The Adversary

Chapter Sixteen

24 Ches, the Year of the Nether Mountain Scrolls (1486 DR) The Lost Peaks

The wizard-Lords of the Nine never take your eyes from him, Lorcan thought-looked up, surprised at Lorcan’s sudden appearance. Farideh had fallen backward into Lorcan, her skin pale and grayish with shock. Blood-her blood-stained the front of her tunic, and Rhand’s. A jagged stump remained of her finger, stark white bone and a fringe of torn flesh.

Don’t kill him, Lorcan told himself, dimly aware of how tightly he was holding onto Farideh. Not yet. Not here.

If Farideh noticed at all as he hauled her into the room and slammed the door shut, she gave no sign. “Which of these opens your dimensional pocket?” Lorcan said to Sairché as she threw the bolt, locking Rhand and his curses on the other side. “She needs a healing.”

Sairché considered the array of rings around his neck. “If I tell you, I get the ring.”

Lorcan laid Farideh on the bed. “Lords damn you. Just tell me!”

Sairché shrugged. “Nothing in our deal about following all orders. She’s not going to die of a missing finger.”

The wound still wept blood and Farideh’s breath came shallow and rapid. “Tell me which ring,” Lorcan said grimly. “And you get it.”

“Emeralds in a serpent band. Left-hand stack,” Sairché said, holding out her hand. Lorcan tossed it to Sairché, who slipped it over her finger. A spidery line of darkness cut through the air, widening when Sairché thrust her ringed hand past it. She rummaged in the unseen compartment, pulled out a glass vial the size of Lorcan’s thumb, and threw it to him.

Sairché admired the ring. “Well met, pretty,” she purred.

Lorcan ignored her, leaning over Farideh with the potion. He opened her jaw with one thumb and poured the syrupy liquid in. Her eyes opened wide. She choked and sat up.

“Swallow,” Lorcan ordered. She did, flinching before she looked up into the room, and spied Sairché, spied Lorcan.

“What. .,” she started, then all her breath went out of her. She inhaled in a horrible, throat-tearing scream and every muscle seemed to contract at once, as if trying to hold her struggling bones inside her flesh. Hells magic surged up her arms, tinting her veins black and ugly, creeping into the corners of her eyes. Lorcan pinned her to the bed, before she could cast accidentally or hurt herself.

Just as swiftly, the dark taint of Malbolge ebbed from her golden skin. Farideh looked up at him. A line of tears welled up in her eyes.

“How could you?” she said hoarsely. Her breath smelled of the healing draught, of char and cockroaches.

Lorcan didn’t move. “Which time?”

She shoved him off of her with surprising strength and sat up, eyeing first Sairché, then Lorcan, as if she wasn’t sure who to attack first. She would kill you, given the chance, Lorcan thought.

“Getout,” she snarled. Lorcan held up his hands, a gesture of appeasement.

“Farideh, we’re on your side. We’re here to fix things.”

Nothing softened in Farideh’s expression, and she held her hands up as well, bruised light collecting between her fingers. She caught sight of her previously wounded hand, now whole. The ring finger was ghost white to the line where its predecessor had been severed. Everything below was stained with blood.

“Oh gods,” she whispered. The bruised light sputtered out as she stared at it. Lorcan crept a little nearer. If she kept her focus on the injury. .

But then Sairché sighed. “If the color bothers you, I suggest taking that problem to someone else. Any cure I can get is about as pleasant as the last one.”

Farideh’s gaze snapped to the cambion and in a moment, she had crossed the room, forcing Sairché to retreat behind Lorcan. Farideh stopped, just out of his reach, her long frame gripped with rage so forceful, Lorcan was afraid what it might unleash. .

“The color?” she cried. “The color? You threw me in here with no sense at all of what I was meant to do,” she said, still hoarse from the potion. “You left me to flounder and guess and worry. You never bothered to tell me. . to tell me. .” Tears thickened her voice. She lowered her hands and gave Lorcan a look that cut right through his hope that any of this could work like in the old days.

“And we’re going to fix it,” Lorcan said gently. But that only made Farideh’s expression grow harder.

“You can’t fix this.”

“Oh come now,” Sairché said. “You couldn’t have fumbled that badly.” She edged out from behind Lorcan. “Although it does incite the question: why did he take your finger?”

Farideh gave a bitter laugh and all but collapsed onto the bench beside the dressing table. “Because your assurances mean nothing. Your deal is aithyas on a dead dragon’s belly. I said I couldn’t see any Chosen and so he murdered them.”

“Well what did you expect?” Sairché demanded. “That he’d be pleased? He’s a nuisance, not an idiot. That has nothing to do with our very respectable deal.”

“You said I wouldn’t kill anyone,” Farideh said. “You said-”

“Who did you kill?” Sairché interrupted. “He killed them-or more precisely I suspect, his guards killed them-and you merely watched. I don’t recall,” she added coolly, “you negotiating anything about not watching someone being killed.”

“Shut up, Sairché,” Lorcan said. He had only the barest sketches of a plan, but one thing was certain: he needed Farideh to calm down. “You’re going to declare her favor complete.”

Sairché looked at him as if he were mad. “No, I’m not.”

“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said, “or a lot of resources, and we have quite a lot of things to right if this is going to end with everyone important keeping hold of their heads. So to begin: her favor is complete. She owes you nothing else. Say it.”

“If I do that,” Sairché said, “then I’ve reneged on my deal with Rhand. I don’t exactly keep my head in that case.” She dropped her voice. “This isn’t about making your pet happy.”

“Find a loophole,” Lorcan said, ignoring her. “The favor is done. Our plans hinge now on making sure of Magros. And since he’s made it clear his intent is to kill Farideh, she needs to be removed from the situation. Is anyone going to argue with that?”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Farideh said.

“Don’t be silly-” Lorcan bit off his reply as he turned. In Proskur, Lorcan had begun to think Farideh was learning to mask her true feelings, to keep her anger quiet, her heart off her sleeve. Not well enough to hide from him- never that well. But enough that she thought she was hiding. Enough that she could be useful against Temerity, against some other mortal.

Whatever mask she’d crafted herself was torn away, and every bit of hurt and rage was writ as plain on Farideh as if it had been rendered in fresh blood. Lorcan recalculated.

“I take that back,” he said. “You sound very much like a woman with a plan. Perhaps you ought to be in charge here.” Her expression didn’t flicker, and another thread in Lorcan’s cold heart snapped. Careful, he told himself, even though another part of him wanted nothing more than to be very incautious indeed. Careful. Ease your way back. “Why are you staying?” he asked her.

“I won’t let them die,” she said. “I won’t help and I won’t walk away. I may be damned, but I won’t go to my grave earning it.”

“Who’s sending you to your grave?” Lorcan said. “Who said you were damned?”

She laughed again. “Tell me the name of the god that’s willing to claim a Chosen of Asmodeus. One-just one.”

Dread coiled up Lorcan’s core. “So you know,” he said lightly. “Sairché apparently felt it was better you didn’t.”

“She was probably right,” Farideh said. She rested her head in her hands.

Lorcan took a chance and moved nearer to her. “Darling, you’re not damned. This is nothing. Favored status. A few silly powers to show off His Majesty’s reach.”

“Name the god, Lorcan.”

“Stranger things by far have happened.” The god of evil singling out his distressingly moral warlock for one. .

“Why me?” Farideh whispered, as if she’d had the same thought. She shook her head, her face still buried in her hands. “I’m not. .”

“You are,” Sairché said. “And it doesn’t matter if you did or didn’t or never would have done any sort of thing. It’s Asmodeus’s decision, not yours. It’s why they call them Chosen, not Choosers.”

Lorcan spun on his sister. “Shut up,” he hissed. “Or I do not care what deal we have, I will send you right back to that shitting cage. Every word out of your mouth is moving the axe closer to your neck, do you understand that?”

Sairché’s golden eyes flicked over his face. “I don’t take well to my pieces being impudent.”

“And how well has that suited you? Shut up and let me do what I do best.” He turned back to Farideh, who had lifted her head to glare at the both of them.

“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “I’m still not helping him massacre these people.”

“No one’s massacring anyone,” Lorcan said. He frowned and glanced back at Sairché, realizing he wasn’t sure what her plans had been for the prisoners. Sairché shrugged.

“If you don’t help,” Sairché said sweetly, “then you’re the one who reneged. You’re the one who bears the weight of the forfeit. Do you still want your soul?”

Lorcan started to silence her again, but then Farideh spoke, and she had never looked so terrible to Lorcan-so likely to be the Chosen of Asmodeus- as the moment when she turned to Sairché and said, “Would you steal a soul from your king’s hand?”

Sairché froze, watching Farideh as if she’d like nothing better than to tear the woman’s eyes out with her bare hands. “Not as such.”

For a moment, Farideh held Sairché’s gaze as if daring her to lunge. Then grief folded over Farideh again, dampening her fury. “All this time. . you have nothing over me, do you? My soul’s his as much as it can be. I’ve just gone along doing horrible things because I trusted you.”

Lorcan kneeled beside her. “So we’re not massacring prisoners,” he said carefully. “Agreed. What are we doing?” Farideh shook her head.

“I could get you something to get you through the wall,” Lorcan went on. “Sairché was kind enough to plan for-”

“Let me guess,” Farideh said. “It will only let me out. Or it will snatch up anyone who passes through and drop them in Shar’s hands. Or-”

“Hold on,” Lorcan said. “We’re as interested as you are in bringing Rhand down. Only we’re interested in doing it the right way.”

“Shar is not supposed to win here,” Sairché added, for once following Lorcan’s lead. “She never has been. That’s your ‘common enemy’ after all. But if we break the deal with Rhand-” She cleared her throat. “We can’t just take the wall down.”

“But that doesn’t mean,” Lorcan went on, “that you can’t win a little too. Forget the passwall spell. How do you plan to rescue more than yourself?”

Farideh shook her head again, as if she couldn’t believe she was listening to them. “I think someone’s escaped before,” she said.

Sairché sighed. “No one’s escaped from here. I’m sure of that.”

“Not from here,” Farideh agreed. “From one of the other camps.” Lorcan frowned and looked back at his sister.

“What other camps?” Sairché said, each word shot like a bullet from a sling.

“He has six camps,” Farideh said. “He’s moving Chosen from here to there. And in one of them. . I think someone managed.”

Lorcan smiled. “Well, I think you’ve found your loophole.”

“Indeed,” Sairché said, curling her hands into fists. “We are well into disputation.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Lorcan said. “You dispute the terms and you bring Asmodeus’s attention to us and pull her back to the Hells. Make Rhand think you’re invoking the disputation clause. But don’t.”

Sairché narrowed her eyes at him, and for a brief moment he was very glad she was on his side. “A fair point. But I’m still offering him a proxy. A nice, antsy erinyes, I think. That gives you three days before the ruse is up.” She looked at Farideh as if she’d like to give a few orders of her own.“Your favor’s complete,” she said instead. To Lorcan she added, “Remember what I said.”

She opened the dimensional pocket once more and plucked another ring from it. A flash, a smell like burnt meat, and Sairché was gone.

And Lorcan was alone with Farideh again.

She turned from him, her eyes locked resolutely on her reflection in the mirror. She and Havilar might have the same features, the same face, but to Lorcan’s eyes she looked ages older. And she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

“I have nothing to say to you,” Farideh said.

“Good,” Lorcan said lightly. “I have a great deal to say to you, and I don’t like being interrupted.” Lords, he thought. He’d still set Asmodeus above anything else he feared, but this moment made the list.

“Don’t bother,” she said. “There’s nothing you can say to me to change my mind. I know who you are now.”

No, you don’t, Lorcan thought. Even I don’t know that anymore. There was a time when he would have said he did not have allies, and if he did by some twisting of the layers, he certainly did not try to win them back if they turned from him. He certainly wouldn’t do it by admitting weaknesses. He certainly did not care.

But if he said that now, he knew he would be a liar, and if Lorcan was sure that he was anything, he was not a liar.

“I have never said this to another soul, another person on this or any other plane, and if I did, I am absolutely sure I didn’t mean it,” Lorcan said. “I mean this: I am sorry. I misjudged you. Terribly. I should have known, I should have realized from the very start you wouldn’t have thrown me over. You were the only person in all the planes who wouldn’t have thrown me over.” He had never in his life felt so ridiculous, but he continued. “You were-you are the only one I trust. And for a time I was a fool, and I forgot that. And I’m sorry.”

Farideh said nothing, still simmering with fear and hurt and anger. But there-a moment of softness where she looked his reflection in the eye, before she spoke. “You trust Sairché.”

“I don’t trust Sairché, I have a deal with Sairché. There are a multiverse of differences.”

Farideh shook her head. “How can you stand at her side, when-were you ever even captured? Were you even in danger?”

“Yes,” Lorcan said. “What does that have to do with anything?”

Farideh watched him a moment more, then sighed. “I’ll never understand you.”

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Lorcan said, acutely aware she had not forgiven him.

“I suppose I’ll have to learn the ways of the Hells,” she said bitterly. She started to say something else, but the words crumbled into a sob. She drew a slow, shuddering breath, trying to compose herself. She wouldn’t, Lorcan felt sure. She couldn’t. Everything he’d known would break her down-the fear of the dark sides of the pact, the fear that she couldn’t escape, couldn’t hold back the tide of the Hells herself-had come true in one terrible fact: she was a Chosen of Asmodeus.

Farideh stood-hardly able to straighten-and held her hand up as if she were going to push him away. “Please. .” she managed. “Please. .”

But Lorcan found he didn’t care what she was going to ask him for. He seized her in a tight embrace. “Don’t say a word,” he said, trying himself to ignore the thickness in his voice. “Just don’t say a godsbedamned word, all right?”

And she didn’t. The stiffness in her frame fled and she buried her face against his shoulder and wept. He held her close, half folding his wings around them, and kept his own silence.

Because she’d said “please,” he told himself. Because if she were still against you, she wouldn’t have asked. This is the next step-you’re her ally. Act it.

But that wasn’t right. It was because he couldn’t listen to her try and hold him off like an adversary, when she was too despairing to form words-that was the truth. Because he owed her better. Because she needed a moment to not be on guard.

“Take it back,” she sobbed. “Please take it back. I’m not his Chosen. I can’t be.”

This is none of your doing, Lorcan reminded himself. This is nothing you could have stopped.

“If I could I would,” he said. “You know that.”

That triggered fresh sobs. “Why? Why?”

Lorcan shook his head. He didn’t know. He didn’t want to know. “It seems he’s invested all the Brimstone Angels,” he said. “Just an accident of your birth.”

She went rigid again and pulled away. “All of them? Oh gods. Oh gods! Havi?”

Shit and ashes, Lorcan thought. “No. Your sister’s fine. Nothing’s shown up in her, I promise. I was at her side before I came here-several days now. I saw her only hours ago. Nothing.”

“But it will?” Farideh said, panic edging her voice. “It will, and then what?”

“One thing at a time,” Lorcan said. “Your sister has a protection laid on her too-and darling, it’s heavier than yours. It may be Asmodeus passed her by. It may be that protection stops the blessing from awakening. The important part is that she’s fine. She’s not a day and a half from here, her and Brin. They’ll arrive soon. And you and I had best be ready for them.”

Farideh pulled away from him farther, shaking her head. “What’s the trick?” she said. “Your god clearly doesn’t go to all this trouble just to be perfectly happy when you go ahead and undo it all.” She was back to looking at him like a demon, crawled out of the Abyss. “So what’s the trick? You ‘help them escape’ by killing them all? You don’t kill them, you just. . pull them into the Hells? Is it me? — will I have to. . Is it really my soul. .?”

“Gods damn it!” Lorcan cried. “The ‘trick’ as you put it, is not on you. It’s on Asmodeus.”

That stopped her. “On Asmodeus?”

“Or,” Lorcan said more carefully, “perhaps a better way to say things is that Sairché’s plan is flawed. As is her collaborator’s, a devil called Magros. Both have made”-he gave her a significant look-“mistakes. Sairché was tasked with collecting Chosen. Magros was tasked with gathering their powers. We shouldn’t be surprised if it falls apart. The concern, of course, is that any failure would reflect poorly on the person who caused it”-he nodded to Farideh-“the devils who made the plans. . and the archdevil who oversaw it. We must make sure that isn’t us.”

“So I have to help you so your lady isn’t punished.”

“I’m more concerned about the fact that I’ll be dead,” Lorcan said. “And listen to what I’m telling you: there is another devil. Another Lord of the Nine with their fingers in the pie. And none of them care even a little what becomes of you or the people you’re worried about. I do care.”

She watched him warily. “So if Sairché fails, she’ll be punished and so will you. And your lady. But if the failure is the other devil’s it’s him and his lady in trouble?”

“Lord,” Lorcan corrected. “And yes.”

“And none of you have an interest in making sure that Asmodeus’s plan succeeds?”

Lorcan hesitated. “All devils in the Hells are invested in the success of Asmodeus,” he said. “At least, all devils in Malbolge. Magros. . One could surmise-if one stretched-that he and his lord might be pleased if Asmodeus didn’t succeed. If Asmodeus didn’t collect more divine power for himself.” He told her what Sairché had said about the divine sparks, about Asmodeus’s orders, and what Shar wanted. About what was happening to the world beyond. If possible she seemed to deflate further.

“What happens if he succeeds? If he takes the sparks?”

“Then his godhood is a little more assured in the days to come.”

“And if he can’t?”

“Weakened,” Lorcan said. “He might even lose the godhead-no one knows.”

Farideh sat on the edge of the bed, her expression drawn. “So you’re worried,” she said, as if choosing each word from a sack of razors, one by one, “that the other devil might sabotage the plan, stop Asmodeus, but make it look as if you were the one who failed. Do you think he’s worried you’ll do the same?”

“That would be clever,” Lorcan said with exaggerated surprise. “But Magros seems to think Sairché and I don’t have half a brain between us. He’s already attempted to get me to kill his agent in the camp-an act that would place the failure squarely on me.”

“So if I give up,” she said, “then this. . plan you’ve sold Rhand and Shar on might succeed.”

“Perhaps,” Lorcan said. “And who wants that?”

“Or Magros and his lord might succeed. But if I help you, your lady will succeed.” She looked him in the eye. “I’m not gathering the divine sparks. Not even one. I don’t care what she wants, I don’t care what any of them want.”

“Fair enough,” Lorcan said. “I doubt either of them or Asmodeus are foolish enough to be surprised by that.”

She shook her head. “Let’s hope so. I think he’ll find a great many things I won’t do. Chosen or not.”

“Darling, you know better than that,” Lorcan chided. “No one wants to force you. That’s our way-let the demons drag souls kicking down to the Abyss. The baatezu know you’ll walk right in yourselves if we open the right doors.” He smiled. “You just have to be wise enough to pass them by.” And watch for the ones that open in your path, he thought.

She sighed. “You talk like this all day long don’t you? Saying things without saying them? Whatever happened to not thinking about the plans of archdevils?”

Lorcan just shook his head. “The world’s a different place. You and I are different. Something’s happening and. . it might be better to know.”

“Who’s the agent?” she asked. “One of the guards?”

Lorcan shrugged. “All I’m sure of is that it isn’t a Chosen of Asmodeus. Magros managed to kill the Chosen Asmodeus allotted him. He had to find a replacement. But they’ll be moving through the camp, not keeping to the tower.” He blew out a breath, not wanting to say what he knew he had to. “What do you have in mind?”

Farideh looked up at him. “Is this where you try to talk me out of it?”

“No,” Lorcan said reluctantly. “This is where we leave the tower, and I help you do something mad.”

“We’re not leaving the tower,” she said, standing.

Much like Oota had, the elves had restructured a cluster of huts to mimic an elven high court, bringing in what scrubby brush and lichens they could collect from the hillsides in a defiant mimicry of the sort of lush green space Dahl found himself expecting. As if to set a seal on it, Cereon-the elves’ Oota, as it were- was without a doubt the most eladrinish sun elf he had ever crossed paths with.

“You bring us empty promises of the goodness in an evil race.” Cereon spoke as if he were reciting an ancient, elven spell, not dressing down Armas and Dahl. The cold planes of his face reminded Dahl of nothing so much as a marble statue. A very unhappy marble statue. “What a surprise,” he said.

Ol’ Sour-Fey, indeed, he thought.

“I would not call them empty, solosar,” Armas said. His speech had shifted to mirror the sun elf’s from the moment they crossed into Cereon’s territory. “Nor would I call them promises. Say instead, ‘potential.’ My friend believes the warlock can help us.”

“The tiefling,” Cereon said. Two of the elves behind him, graceful women with their dark hair pinned up and ugly cages trapping their hands, exchanged looks. Half a smile cracked Cereon’s stern facade.

“The tiefling,” Dahl agreed, the words springing from his tongue in Elvish, thanks to the ritual. “Unless you have another way to get your hands freed?”

Cereon didn’t look away from Armas. “I’ve heard what her help gains.”

“You’ve heard what the wizard can make one do,” Armas corrected gently. “Out of the fortress-”

“How do you intend to get this creature out of the fortress?” Cereon asked. Armas looked over at Dahl-that part they hadn’t gone over, largely because Dahl was still plotting it out, looking for holes and traps and problems. There were too many, especially when so much of his mind was caught on the two score ales he hadn’t had and the flask full of Shadowfell liquor still riding in his pocket. When his temper was still tangled around Cereon calling Farideh a “creature”-as if there weren’t a hundred others who deserved Cereon’s sneer before she did.

“We are working on that,” Armas said finally. “We just want to know if you’d be willing to ally with Oota if we manage it.”

“And I know better than to make assurances based on fancy. I know how this plays out-you take my agreement and next thing I know, you and your devil-child need sanctuary, because the guards are hunting for her, and as it happens, her magic doesn’t quite work.”

“Oota’s willing to give her sanctuary,” Dahl lied. “And I don’t intend to have guards on our tail.”

Cereon smiled thinly and considered Dahl with his fathomless eyes. “No one does. Trust me, young man, I have been on this plane for several centuries. I know when you ought not prod the dragon.”

Dahl drew a long slow breath, trying to calm the temper that rose in him. “You want to know how we’d manage it? If I had to do it right now, I’d say in through the passage to the sorting courtyard. Up the wall and into the second floor-we’re not nose-to-nose with shadar-kai there since we skip the cellars and the curtain wall-preferably in stolen Shadovar uniforms, but we can make do with the one we have. Then two floors up to the guest quarters as I understand it-she’ll be there. The number of guards at that point isn’t unacceptable, but we can work with that after a casting to peer ahead. After that, she’s on our side.”

Cereon smiled at Dahl as if he’d just suggested they ask nicely to be let in. “Where do you intend to get the means to cast a ritual like that?”

Dahl pulled Farideh’s ritual book from his sack and flipped to the ritual in question as if each turned page was a slap across Cereon’s still face. “Gold salts, cerated sulfur, basilisk venom. Easily obtained from Rhand’s stores.” He hoped-Rhand’s study was at the top of the fortress-either they’d go up blind and pray no one caught them, or Farideh would have to take the risk and smuggle out components. That made Dahl’s nerves fray further still-he was supposed to be rescuing her, not putting her in worse danger.

Cereon tilted his head. “Wizard’s sight,” he said, naming the ritual, “cannot be cast without a focus. Do you have a very expensive mirror hiding in your pack? Or is the wizard going to provide you with that as well?”

Dahl shut the book. “We haven’t pretended that this plan is complete, or that we’re not still looking for solutions to make it work. All we want to know is if you and your people would be willing-under the right circumstances-to throw in with the rest of us. A provisional agreement-that’s all.”

“A provisional agreement to a hypothetical situation,” Cereon said, “deserves careful consideration.” He waved them from the makeshift chambers and back out into the street.

A wet snow fell, melting into the dirt paths and making them muddier still, and dampening all the sounds of the camp into stillness. Dahl wondered if the Harper mission was near. There was no way Tam would send the sort of army needed to retake the camp. He ran his fingers through his hair-there had to be an answer, and he had to find it. Before Rhand claimed too many more Chosen. Before the guards caught on or the possible traitor struck again.

Before something happened to Farideh.

“Well that was no good,” Armas said. “We can try again in a day or so. Maybe don’t talk so much next time.”

Dahl blew out a breath.”I don’t know if we have a day,” he said. “If we leave Farideh in there, she’ll have to keep sorting. If she stops. .” He didn’t want to finish.

“You don’t need Cereon to rescue the warlock.” Armas considered Dahl as they walked. “Why are we counting on a tiefling warlock?”

“Because,” Dahl said firmly, “if we have to fight our way out, we’re going to need casters, and so we’re going to need someone to shatter those finger cages of yours. I’d rather count on a warlock than get cozy with a Shadovar wizard at this point, and those are your options. And she’s not bad.”

Armas grunted. “Neither’s Phalar. And look at that.”

Dahl shook his head. What had Phalar been thinking when he’d told the guards Dahl was in the armory? Probably nothing, Dahl thought. Probably just wanted to make some mischief, put Dahl in some danger. He had his dagger after all. Why worry about the rest?

Because to stop and tell the guards would give away his presence, Dahl thought. Risky. Too risky even for a Chosen of the drow gods. Phalar knew best how to survive, and opening himself to the guards just to strike back at Dahl. . what had Phalar been thinking?

“Every time he comes out,” Armas said, “carrying extra food or supplies or what have you, you think ‘Maybe he’s not so bad. Maybe he’s not so different.’ And then something like this happens.”

Dahl walked along in silence. It was the sort of thing you expected from drow-like kicking a person through a roof, like knifing an ally in the dark-and yet it didn’t fit. It was what you expected, and so the guards should have grabbed him. Made sure he wasn’t lying, wasn’t sending them on a wild hunt or into an ambush. Because that was what you expected from a drow. Phalar shouldn’t have made it out of the fortress if he’d been foolish enough to stop and taunt the guards.

But Phalar wasn’t the only one who knew that Dahl would be in the armory, Dahl realized. Nor the only one who came and went through the fortress.

“Does Tharra have a guard on her when she’s in the tower?”

“Of course,” Armas said. “Everyone does.”

“Same one every time?”

“Since she started playing lady’s maid for your warlock.”

Dahl blew out a breath. Less likely than Phalar, he told himself. But then there was Tharra’s insistence that he was making things worse by getting into the fortress, by trusting Farideh. By bringing weapons out. “She’s not going to be happy about Cereon is she?”

“Happy about us talking to him? Or happy that he’s exactly as difficult as he is with her?” Armas shrugged. “Either way, I doubt it.”

They reached Oota’s quarter as the sun began to set. The alleys around the makeshift court were packed with bodies-frantic, fearful bodies. The court inside was no better, except a circle in the center where Hamdir and Antama had held back the swarms of prisoners.

“This wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t let Phalar and Dahl go in!” Tharra’s stern tones cut through the crowd of voices. “They’d be alive-she’d be alive if they’d stayed out!”

Cold rushed over Dahl. She’ d be alive. Oh gods. .

“Watch your tongue,” Oota said. “You don’t know why things changed.”

“Tharra?” Armas called, pressing through the prisoners, ducking past Hamdir. “Tharra what’s-”

Dahl and Armas broke through the crowd, and Dahl saw what was truly holding back the other prisoners: a pile of bodies, at least a dozen, wrapped in blood-soaked cloths.

“Where have you been, fledgling?” Tharra demanded. “You were supposed to be watching the children.”

“Gods,” Armas said. “Gods, please, what’s happened?”

Dahl’s heart stopped and he couldn’t look at the stack of bodies, couldn’t bear to find a child-sized bundle among them. “He killed them in the sorting?” he asked.

“Surprised your warlock is no ally?” Tharra said. “From what we can tell, she killed an entire courtyard of people. Took at least four. Including Vanri.”

Shit, Dahl thought. Gods’ broken books. “Where is Farideh?”

“With the wizard,” Tharra said savagely. “We told you, and you didn’t listen, and now Vanri’s probably. .” She faltered. “We were keeping them safe. And you’ve destroyed that.”

“I got the boys through,” Hamdir said, shouted in that way Dahl was uncomfortably familiar with. “I wasn’t expecting the grays, I didn’t lose hold of her on purpose.”

Tharra fixed him with a hard stare. “Tell him what you heard.”

“Screams. Definitely Vanri. And then. .” Hamdir swallowed. “A roar. A terrible roar.”

“She manifested.” Tharra glared at Armas. “All those nightmares, all those worries about the ocean taking her. . If she isn’t dead, gods know what horrors are whispering in her ears now.”

“If she isn’t dead,” Dahl said, “we can still save her.”

Firm up, he thought, shaking. If Rhand was killing Chosen, it was because Rhand was angry. If he was angry, Farideh was in more danger than before. There was no time to wait for Cereon. There was no time to wait for the appointment he and Farideh had agreed upon. There wasn’t even time to figure out whether he could trust Phalar. “We need to get in there, now. We need to get her out, get to the Chosen-”

“Get the rest of us killed?” Tharra said, as if he were her fledgling scout as well, as if Dahl were in need of censure. “What do you think you’re going to do?”

“Save those of us who can still be saved,” Dahl said. “Including Vanri.”

“Do you have a plan?” Oota interrupted, calmer than any of them. “Or are you just expecting to walk in through the gates and come back out with all our lost following behind?”

Dahl faced her. He didn’t have a plan-not as such. He didn’t have a way to be sure no one else was going to die or be caught, or to prove to them once and for all that Farideh was someone to trust. But he could be certain it wasn’t better to stay here, huddled together and waiting for the shadar-kai to come to them.

Nor was it better to leave Farideh in the tower when Rhand was slaughtering innocents.

“Do you?” he said calmly. “Or are you planning to just hope the tower collapses and the wizard drops dead? You were right before-you’re going to have to make a stand, and the longer you wait. .” He spread his hands. “This will keep happening.”

“And a dozen daggers and a devil-child won’t change that,” Tharra said. “People’s lives are at stake.”

“Are they any less at stake right now?” Dahl demanded. “Right here?” He looked out into the crowd. “Can any one of you say you’re better off holding your breath and hoping you’re not the next one to be caught? You’re the Chosen of the gods-are you going to spit so merrily in their eyes and lie down to die on Shar’s altar?”

No one answered. It felt as if every eye were on him. Waiting for someone to do something. For something to change.

“This isn’t a nursery tale,” Tharra said. “The blessings we carry aren’t weapons.”

Dahl held her furious gaze. “How fortunate for me,” he said. “Isn’t that right?” She looked back, unblinking, no sign of the treachery he suspected save the sudden stillness of her features. He looked to Oota. “I’m in this alone, fine. Let’s hope the gods still smile on those of us who give two nibs about the world. I’ll find my own way in. I’ll get Farideh out. And then we’ll see what plans can come together.” He leaned toward Tharra.

“And if you tell the guards that, fellow Harper,” Dahl murmured, “I’ll know.” He turned without waiting for Tharra’s reaction, and headed out into the darkening night. Reflexively he pulled the flask of Shadowfell liquor out of his pocket, passed it from hand to hand, then shoved it back again. If no one else was going to be the hero, then the Chosen were stuck with Dahl.

“Show me Lorcan again.” Farideh doesn’t care what it shows, or when, or why. She misses him and Sairché’s words ring in her ears over and over. He’s done with you. She might never see him again, never get to explain herself, and whatever Rhand’s apprentices think about that, she doesn’t care either. They haven’t moved from their stations in nearly an hour-waiting, it seems, for some other development. There’s no more blood, no more whispers, and no more hints about what might be, save for a pair of them fussing with the shelf of ancient scrolls, arguing over whether any of them could be useful. And Farideh wonders if all her plans are doomed to fail this badly.

A taproom in a waystation, sometime before Proskur. Farideh can’t remember the name of the inn or the village. She remembers the night, though, and the taproom. There’s a fiddler and a bard with a lute, another with a drum. The music is raucous and cheery. The dancers are wild and carefree, and the room feels like a hive of bees. Brin and Havilar are whirling, giggling, not caring that people are giving them looks. They crash into the table Farideh keeps between her and the mayhem and look abashed. Brin offers Farideh a hand. “Do you want to take a turn?”

“No thank you,” she says. They whirl off.

“Don’t you like dancing?” Lorcan drawls beside her. She hates it when he talks like that.

“Why would I like dancing?” she says irritably. “I don’t like people staring at me. I don’t like being crowded. I don’t like strangers grabbing at me.” She sips her ale. Farideh remembers wondering if he was going to ask her to, and if she’ d say yes. And she remembers knowing he wouldn’t. “Do you like dancing?”

Lorcan shrugs. “Why would I?”

Farideh sighs. “Right. You don’t like anything.”

“I like surviving,” Lorcan says.

“Do you like anything that you don’t need?”

Lorcan gives her such a puzzled look, and standing over the waters, Farideh is embarrassed all over again. How many times has he hinted at the terrors of Malbolge? Everything Lorcan does is, by necessity, to save his own neck-one way or another. Even when he saved her life, there was a payoff, a reward. Passage to the Hells, safety from his sisters, an alibi when he returned to his terrible mistress. Lorcan does nothing because it’s just pleasant. She knows that now. She suspected it then. Enough she should have known better than to ask such a silly question.

“Never mind,” she says and looks down into her ale. It’s the first time, Farideh thinks now, she started to understand he would always be something alien, something inhuman.

But as the waters continue reflecting, she notices something she hadn’t in the taproom that night: Lorcan’s puzzlement fades into something bare and uncomfortable as he watches her. As if she wears him out. As if she vexes him. As if he’s confused and frustrated. As if he knows all of this, and still, he wants her to stay there, beside him. He sighs, so quietly she never heard him.

“I like,” he said finally, “this ale. I think I’ll have another.”

The vision fades, the waters stop, and there is only Farideh’s reflection on the glassy surface. She wonders why the waters chose that moment, why they revealed it from that angle, why they let her see that strange look Lorcan gave her that makes her heart quicken. To teach her a lesson or to break her heart swiftest? To tease her or taunt her or none of it? The waters might be good or evil or neither.

Neither, she tells herself. The magic doesn’t care one way or another. It’s only her melancholy that makes it feel that way. It’s only knowing that perhaps Lorcan wasn’t as alien as she’ d always thought that makes her feel as if she’s failed him too.