Heat tingled beneath the skin of her forearm, winding its tendrils over her muscles, crawling up and around her elbow. She imagined herself pulling away from this creature who wore the semblance of a man, yet she did not – could not – move. She was distantly aware of the drone of surrounding conversations, of the clatter of plates and tankards, but it was those stone-coloured eyes that seemed in that moment to contain all the world. And they held her, drew her close, even as her mind sought to deny them.

“I am a gift to you,” Aeglyss said. “Call it fate if you like, or fortune, but never imagine that nothing has changed. You needn’t fear men like Temegrin. Not now. He has been… exceeded. There is no strength – of arms, of will, of authority – that cannot be exceeded.”

“I never feared him,” murmured Wain. The sounds she made were so faint, more like breaths than words. The warmth was in her neck, blushing up, cupping her chin, reaching for her lips, her cheeks.

And then Aeglyss withdrew his hand from hers, and the warmth was gone. She fought a wave of dizziness. She could suddenly hear the babble of voices that filled the hall, feel the grain of the table top beneath her fingers. She brought her hands together, searching for the reassuring solidity of her rings. Aeglyss was looking over his shoulder now. Wain turned her head, and found Fiallic standing there.

“I thought we might have a quiet word,” the Inkallim said. He was ignoring Aeglyss. The na’kyrim turned back to the table.

“If you wish,” said Wain.

Fiallic gestured to the open door of the hall. “Will you walk with me? Just for a moment or two.”

Wain hesitated, and silently cursed herself for doing so. She hated uncertainty, despised those who allowed it to gain a foothold in their thoughts, yet found herself more and more afflicted by it. She rose and strode away from the table, away from Aeglyss. Fiallic walked at her side.

“You seem distracted,” the Inkallim said. “Does what you have found here in Anduran displease you?”

“I am fine,” Wain snapped.

“Very well.”

They threaded a path through the warriors scattered across the hall’s floor. Gyre spearmen shuffled aside to let them pass, but did so grudgingly. Wain was tempted to kick one of them, or tread on a tardy hand.

Fiallic ushered her out into the courtyard. It was quieter now than it had been before. A wagon loaded with sacks of horse feed was rumbling in through the castle gate.

“You saw that Temegrin mislikes the path that fate is following,” Fiallic said. He watched the wagon drawing to a halt. Men began to haul the sacks off.

“So much was obvious,” Wain said.

“You are aware that the High Thane would not even have sent his Third Captain if the Battle Inkall had not marched to your aid? He made no move until the commonfolk began to follow us across the Stone Vale.”

Wain had no intention of being drawn so easily into criticism of Ragnor oc Gyre. That a Banner-captain of the Battle should tread upon such ground was in itself worrying: it spoke of dangerous, unpredictable times.

“How many swords does Temegrin command?” she asked.

“A thousand and a half. Five hundred of them are Tarbains. Well-trained and disciplined, by the standards of Tarbains, but Tarbains nevertheless. It was we Inkallim, and the army of farmers and herdsmen and fishermen, that took Tanwrye, not the swords of Gyre.”

Wain grunted non-committally.

“My advice to you would be to have a care in your dealings with the Eagle,” Fiallic continued. “His master in Kan Dredar does not like this war. We do not know what orders Temegrin was given, but it is unlikely they were the same as those I received from the First of the Battle.”

“And they were?” asked Wain. She strove to sound only mildly interested. There was something unsettling about one of the ravens being so forthcoming. She had never known there to be anything other than unity of purpose between the Inkallim and the Gyre Blood; not in her lifetime, at least.

“To pursue this conflict as far, and as fiercely, as fate will allow. To make myself an ally of your Blood. To oppose any effort – from whatever quarter – to deny the full expression of whatever outcome fate has in mind for us.”

“And what outcome is it that you expect? What do the Children of the Hundred hope for?”

Fiallic smiled. The wagon, now empty, was being slowly wheeled around. The huge horse that drew it looked weary; its head was hanging low. Little birds were already dropping down from the battlements to scavenge feed that had leaked out from the sacks.

“I expect nothing,” Fiallic said. “I wait to be shown what the Black Road has in store for us. We have the beast by the tail now. It will either turn upon us, and consume us, or drag us in its wake to glory.”

“The beast?”

“War. There is no surer way to test fate.”

“No,” said Wain quietly.

“You should speak with Goedellin.”

Wain hung her head for a moment. Those strange, intense moments with Aeglyss had left her inexplicably tired. Her arms and shoulders felt slack, lifeless; her thoughts were sluggish.

“Be assured that the Children of the Hundred are your friends,” Fiallic said with measured precision. “The Horin-Gyre Blood has earned the gratitude of all in whom the faith burns brightly. If there are others whose gratitude is more… grudging, well, all the more reason to secure whatever bonds of friendship are offered. Goedellin represents the First of the Lore here. Whatever Temegrin may think, there is none more central to matters than Goedellin. There is none whose friendship could do more to secure your Blood’s position.”

“Very well. Very well.”

VI

Goedellin, Inner Servant of the Lore Inkall, was not a man whose appearance put those meeting him for the first time at their ease. What little hair remained on his head was white and wispy; the scalp that showed beneath it was a tapestry of blotches, moles and blemishes. His lips were dark grey, veined with streaks of black: the legacy of the seerstem that some of the Lore used. His back was bent into a hook, pulling his shoulders and head down and forwards. Wain towered over him. Walking alongside him through the yard of what had been Anduran’s gaol, she had to shorten her stride to little more than a shuffle to avoid leaving him behind. The Inkallim’s legs were crooked, swaying out at the knees. He leaned on a thick, twisted stick.

“It was the house of the gaoler, I am told,” Goedellin said as they drew near to the squat building.

“Yes,” Wain murmured. “I think it was.” She found Goedellin unsettling not so much in how he looked as in who he was. The Inner Servants of the Lore were its most senior and most respected members. Each one had spent years in the consideration of the creed, reflecting upon its meaning. They stood but a single step beneath the First himself in the hierarchy. For one such as Wain, wedded to the faith in heart and mind, Goedellin inspired a respectful, nervous awe that the bloodiest, most terrible of warriors could never have matched.

The door to the house opened as Goedellin stepped carefully up onto the threshold. A young Inkallim, perhaps a candidate for the Lore, ushered them inside. The interior was bare – looted, Wain suspected, when she and her brother had first overrun this city – but that austerity seemed fitting for the lodging of the Lore. The room Goedellin led her into still held a grand table – its surface now scarred, and notches cut into its edges – but the chairs clearly did not belong. They were simple, crude. Goedellin settled stiffly into one. He rested his walking stick against its arm, and indicated that Wain should sit opposite him.

“Fiallic advises me that I should not detain you for too long,” the old man said. The tilt of his head made it hard to see his lips or eyes. Wain found herself staring at his scalp. “He tells me you will be eager to leave this place, and return to Glasbridge.”