THE FAINT GLIMMERINGS OF DAWN JUST LIT THE EDGE OF THE HORIZON. From so high up, the sun seemed imminent, but Churirajachi Kerashna, daughter of Versengethor, of the line of Abinirash, knew better. Another hour, maybe an hour and a half, before the sun broke. That didn’t seem to stop the army trudging on toward Djerad Thymar in the dark.
“The demons are all at the front!” the man clinging to her waist shouted over the wind. “They see in the darkness!” Amurri, she thought, trying to make the lonely name stop feeling overly familiar. Just Amurri.
“Do you think he knows they can’t be replaced?” she asked, pulling the reins so that her bat, Ishaniki, wheeled westward, coming around to pass the army again.
“I can’t say! I’m not an expert on demons! We don’t usually get them in the other world!” He resettled his grip. “Do you fly on these a lot?”
“Every day!” she said, chuckling. “Not usually scouting an army.”
“Do you think they’ll let some of us join you?” he asked. “I would like this, I think!”
Kerashna laughed. “So long as you earn it. Which way’s the wind blowing on that? You think we’re getting a new clan?”
“I want it,” Amurri shouted over the wind. “I think a lot of people do. It’s hard to read the sikati, but she wants safety for us, and she’s … I don’t know the word.”
“Honorable?” Kerashna suggested. Namshita had the sort of presence that made you want to stand a little straighter, answer a little quicker. An elder already, she thought. “Gotta choose a name,” she called. “Maybe you’ll get one out of this battle.”
They came up on the western flank of the army. She urged Ishaniki down for a closer look. Torches punctuated the dark shapes of troops marching in formation.
“How important is the jewelry do you think?” Amurri asked.
“Pretty important,” Kerashna agreed. “That way everyone knows at a glance you’re Thymari. But there’s not much to pierce on your faces is there? It’s all smooth. So I don’t know.”
“Does it hurt?”
“Of course it hurts,” she replied. “You’re getting holes stabbed in your face. But I’d say it’s worth … Karshoj!”
Ahead of the demons, they drove a line of chained Vayemniri.
A lance of yellow energy shot past them, singeing the giant bat’s left wing. They dropped sharply, plunging a handful of feet, and Kerashna reached back to be sure Amurri didn’t leave the saddle, even as she yanked Ishaniki’s reins hard.
“The Son of Victory!” Amurri shouted. “He’s seen us.”
“Up, up!” she shouted. “Kick her in the ribs!”
The bat screeched, a needling sound that made Kerashna’s ears itch even when it had passed. If Gilgeam had seen them, his winged demons wouldn’t be far behind. There was no chance for a single scout to rescue those captives, she told herself. Another bolt of yellow light blazed past as the bat climbed and climbed into the cold air. “Hold on very tight!” she told Amurri. There was no time to lose.
• • •
WAR DRUMS BEAT a furious pulse for Djerad Thymar. Even in the heart of the Verthisathurgiesh enclave, Mehen fought back the building anticipation and anxiety the sound stirred in him, despite the years. He pushed into the guest room with his uninjured shoulder, with a treat for the boy who was and wasn’t his grandson in his other hand. The hellhound by the foot of the bed leaped to her feet.
“Lie down, Zoonie,” he said irritably. The dog sat but laid her enormous head—once more muzzled—on the quilt that covered Remzi’s lap as he sat against the headboard. “Well, Dahl managed to make a sending to your parents.”
“Are they all right?” Remzi asked.
“Better now they know you’re fine. Here,” Mehen said, handing Remzi the handled bowl. “It’s called indhumicha. It’s hot, it’s sweet, it will help you sleep.” Particularly, Mehen thought, with the few drops of chmertehoschta he’d stirred into it. The boy had been up all night long, and the racket of a battle wasn’t going to help things.
“It looks like porridge,” Remzi said skeptically.
Mehen shrugged. “A little. It’s got corn flour, honey, anise, and … you don’t have it in Aglarond, but it’s called fahel. Put it in pies and things.”
Remzi took a cautious slurp. “It’s good,” he said, sounding relieved. Then, “Did Havilar drink this? When she was little?”
“On special occasions,” Mehen said. “We lived up in the mountains, so some things were a luxury.”
“Is she going to fight in the war?” He looked Mehen over, wide-eyed. “Are you?”
Mehen tapped his injured arm. Better suited, this time around, he thought bitterly, to caring for babes and staying out of the way. Karshoji Vozhin. Karshoji Lorcan. Kallan up on the wall. Uadjit leading a cohort. His girls standing atop the pyramid, racing the demons. And Mehen couldn’t move his sword arm. “Priest’s busy,” he said. “I’ll find something to do.”
“You have a really big sword,” Remzi pointed out. “Maybe you should use a smaller one, while your arm’s hurt?”
“I’ll think about it,” he said. “Drink your indhumicha.”
Remzi gave the drink another cautious slurp. “Do the drums mean that they’re attacking already?”
“No,” Mehen said. “When they drum like that”—he clapped his hands, matching the beat—“it means attackers are in sight, and everyone needs to make ready.”
“And I have to go to bed.”
“You’re seven,” Mehen reminded him. “And you have no weapons.”
Remzi frowned. “I have a sling to scare off wolves. I mean, at home I do.”
Mehen smiled—he sounded so much like Havilar. “In the morning, if you’re needed, I will find you a sling. Provided you go to sleep.”
“Maybe a sword?”
“Maybe a sword,” Mehen said. At seven, a child should have a sword, even if he’s only a cowherd. “Are you excited to go home?”
Remzi shrugged. “Yes, but I’m liking my adventure. The parts without the ghost, I mean. It’s going to be boring when I go home.”
“Boring isn’t bad,” Mehen said. “Boring lets you get your feet under you.”
“My feet are under me.”
“You’re seven,” Mehen reminded him. “You’ve got a lot of adventures ahead of you.” He nodded at the bowl. “You finished?”
Remzi drank the last of the indhumicha and the rest of the sedative, handing the bowl over to Mehen. “If the city gets taken while I’m asleep,” he said, snuggling down under the covers, “what do I do?”
“If that happens, I still have one good arm to carry you off with. Stay with Zoonie until someone comes for you.”
“Thank you for … the porridge thing,” Remzi said.
“You’re welcome. Get some sleep.”
Mehen closed the door and went back out into the sitting room, just as Farideh and Dumuzi came back in, that horrible ruby rod in her left hand. Between Mehen and them, Lorcan waited on one of the low couches, tense and twitchy—that, more than anything, made Mehen nervous.
“What’s the word?” Mehen asked his daughter.
“They’re moving Nanna-Sin,” Farideh said. “Everything should be set in maybe an hour.” She blew out a nervous breath. “And I have to talk to Sairché for some reason. How are you?”
“I will be better when all this is passed,” Mehen said. One more act, one more ritual and they’d be through with all this nonsense about gods. Farideh hugged him, and he flinched as she jostled his arm.
Farideh pursed her mouth. “Will you just let Tam heal it?”
“You’ve got Tam up to his elbows in gods,” Mehen said. “Besides, there’ll be plenty of folks needing his healing spells more than I do.”
“You can’t wield your sword, though,” Dumuzi said.
“Happens when you get old,” Mehen said. He nudged Farideh toward the cambion’s door. “Go have your chat.”
Farideh and Lorcan exchanged a look as she passed him. Her step slowed, just for a moment. “She said alone,” Farideh told Lorcan.
“Not surprising,” he said, a touch gruffly.
“I need to talk to you,” she said. “After.”
Lorcan looked away. “Of course. I’ll be waiting.”
Mehen snapped his teeth. Another thing they might be all through with after this, and it was only a very small part of him that regretted the loss of Lorcan.
“Have you seen healers?” Dumuzi asked.
“No, I’ve just been wandering around with a useless arm,” Mehen retorted. “Of course I’ve seen healers. They got the joint reset, but there’s damage inside. They say it’s going to take a long time to heal and it’ll fall out again. Probably through with the falchion.”
Dumuzi’s teeth parted, anxious, and Mehen sighed. “Don’t. Don’t feel bad. I’ve done this enough times I’ve had it coming.” He looked at the door Farideh had disappeared through. “I do wish I could do something to protect them, though. Much as I’d like to trust the lot of you, you’ve hardly shaken the eggshells off your heels.”
“You can be healed by divine magic, though,” Dumuzi said.
“Maybe. Maybe not. Doesn’t always work with old injuries or old bodies.”
“You aren’t that old,” Dumuzi said, and he sounded so much like Uadjit that Mehen chuckled. Dumuzi only grew more solemn. “Do you accept Enlil as an ally?” he demanded.
Mehen snorted. No—every part of him wanted to say no. Every instinct, every lesson he’d learned—you didn’t yoke yourself to a tyrant. You didn’t tie yourself to a god. But he hesitated. He thought of the vision of the black-scaled Vayemniri, his hand on Dumuzi’s shoulder. He thought of the way Dumuzi had described the god—He sees himself as a father. A parent and a soldier. And so are you. That balance, Mehen thought, between protecting and smothering. Between trusting and neglecting.
“Yes,” Mehen said. “An ally and a comrade.”
Dumuzi nodded. “Then I think this might work.”
He clapped his hand to Mehen’s injured shoulder, harder than Mehen would have expected the boy to manage. A jolt went through him, the feeling of the lightning biting back, followed by the strange ringing voices he’d heard when the god had first appeared in the Vanquisher’s Hall. For a moment he was aware of every bone in his skeleton, and then the smell of fahel and fennel burned his nostrils. His ears thrummed with a beat that his heart fought to match.
Be well, a voice said. We need your sword.
The next moment, Mehen stood in the sitting room, sling loose around his neck with his arm out as though he’d shoved Dumuzi off. The boy only regarded him with a satisfied smile as Mehen rotated his shoulder tentatively.
“Well,” Lorcan said dryly. “You’ve gained a bit of skill while we were gone, haven’t you?”
“Thank you,” Mehen said, his ears still pulsing. But Dumuzi wasn’t listening.
“The drums,” he said. Mehen listened—the beat wasn’t in his ears. The drummers had changed the rhythm—faster, more urgent. A message to all parts of the city to take their stations.
“He’s here,” Dumuzi said.
• • •
YOUR ARMY IS HERE. Havilar scowled back at the ghost of Bryseis Kakistos, washed out by the growing sunlight. Alyona still held tight to her arm, but they didn’t struggle as they looked over the side of the pyramid.
Havilar cursed. Of course they were—and she was still stuck up here, waiting for everything to begin.
“You’re supposed to be checking his work,” she said to the ghost. “Not watching the battle.”
Down on the stones of the pyramid, Dahl paused in his construction of the magic circle meant to protect them, but he held his tongue. Pity, Havilar thought. She could use a fight.
He’s fine, Bryseis Kakistos said dismissively. The circle’s simple. The shield trickier. What you’re doing is the complex part.
Havilar moved nearer to where the ghosts hung. Down below, the battling fiends and humans and Vayemniri were too small to even gain a sense of who was winning or losing. She tapped the black axe on her belt and thought about her glaive, down in the Adjudicator’s enclave with the rest of her armor.
We talked, Bryseis Kakistos said offhandedly. Alyona and I.
“Is that why you’re being so helpful?”
One of the reasons, the ghost said, but she didn’t elaborate. Alyona smiled at Havilar.
She’s keeping her promise, Alyona said. Then, But I’m keeping mine too, to you.
That was probably for the best. For all Havilar wanted to see parallels between Alyona and her twin and Havilar and Farideh, none of Fari’s crimes could hold a candle to Bryseis Kakistos’s.
She didn’t think, anyway.
Havilar turned back to Dahl. “Are you done yet? I want to get a chance to fight some demons.”
“Well, if it were up to me, you could be down there,” he said, eyes still on his runes. “And I could be down in the enclave with your sister, instead of Lorcan. But it’s not up to me.”
“Oh, don’t be stupid,” Havilar said. “She likes you better. She told you that. She told me that.”
Dahl looked up at that. “What did she tell you?”
Havilar grinned at him. “Sister secrets. But, come on. You’re supposed to be smart. She kissed you in front of people. In front of Lorcan. She’s private. For Farideh, that’s basically the same as … as me ripping Brin’s breeches off in the middle of a crowd. She likes you. Stop fussing.”
Dahl regarded her warily a moment, a smile spreading on his face. “Well. Fair then. Are you scared?” he asked.
“Probably,” she said. “Farideh warned me.” She looked back at the ghosts. “I should be more scared. But I’m so tired of all this that I’m starting to get numb to it. But … I keep thinking about Remzi and about the ancestor stories they have about the Wailing Years, and I really don’t want him to have to grow up fighting monsters and devils and things because he has to, because Azuth and Asmodeus melt into one thing or explode or whatever.” She scowled down at the runes. “I don’t understand gods. Seems like we’re always getting the worst of their messes.”
Dahl sat back on his heels and looked up at her. “It does,” he agreed. “Sometimes they’re very helpful, and sometimes you’re just wishing they would stop giving you notice. But that’s the way it is.”
“That’s a horseshit answer, Dahl.”
He smiled. “That’s not up to me either.”
The air snapped, and a board, covered with a sheet and holding a body that seemed improbably long, appeared in the center of the circle. Ilstan, Brin, Tam, and Mira stood at the corners.
“Watch the circle!” Dahl shouted as Mira stepped back from the body.
“Is that him?” Havilar asked, a queer feeling curling in her stomach. She lifted the corner of the sheet, and that was answer enough. At least he looked peaceful.
Brin moved to stand beside her, tucking an arm around her waist.
“The circle’s ready,” Dahl said. He looked out toward the army, to where the air was growing thick with the dark shapes of flying demons. “Time for the shield.”
• • •
“THEY’RE FAST,” FENKENKABRADON Dokaan said to the Vanquisher and the sikati as they stood on the glass-smooth top of Shestandeliath’s wall, looking down at the army advancing swiftly toward Djerad Thymar’s northern side. “You have to give them that.”
“The Son of Victory knows his time is borrowed,” Namshita said. “The victory at Shyr was stolen. He needs to prove his deal with the Dark Prince was worth it.”
“You think it’s going to be worth it?” Kallan asked.
Namshita’s mouth tightened. “A great many people are going to die today. So I would say no.”
On either side of Kallan, rows of archers held their arrows nocked and ready. At either gate, a ballista waited to be rolled out. A far cry, he thought, from being a sellsword. He’d told Dokaan and Namshita not to leave his side. If he couldn’t turn into a decent general overnight, then he’d make do with two ready-made ones by him.
“Not as big as I was expecting,” Kallan said. “We ready for a siege?”
“So long as we hold the river,” Dokaan said. “We can keep getting supplies from Arush Ashuak.” He shifted his crutch to spare his injured leg. “It’s the demons I’d worry—chaubask vur kepeshk karshoji!”
The front lines of the army of Unther were solely of the Abyss. Hulking monsters with bull’s horns and fists like tree stumps. Slippery shadow-creatures. Squat spiky beasts like brutal toads. Winged women and men who perched atop the bull-demons or flew above their fellows.
Or goaded the line of chained dragonborn that ran ahead of the army, now visible in the growing light. Kallan’s heart squeezed. Only a dozen or so, but still—a dozen or so! Their snouts had been wrapped in leather, their hands chained behind them. Too far to pick out clan piercings, but that didn’t matter.
“Send a cohort out to retrieve them,” Dokaan said. “Cavalry, they’re far enough ahead, we can make a run while the archers cover—”
“No,” Namshita said. “Those ones”—she pointed at the shadowy demons—“they are fast. They’ll cut your cavalry out before it ever reaches them. If I were you, Vanquisher?”
Kallan turned to her. “Yes?”
“Have the archers shoot the captives,” she said solemnly. “They cannot be rescued, but they can be saved.”
“Madness,” Dokaan cried. “We’re not out of options.”
A green-scaled man at the center of the line stopped, just within bowshot. His pause jerked the chain, stopped the line to a ragged stop. To his left and right, the others glanced back, but the green-scaled man just stared up at the wall. Could he see them? Kallan wondered. Could he spy his own clan among them?
“They’re within range,” Namshita said.
“Hold,” Kallan ordered, the shout repeated down the line.
One of the winged men dropped behind him, clawed hands glowing. He set his hands on the green-scaled man’s shoulders. “They will make him,” Namshita whispered. “That’s what they’re doing. Succubuses take over your mind.”
Other winged humans came up behind the remaining prisoners, pressing other magic to them, forcing wills that weren’t their own. Kallan felt sick—worse than captives. They were within range, he thought, watching the green-scaled man twist as though fighting the succubus standing behind them. Another landed beside him, building her will on the others.
The demons are in range, he realized. And still.
“Loose arrows!” he shouted. “They hold your targets for you!”
Arrows filled the air, followed by the sizzle of the Sixth Red’s fireballs. The succubi tried to scatter, but a full two-thirds of them were caught in the storm of projectiles and knocked to the ground. Whether they had survived or not hardly mattered when the front line of the Untheran force hit them, the bull-headed beasts and spike-covered toads trampling their prone forms.
And those of the prisoners. They’d sacrificed themselves to take out an equal number of Gilgeam’s demons, like something out of a karshoji ancestor story. Kallan glanced back up the pyramid’s slope, toward the peak where the flashing lights of stirring magic could be seen.
All of this is like something out of a karshoji ancestor story, he thought. And he hoped if it turned out to be one, no one made Yrjixtilex Kallan out to be anything he wasn’t.
The first bull-headed demon slammed into the wall, nearly knocking Kallan off his feet, and sending a rain of stone shards down the slope of the wall. He swept his gaze over the army, counting the big brutes, just as a ray of golden light streaked over his head, striking the pyramid in an explosion of granite.
“Come on, Dumuzi,” he muttered. “We’re going to need that god back.”
• • •
FARIDEH STOOD AT the foot of the bed, just beyond the circle of runes, expecting a trap, but unable to find the proof of it. “You want me to kill you?”
“No, that would actually ruin everything,” Sairché said. “Have you listened to a word I’ve said?”
Shadow-smoke leaked off her arms, her nerves driven by the persistent beat of the war drums as much as dealing with Sairché—she didn’t have much time left. “If I break the circle,” Farideh said, “one of your sisters will find you.”
“One or more of them,” Sairché said.
“And they’re going to kill you.”
“Yes.” Sairché’s mouth twitched in an uneasy smile. “Hopefully quickly. But you can’t do it. That would make this entire plan fall apart. You need the pradixikai to come here.”
“It’s as good as killing you,” Farideh said, not sure how she felt about the offer.
Sairché rolled her eyes. “Well, then you should be all the more pleased with this plan. You get your revenge. Lorcan gets to be rid of me. Your friend gets reinforcements—”
“What do you get?” Farideh asked.
Sairché fell silent a moment. “I get to be free. So far as anyone knows, the oathbreaker curse is permanent. It’s not going to wear off. And, as Dumuzi made abundantly clear, there aren’t many gods out there that are keen to do a favor for a devil like me.” She paused as if waiting for Farideh to say something. “Don’t you owe me a favor still?”
“You cleared them,” Farideh reminded her. “What about Asmodeus?”
Sairché chuckled. “That would be disrupting the hierarchy quite baldly. He might,” she allowed, “but also he might decide one day to mend his ways and become the footman of Lathander. I wouldn’t hold my breath. No, my very best hope is to assist you with all I can, and pray”—she said this with a desperate smile—“that Asmodeus takes notice and plucks my soul up from the Styx.” She folded her hands together. “Besides, we come back to the fact that I’m completely trapped here. Best case scenario, I’m left alone to go slowly mad in a cell the size of a dragonborn’s bed.”
Farideh had seen the pradixikai kill people in Neverwinter—even if it was Sairché they’d be killing, it felt abhorrent. But somehow it seemed crueler to leave her trapped here—and she couldn’t deny that fact made it more tempting to do just that.
“I hate you,” Farideh said. “I can’t say that about many people.”
“Well if it makes a difference, I hardly think about you personally anymore.”
“I hate giving you what you want,” she went on. “But I’ll do it.”
“Wait: there’s another part,” Sairché said. “It’s very important. Lorcan cannot let me come to harm. So you can’t tell him you’re doing this. But you need to make certain he’s near, because he is the only one who can control the pradixikai after they … after the deed is done,” she decided with the faintest tremble in her voice. “He must be in the room not a moment too late, or you’ll be dead too. And then I can kiss Asmodeus’s good word good-bye.” She licked her lips again. “Do we have a deal?”
Will you bargain for her as well? Asmodeus had asked of Sairché. Whether that boded well or ill for Sairché in the world beyond, Farideh wouldn’t have dared guess. Out in the city beyond, the drums’ beat shifted, became more insistent, more frantic. Sairché turned toward the door. “Sounds like you’re in a hurry.”
“Fine. Let’s do it,” Farideh said. She went to the door and looked out into the sitting room. Dumuzi and Mehen were gone, but Lorcan remained, sitting quietly on the couch. He looked up as she came out. “Is it time for that ominous ‘talk’?” he asked.
“Not yet,” she said. “Don’t go anywhere.” She closed the door again.
“I bargained the pradixikai’s aid,” Sairché reminded her. “Make sure he knows that.” She folded her hands nervously. “Make sure they know that army’s full of demons. Good, big ones. They won’t ask twice.” She smoothed a hand over her bare scalp, as if trying to memorize it. “You were … a surprising opponent, Farideh. You made my days interesting at least.”
“Go to the Hells,” Farideh said.
Sairché snorted. “I suppose I will. Tell Lorcan …” She sighed. “Never mind. He knows exactly how I feel. Let’s stop dawdling.”
Without another word, Farideh dragged a foot through the runes, scattering the powder that made the magic circle hold against devils. Sairché gave a sharp gasp as the magic failed.
For a heartbeat, nothing happened. Sairché’s golden eyes held hers as the cambion licked her lips nervously. Farideh took a step toward the door, and another, another, until her hand touched the handle. Sairché gathered her legs under her, rising slowly.
The first erinyes appeared near where Farideh had broken the circle. Dark-skinned, dark-haired, and not as big as the pradixikai erinyes she’d seen. Sairché backed up to the wall.
“Little Sister,” she said. “Oathbreaker.”
“Neferis,” she said. “Hold a moment.”
The erinyes didn’t listen, drawing her sword as she stepped up onto the bedframe. Another trio of erinyes appeared on the far side of the bed, and then a second, on the nearer side—both led by one of the huge pradixikai. Sairché’s eyes widened at the sight of them, but she seemed to relax. She found Farideh’s eyes.
The air went out of Sairché in a gasp as Neferis’s sword plunged into Sairché’s belly. One of the other erinyes dived forward, grabbing the cambion’s arm as if to yank the prize away from her sister.
Farideh fumbled with the knob as Sairché started screaming. By the time she got the door open, Lorcan was already there, already pushing in, and one of the erinyes had cut Sairché’s head partway from her shoulders. Farideh’s gorge rose and she turned away again.
“Stop!” Lorcan shouted, and mercifully, unbelievably, they did. Every sound in the room beyond the devils’ breath ceased. “Is she dead?”
A pause, a horrible fleshy sound. “Looks like,” one of the erinyes drawled. “She was an—”
“Oathbreaker, yes, I know.” He said nothing for another long moment, then turned back to Farideh. “Are you all right?” Lorcan asked, almost too soft to be heard. Farideh nodded, risking a glance over her shoulder. There was so much blood—
“You have to order them to take the battlefield,” she whispered. “Sairché bargained their aid to Enlil. Asmodeus already thinks it’s happening. You have to do it and you have to do it now. I’m sorry.”
Lorcan looked at her as if she were mad. “Asmodeus already knows about this?” he said carefully. She nodded. He looked back. “Seven’s not going to do it,” he murmured. “Shit and ashes.
“Megara, Charonea,” he barked. The pradixikai erinyes sneered around their terrible tusks but took notice. “His Majesty has bargained the might of the pradixikai to aid Djerad Thymar in the defeat of the Traitor Graz’zt’s beloved demons.”
“Demons?” the farther one, a white-haired high-cheekboned creature. “What sort of demons?”
“Goristros,” Lorcan said. “Vrocks, hezrou. Succubi,” he added with special emphasis. Now he had their attention. “They’re attacking, and His Majesty has business in this city he doesn’t want disrupted. Bring all twelve furies to the field, northeast of the city. You kill demons, leave the humans and the dragonborn.”
The white-haired one turned to nod at the two sisters at her side, but the other, red-eyed with her dark hair in twin braids, threw up a hand. “We don’t have twelve,” she said. “And we don’t have a leader. Who’s in charge?”
Lorcan scowled. “You can’t figure that out yourself?”
“You have Mother’s holdings,” Neferis pointed out. “You have to advance us. I told you that.”
Lorcan clenched his jaw as if he were biting back a scream of frustration. “Ascend Tyndaris and the twins. Neferis, congratulations, you’re now the leader of the pradixikai. Get your forces to Toril.”
The words themselves were magic. Hellfire erupted around Neferis, cocooning her in flames. As they fell away, the erinyes was revealed, bigger and fiercer looking than before, now clearly one of the fearsome pradixikai.
“What the shit do you think you’re doing?” the braided erinyes demanded.
“Putting someone in charge who isn’t going to stab me in the back, Megara,” Lorcan said. “I should think that fairly obvious. Next time, think a little more carefully on whom you’re tormenting.”
Neferis stepped down and dragged one obsidian-sharp hoof over the stone floor. “Charonea, send one of yours to find Faventia and Fidentia and tell them to choose their fury-sisters if they haven’t already figured out that much. We ride at once. Megara.” She paused, a deadly threat in that moment of quiet. “Let’s go.”
Lorcan turned to Farideh, expression grim. “You’ll understand,” he said quietly, “that Sairché’s set off something bigger than she realized. I need to go to Osseia. And you need to get to your post.”
“Be careful,” she said. He started to answer, but seemed to think better of it, stepping back from her as he called up the whirlwind that would carry him into the Nine Hells.
• • •
LORCAN HAD NO more than let his feet touch the bone-tiled floor of the fingerbone tower but he was sprinting for the exit, leaving his sisters to sort themselves out. He leaped from the window, flying with every bit of strength left in his wings, for the skull palace of Osseia, hoping that Sairché had not left him a trap buried in the gift of her death.
Sairché was dead. He reminded himself of this over and over. He’d seen her corpse, her mangled bloody corpse, but he couldn’t believe it was real. Sairché was dead. He was alone.
Lorcan landed before the jaws of the palace, running the moment he touched ground, forcing his way past throngs of greater devils into Glasya’s court room. The Princess of the Hells, Archduchess of Malbolge, Lord of the Sixth, Glasya lounged upon a silken couch, flanked by pit fiends and surrounded by the constant thrum of her hellwasp swarm. His stomach balked as he ran straight toward her—this was the only way to make certain he wasn’t eviscerated and the only way to be sure that Farideh didn’t perish at a demon’s hands, he told himself, shoving a horned devil out of the way.
“Highness!” Lorcan shouted, ignoring protocol, ignoring courtesy. Glasya sat straight, her black gaze the fathomless maw of a terrible beast. Lorcan threw himself to his knees before her, panting, knowing he had to wait for her notice. An eternity unfolded. Then two.
“What is it, Lorcan?” she finally asked.
“Highness, His Majesty is incarnate in Toril,” Lorcan said, trying to make his words come slowly, easily. Not the frantic screeching of a man fearing for his life and worse.
“What?” Glasya shouted. She stepped down from the couch, leaning closer. “Is this true?”
Lorcan nodded. “Fortuitously, his Chosen has discovered a way to save him from the betrayal of the Lord of Spells.” He looked up, hoping his careful words had made an impression on her. “He will remain a god.”
Glasya stared at him so long he felt his heart wither in his chest. “How fortunate,” she said.
“There is more,” Lorcan said.
“Oh really? Do tell.”
“The pradixikai. They have departed,” Lorcan said, hoping beyond hope that Glasya wouldn’t break his bones to splinters and pin him to the layer later. “As requested by His Majesty, to aid the god Enlil in his battle against his reborn son, who has allied with the traitor Graz’zt. I presumed that expediency in that request was more valuable to Your Highness than certainty, though you have my utmost apologies if I’ve erred.”
“Why would you think yourself in error?”
Lorcan wet his lips, urged himself to keep talking. This is how you protect her. “I would never doubt His Majesty or Lord Enlil,” Lorcan went on with careful, special emphasis, “but I would wager that the pradixikai are not quite enough to stand against the army of Gilgeam as it is.” He hesitated. “I’m sure they will take many of the Abyss with them when they fall.”
Glasya straightened. “Who else knows about this?”
“None of the lords know,” Lorcan said. “They are saying Lady Zariel is pursuing the Brimstone Angel, and Prince Levistus, an artifact that she seeks. The others have their attentions elsewhere.” He dared another glance up into her endless, ravenous eyes. “You know, though. And it’s a Malbolgean warlock who is the architect of His Majesty’s rescue.”
“And I can hardly let my dear father and sovereign fall to risk on the mortal plane,” she said. “What kind of daughter would I be not to aid him with all I have?” She smiled, and Lorcan shook with fear. “How good you brought this to me, Lorcan. Khartach?” One of the pit fiends stepped forward. “Gather your forces and join the pradixikai immediately. A purse to any who can bring me one of the Traitor’s generals alive.”
She smiled at Lorcan once more, as the pit fiend strode through the crowd of devils. “Well, Little Lorcan, what will you do now?”
“I am at Your Highness’s disposal,” he made himself say.
Glasya chuckled in a way that made his spine want to flee his body. She snapped her fingers and a hellwasp descended, carrying a ring of keys. From this, she selected one—pale and gleaming and small enough for her to close her hand around it. “Take this,” she said. “It will give you passage to the Fugue Plane.”
Lorcan took the key from her, dread unfolding in his chest. “What am I to do on the Fugue Plane?”
“Why, coax the warlock to Malbolge, of course,” Glasya said. “Mortals don’t take well to incarnations. I suspect I’ll get to meet this charming tiefling sooner than expected.”
• • •
WHEN THE BREATH of Petron had raised the stone wall, it left two gaps for gates—one on the road that led back to the sea, one on the track that led up into the mountains. Namshita raced toward the latter, where the Untherans were positioned.
The Vanquisher had named the Untherans “the Eighth Red Cohort,” which meant little to Namshita, except that the color red was auspicious, a color for warding off evil, and so those who looked to her were pleased. They’d taken up spears and bolas and swords, a handful who’d been hunters for the genasi, claiming bows up on the wall. They would be able to hold their own against this enemy that they’d only just fled.
She reached the gate as the beast on the other side began breaking through, the great stone doors cracking and shuddering a rain of dust. The wall here was deserted, the archers moved out of range of the goristros so they could focus on the succubi and vrocks coming over the wall.
Namshita found Amurri and Kirgal, who gave a sharp whistle, and the Untherans cheered that she’d come back to them. Beside them, a Vayemniri force under the banner for the Seventh Silver Cohort looked on. Namshita was pleased and surprised to see Uadjit directing them into formation.
“You’re here?” Namshita asked. “At the gate?”
“Where else would I be?” Uadjit replied. “I’m no archer.”
Namshita smiled. “Where are our giants?”
A stone the size of a child fell from the top of one door, crumbling as it hit the ground.
“With any luck,” Uadjit said, “on their way.”
“Do Vayemniri believe in luck?”
“Pardon the word, but I don’t karshoji know what we believe anymore,” Uadjit said crisply. “But I know we’ll take what we’re given in the way of benefits. Get ready!” she shouted. “Stand back from the ballista!”
“Draw!” another Vayemniri woman yelled, preparing the ballista.
All around them, swords left their sheathes, and soldiers crouched, the better for their comrades to aim past them with spears and javelins.
The door shattered, the first glimpse of the beasts coming clear.
“Remember your ancestors!” Uadjit shouted. “Remember their strength and their struggles! Remember the ones who come after us, who will sing of this day!”
Likely without us, Namshita thought grimly as the first goristro tore aside the remains of the door, letting sunlight pour past its shaggy frame. But there will be a future, she told herself.
Suddenly, the air before the ballista sizzled, vents opening in the very air. A creature stepped free—and another and another and another. Nine. Nine of them. Fiends, Namshita thought, ferocious-looking women with tangled horns and sharp hooves. The first of them shouted—a war cry to be certain, but in no tongue Namshita knew—and charged the goristro, sword first.
“Reinforcements?” Uadjit said, sounding puzzled.
“Luck,” Namshita told her, as the devilish warriors drove the demons back, away from the gate. “Forward!” she cried. “Let the Son of Victory see we are not his thralls and our home is no prize for him!”
• • •
DAHL’S HANDS SHOOK as he set all the components he needed in order, the book open at his feet. Already, there were demons climbing the winds high enough to reach them on the peak of Djerad Thymar. He needed to cast the shield—but once he did, he couldn’t break concentration or risk letting the spell slip. The body of Nanna-Sin lay at the center of the unfinished circle, all but bait for the circling demons. Ilstan stood alongside it, Dumuzi and Havilar at its head and feet, all prepared with the markings the spell demanded and the words Caisys had crafted. And Farideh wasn’t here yet.
Mehen slashed at a succubus that dipped too near. “Dahl, stop dawdling!”
Farideh came racing up the stairs from below, her cheeks flushed. “Sorry! I’m here!” she panted. “We have to start!”
“Obviously!” Havilar shouted. She and Farideh both looked to the empty space between them for a moment, as if listening. “Switch spots with me, Dumuzi,” Havilar said.
“Should you be listening to her?” Dumuzi asked, but he exchanged positions anyway.
Dahl started mixing the powdered bluefoots and the salts of mercury. Farideh darted over to him and held him tight a moment. “I’ll be right back,” she whispered.
“Promise,” he said, and kissed her cheek. He glanced at Tam, checked for the vial of crushed diamonds at his belt.
He finished the spell, dragging an iron ring through the mixture and whispering the words that made a rust-colored hemisphere shimmer into being over them. He held that image in his mind and began a prayer to Oghma to help keep his focus.
Farideh twisted the ring on her finger, retrieving the pale staff of Azuth from its hiding place. Ilstan took hold of it as though she were returning his child, cradling it close to his narrow chest. Brin stood ready with the powdered silver. Mehen and Mira kept their swords out, in case Dahl’s shield dropped. Tam lowered himself to his knees, as if in prayer.
Farideh looked over at Dahl. I love you, she mouthed, before touching the ruby rod of Asmodeus to the staff of Azuth and starting something that might save the world, or end it.