To Clutch a Razor (Curse Bearer, #2)

by Veronica Roth

She can feel the agony that brought it into being every time she walks past it, like a sour taste in her mouth, like an echo of a scream. It used to be buried in the Knight’s back, formed by splitting his soul in half. And now it’s hers—and by extension, he is hers, until he manages to earn it back.

“But whatever the truth is, I know it’s not good to walk around with only half a soul.”

“You were named for the harvest, and harvest you will.”

“I know they’re monsters. But a man can love a monster.” Kościej, something inside her whispers. She remembers. She has loved a great many monsters, and Kościej was the greatest of them. In some ways he reminds her of the man kneeling in front of her. His soul displaced. His nature still undecided.

“Don’t fear pain, Dymek,” he said. “Fear … losing your purpose, losing your family, losing yourself. Those things are worse than pain.”

“The world is the same age no matter where you go,” Dymitr replies. “Just because it’s new to you doesn’t mean it’s new.”

“I’m not jealous because I’m not entitled to you,” Dymitr says. It should be reassuring, maybe, or noble, but to Niko it only seems sad. Sometimes anger is entitled and jealous, but sometimes it rises up to demand what you feel you deserve. And Dymitr feels he deserves nothing and no one.

He’s been able to sense it since he split his soul to become a Knight. But he didn’t feel this way about it before. Before, coming home felt like stepping into a quiet room. Like a museum or a library. It felt sacred. But now, the way it presses against him … it’s like something that was alive in the air, something that danced around him, is now dead. The silence is stifling.

“and then … I have an idea. It’ll keep you out of harm’s way.” “Let me guess: it puts you directly into harm’s way, instead.”

She had her reasons for delaying in telling him. I wanted to make you patient, she said to him once, almost as an apology. I wanted to test your resolve. She had a way of making suffering feel almost like heroism.

The more I remember, the more I realize that every memory I have here is a horror, even the good ones.”

If they’re clever, they don’t have to turn on their own people to protect themselves … but not everyone is born clever.

“The bees are swarming the hive, and you want to stick your hand in it?”

“I was human, once,” she says. “So was I.” Niko leans back in his chair. “Ask me how many creatures I got killed when I was still mortal.”

It’s too much to ask of any heart, Niko thinks. To turn so fully against the ones you love, even once you’ve realized what they really are. It’s just too much.

They let each other see the things they don’t reveal to anyone else. But she doesn’t want to do that now. She blinks the tears away.

He’s used to the ache of his missing sword, but a new one joins it now. When he was in Chicago, it was easy to pretend that he didn’t miss his family, that he didn’t love them; it was easy to focus on what they were instead of who they were to him. But now he watches the youngest cousin, André, in the kitchen, spots on his cheeks, stirring up sour cream; now he watches Kazik wiping down chairs from the storage shed to get the cobwebs off; now he sees Joanna nudging Marzena with her shoulder as they line up the tables, and he remembers. He remembers that Knights, like the creatures they hunt, are people. His people.

But now, he’ll have to say goodbye to them knowing they would hate him if they knew what he really was. Knowing that he’ll only ever be able to lie to them. Knowing that he still loves them, no matter what they’ve done, and no matter what lies they’ve believed. And how can he blame them? He believed those lies, too.

“I explained to him that killing them was a mercy—that death is not the worst that awaits any creature, but suffering. He handled them well enough after that.”

“You’ll probably die,” Niko says to her, gently. “You’ll probably die, too,” she says. “But I don’t see you refusing to do what you have to. Why do you expect me to?”

Every memory he has here is a horror, even the good ones.

It’s a difficult task in Poland, not because there aren’t enough suitable places, but because it’s too soaked in pain.

I wish to take another shape, for the purpose of revenge.

He waits with his hands in the water as the magic decides. That’s how he thinks of it, anyway, as slight currents pass over his knuckles and work their way over the veins of his hands. Testing him, maybe, or maybe that’s just the most sense he can make of something that isn’t sensible.

But they don’t love him, Niko thinks. Because if love doesn’t allow change, then what the fuck is that love worth?

She remembers how it feels to deliver death, and she dreads it, and she craves it.

Trauma doesn’t ask whether the person experiencing it is a sympathetic figure or not, after all.

Letting go of the illusion feels like unclenching a fist.

“Can’t really say the same. For me, it’s definitely a little bit personal.” Niko smiles. “And I’m not a zmora, you idiot.”

Dymitr is beautiful like a Rembrandt painting, the only focal point in a room of darkness, expressive and significant somehow.

But mostly … he curses himself, for letting himself be softened by all those things. “You’re lucky your son is so beautiful,” he says.

“You didn’t kill her,” Dymitr says roughly. “Why?” And Niko says, “You know why.”

He runs his fingers through Dymitr’s wet hair, and doesn’t say anything, because there’s nothing to say.

“If I cross paths with you again, I won’t be merciful.” The zmora smiles a little too wide—like the Cheshire cat from the old cartoon, just teeth aglow in the dark woods. “Neither will I,” it says.

“What you will always be to me now,” he says, “is my sister, who I love and want to be safe. Understand?”

She leans her head on his shoulder, and he turns on a movie, and she thinks that if she’s going to spend her life untangling all this pain, at least she has someone she cares about to do it with. At least she has him.

But not until she knows where the pain came from—not until she knows what it’s teaching him.

“Do you know that a complete transformation is almost impossible?” she asks. “Something of the old version usually remains.

“I had to kill the one I loved most in all the world,” she says. “It was for the good of all, but that isn’t the reason I did it. I did it because I was desperate to change, fully and completely, and I was willing to do anything to accomplish it. Even rip out my own heart.”

“I am often cruel. But I am not usually cruel without reason. This was the crucial first step in making your transformation real and lasting.”

“Thirty-two broken curses, and you’ll give me back the sword?” “Thirty-two broken curses, and your soul will be fully healed.”

“Protect my grandson,” she says. “The Kostkas are trying to get him killed, and I’ve grown rather fond of him.” A soft reply: “I would have done that anyway.” “I am an excellent negotiator,” she says. “So you can assume that when I’m not, it’s intentional. Show yourself out.”

Niko can feel Dymitr’s rage, like swallowing a mouthful of high-proof brandy. It burns all the way down, and settles in Niko’s stomach like a warm meal. “I thought I knew what she was. But I didn’t.” Dymitr swallows hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing painfully. “That was my mistake. But I won’t make it again.”

The moon glimmers on the lake. The night is just beginning.