“I will not return to that life.” I have waged enough war. Brought enough pain into existence. For all that I long for in the world of the living, war is one thing I will never miss. “Besides, if I fight for the Tribespeople or the Scholars, I will only end up killing Martials. Either way, the Nightbringer wins. I will not do it.”

We have reached the escarpment, and here Talis stops. “And that is why it must be you,” he says. “A commander who has tasted the bitter fruit of war is the only one worthy of waging it. For he understands the cost. Now—to my question.”

“No more questions,” I say. “For I have none for you. I will not tell you what the Augur said. Do not bother asking.”

“Ah.” Talis observes my face, and I feel like he’s seeing more than I want him to. “That alone gives me the answer I seek. Will you fight, Soul Catcher?”

“I do not know,” I say. “But since you asked a question, I find I have one more, after all. Why let me live? You got nothing out of this conversation.”

Talis glances up at the escarpment, at the exposed, blackened roots of the jinn grove. “I love the Meherya,” he says. “He is our king, our guide, our savior. Without him, I would still be locked away in that damnable grove, leeched on by the Augurs.” He shudders. “But I fear for the Meherya. And I fear for my kin. I fear that which he calls forth from the Sea. Suffering cannot be tamed, Soul Catcher. It is a wild and hungry thing. Perhaps Mauth protects us against it for a reason.”

The clouds above shift, and the sun peeks through for a moment. Talis lifts his face to the light. “We were creatures of the sun once,” he says. “Long ago.”

The hollows of his cheeks, the angle of his chin are strangely familiar. “I know you.” I remember then, where I saw him. “I saw you with Shaeva, in the palace walls—in the images there. You were the other guard to the Nightbringer—to his family.”

Talis inclines his head. “Shaeva was a friend for long years,” he says. “I mourn her still. There must be some good in you if she saw fit to name you a Soul Catcher.”

After he leaves, I go to the clearing outside my cabin. The soft grass is nothing but snow-dusted yellow scrub now. Shaeva’s summer garden is a squarish lump beneath a fresh layer of powder. The cabin is dim, though as ever, I left a few embers burning in the hearth.

All is silent, and the silence is obscene, for this forest is the one place where ghosts are meant to find succor. And now they cannot. Because the Nightbringer is taking them all.

Inside the cabin, I do not light the lamp. Instead I stand before the two scims gathering dust above the fireplace. They gleam dully, their beauty an affront when one considers what they were created for.

I think of the Augur, that odious, cawing wretch. Not just of his foretelling, which made no sense, but the last two words he spoke. Words that stirred my blood, that made the battle rage rise in me. My vow to Mauth rings in my mind, clear as a bell.

To rule the Waiting Place is to light the way for the weak, the weary, the fallen, and the forgotten in the darkness that follows death. You will be bound to me until another is worthy enough to release you. To leave is to forsake your duty—and I will punish you for it. Do you submit?

I submit.

No one has released me. I am still bound. And I do not know the fate of the ghosts the Nightbringer has already abducted. Whether I wish to fight his forces or not, I cannot let him steal away any more.

I reach for the scims gingerly, as if they will burn my palms when I touch them. Instead, they slip into my grasp like they have been waiting for me.

Then I leave the cabin and turn south to the Tribes, and the Nightbringer and war.

XXXII: The Blood Shrike

From the knolls and ravines of the Argent Hills, Antium is cloaked from view, hidden by thick fingers of evening mist rolling down the Nevennes Range. Its towers and ramparts disappear and reappear, a city of ghosts.

No. A city of living, breathing Martials and Scholars, waiting for you to lead the charge.

I used to love nights like this in the capital. My work would be done, Marcus would retreat to his quarters, and I’d walk the city, sometimes stopping at the stall of a Tribeswoman who brewed sweet pink tea sprinkled with almonds and pistachios. Mariam Ara-Ahdieh left Antium long before the Karkauns came. I wonder where she is now.

“Good weather for a battle.” Spiro Teluman hunkers down beside me, a scim hilt poking up over his shoulder. The smith’s legendary skills and long disappearance give him an enigmatic aura. The men around me, including Pater Mettias, eye him with a wary sort of awe.

Despite my gloves, my hands are numb. In the snow-choked dell behind me, five hundred of my men hunch in their cloaks, their breath rising in white puffs.

“Sword-breaking weather, Teluman,” I say. “I don’t like it.”

“The scims are Serric steel.” Teluman’s tattoos are hidden by the dark, form-fitting armor he forged. In the gloom he is nearly impossible to see. “They won’t break. How’s the armor?”

“Strange.” It fits like a glove, makes me difficult to see, and is so light that I might as well be wearing fatigues. But it’s strong—Harper and I tested it for hours before donning it.

Still, other than Mettias, the Martials refused to wear it. Witchery, they said. Teluman argued over it. But I wasn’t willing to issue a command that wouldn’t be followed.

“Shrike.” Harper appears on my right. My heart thuds a bit faster, traitor that it is. This is the first time he has spoken directly to me in days. “Something is off,” he says. “There aren’t enough guards on the walls. The streets are empty—the squares are empty. This doesn’t feel right.”

It is the last thing I want to hear. The people of Antium await aid. They await the weapons and soldiers that will allow them to cast out the Karkauns.

“Where the bleeding hells is Musa?”

“Here.” The tall Scholar, also clad in Teluman’s armor, materializes from the darkness like a wraith. “The wights say the Karkauns have gathered near a big, bloody rock close to the main palace. They’ve turned it into an altar. They’re shouting, screaming, murdering people—that sort of thing. And they’re leading prisoners there. Mostly Martials. Some Scholars too.”

He must speak of Cardium Rock. “Women?” My fist clenches on the scim at my waist. “Children?”

Musa shakes his head. “Men. Boys. Captured soldiers. Those who didn’t fight or couldn’t. There are thousands of them.”

“Our spies said the men were killed—”

“Does Antium have an extensive system of dungeons?” Musa says, and at my silence, he nods. “They weren’t killed, then,” he says. “They were hidden. Saved for . . . whatever the hells this is.”