my head. If he can change sides once, he can do it again. Was it Nikolai’s voice? The Darkling’s? Or was it just the part of me that had learned to trust no one?

“Good luck with the dishes,” I said as I rose to leave.

David hunched over his papers. “I don’t believe in luck.”

Too bad , I thought. We’re going to need some.

I WENT STRAIGHTfrom the Fabrikator workrooms to the library and spent most of the night there. It was an exercise in frustration. The Grisha histories I searched had only the most basic information on Ilya Morozova, despite the fact that he was considered the greatest Fabrikator who ever lived. He had invented Grisha steel, a method of making unbreakable glass, and a compound for liquid fire so dangerous that he destroyed the formula just twelve hours after he created it. But any mentions of amplifiers or the Bonesmith had been expunged.

That didn’t stop me from returning the next evening to bury myself in religious texts and any reference I could find to Sankt Ilya. Like most Saints’ tales, the story of his martyrdom was depressingly brutal: One day, a plow had overturned in the fields behind his home. Hearing the screams, Ilya ran to help, only to find a man weeping over his dead son, the boy’s body torn open by the blades, the ground soaked through with his blood. Ilya had brought the boy back to life—and the villagers had thanked him for it by clapping him in irons and tossing him into a river to sink beneath the weight of his chains.

The details were hopelessly muddy. Sometimes Ilya was a farmer, sometimes a mason or a woodworker. He had two daughters or one son or no children at all. A hundred different villages claimed to be the site of his martyrdom. Then, there was the small problem of the miracle he’d performed. I had no problem believing that Sankt Ilya might be a Corporalnik Healer, but Ilya Morozova was supposed to be a Fabrikator. What if they weren’t the same person at all?

At night, the glass-domed room was lit by oil lamps, and the hush was so deep that I could hear myself breathe. Alone in the gloom, surrounded by books, it was hard not to feel overwhelmed. But the library seemed like my best hope, so I kept at it. Tolya found me there one evening, curled up in my favorite chair, struggling to make sense out of a text in ancient Ravkan.

“You shouldn’t come here at night without one of us,” he said grumpily.

I yawned and stretched. I was probably more in danger of a shelf falling on me than anything else, but I was too tired to argue. “Won’t happen again,” I said.

“What is that?” Tolya asked, lowering himself down to get a closer view of the book in my lap. He was so huge that it was a bit like having a bear join me for a study session.

“I’m not sure. I saw the name Ilya in the index, so I picked it up, but I can’t make sense of it.”

“It’s a list of titles.”

“You can read it?” I asked in surprise.

“We were raised in the church,” he said, skimming the page.

I looked at him. Lots of children were raised in religious homes, but that didn’t mean they could read liturgical Ravkan. “What does it say?”

He ran a finger down the words beneath Ilya’s name. His huge hands were covered in scars. Beneath his roughspun sleeve, I could see the edge of a tattoo peeking out.

“Not much ,” he said. “Saint Ilya the Beloved, Saint Ilya the Treasured. There are a few towns listed, though, places where he’s said to have performed miracles.

I sat up straighter. “That might be a place to start.”

“You should explore the chapel. I think there are some books in the vestry.”

I had walked past the royal chapel plenty of times, but I’d never been inside. I’d always thought of it as the Apparat’s domain, and even with him gone, I wasn’t sure I wanted to visit. “What’s it like?”

Tolya lifted his huge shoulders. “Like any chapel.”

“Tolya,” I asked, suddenly curious, “did you ever even consider joining the Second Army?”

He looked offended. “I wasn’t born to serve the Darkling.” I wanted to ask what he had been born for, but he tapped the page and said, “I can translate this for you, if you like.” He grinned. “Or maybe I’ll just make Tamar do it.”

“All right,” I said. “Thanks.”

He bent his head. It was just a bow, but he was still kneeling beside me, and there was something about his pose that sent a shiver up my spine.

I felt as if he were waiting for something. Tentatively, I reached out and laid a hand on his shoulder. As soon as my fingers came to rest, he let out a breath. It was almost a sigh.

We stayed there for a moment, silent in the halo of lamplight. Then he rose and bowed again.

“I’ll be just outside the door,” he said, and slipped away into the dark.

MAL RETURNED FROMthe hunt the next morning, and I was eager to tell him everything—what I’d learned from David, the plans for the new Hummingbird , my strange encounter with Tolya.

“He’s an odd one,” Mal agreed. “But it still couldn’t hurt to check out the chapel.”

We decided to walk over together, and on the way, I pressed him to tell me about the hunt.

“We spent more time every day playing cards and drinking kvas than doing anything else. And some duke got so drunk he passed out in the river. He almost drowned. His servants hauled him out by his boots, but he kept wading back in, slurring something about the best way to catch trout.”

“Was it terrible?” I asked, laughing.

“It was fine.” He kicked a pebble down the path with his boot. “There’s a lot of curiosity about you.”

“Why do I doubt I’m going to like any of this?”

“One of the royal trackers is sure your powers are fake.”