* * *

  “It's okay,” said Roskvir. “They can’t hurt you anymore... you’re safe.” He swallowed a shaky breath, still himself on the verge of breaking.

  But his words did nothing to slow Aurelia’s tears, as they rode off into the night, and she watched the burning village grow smaller in the distance behind them.

  She already knew she was safe, by then. In Roskvir’s arms, atop the back of He-Who-Tends-Gardens, that much was a foregone conclusion.

  It was the others for whom she wept.

  The image of Lambros’ body incinerating had been seared into her mind’s eye. She couldn’t stop remembering the way his flesh had simply evaporated, beneath Roskvir’s fury. So little of anything that had once been him had remained, once the flames had ceased.

  Nor could she forget Rhea’s scream. How short it had lasted, and yet, the immensity of terror it had managed to package into that final instant.

  Not that she blamed Roskvir for his violence. Of course she didn’t. He’d been protecting her.

  But she didn’t blame the other two, either. Despite Aurelia's own fright during that moment, her perfect recall never lapsed. And so she could remember that Rhea had been crying, too, as she’d readied the knife. Someone or something had compelled those two to try to hurt her, against their will, for some reason. They hadn’t wanted to.

  Aurelia blamed herself, instead.

  If only she could’ve attuned to her vis, by then… if only she wasn’t so weak, and foolish.

  If only she’d had the power to defend herself, to fend off her assailants before Roskvir had been forced to kill them.

  But she hadn’t. And so she couldn’t help but think that they’d died because of her.

  “Roskvir…” Aurelia murmured through her tears. “Why were they trying to hurt me? What did they want?”

  “They wanted to blind you, to make you an oracle-child…” said Roskvir.

  “An oracle-child?”

  “I don’t know much about it, but… I think that’s what they were trying to do. That was why… that was why we had to leave my old master’s warship. Back aboard the Tanngnjostr, I… I saw…”

  But Roskvir choked back his next words. With his eyes clenched shut, he simply shook his head, unable to finish.

  “At least…” he mumbled. “...At least they really did have some food for us… in the cellar, there…”

  * * *

  “It’s just… we’re so fucking close, I can taste it,” said Kera.

  They’d found the prisoner-of-war camp right where Bronnr had said they would, abutting the rocky persimmon foothills right outside Nouklon. But after encamping in the shallow caves of the nearby scrubland about a week ago, they’d been only able to watch across that final stretch of grassland, impotent, as airships delivered new battalions of captured Setetic soldiers every few days.

  “In a literal, geographical sense?” said Lycera. “Sure, we're close. It's a fifteen-minute ride, with the birds at a full sprint… across open savanna. Toward a camp that looks larger and more heavily defended than most fortresses emplaced around strategic strongpoints we’ve seen constructed by the Albians, so far.”

  “Of course we can’t try a frontal assault. But there has to be a way we can make something work." Kera wrapped knuckles against her temple as she studied the distant fortress-camp, as if hoping to shake loose some new idea. "There has to be. Yes, I get it, it's filthy with Albians. But like I’ve said before, it has something else those other forts don’t: tons of our own soldiers already inside. If we could get them rifles, or even just sabers, somehow… to say nothing of the ones with vis…”

  “I’m sorry, Iumatar. I know your long-shot plans have worked for us before. And I know it's painful, seeing it so close like this… but if what we heard this morning is even halfway true, then there’s just no two ways about it. Our time is up.”

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  For that whole last week, Kera and Lycera had been tearing their hair out trying to find any sort of angle to approach staging a break-out. But that morning, the scout-infiltrators their company had sent disguised into Nouklon proper had reported back the news Kera had always dreaded most:

  Rumors were spreading among the civilians even that far north, that the Albian army had crossed the river Set.

  If so, they’d breached one of the strongest natural fortifications protecting the remainder of Setet's inner strategic depth. And they'd punched through the best Setetic regiments formed of career soldiers with years of experience, battle-hardened in the phraintlands — not just fodder composed chiefly of conscripts thrown against their spearhead to buy time, as they’d mostly faced until then.

  “Sometimes, when you’re playing cards,” Kera said, “being down means you have to fold. Cut your losses. But sometimes it means you have to go all in. That’s where we are, now, if the Albians are across the Set. We need to try something.”

  “No, Iumatar. It's definitely… bad, if the rumors are true. But our forces still have plenty of space to retreat. There’s still time. And we probably still have a good shot of making it back to Capria in one piece ourselves, and informing Tanhkmet we can verify his best officers are likely imprisoned at Nouklon… but only if we start heading back now. That's what we 'need' to do, if this is what we're facing. What would 'going all-in' even look like, for us, here, Iumatar? Tell me, what’s one theoretical way we even might go about cracking this problem? If our plan is to arm the prisoners in order to stage a revolt, where are we going to source those arms, isolated behind enemy lines out here? How do we smuggle them in? How do we stockpile them inside the camp for long enough while avoiding detection? Paint me a picture… take some liberties, even, if you want, within reason. Please. Go ahead.”

  For an instant, incandescent fury left Kera blind.

  A single spark of blue and white flit down to the brown savanna grass at their feet from an unseen crown.

  Didn’t Lycera understand the desperation of Setet’s military situation? Didn’t she understand their comrades — their friends — were suffering right there, literally within view? Didn’t she even care about them at all?

  In that flare of rage, for an instant, Kera could think only of how much easier things would be if only she was the commanding officer of that expedition, instead. If only she was giving the final orders, and wasn’t confounded by that frustrating obstacle standing next to her.

  It was just the two of them at that elevated lookout, after all, she thought. The rest of their camp was around a few rocky bends, a few hundred yards away…

  But Kera blinked, returning to reality. The silent spark vanished over the dry earth.

  That was insane. That had been an insane thing to think. What was she thinking?

  She'd no reason to be that frustrated. Lycera was just doing her duty advocating for the course she thought best, even if Kera disagreed with her conclusions. They’d even grown close, during those last few months — more than just a capable superior officer commanding her respect, Lycera had become almost like an older sister to Kera over the course of their expedition.

  Gods above, what the fuck is wrong with me?

  “I… I don’t know yet,” Kera admitted, shaking her head as if to clear it, as at last she tried to answer Lycera’s question. “...But I think... Bronnr still has more to tell us. That’s how we get our shot, I think... he has to know some thread we can start pulling, to open a bigger seam in their security… I’m still working him with my vis every night—”

  “I know,” Lycera cut in. “The whole camp can hear him moaning in pain while we’re trying to fall asleep. Torture will only go so far, Iumatar… eventually he’ll just start saying whatever it is he thinks will make you stop, whether its true or not. He might not even know difference himself anymore, if the shocks from your vis have already fried his brain.”

  Kera bit her lip, grimacing. She hated to admit it, but Lycera probably had a point about that.

  But even still… the camp was right there.

  It almost felt as though it was taunting her, sitting on the horizon, so nearly within reach. It just didn't seem impossible they could’ve gotten so close, while still being so far. If only Bronnr could name some insider they might bribe... or anything to at least attempt investigating further, before turning back…

  Grunts of effort and the shifting of loose rocks heralded the approach of a patrol officer from their troop. After climbing the last few feet to the lookout, she saluted Lycera, then Kera in turn.

  “Bad news from the camp,” she reported. “Thought you two would wanna know right away. The Albian captive... looks like he’s dead. Heart gave out, or something. The medic was trying her best before I left, but he seemed pretty gone. She said he probably ‘fibrillated’ too much during the last few days, whatever that means.”

  Kera felt as though something had wrenched her own heart out of place.

  I did that.

  “Look, Iumatar,” said Lycera, turning back. “How’s this... when we get back to Tanhkmet, and tell him where we’ve found the prisoner camp... I’ll be first in line advocating for a second expedition behind enemy lines. To set out right away, as soon as it can leave, equipped to actually stage a break-out. Or, I’ll be telling him to drum up the funds for bribes, or gather more intel, or do whatever it is you think will be the best way to go about getting our friends back. I won’t let up until it's his number one priority. Because one way or another, we’ll be back for them. I swear."

  Lycera set a reassuring hand on her shoulder, in spite of everything.

  "...But right now," she said, "I’m the commanding officer here. And I’m making an executive decision. We’re going back to Capria.”