Siofra nudged the drunk with her boot. She wrinkled her nose. He reeked of bile and drink.

  He jolted up, dropping the mug. “Whosedat! Whattrya ‘bout!”

  Celdar cleared his throat. “Greetings, friend. We were hoping—”

  “Enoufadat! Ain’t no friend o’mines!” The man broke out into wet, raspy laughter. “Only friend o’mines was indat there mug, an they’s long gone.”

  Ever the polite one, Celdar dipped his head. “That’s why we’ve come to you. Where’s The Brave Hand?”

  The man broke out into more laughter. “It’ll cost ya. Yeah, I reckon it’ll cost ya a bunch.”

  I, however, am of a different cloth. “We barter in the old price.”

  He laughed louder than before. “What is you a elf? Don’t be talking ‘bout no old prices wifme!”

  “Our apologies, sir,” Celdar intervened. “What price did you have in mind?”

  The moron tried his best to look thoughtful, but his browning eyes just lolled back in his skull. “Tell ya what. Seein’ as I’m ina goodish mood, I’ll get ya there for two tankards worth. Lead ya there meself.”

  Celdar flashed a gold mark in his hand. “We’d prefer to keep to ourselves once we reach the inn. Could we pay now?”

  The human’s eyes widened. He tottered to his feet and tried to clear his throat, but only ended up retching on what was left of his boots, not that the muck bothered him. He held a grimy hand out. “Course, friend! Hehe lemme get you there soon as can be!”

  Celdar dropped the gold into his palm and the man did a jig and a kick as he shoved the coin into his pocket. He kicked some of the filth off his boots and started off. “This way, friends!”

  He led them all the way to the building next door.

  Further down the street she’d have tolerated, possibly even only two or three doors down. But paying a drunk to make a fool of her and bring her next door? Whatever the threshold was for what Siofra would put up with, that fell on the far side.

  She shoved him against the wall and lifted him by the throat with her shield hand.

  The drunkard yelped and the greed in his eyes slipped into terror. “I ain’t mean nuthin by it. I swear! Please. Please. I got a daughter.”

  “Vonungr,” Celdar whispered.

  She glanced back. All eyes in the street were glued to the tall woman holding the drunk by his neck. So much for staying discreet. She dropped him and he stumbled back onto his arse. The quiet bustle resumed around them.

  Celdar patted the drunk on his head. “Your assistance is appreciated, friend.”

  The man nodded quickly.

  Siofra stepped over him and creaked the door open. The inside was just as solemn as the rest of the city. Worn tables were dimly lit by lamps along the wall. A sparse crowd was dotted throughout the space, but these people were made of sterner bones. It was evident in the sinewy muscles, in the daggers and swords that hung from their belts, in the ironed glares.

  A girl with snow-white hair sat at the edge of a table with four others, mug raised to her lips, head down so it was impossible to make out any features. But something was off. She wasn’t dressed like a whore, and the men at her table were fighters. As much as humans could be.

  “What’s your business here?” a voice grumbled from behind the bar.

  Celdar strode over and took a seat in front of the barkeep, a large man with a thick, grey beard wearing a dirty apron. “We’re looking for proper lodging until we can afford to cross the Red Strait.”

  Siofra took a seat to his right, surveying White Hair out of the corner of her eye.

  The barkeep huffed. “Looks to me that the two of you don’t need to wait long at all. That pelt on her shoulders is worth a great deal more than a trip north will cost. So, I’ll ask you again, and this time you’ll give me the truth of it. Who’re you and what’s your business here?”

  Siofra slid her eyes to him. “We gave you our business and from the looks of you and your patrons it would mean a great deal to you. Take it, and we’ll all keep to ourselves.”

  The barkeep worked his jaw over. “I’ll fetch you some keys for a room upstairs. Anything else?”

  “Bread will do,” Celdar said.

  The barkeep nodded and squeaked through the hinges of a swinging door. Light filtered in and their guide from earlier stumbled through. He scooted into a seat at the far end of the bar.

  Celdar removed his pipe and pressed it with rut. He reached into his pocket for more and packed it even tighter than usual. Why so much today? It hasn’t been a particularly bad one for the tremors. Something else racking at your mind? He exhaled and his eyes fluttered.

  She wrinkled her nose and flicked out a gold mark, rolling it between her knuckles. In and out. It was taking an awfully long time to fetch bread and there were no conversations at the tables. In and out. The tension was thick as mud. She tossed the mark to her left hand. In and out.

  The barkeep returned and slid two dirty plates across the bar top to her and Celdar. He went to wait on the drunkard. A cleaving knife bulged under his apron that hadn’t been there prior.

  “Something’s wrong,” she muttered to Celdar. She cast her gaze over her shoulder.

  White Hair rose to her feet and the others at her table fidgeted. She sat at the bar a couple of spaces from Siofra. “I’d heard there were strange visitors in Aerilon’s Edge,” she said in a soft cadence.

  Siofra ripped a chunk off the bread and popped it into her mouth. Celdar blew smoke through his nose and rolled his neck. He put his pipe away and kept his hands near his belt.

  “Word travels fast here,” White Hair continued. “But your ears can deceive you. Do you know what never deceives me?”

  Siofra swiveled her eyes to White Hair. The girl had fierce yellow eyes.

  “My eyes, and especially my nose.” There was frost to her words now. “So, when two strangers arrive, one wearing the coat of my people as a trophy, smelling of the Arden Mountains, I have questions.”

  She snarled at Siofra with daggers for teeth. Anyone else might’ve been petrified, but Siofra Vonungr was not anyone. In and out. “You wouldn’t be half as bold if you knew who I was.”

  The Lýkein snorted and turned her gaze forward again. “I will never fear you, Fanir. You who ran from here with your tail between your legs while your packmates burned alive.”

  Siofra flicked the mark spinning onto the bar top and rolled her shoulders. “Perhaps it’s time for another coat.”

  The Lýkein’s mouth curled into a smile. “The moon shines on you today. You’ll come with me, and we’ll work out whether you’re ever leaving Aerilon’s Edge.”

  “You don’t have the bones to bring me anywhere, dog. That much I promise you.”

  Celdar leaned close to her muttered under his breath. “Vonungr, if you kill her, they’ll all be on us.”

  Siofra kept her eyes on the Lýkein. “And if they decide we aren’t leaving Aerilon’s Edge alive?”

  “Then we will do what the old ways require, the same as we always have,” Celdar said. “But if there’s a chance to avoid them . . .”

  Siofra pursed her lips. “Where would you take us, dog?”

  The Lýkein showed her teeth and pushed off the bar onto her feet. “You should let him make all the decisions.”

  Already tried that, actually. She spun another mark onto the bar and she and Celdar rose and followed the Lýkein out of the inn. They stepped into the light to find the rotted souls of two Lost and a bald man holding their chains were waiting for them. The man spread his arms wide and bent his face into a grin. “Siofra Vonungr, Celdar Nolanr, even the traitor Kara, I cannot tell you how pleased I am to see you!”

  Her mouth gaped open, and instinct pushed her hand to her falchion’s hilt. You really should’ve brought all the Shields. She’d forgotten the Lost’s festering stench of rot. What was left of these two was more dead than alive, but not quite either. Their skin was dull and decayed, maggots and leeches boring into it. The slimy whites of their eyes languished in gaunt skulls, barely hidden by thin greying hair that was missing in clumps. Impossible to tell if they’d been men or women in life. All in all, they were as ruined as the rest of Ilysílos.

  Celdar didn’t seem perturbed by the Lost even a touch. He placed a steady hand on his sword’s hilt. Her chest tightened. That explains all the rut today. You were always going to turn on me. Nothing but my own hubris that didn’t let me kill you earlier. She didn’t even turn to him as she yanked her falchion free. “Sooner than I expected.”

  Celdar pulled his own weapon out in turn. “The old ways have failed us, Vonungr. You can see that as plainly as I.”

  The bald man grinned wider and he dropped the Lost’s chains. Siofra flinched, but the wretches didn’t move. “Don’t worry. They won’t hurt you unless I make them.”

  Her falchion trembled in her grasp. “What is this godlessness?”

  He shed his mask, lips peeling into a grimace. “With my appetite I’ve managed what no one else could. Fuck your Old Gods. They’ve not my hearts.”

  His voice cracked on the last word and Siofra recognized him. The years hadn’t waned his whining or need for approval. He’d just gotten older and fatter and lost his hair. “The decades have been unkind to Aerilon’s dog.”

  “You’ve no idea who you’re speaking to!” Ackland shrieked; veins wailing through his brow. “What I’ve made of myself!”

  Siofra chortled hollow and steeled her nerves. “You’ll always be the same man who was happy to lick the muck off his boots.”

  Ackland stomped. “Bah! You want to know how I got here? How I ceased to be Aerilon’s dog? The same way you’re here.” How much has Celdar told you? “Aerilon was old and complacent and weak. Content to sit with his thumb up some whore’s arse. So, I sculpted the future in my vision and now a moron wears the crown and the strings!” A rare class Aerilon’s boy must be of to be even less competent than his father. “I’ve achieved more than you ever have. Lay down your weapon and walk with me, or you will die here. Kara, unarm her.”

  Siofra squeezed her falchion’s hilt, but the Lýkein whiffed through her nostrils and stepped shoulder to shoulder with Siofra. “I can’t do that.”

  Ackland’s veins looked ready to burst from his skull. “What?” His eyes fluttered in his skull. Siofra glanced at Celdar, but his irises were in place. Likely he couldn’t even control his Gifts to that extent anymore. That, at least, she’d seen to.

  “I see you,” the Lýkein snarled from her other side, eyes twitching with her own Gifts. “You don’t care a shit about uniting the Twins.”

  “You’ll both be fucking Lost when I’m finished with you,” Ackland growled.

  “Vonungr,” Celdar pleaded. “We can reshape this world and undo the mistakes of the past.”

  “Mt mistake was letting you live all these years,” she twirled her falchion into balance, the way she’d taught her children all those years ago.

  Ackland’s nostrils flare and his empty eyes turned wild. “You choose death then?”

  “I choose the old ways,” Siofra said.

  Celdar hewed at her, and those were the ways that erupted. She parried and her arm jarred on the crack of metal. She narrowly ducked under a quick slash. So much for his fucking tremors.

  From the corner of her vision, the Lýkein managed Ackland and his Lost. Ackland’s eyes whizzed in their sockets and the surrounding debris hurtled toward the girl, who diverted it with her own Gifts. One of the Lost jerked its body at her, chomping at her with rotten teeth. She punched in its jaw and the bottom half of its mouth fell off, slimy bugs still scuttling in it. The thing came at the Lýkein again, black tongue dangling. The mongrel—

  A sword stabbed at Siofra’s throat. She swatted his steel away and he turned it into a down slash with effortless precision. She gasped as the cold metal sank into her ribs and she flexed it. She reeled back and held her free to hand to the bleeding. Idiot, hate him or not, he’s still Niall’s First Shield. Fuck. The old ways have always been bloody, but it’d never been my blood. A lot changes in twenty years.

  Celdar came at her again. She moved to parry, but he feinted and opened her over the knee. She screamed and barreled her shoulder into his side. He yowled and shoved her reeling into the road. He smashed his pommel into the back of her skull as she was falling, and she buckled to her knees. She rolled away to put some distance between them and staggered to her feet, vision fuzzy, breath short, limbs burning like the Fall. Her hair stuck to the back of her skull where blood was mottling it in clumps.

  Siofra spit blood, chest heaving, and looked to where the Lýkein was still fending off Ackland and the Lost. Ackland had collapsed to a knee on the road, sweat glistening his bald pate, but from the looks of it, Lost were starting to reach the mongrel. She turned back to find Celdar looking just as tired as any of them, but neither of him was bleeding from the head and ribs. “Would you like to see how the mutt fares?” they huffed through ragged breaths.

  She squinted until there was only one of him. I’d like to sever your head from your fucking neck, but the Old Gods know I need a moment.

  He let his steel clang against the road and drew in breath through his nose. “I’ve no skin in their score. And I’m curious to see if she’s been touched by the old ways.”

  Siofra drew in slow breaths. Dog tired is probably nearer to the truth. It’s a miracle you still haven’t seized, but I need a breath just as bad. Worse. She returned her attention to the mongrel.

  One of the ghouls was missing an arm and the other a leg, but they kept coming at her. Moaning. Crawling. Oozing thick blood closer to black than crimson. Mindless in their pursuit of death. The Lýkein’s breathing was labored, and every blow she struck was a hair slower, but it was clear the sort of bones she was made of. Touched by the old ways might be selling it short. Would I have actually been able to kill her?

  Ackland stood up, breath steadying, veins popping in his brow, veiny whites of his eyes turned wild. “Die you fucking mutt!”

  The earth tore apart under their feet, fracturing the street into chunks of debris. The buildings lining the street caved in on themselves, blanketing them in ash and dust. Ackland screamed as some of the rubble hurled toward the Lýkein.

  Siofra leapt at Celdar with her falchion brandished. The hollow clang of metal sparking against metal. The buzz in her arm from the contact. Their steels grinded until their crosspieces locked and they were snarling froth in each other’s faces. “You meet the Old Gods today,” she spat.

  His arms trembled. “You were the best of us, Vonungr.”

  She kneed his gut, doubled him over, then turned her falchion around and crunched its pommel into his chin. He dropped his sword and folded to his knees. “I still am.”

  She cleaved down, but her falchion held a hair’s length away from the back of his neck and her fingers unwrapped themselves. Her falchion bounced harmlessly off of his neck and clattered into the rubble.

  Celdar looked up, eyes buzzing in their sockets, pupils nowhere to be seen. He stood, cords pulsing out of his neck, arms shaking violently as he managed his Gifts. “I am the First Shield of Niall Vonungr. You think me so far fallen that my Gifts have forsaken me completely?”

  Siofra sucked in hard breaths.

  “You will die alone, Siofra. The same way you lived. I’d hoped the guilt would kill you, but alas, I’ll do it myself.” He knelt to pick up her falchion.

  An icy tear streamed down her face. In the end she just thought of her children. How she should’ve told them how much they meant to her and that she loved them unconditionally. How she should’ve given them the last of her warmth after the Fall. Cruel of the Old Gods. It’s in death you learn the important things about living.

  Celdar plunged his blade at her, but his body twitched and froze. His mouth gaped open, spilling saliva. He tried to talk and more spit splooged out. The chords tightened in his brow, and he tottered over, twitching, and grunting and frothing at the mouth. The shaking grew more violent, and the pressure lifted in the air.

  Siofra collapsed next to him and gathered herself. She grabbed her falchion and scooted back on her arse. You’ve fallen further than you realized.

  Celdar turned to her, body calming but still breathing raggedly. His jaw clenched as he tried to form words.

  She hauled herself to her feet. “Save your words for the Old Gods.”

  She approached him, ready to claim the old debt, but something barreled into her and sent her sprawling. Then she was being dragged by the maw of a giant white wolf, legs smacking and bending against the ground, falchion scraping across the ashy road.

  She should’ve been furious at the mongrel for dragging her through the streets, but damn she was tired. Too tired even to care about her legs getting beaten in. The world was a blur of men and women diving out of the way hollering. Eventually, it all slowed back into the crumbled remains of Ilysílos. The wolf halted in an empty road and set her down, tongue dangling from her jaws.

  Siofra’s legs were chafed pink and bloody from being dragged. Her upper body was in a similar state from her bout with Celdar. She groaned to her feet and grimaced as she sheathed her falchion. She hadn’t expected the old ways to be any easier, but damn. A little long in the tooth, aren’t we? She drew a long breath before looking up to the beastly yellow eyes. “Ackland?”

  The wolf shook its thick shaggy head. Alive then, along with Celdar. Siofra cast her gaze over the surroundings. The sun was blotted out by what was left of the great library’s towers. Even in its sordid state it was nothing to imagine the spiraling towers as they once were. The few humans in the vicinity had their hard gazes stuck on her and the Lýkein, but they were far from afraid of the giant wolf. Maybe it’s just the exhaustion seeping through my bones, but they don’t even appear surprised.

  The wolf jerked her skull toward the great library and padded toward it. Siofra exhaled and limped after her. Siofra recognized Haralda, the woman with an eye patch waiting for them at the library’s grand doors.

  Haralda didn’t flinch as the wolf walked up and brushed its snout against her eyepatch. She ran her cold eye up and down the pair. “It went that well then?”