Next to them, two older fighters exchange blows, using just their hands, their feet not moving from spots delineated with chalk on the ground. Their hands move so fast, they blur, and their faces are tight with concentration.
We walk further, passing two young girls training high kicks under an instructor’s eye, and then, archery stations, where older soldiers shoot translucent, magical arrows that only materialize when they hit the wooden targets. It’s my invention. Thanks to this, no accidents occur, since the training arrows pass through flesh without harm.
“They don’t look dead. Or like babies.”
Jaga’s voice is clipped and tight with suspicion. I smile and pull her faster toward the building at the far end of the arena, where we should find Nyja.
“Remember how outraged you were that miscarried babies had souls? You asked what the point was. To give a soul to a baby that would die in infancy and never experience life.”
She nods tersely. I grin.
“Well, love, I had the very same thought long before you were born, when mortals were still a delight to behold. I decreed babies’ and small children’s souls would turn into nawkas, and gave Nyja power over them. They come here as tiny birds, and each newcomer has a choice. They can remain a bird for eternity. Or they can receive a body, similar to a mortal one. Some choose to spend endless sunny afternoons playing in the woods and lakes, remaining children forever. But many choose to grow up and fight.”
We walk through the high arch of the entrance into the academy proper. Outside, it’s humid and warm, but it’s cooler here, the tall, spacious hall lit with glowing orbs. I see Nyja talking to a few half-solid souls ahead. Above us roost the nawkas that chose to stay as birds.
They sit on perches of various lengths and thicknesses, a maze of them reaching from as low as nine feet above the floor up to the very ceiling, dozens of feet high. It’s made of crystal, and the roost is clearly visible in the bright light coming from above.
The nawkas coo and shake off their feathers in greeting. A few spread their wings, black and sharp against the light. Something falls—four somethings.
I have enough time to push Jaga away before I’m trapped.
Chapter ten
Breathless
Jaga grunts, landing on the cool polished stone of the floor. I try to follow, but a familiar zap of magic bites my skin. There’s a barrier around me, four oak saplings growing rapidly in four corners of a square. I am trapped between them.
The stone floor underneath them splits and breaks as roots dig in. The oaks grow taller, and I throw myself at the invisible barrier, only to be repelled by magic far stronger than mine.
“Hello, little brother.”
I growl when I hear Perun’s smug voice rumbling from one of the oaks that’s now taller than me, spreading its branches in a green canopy. There’s a scream. Nyja calls on her soldiers to hack down the oaks, but I know we have a more urgent problem.
“Look up!” I roar. “Upierzycas!”
Four nawkas above us stretch and grow, their tiny beaks shifting into angry female faces, their wings growing bigger, feathered torsos elongating. They crouch on their perches, each of the four the size of an adult mortal, with wings instead ofarms, their birdlike feet gripping the wood that groans under their weight.
They are bieses, one of the few kinds made by Perun. Fast and birdlike, upierzycas are lethal fighters. I never saw one change into a smaller bird before. Perun must have dabbled.
They dive, one by one, and my heart bursts with panic when I see who they aim for.
“Is that the redhead whore Mokosz kept boring me with? I thought she was feeding worms.”
And now he knows, but there’s no time to worry about it.
“Nyja, no!” I roar, sending a powerful wave of magic to push the goddess away from the nearest oak, which she’s trying to uproot. “Protect her! Now!”
Nyja turns. The nearest upierzyca lands on top of Jaga with a screech of triumph, and they roll in a flurry of feathers and talons. Nyja rushes into the fray, nawkas flying in from the arena to fight. I don’t look away, ignoring Perun’s satisfied laughter, until I see Jaga get up, bloodied but safe. Nyja shields her with her body.
That done, I can focus on myself. This is a clever trap. Oh, so clever. The oaks keep me contained in a prison woven from magic stronger than mine. Perun channels his power into this space through the trees.
I push back with my own magic, sending claws of darkness into the nearest oak that now reaches as high as the lowest perches above me. Its bark splits, sap flowing out in rivulets like blood, but the tree doesn’t budge, and Perun’s power doesn’t waver.
“If you wanted to take me out on a stroll in a grove, you only had to ask,” I taunt him through gritted teeth.
“No strolling for you, little brother. You’re going back where you belong.”
My gut fills with ice. I suspected—and he just confirmed. This isn’t just a trap. Perun will use this square, his tiny domain right inside my kingdom, to transport me to Wyraj. I’ll be helpless. Mokosz was right, after all. They will imprison me again.
