V.E Schwab - A Darker Shade of Magic

Kell was a year older than Rhy but built like an afternoon shadow, tall and slim, while Rhy was built like a statue, and nearly as strong.

“Do not lie,” warned Rhy. “Not to me.”

Kell’s mouth became a hard line. Rhy had caught him, two years before. Not caught in the act , of course, but snagged him in another, more devious way. Trust. The two had been drinking on one of the palace’s many balconies one summer night, the glow of the Isle beneath them and the stretch of sky above, and the truth had stumbled out. Kell had told his brother about the deals he struck in Grey London, and in White, and even on occasion in Red, about the various things he’d smuggled, and Rhy had stared at him, and listened, and when he spoke, it wasn’t to lecture Kell on all the ways it was wrong, or illegal. It was to ask why .

“I don’t know,” said Kell, and it had been the truth.

Rhy had sat up, eyes bleary from drink. “Have we not provided?” he’d asked, visibly upset. “Is there anything you want for?”

“No,” Kell had answered, and that had been a truth and a lie at the same time.

“Are you not loved?” whispered Rhy. “Are you not welcomed as family?”

“But I’m not family, Rhy,” Kell had said. “I’m not truly a Maresh, for all that the king and queen have offered me that name. I feel more like a possession than a prince.”

At that, Rhy had punched him in the face.

For a week after, Kell had two black eyes instead of one, and he’d never spoken like that again, but the damage was done. He’d hoped Rhy would prove too drunk to remember the conversation, but he’d remembered everything. He hadn’t told the king or queen, and Kell supposed he owed Rhy that, but now, every time he traveled, he had to endure Rhy’s questioning and with it, the reminder that what he was doing was foolish and wrong.

Rhy let go of Kell’s shoulders. “Why do you insist on keeping up these pursuits?”

“They amuse me,” said Kell, brushing himself off.

Rhy shook his head. “Look, I’ve turned a blind eye to your childish rebellion for quite a while now, but those doors were shut for a reason,” he warned. “Transference is treason .”

“They’re only trinkets,” said Kell, continuing down the hall. “There’s no real danger in it.”

“There’s plenty,” said Rhy, matching his stride. “Like the danger that awaits you if our parents ever learn—”

“Would you tell them?” asked Kell.

Rhy sighed. Kell watched him try to answer several ways before he finally said, “There is nothing I would not give you.”

Kell’s chest ached. “I know.”

“You are my brother. My closest friend.”

“I know.”

“Then put an end to this foolishness, before I do.”

Kell managed a small, tired smile. “Careful, Rhy,” he said. “You’re beginning to sound like a king.”

Rhy’s mouth quirked. “One day I will be. And I need you there beside me.”

Kell smiled back. “Believe me. There’s no place I’d rather be.” It was the truth.

Rhy patted his shoulder and went to bed. Kell shoved his hands into his pockets and watched him go. The people of London—and of the country beyond—loved their prince. And why shouldn’t they? He was young and handsome and kind. Perhaps he played the part of rake too often and too well, but behind the charismatic smile and the flirtatious air was a sharp mind and a good intent, the desire to make everyone around him happy. He had little gift for magic—and even less focus for it—but what he lacked in power he more than made up for in charm. Besides, if Kell had learned anything from his trips to White London, it was that magic made rulers worse, not better.

He continued down the hall to his own rooms, where a dark set of oak doors led onto a sprawling chamber. The Isle’s red glow poured through the open doors of a private balcony, tapestry billowed and dipped in fabric clouds from the high ceiling, and a luxurious canopied bed, filled with feather and lined with silk, stood waiting. Beckoning. It took all of Kell’s will not to collapse into it. Instead, he crossed through the chamber and into a second smaller room lined with books—a variety of tomes on magic, including what little he could find on Antari and their blood commands, the majority destroyed out of fear in the Black London purge—and closed the door behind him. He snapped his fingers absently and a candle perching on the edge of a shelf sparked to life. In its light he could make out a series of marks on the back of the door. An inverted triangle, a set of lines, a circle—simple marks, easy enough to re-create, but specific enough to differentiate. Doors to different places in Red London. His eyes went to the one in the middle. It was made up of two crossed lines. X marks the spot , he thought to himself, pressing his fingers to the most recent cut on his arm—the blood still wet—then tracing the mark.

“As Tascen,” he said tiredly.

The wall gave way beneath his touch, and his private library became a cramped little room, the lush quiet of his royal chambers replaced by the din of the tavern below and the city beyond, much nearer than it had been a mere moment before.

Is Kir Ayes—the Ruby Fields—was the name that swung above the tavern’s door. The place was run by an old woman named Fauna; she had the body of a gran, the mouth of a sailor, and the temper of a drunk. Kell had cut a deal with her when he was young (she was still old then, always old), and the room at the top of the stairs became his.

The room itself was rough and worn and several strides too small, but it belonged entirely to him. Spellwork—and not strictly legal at that—marked the window and the door, so that no one else could find the room, or perceive that it was there. At first glance, the chamber looked fairly empty, but a closer inspection would reveal that the space under the cot and the drawers in the dresser were filled with boxes and in those boxes were treasures from every London.

Kell supposed that he was a Collector, too.

The only items on display were a book of poems, a glass ball filled with black sand, and a set of maps. The poems were by a man named Blake, and had been given to Kell by a Collector in Grey London the year before, the spine already worn to nothing. The glass ball was a trinket from White London, said to show one’s dreams in the sands, but Kell had yet to try it.

The maps were a reminder.

The three canvases were tacked side by side, the sole decoration on the walls. From a distance, they could have passed for the same map—the same outline of the same island country—but up close, only the word London could be found on all three. Grey London. Red London. White London. The map on the left was of Great Britain, from the English Channel up through the tips of Scotland, every facet rendered in detail. By contrast, the map on the right held almost none. Makt, the country called itself, the capital city held by the ruthless Dane twins, but the territory beyond was in constant flux. The map in the middle Kell knew best, for it was home. Arnes. The country’s name was written in elegant script down the length of the island, though in truth, the land on which London stood was only the tip of the royal empire.

Three very different Londons, in three very different countries, and Kell was one of the only living souls to have seen them all. The great irony, he supposed, was that he had never seen the worlds beyond the cities. Bound to the service of his king and crown, and constantly kept within reach, he had never been more than a day’s journey from one London or another.

Fatigue ate at Kell’s body as he stretched and shrugged off his coat. He dug through the pockets until he found the Collector’s parcel, which he set carefully on the bed, gingerly undoing the wrapping to reveal the tiny silver music box inside. The room’s lanterns grew brighter as he held up the trinket to the light, admiring it. The ache in his arm drew him back, and he set the music box aside and turned his attention to the dresser.