Page 79 of Foul Days

“Did we get what we needed?” Asen asked.

Kosara placed a hand on his forehead. It wasn’t warm. His eyes were normal. He’d formed a coherent sentence. None of this seemed right.

“Are you alright?” she asked. “You’re not feeling dizzy or anything?”

“Just tired. You weren’t joking when you said they’re very fast.”

“But you looked them in the eyes, and you told them your name, and you drank from their wine—”

“You didn’t believe me that magic doesn’t work on me. I thought I’d show you.”

“But you looked enchanted!”

“Well, they were supposed to think I was, weren’t they?”

Kosara exhaled, all the pressure finally leaving her body. He was fine. He wasn’t enchanted.

He smiled at her, and she smiled back, wide and excited. They’d got the invitation to the Zmey’s feast. It had all been so easy.

Surprisingly easy. Worryingly easy. Kosara’s smile faltered. In her experience, such rare moments of good luck were simply the universe giving her a breather before the next disaster struck.

She replayed the events of the evening, trying to find where the catch was. As far as she could see, it had all gone according to plan. They’d got the invite. Asen had danced with the samodivas, and he wasn’t enchanted.…

Kosara swore under her breath. Asen had danced with the samodivas—he’d looked them in the eyes and told them his name and drunk from their wine—and he wasn’t enchanted.

This wasn’t good luck, this was terrible, dreadful luck. There was only one explanation for how that could be possible, and it wasn’t one she liked. At all.

He couldn’t be enchanted by the samodivas because he was already enchanted by someone else. Someone whose magic was stronger than that of the samodivas. There couldn’t be more than a handful of such people in all of Chernograd.

That was just Kosara’s luck. As if visiting the Tsar of Monsters wasn’t dangerous enough already, the copper she was bringing along to help her was under a spell.

* * *

Kosara lifted the samodiva’s invitation to the kitchen window and let the moonlight illuminate the symbols. She’d gone through several of her books, searching for anything that looked similar. No luck. It seemed that whatever alphabet the monsters used, no witch had ever noted it down.

To distract herself from her more pressing problems, Kosara did. She copied the symbols carefully onto an empty page of a thick tome.

Asen sat across from her at the table, cleaning his revolver and whistling one of the songs from the folk record. He looked as if he’d had a refreshing workout, not as if he’d fought a terrifying monster from another dimension.

While she worked, Kosara kept throwing secret looks at him. How did he end up enchanted? Where did he even meet a witch or warlock stronger than the samodivas?

“Why do you keep looking at me?” he asked.

Evidently, Kosara’s looks hadn’t been that secret. “Do you remember when magic stopped working on you?”

“Shortly after I joined the police. I think it’s because I started encountering more witches and warlocks, and I finally saw them for what they really are.”

“Criminals?”

“People.”

“Did anything unusual happen around that time? Did you meet a particularly strong witch or warlock?”

“Not that I remember. Why?”

“I’m worried you might be enchanted.”

He laughed. “I really don’t think so. Surely, I would have noticed.”

---