Page 62 of The Maiden and Her Monster

When the crowd circled around the stage began to drum with applause, Malka, Vilém, and Chaia found a good place to view the dais.

It was decorated with pale snowdrops and bright mauve hellebores.

A row of guards split a path and Prince Ev ? en and King Valski strolled toward the stage.

Ev ? en had all of his father’s features—sand-colored hair brushing to his ears in length, though most of it was covered by his jeweled crown, which glimmered under the festival lights.

The king’s gold crown was studded with rubies, the same red of Father Bro ? ek’s robes.

It seemed impossible this was the Dull King, garbed in so much gold and velvet.

As they approached the dais, King Valski tapped his scepter onto the stone to settle the crowd, yet the sound only heightened.

The king motioned to the guards, and they struck their swords together in a piercing clang, quieting the crowd at once.

Ev ? en stood beside him, his arms clasped.

Malka slit her eyes to see better, but she could not find Sévren anywhere.

Malka sent a worried glance to Chaia, who had grown pale at Sévren’s absence. He was supposed to be here. At every Lé ? rey celebration, Vilém had told them, Sévren stood between the prince and the king.

“Citizens of Ordobav,” the king began, and his voice was nothing like Malka expected. He slurred his words only barely. Anyone else would think it a result of the cold stiffening his jaw. But Malka recognized it from Abba’s late-night returns, foul breathed and angry.

The king was drunk.

“Twenty-five years ago, Saint Celine gave her blessing to our rule and to the people of this great kingdom with the birth of my son. Today, we celebrate his miracle birth, and the blessing of the saints. Now, Prince Ev ? en has some words he would like to share with you all.”

Vilém had said Imma would be secured in a tumbrel surrounded by guards near the square. Malka searched for any wooden cages, though it was unlikely she’d be where the revelers could spot her yet—her unveiling was part of the event. So close, yet still out of Malka’s grasp.

Nimrah was nowhere to be seen. Sévren was absent. Everything was wrong.

Ev ? en stepped forward and began his speech. He was calm, voice even.

“It’s an honor to celebrate my birthday with all of you. Though truly, it’s a day for everyone. Saint Celine has blessed us. Each year, we grow stronger, greater. The most vital kingdom in Rha?ka.”

The crowd cheered, hands flailing in the air.

He opened his mouth to continue, but there was a barreling whoosh and the sound of metal thudding into a body. Ev ? en’s face contorted, blood dripping from his mouth. He fell forward with a loud thump, a throwing axe embedded in his back.

The moment Ev ? en hit the dais, his blood seeping out from under him, time slowed. The clank of his crown as it fell from his head echoed. The crowd was silent as they processed the death of their saint-blessed prince until the horror struck them as real.

The crowd searched for the prince’s murderer.

Malka’s eyes were the first to catch on Nimrah, so instinctual that Malka would have blamed the bond between them had she not herself witnessed its severing.

Nimrah stood near a costume stall across from the dais. To anyone else, it would have been a difficult venture to aim a weapon so precisely that it hit its target without shaving off the heads of those in the crowd. But Nimrah was not just anyone.

Though, staring at her now, Malka did not know if she recognized this version of Nimrah: knuckles white around the handle of another axe, breathing hard as the wind whipped her hair around her like a shroud. Her eyes were like hot coals, dangerous and visceral.

Malka bit down on her tongue.

Screams filled the air as the crowd recognized Nimrah and took in her dark green veins, her half-stone body.

A knight yelled orders. Some rushed to the king, covering his body with theirs and pushing him away from the surging crowd. The others set their sights on Nimrah, unsheathing their weapons in pursuit. A priest ran to the dais and rested his hand on the prince’s chest.

Malka couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe. It was not supposed to happen like this. Ev ? en was not Nimrah’s target, and no one was supposed to die on the dais.

She tracked Nimrah, who began her escape as she jostled past the festival goers.

With the flick of her hand, vines unfurled from the earth and wrapped around the legs of a market stall, pulling it off balance and sending it clattering to the ground.

Tapestries flew everywhere, masks decorating the floor. The knights stumbled over the stall.

Someone knocked into Malka, jolting her into someone else. Her jaw hit hard on a sharp shoulder as she lost sight of Nimrah and the knights chasing her. She tasted blood.

Children were sobbing, their celebration masks crooked and broken on their faces as parents tugged them to safety.

One of the knights who had escorted the king away returned to the dais and quieted the raucous crowd with his buisine.

“The king is offering a generous reward of one thousand Ordon coins to anyone who can bring the golem’s head on a spike,” he announced, though not even he could hide the slight waver of his voice. “She’s an active threat to Valón and must be eradicated.”

The crowd riled as a mob gathered, made mainly of Ozmini men, but some women had joined, as well. A few Yahad, distinguished by their rotas, drew away from them. The mob shouted threats. What they would do to Nimrah once they found her. How they would do it.

Malka’s vision hazed as the commotion around her heightened.

In the crowd, she could faintly make out Chaia calling her name.

Her eyes darted around frantically. When she finally spotted her, Malka’s shoulders slumped in relief.

They came together and Malka took Chaia’s hand like it was a lifeline, like she would be swept away in the current if she were to ever let go.

Together, they pushed their way out of the mass of people threatening to swallow them.

“We need to find Nimrah,” Malka said, raising her voice to be heard over the roaring chatter.

If Nimrah had killed Ev ? en and incited this mob, there must’ve been a reason.

She and Nimrah had fought, and Malka knew Nimrah was angry with her, but she wouldn’t do this.

Did Nimrah know something they didn’t? What did this mean for Imma?

“We will,” Chaia responded. “But it’s not safe here now.”

Vilém grasped Chaia’s other hand and beckoned them to follow, but Malka wouldn’t budge.

“But Imma—”

Another person slammed into Malka, knocking the air from her. She doubled over, arm around her ribs.

“Malka, you’ll be no help to anyone if we don’t get to safety first. There’s no telling what a mob would do to a Yahad right now if they noticed us.”

Though leaving without finding Nimrah or Imma made Malka sick, Chaia was right. It was dangerous to stay here.

Reluctantly she nodded and let Vilém guide them away from the pit of the crowd which threw threats in the air like the children’s saint figurines.

Malka did not let go of Chaia until they stumbled into the old Qehillah meeting room. Danya and Amnon raised their heads from where they played a game of split tooth at the table.

“What’s happened?” Amnon asked. “Is it done?”

“Something’s gone terribly wrong,” Chaia said, and recounted the celebration’s unforeseen events.

More and more people began to arrive, enough to fill every seat at the long table and then some.

Katarina had been right when she said there were many different kinds of people involved in this plot; several of Vilém’s fellow Ozmini magisters, as well as the duke’s supporters, who ranged from cooks to shoemakers and merchants.

Several Yahad and Fanavi were there, too. Katarina began to pace.

“She’s betrayed us,” one of the Ozmini men said, running his hand against his stubbled cheek. “We should’ve known better than to trust the golem with something so important.”

“We don’t know what happened,” Chaia responded, crossing her arms.

Another magister raised his sparse eyebrows. “We know exactly what happened, Chaia. She disappeared and came back to send an axe straight into Ev ? en’s back.”

It didn’t make sense. Nimrah had no reason to betray them. She wanted Sévren’s death as much as they did.

The door opened, and the Maharal joined them. The rabbi was ragged—pale and disheveled, with creased robes and a crooked wool hat upon his head.

“Your golem’s gone rogue,” Katarina said to him, tapping her foot.

Malka shook her head. “No, it’s something else. It has to be something else. She wouldn’t do this. If there’s one thing I know about Nimrah, it’s that she’d never do anything to purposefully put the Yahad in danger. Certainly not kill Ev ? en when she knew what was at stake.”

The man with the stubbled cheek cleared his throat. “Ignác is right,” he said, motioning to the scholar who had spoken earlier. “Maybe she had good intent. That doesn’t change the fact she chose to betray us instead.”

Something wasn’t right. Malka knew Nimrah.

She had spent every day with her since Nimrah drew her from the river.

She had heard her stories, gauged the truth in Nimrah’s eyes.

Nimrah wanted nothing more than to protect the Yahad.

She wouldn’t do something this careless.

Even with Basám’s son, it had been an accident—Nimrah’s power slipping for a moment. This… this was different.

When Nimrah had shared the story of her exile, when she had begged for Malka’s forgiveness for betraying her, Malka had seen her regret in the bob of her neck and the sullen look in her eyes.

After she threw the axe into Ev ? en’s back, Nimrah’s face had been hardened—glazed over. Like she was a different person.