If she’d been a Big, she was sure the Three’s Wardens would have welcomed her as a sister. As it was, she made do with fairy rimfire and looking damn fine while she did it.

  They approached their target. It was an armoured convoy protecting stolen knowledge of dragonmaking. Somehow the Vehement bastards had taken over a Skyforge. Intelligence said they meant to blow it up, but after a dragon ate almost all of them, a heroic monster managed to escape as dragonfire purged his kindred. He’d been seen with a gemstone of knowing, etched with the eldritch mysteries of dragonkin.

  Thinking about it made Tarragon feel tired.

  The knowledge wasn’t just information that could be copied. That’s not how the Skyforges worked. What Vehement Systems hadn’t worked out was how to marry magic and science. Not properly. The gemstone was a spell frozen in amber. They were trying to sherpa it across the plains below to a safehouse, their tame warlocks at the ready to pry the secrets from within.

  The convoy had the look of a professional job. Tarragon counted ten Artifices stalking the land. A hundred of the fiendish monsters in blue-runed armour walked beside them, heads on a swivel, ember lances in hand. At the heart of the convoy was a low-slung machine that rolled on treads. An amusing anachronism, but Tarragon could see the tracks it left from up here. That machine was heavy, which meant armour. You could send one of the Three’s Wardens in here, but only a Valiant would be able to crack that nut.

  There weren’t a lot of Valiant sitting on the bench, which left the job to two small fairies.

  A staccato crackle from the north drew Tarragon’s eye. Blue touched the night. No problem, two small fairies and a dragon. Mynned was drawing the enemy’s attention at distance. He was proud like all his mighty kind, but she had to admit they kind of got the job done.

  The response in the convoy was instant. Artifices shifted their cannons northward. Troops on the ground dropped to fighting crouches, weapons trained in the general direction. All Vehement soldiers knew dragons meant business, and you didn’t take one on unless you wanted to die. It was more personal for the ground troops, because Itikari designed dragons to heal by eating the creatures that were front-line shock troopers. The message was clear: dragons don’t view you as a threat. They think of you as fuel.

  Helio dropped lower, bringing them in from the south. Tarragon stayed on his wing, close enough they could’ve touched. He gave a tight salute, then peeled off toward the heavily-armoured tank. Tarragon ignored it, heading right for the largest concentration of soldiers.

  She wasn’t a Builder. She couldn’t hack the defences of the tank, subvert its friend-or-foe, and liberate stolen knowledge. Helio could do all that. Builder, saboteur, craftsman, hero—whatever Itikari needed, he rose to the challenge. Tarragon was just a soldier-spy.

  But she was a pretty good one.

  The black suit had collected her ember all through the flight. She felt buoyant with it, like she could do anything. Maybe even fight a dragon. She was more than enough for the chumps before her. A thrill tickled her as she dropped her head, leading her charge with a shoulder. Tarragon gathered all that stray energy, the magic Itikari put inside her for just this moment, focused, and let it shine.

  The suit went from black to clear in a moment, and Tarragon’s emberfire blazed. She punched through the back of a blue-runed monster, then another, and another after. She kept going, putting some real curry into her wings, leaving a trail of burning flesh and ash behind her. The armour they so prized melted like wax against the meteoric fury she brought.

  Then she was out the other side. She flew up, turning to see what she’d wrought. A swath of the enemy slowly toppled in her wake. The first was just legs, nothing else left, but as her fire ablated their armour and flesh, there was more left. The very last creature she killed had a charred, fairy-sized hole in his breastplate, a wick of flame curling from within.

  She bared teeth. Not a grin, something darker in it. Her sword was in her hand, a sliver of Fey Branded-forged metal that gleamed like justice. Tarragon went back down, faster and harder, eyes locked on the visage of a monster whose armour glowed azure. The monster raised her lance, firing, and Tarragon caught the beam on the edge of her steel. The metal glowed, heat flowing into her hands, and the fairy felt alive, because she was from a race of reactor technicians, and there was nothing these fiends could do to her.

  The monster, nobody’s fool, brought her weapon up in a reflex block. Tarragon cut through it on the way to the creature’s head, severing flesh, bone, veins, the works. Her sword was so hot no blood flowed, but the monster fell nonetheless. Even they couldn’t walk off a headshot.

  Another lance shot caught her, and she revelled in it. Heat flowed into her, and she let herself hover a moment. The creatures fired, and fired, a fusillade of hate. She welcomed it. You knew which side you were on by who shot at you. She flitted higher, soaring between the beams of an Artifice that seemed suddenly aware a dragon wasn’t their only foe.

  Tarragon ignored it, came around, and made another pass. Her emberfire burned brighter from the energy she’d borrowed from their lances, and she ploughed through their ranks, another burning charnel path of monsters who’d trouble no one ever again.

  A creature pulled forth a mace, swinging as she exited one of his comrades. This was why she had the sword. She dodged the swing, a spark on the wind, and rounded on the weapon, her own blade hungry. There was a tiny chime, the mace severed through the haft. Tarragon flitted left and right as the creature swung the useless handle. She couldn’t take a physical blow from these creatures, not when their armour was so blue, but her sword could defang them.

  Tarragon glowed with righteous fury, shrieking, and dived like an avenging angel.

  “Do you think that was right?” Helio was sombre as they flew back to the citadel.

  Tarragon scoffed. “They would have killed us a hundred times over.”

  “That’s true. But they’re the bad guys.” Helio’s normally zippy flight was a little beleaguered by the crystal he carried. He didn’t say how he’d got it from the tank, and Tarragon wouldn’t have understood anyway. She hadn’t passed her exams.

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m not sure.” She imagined a shrug, but his black suit hid all. “I think I’m … tired.”

  “We know we’re the good guys because the bad guys shoot at us.”

  “We know we’re the good guys because we do good things.” Helio’s voice was level, calm, and perhaps just a shade sad.

  “Easy to do good when you passed your exams.” She felt the heat in her words and tried to dip the next in a little honey. “I’m only good at one thing.”

  “I don’t think that’s true. But the other thing I can’t teach.” Helio sighed, the comm heavy with it. “You’re a master with a blade, no mistake. But you’ve yet to master yourself.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Nothing. Everything.”

  She held her silence for a spell. The citadel glimmered through a cloud bank then was revealed. Golden splendour, gleaming spires, heavenly radiance, the whole shebang. She marked the conning tower above the control spire near the rear. The spire ran through the citadel, a single strut on which all things led from. Tarragon pushed herself a little faster to bring herself in Helio’s eye line. “Want to buzz the tower?”

  He laughed. “It wouldn’t be very effective. We’re black on black, Greyflight. They wouldn’t see us.”

  //THEY WILL SEE ME.// Mynned soared past, his passage buffeting their smaller bodies. He roared, lightning blue crackling against the cloud, then lanced like a spear toward the citadel’s tower.

  Tarragon raised a tiny middle finger in his passage after she’d regained control of flight. “Bastard.”

  //NO. JUST A DRAGON.// The black beast sped up as he approached the tower.

  She heard comm chatter. The likes of no stop and by the Three Mynned if you dare, but of course he was a dragon, and dragons didn’t kneel. Tarragon grinned as he winged past the tower, lightning crackling against the heavens.

  And she knew. She knew. They were the good guys.

  “We didn’t do anything wrong,” Tarragon said. “We did it all right. We fought the darkness. We battled demons and monsters. We were on the side of dragons, Yasmine. Dragons! They flew so high. I remember. I remember it all.”

  Yasmine held her peace a spell. “And whose side were the dragons on?”

  “Their own. They’re dragons.”

  “Huh.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means ‘huh’.” Yasmine sighed. “We did you a great injustice, Tarragon of the Grey Flight. We robbed you of purpose and gave you another. We planned, and schemed, and did things we shouldn’t have done, all because to not do them would damn us all.”

  “What the fuck,” Tarragon said.

  Yasmine straightened. “The Three see things beyond mortal ken.”

  “Blah, blah, get to the point.”

  The other fairy snickered. “I can see why Helio liked you.”

  “He was my friend. He died.” She felt the bite of the words against her lips, the petulance in them. “All my friends do. I’m the only one left.”

  “Huh.”

  “Three’s mercy.” Tarragon sat in disgust.

  “Helio had a job. He did it. You had a job. You’ve yet to do it.” Yasmine’s voice was soft, like spring dawn. “Since you remember everything, tell me: what’s wrong with this room?”

  Tarragon didn’t want to think anymore. I’m tired, too. Everything is hard. The world is upside down, and I’m in love with a monster. I used to kill Evanne’s kind, and now I hurt when she’s not here. The citadel is broken. They changed the locks while I was away. The hangar was on top, not the side, and⁠—

  She jerked to her feet like a puppet yanked on strings. “This isn’t the citadel!” She whirled, glaring at Yasmine. “But it’s where the citadel was. So, where are we?”

  Yasmine smiled, gently, as if about to give the bad news to a cancer patient no longer in remission. “We’re in the worst place we could be. We’re in the machine that killed our home.”

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  This is some bullshit. Vertiline waited for her husband to call for help, solve the problem, or whatever damn thing he was up to. She heard the cat firing his bow, and imagined Sight of Day was doing his best in the pitch shroud that settled on them. She couldn’t see, and the Sway still hurt so much to use. Not the pain in her throat or the shriving of her soul. Vertiline was used to that. It was the pain of others, and the consequence the Sway brought. But it was there, itching at her, making her throat tighten, and her teeth clench. It wanted her to speak, to bend the world to her will, to alter reality to suit her whim.

  Almost every time she’d used the power someone died. If I use it, will I help my husband or kill him? She knew the logic was flawed at a base level, but her heart wasn’t convinced. Imshir fell, and her baby girl was lost when she but called a glimmer of radiance to her side. I do not understand why the Three hate me so.

  Perhaps it was because Vertiline was better as a Knight than Cleric but had to be both now her order were all but forgotten. And if the Tresward were a dim memory, the Three might consider her bargain null, and come for an accounting. She was supposed to resurrect the order, not bury the remainder.

  She bided, thinking, If my love asks for aid, I will raise the Light, or, If Sight of Day needs me, I will be there. And she waited, glass in hand, while her shoulders hunched so much they near squeezed her head off. Vertiline almost cried out when she heard her husband fall. She froze, feet welded to the floor, because he hadn’t asked, and every time she put her will into the world on her own hundreds of people died. Then Sight of Day did something that rattled, and something else that sounded like a whisper on the wind, and fire bloomed.

  And with it, hope in her heart.

  We are in a place no sunlight touches. These creatures haven’t learned to fear the Light. I will teach them.

  She saw the mantle of dog spiders. They coated the walls, ran down the spire behind her toward the pitiful bait-in-the-trap sinner there, carpeted the floor, and came for her. Her, and hers, and in that moment she saw enough for the pattern to fall on her, each word of its name like a hammer from above.

  Seven Seasons Reaping.

  She knew where her feet should be, and they were. Vertiline knew how her blade should start at high guard, and that’s where glass glimmered. Each movement perfect, and as her sword sang the hymn of death, golden Light infused the blade. Vertiline heard the tolling of mighty bells as reality parted for a moment, a mere fraction of time, but making the Three’s Light real. A butterfly rested on the narrow prism of her blade’s edge, gold-and-black wings fanning against the warmth of an invisible sun.

  Vertiline stepped forward, blade coming down, and three spider dogs ignited in a single cut. She stepped to her right, one foot behind the other, turning the linear movement into a spin as she straightened her stance. A spider dog fell from above into the perfect upswing she’d readied for it, and the bells’ toll became the rumble of thunder.

  Seven Seasons Reaping was one of black Khiton’s favoured graces. He’d passed it down for a single soldier on a battlefield of the fallen. A late, sole reinforcement coming to defend against the damage of a thousand blows. He’d meant it as an end of battle, but Vertiline saw the horrors coming forth from the walls, and knew it was simply a different kind of beginning.

  The Light flowed from her blade, droplets of golden shimmer hissing like molten stone as they hit the ground. She stepped into the fifth movement of the stanza, blade sweeping a head-height three-sixty-degree arc about her. No spider dogs were that tall, but the Light blazed from her glass, spraying liquid fury. A dozen, nay twenty spider dogs died.

  And still they came.

  She saw Sight of Day by the spire, his blade out as he fenced with those coming down the pillar. Vertiline moved toward where her husband fell, saw a spider dog rise with fangs bared, and knew it for the killing strike.

  It wasn’t in the pattern, but it must happen. She reached with her metal hand, fingers splayed wide, and heard thunder roar. She closed her hand into a fist and pulled it down. Something resisted, but only for a moment, then the sky fell.

  Lightning blasted through the roof of the chamber. It coiled about her closed hand, blue-white and feral. She screamed, tossing her hand toward Armitage, feeling her control of the Three’s power a brittle thing, her arm trembling to hold it steady, and a wave of rolling electricity coiled across the ground.

  Energy arced from spider dog to spider dog, curling about the chamber, a web of linked rage. It lashed from her clenched fist, a train of horses on a leash too frail to hold it, trembled against its bridle, then snapped it. Energy crackled to the spire, the metal turning brilliant white, and she thought no, no, not him, never him as the Light sought release through the man and Feybrind at its base.

  Silence. Smoke and ash swirled through the dim rays peaking through the rent in the cavern’s roof.

  Vertiline held her shaking fist against her body like an injured bird. She swayed, then slumped to one knee. She couldn’t look. Not at what she’d done.

  Not again.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  It makes no sense. There is no ship this big. Evanne stamped her way toward the tower. The mimics followed, a small troupe now at heel. She had suitcases and armoires, writing desks and sea chests. There was even a cabinet with sliding drawers that looked hungrier than any furniture had a right to. They clattered along, keeping time with snapping of buckles or clunking of lids as she played. Her throat felt raw from whatever it was she’d done before. She’d reached out, but reached in too, found something there she wasn’t sure had been there before, but it didn’t make her feel bigger.

  I feel complete.

  A small sewing box kept pace at her feet. “Why do you go to the place where everyone dies?”

  Evanne didn’t slow, because there was always some fool spouting portent this or doom that. “Everyone dies everywhere, Box.”

  “I didn’t.” The sewing box seemed thoughtful, if a box could. “I have been a sewing box for a thousand years or more.”

  “Wait. A thousand? But the world died eight hundred years ago.” Evanne gave it a few moments’ thought. “The ancients made you before they needed weapons?”

  “Humans always needed weapons.” The sewing box clattered a happy clip as she struck a chord, notes dripping from her guitar like invisible happiness. “Do you know what a contract is?”

  “It is paper that two liars use to Trick each other.”

  The box snickered shut. “Yes. I was a liar. I bartered my soul for a life of luxury. I lived well before, and now I live forever as a sewing box.”

  Evanne glanced to the tower. It loomed above, the lights spearing the gloom doing little to relieve the oppressive air. All the more reason to play for joy. “The ancients … animated objects with human souls?” She felt ill. “That’s inhuman.”

  “It is very human.” The sewing box clipped a few steps ahead of her, bouncing from corner to corner as she played. “The next part of your journey needs care, Half-Made. Within the tower, all die. We can’t go with you.”

  “Why not?” They rounded a last bank of derelict buildings, all with the look of tiny houses stacked atop each other. Oh, for a hundred years to look inside these places. There must be so many stories. The tower was suddenly right there, hulking, impassive, eternal.

  “It is forbidden.”

  “All the people doing the forbidding are gone.” Evanne turned a small circle, facing each mimic one by one. “You’re with me now, and we make our own rules. We’re different, and it’s fine they didn’t understand.”