"Madame! Madame, what can I do?"

  Mirk slid to a halt at his godmother's side, dropping to his knees and letting Jean-Luc's staff clatter to the floor so that he could grasp both her hands in his. She was painfully, deathly cold, trembling. On instinct, Mirk reached out to the well of life-giving potential within him, drawing it up into his hands to press it into hers.

  "No!" Madame Beaumont snapped, her head jerking up. At least nothing nightmarish had happened to her features. She looked exhausted, but her face still had flesh on it and her eyes were focused, as cutting as her voice.

  "But madame, your magic—"

  "Has nothing to do with it, my boy. I don't need healing. I'm past that. Though I will accept a hand up, I suppose."

  A wave of guilt rolled over Mirk as he looked across the emptying ballroom toward where Seigneur d'Aumont had disappeared. "I should have stepped in. I should have stopped him, we'll never—"

  Madame Beaumont cut him off again. "You wouldn't have been able to do anything to him. But we've dealt him enough of a blow as it is. People will talk."

  They would, Mirk knew. Someone other than him must have seen his godmother confront Seigneur d'Aumont and pry Er-Izat's soul from him. And a mob of fighters from the Seventh and Fatima's ladies were trooping out of the kitchens after the fleeing high-born mages, to make sure that none of the ones who held the soul of a djinn who wished to be freed left without handing it over. Mirk didn't know yet whether all the djinn Seigneur d'Aumont sold came with their souls in a bottle from his relations' winery, but he suspected those who'd had their djinn taken from them would talk, would compare notes and complaints.

  And then there were the djinn themselves. They had drifted away from the wall, venturing into the center of the ballroom to meet with Am-Gulat. Even in their excitement, they were prudent: they kept their distance from Am-Gulat's unsettled magic and the war hammer he'd summoned, the crowd pushing Er-Izat to the front. Mirk didn't know if it was simply because Er-Izat was bigger than the rest of them, or because of what kinship line he was from. The Er-Djinn, the strongest fighters on their home realm. Er-Izat seemed too transfixed by the change that'd overcome Am-Gulat to care that he was being offered up in sacrifice, should Am-Gulat's magic escape his control.

  Though perhaps they would have elected Am-Hazek, had he not decided to step away from his kinsmen to come to Madame Beaumont’s aid. The satisfaction that'd been plain to see on his face minutes ago was gone, replaced by a pained sort of guilt that matched the feeling burning in Mirk's stomach, though Am-Hazek had composed himself enough to hide most of his emotions from Mirk's empathy.

  Am-Hazek crouched down in front of Madame Beaumont, offering out both his hands. "We all owe you our gratitude, madame. Without Monsieur Er-Izat and what he knows, I'm certain we would be lost."

  "I highly doubt that, monsieur. And now is not the time for you to turn into a flatterer. Having one in the house is plenty enough," she added, a half-hearted attempt at a joke that fell flat when she was struck by a sudden coughing fit that left her curled over on the floor, her towering hat sliding off her head. Underneath it, her hair, which had only been touched near her temples with gray before, had gone stark white.

  Mirk and Am-Hazek exchanged a worried look. "Please, Madame," Mirk begged, as he helped her sit back up. "I know I can't heal you, not fully. But at least let me make things easier for you."

  "I will not leave you in this condition, madame," Am-Hazek insisted, as he tried once more to offer her his hands.

  "You must leave. Both of you. Consider that my final order to you, Monsieur Am-Hazek," Madame Beaumont said, firmly, picking up her hat and setting it back atop her head. That time she tied a pair of its multitude of ribbons tight underneath her chin to keep it in place.

  Am-Hazek's face paled. "What?"

  "I am not ignorant to the activities of my servants, monsieur. You had every intention of leaving even before all this nonsense. Your books are gone. And so is that Molière play from my library that you took a liking to, for whatever God-forsaken reason."

  "I hadn't planned on..." Am-Hazek trailed off, staring down at Madame Beaumont’s thin, shaking hands. Mirk recognized the distraught expression on his face. It was the same one that came over his father and all his men when confronted with the fragility of humans, the ephemeral span of their time among the living. But it lacked his father's fierceness. Am-Hazek knew there was nothing that could be done to help Madame Beaumont, not really. There was nothing left but for time to take its toll.

  "Don't be daft," Madame Beaumont said with a snort, stubbornly refusing both their aid in rising back to her feet. "It's long since been my time. And I take great satisfaction in the fact that I was able to insult Herbert d'Aumont before I went."

  "What do you intend to do?" Am-Hazek asked her.

  "You should really go up to bed..." Mirk suggested, wondering if she'd even be able to make it up the stairs unassisted.

  "Nonsense. My house is in shambles and your guests are all bound to riot in the front garden when those brutes you replaced my staff with come out demanding they hand over their djinn. A stern hand is required. And, though I mean him no offense, your uncle is not suited to the task in the slightest, Mirk. That was always Isabelle's work, God bless her. Silly that a man who's devoted himself to banging out swords can't look some second-rate guild mage in the eye."

  The reminder of his duties as host made his stomach twist up again. Mirk surveyed those left in the ballroom — no one but Ravensdale's officers, who one of Fatima's ladies had ordered onto their knees, other K'maneda disguised as servants, and djinn. Even the quartet had made a run for it with their instruments. From out in the foyer, Mirk could hear Henri pleading with someone, though it was hard to make out his words over the crosstalk and Yvette's insistence that she thought guild mages weren't supposed to be so spineless as to go running at the first flash of combat magic.

  "You don't need to worry about it, madame," Mirk said, reflexively sweeping into a bow, to make it clear to her how contrite he felt. "I'll take care of it before I leave."

  "I don't think you have time for it," Madame Beaumont said, as she made sure her hat was standing proudly upright, trying and failing to pull herself into a similar position. "I believe your disagreeable friends are waiting. For both of you."

  Genesis was surveying the officers who'd been loyal to Ravensdale, debating with K'aekniv what to do with them. Though his attention was divided, partially by Am-Gulat staring befuddled at the war hammer in his hand, and partially by him. It was probably a good thing that the commander had too many things clamoring for his attention. If he'd been able to focus the entirety of his frustration on the officers, Mirk knew there was nothing K'aekniv could say to him that would convince Genesis that they shouldn't be dealt with on the spot. In a terminal fashion.

  "If you're determined to do this, madame, at least let me lend you some strength. It's the least I can do," Am-Hazek said.

  Mirk nodded his agreement. "I can't heal you, madame, but I can give you a little potential, at least."

  Madame Beaumont debated their offer, weighing it against the continued yelling out in her foyer. No one had resorted to magic, not yet. But if the French and English were left to their own devices to sort things out, surely there was at least one hothead in the crowd who would switch from throwing insults to throwing spells. "I suppose that is a sensible enough request. But no more than is strictly necessary, the both of you. I'm done with all of this, once this is sorted out," she added low under her breath as she grudgingly held out her hands.

  Exchanging another worried look, Mirk and Am-Hazek took one hand each. The act of passing along his life-giving potential was as easy as breathing to Mirk now, after over a year of practice. But holding back, not giving until the life inside himself was depleted and his patient was restored, wasn't easy. Especially considering who it was he was healing.

  For a moment, Mirk thought of Jean-Luc's staff on the floor. And then he thought better of it. The cost of restoring life to a woman Madame Beaumont's age, whose exasperation with staying among the living was clear to Mirk, would undoubtedly be higher than he could bear alone.

  Am-Hazek had a harder time of things. He wasn't a healer, and Madame Beaumont wasn't a djinn, someone whose magic and body was flexible, a shifting constellation of many elements. And Am-Hazek was more upset than he appeared. Mirk could feel it in him as he pushed some of his potential into his godmother. A deep sense of duty betrayed, mixed with a pity so sharp Mirk wondered if Madame Beaumont would be able to feel it along with his magic, even though she didn't possess a shred of the empathic gift.

  Something must have given Am-Hazek away regardless. Madame Beaumont let go of both their hands before either of them was satisfied, turning up her nose with a private smirk. A gesture of the defiance she so often forced herself to mask. "You pity me, monsieur? Why?" she asked Am-Hazek.

  "It...I only wish I could do more, madame," Am-Hazek insisted, with a deferential half-bow.

  "You are no longer my servant, Monsieur Am-Hazek. I release you. Though, really, you've always done whatever you wanted for as long as I've known you. You're only very good at acting your part when people are watching."

  A small, tired laugh crossed Am-Hazek's lips. "As are you, madame."

  "Be careful," Mirk said to her, as she gathered her skirts and headed off toward the ballroom doors and the foyer beyond. "Get Henri to take you upstairs as soon as everyone else is gone. And I'll be back to help as soon as..."

  Mirk trailed off as his godmother waved a dismissive hand at him, not waiting to hear the last of his promises. She was much steadier on her feet now, no longer so trembling and hunched. But the hair beneath her hat, some of which had fallen out of its chignon, was still stark white.

  He supposed she had the right of things, not listening to his excuses. He didn't know when he'd be back, if it'd take hours or days to see everything through. Fatima and Genesis and all the rest had hammered out all kinds of contingencies and plans at the bordello's back table. But nothing was set in stone. Everything depended on where Ravensdale had gone. And what he had planned to try to escape the war hammer clenched in Am-Gulat's hands.

  "You'll be coming with us, Monsieur...euh...should I use that other name now? Hazek Par?" Mirk asked Am-Hazek, to try to draw him back to the present. He was still staring after his godmother's retreating form, lost in thought.

  "No, Am-Hazek is preferable, seigneur. That other name is best kept private. I believe Monsieur Am-Gulat was just caught up in the heat of the moment."

  Across the room, still up on the one real platform that had been hidden among the vanished illusions, Alice gave up on trying to get the failed teleportation spell scrawled on the wall to engage. Throwing up her hands in disgust, she went to the edge of the platform, calling down to K'aekniv. "Niv! Get over here! We need to leave!"

  K'aekniv extricated himself from his argument with Genesis, going to the platform and holding up his arms. He was tall enough for his outstretched palms to reach the very edge of it. Trying to keep as much of her dignity about herself as she did so, wrapping her skirts tight about her legs, Alice sat down on the edge of the platform and shoved herself off of it, into K'aekniv's waiting arms.

  The half-angel grinned at her as he swept her down onto her feet. "Alice! What a shot! We should take you for the infantry for sure."

  Alice didn't seem to hear him. She was preoccupied with the crossbow she still had in hand, counting the bolts she had left. "I know where Jackson went," she said, to no one in particular. She seemed to relish saying the man's real name aloud, just as Genesis had, though the relief granted by it was short-lived.

  K'aekniv's wings puffed up in surprise. "Huh?"

  "Where?" Genesis demanded from across the ballroom.

  "I know where Casyn is headed, anyway. He recognized me. He'll be taking everyone off to Fatima's for sure. We need to get going."

  "Recognized you?" Mirk asked, as he led Am-Hazek over to join the conversation.

  "He's..." a look of anguish crossed Alice's face and her grip on the crossbow tightened. "He's a right bastard, that's what he is. And I want to get a second shot at him. But he'll be at Fatima's for sure. Good thing we were ready for that."

  "Percival is with them," Mirk said, his mind whirring with possibilities. He had an inkling of what Alice had left unsaid, but refused to linger on it. Now wasn't the time. Not if Ravensdale had gone to Fatima's. "Samael and Sharael. Percival wants them. If he can take their magic..."

  Not to mention the spell that Ambras had shoved at him from behind Yule's back at the tavern. Mirk still had no idea what it did. But if it'd had Imanael's name on it, that of the angel who held the binding spells on Genesis's arms, it couldn't be anything good.

  "Then let's go," Niv said, knocking Genesis in the shoulder. "Leave these pieces of shit for later. We'll keep Olezhka and Orest on them and the rest of us will go get Jackson."

  Genesis hesitated, his gaze flicking between the surrendered officers, Am-Gulat, and Alice. It settled on Am-Gulat and he crossed the gap between them, approaching with caution. With every step Genesis took toward Am-Gulat, the threads of darkness within Am-Gulat's magic thickened, leaning toward Genesis. Like calling to like, Mirk supposed.

  "Ravesndale...Jackson...is yours. What is done with him...is yours to choose."

  Am-Gulat looked up and met Genesis's eyes, unafraid of him. Unlike the other djinn, and very much unlike the K'maneda officers huddled on the floor. "I need to free the rest of them. He still has their souls. And their collars haven't been broken." His gaze shifted to Richard, who had tried to hide himself in amongst the other officers on the floor, to try to divert attention away from himself. "Him. I'm taking him with me. He knows where everything is."

  K'aekniv waded into the cluster of officers, giving Richard a kick in the leg to grab his attention. None too gentle, but not vicious either. "Up. What's your real name, huh? Since everyone is saying them now."

  "Euh...er...Hervé, sir. I mean, comrade." he said, going bright red as he fussed with the voluminous mage robes he'd elected to wear that night instead of a uniform or a suit coat and breeches.

  "Maybe don't kill him," K'aekniv said to Am-Gulat, as he took Hervé by the arm and marched him over toward the djinn. Hervé did very little walking, his face gone white in terror upon being confronted by the djinn he'd helped enslave. "I promised someone that he'd come out of it alive."

  "Why?" Am-Gulat asked, frowning.

  K'aekniv shrugged. "Because I'm an idiot. And he's a coward. You know, too scared to say no to anyone who wants him to do something bad. Anyway, if something happens, something happens. I'll deal with the shit. But it'd be nice if you waited until the end."

  "It is your choice," Genesis insisted, ignoring K'aekniv's words. "If he has earned death through his actions...then so be it."

  "I suppose you already got Paul." K'aekniv stepped forward to examine the charred body on the ground a distance away from the djinn and the dejected K'maneda officers, giving it a much less gentle kick to check to see if Paul was still holding on. Mirk could have told him that Paul was no longer among the living. Considering the extent of his burns, if he'd still been alive, the pain would have been too much for Mirk to endure. As it stood, Mirk was appalled at himself, at how far he'd drifted from what he once had been. The smell of charred flesh was so familiar to him now from the infirmary that he'd forgotten all about what had happened to Paul until K'aekniv drew their attention to his body.

  Hervé didn't say anything. Only swallowed hard and crossed himself, mumbling words that were as familiar to Mirk as that smell of charred flesh under his breath. A prayer for pity, for forgiveness.

  "Will that woman be able to take their souls back?" Am-Gulat asked, turning his attention to Mirk. "The one with the hat. You are kin."

  Mirk nodded. "I promise she will."

  "I have assisted madame for many decades," Am-Hazek said. "When she sets her mind to something, it is done."

  Am-Gulat shot Am-Hazek a strange look, but decided not to comment. "Then it is done."

  Cautiously, Am-Gulat hefted the war hammer in his hand. The gem that contained his soul had been absorbed into its handle, near where it connected to its massive head, flat on one end and pointed on the other. Am-Gulat flipped it around to its pointed end, for greater precision, eyeing up the collar around the throat of the djinn nearest him.

  "You do not...need to be concerned with exact application of force," Genesis said, unprompted. "It is an extension of yourself. It will...break what you desire to be broken. As you are in full control of your potential. Now that your own bindings are gone."

  Am-Gulat turned and looked at the commander, just for a second. As if wanting to understand more. But he dismissed him with a nod and turned instead to the task at hand.

  It took little more than a tap from the war hammer to do away with each of the collars, to make them fall away into black dust that streaked down the djinn's fine uniforms. Except for Er-Izat's. Although Er-Izat met Am-Gulat's eyes when he struck him with the hammer, throat bared to offer him a better target to aim at, it still took five swings of the hammer, each one harder than the last, for Er-Izat's collar to break. And even then, it didn't crumble to dust like the other djinn's did. It only broke in two, the pieces falling to the floor with a dull thud. Er-Izat nodded his thanks and stared down at the broken halves, rubbing his neck, as if contemplating whether it'd be better for him to pick them up and pocket them or leave them behind.

  "It is done," Am-Gulat said to them, with a rightward wave of his war hammer. "You are free. Do what you will. Go help take back your souls, confront the ones who kept you. Or wait here. And once that's done, you can go where you will, or you can help me free the rest of our kin. And kill the worm who did this," he finished, gesturing to the blisters still angry and red around his own neck.

  Am-Hazek stepped forward first. "I'll go with you. Now that you have been freed, the City won't disturb my magic."

  For some reason Mirk couldn't pinpoint, Am-Gulat seemed wary of Am-Hazek. But Am-Gulat brushed his worry aside with a firm shake of his head, turning his gaze, still burning with his shifting magic, toward Er-Izat. "Will you come with me, Er-Djinn?"

  "They have my kin," Er-Izat said softly, his voice tinged with reluctance even as he stepped forward. "You won't stop with your master, will you? You're going back to the home realm."

  Am-Gulat lifted his chin once more, defiant. "The hierarchy must burn. Everywhere it reaches."

  Er-Izat flinched, his hands jammed in his pockets now that he no longer had a master to scold him for being improper. But he still didn't back away. "The Ra-Djinn have my kin. They said I had to protect Seigneur d'Aumont. Or else..."

  "No more threats. No more cowardice," Am-Gulat hissed, his war hammer gripped tightly in his right hand. "No more being pushed around. Am-Djinn or Er-Djinn or Ta-Djinn, no matter what kinship we once had, we're now together. Against them."

  Am-Hazek smiled at Am-Gulat, though Mirk thought he could detect a tired edge to it, something that wasn't shared by the cautiously hopeful looks of the other djinn. "I would recommend having some caution yet...but I sense that would fall on deaf ears. For the time being."

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  "You've been saying things like that for decades," Am-Gulat grumbled. "Doing whatever you want while telling the rest of us to be quiet and do as we're told."

  Am-Hazek shrugged. "Not the time. But I'll admit I've been mistaken in the past. In any case, we must go to the City. I assume there is a teleporting mage...?"

  K'aekniv scanned the ballroom, shaking his head. "Mordka followed Jackson. Never came back. Some shit must really be happening."

  "We need to go," Alice insisted, checking her crossbow. "To Fatima's first."

  "I'm going with too," Catherine said, stepping up beside Alice and taking her arm. She had her wand drawn and clasped in her other hand. "I know father best."

  Orest nodded, putting a hand on Catherine's shoulder. It made Catherine's expression a bit less pinched, dimmed the anger hidden in it that was so often plain to be seen on the faces of her sister and mother. "If she goes, I go too."

  K'aekniv sighed, but waved his assent, knowing better than to get between a lovestruck man and the focus of his heart's intentions. "If these bastards get one over on Olezhka, you get to go hunt them down."

  All eyes — most of them wary, others resigned — then turned toward Genesis. The commander sighed, lifting his hand, but not yet calling to his magic. "Technically...you should also be capable of this," he said to Am-Gulat. "But it is better...not to attempt it until your potential has settled. In any case. It would be best...if you all came closer. As the presence of two Destroyers close together in the Abyss will cause certain...disturbances in the passage."

  K'aekniv was first to move, unabashedly going to Genesis's side and putting an arm around his shoulders. At least until Genesis shoved him off with a few clever twists of his arms and magic, and K'aekniv resigned himself to keeping a hold on the back of his uniform coat instead with one hand, and a firm grip on Hervé’s arm with the other. Mirk took Genesis's left arm, and Alice took the other, Catherine and Orest moving with her. Am-Hazek decided to take Mirk's free arm rather than touching Genesis, the memory of what being manhandled by the commander's chaotic magic still fresh in his mind. Er-Izat felt the same, apparently. He settled for taking hold of K'aekniv's rightmost wing instead.

  Am-Gulat wasn’t so reluctant. He stood face to face with Genesis, war hammer still gripped tight in his right hand, putting his left on Genesis's shoulder in a particular way, gripping his thin frame tight with thumb and forefinger and leaving the other three fingers loose. A djinn gesture that had some meaning to it that was lost on the rest of them, Mirk assumed.

  To Genesis's credit, he managed not to reflexively pull away from Am-Gulat. Though touching Genesis did make the darkness threaded through Am-Gulat's unconstrained haze of magic rise again. "Show me how, k'amskec. So that I can go on my own."

  Genesis said nothing. But an instant later, darkness swam over Mirk's vision like it had countless times before. Usually, he found relief in it. A brief moment of solace, cold and disconnected from the Earth but also alone in his mind without needing to lean hard on his shields or drink down bottle after bottle of pain blockers or liquor. That time, it was different. He could still feel the emotions of the others, their fear and worry, surprise and anger. And beneath it, sparks of a familiar pain that made a wave of his own worry rise up sharp along the length of his spine.

  Then the darkness cleared and they were plunged into an even greater chaos.

  Alice had been right. Casyn had taken Ravensdale and Percival to Fatima's. The bodies on the floor and the smoke in the air was proof enough of that.

  Genesis pulled them all back into existence in the bordello's front room rather than the back room where they usually met. A pair of ladies were at the barred front door, shouting at one another about whether or not they should send a group into the City or stay where they were to guard the others. All the people Genesis had torn through the Abyss were reeling, unaccustomed to the shadows. Mirk and K'aekniv were the first to recover, being the most accustomed to it.

  K'aekniv went right for the ladies at the door, drawing his right-hand sword, the one that spat fire and order in preparation. "Where'd they go?"

  "Out," one of the ladies said, the hand that'd gone to her own sword relaxing once she identified the new mob of intruders. "To the City, probably. They got Rachel and Bori. Some others too, they fucked around a bit in the back first. Then they took those two kids and made a run for it."

  "Ella!" Alice shrieked, bolting for the back room. Mirk was fast on her heels, his eyes watering at the pain radiating from the back of the bordello.

  He didn't make it all the way to the back room. He froze in the hallway before the door to the room Samael and Sharael had been locked in. The man and woman who'd been standing guard before it a few hours ago had both been cut down. Yule and Danu were on their knees beside the woman, who was whimpering at the pain in her legs, both of them reduced to heaps of mangled flesh by some kind of magic. There was nothing to be done for the man. From the size of the pool of blood beneath him and the absence of pain, Mirk knew he'd already passed.

  Mirk went to the other members of his team, already pushing up the sleeves of his justacorps after he tucked away Jean-Luc’s staff, for the time being. "What can I do?" he asked, already finding it hard to suck in enough breath to speak from the force of the pain.

  He needed blockers. There were more wounded in the back room who needed help, but the woman was hovering on the brink of life and death. At least a dozen, considering the magnitude of the agony. It was as bad as the first rush of casualties through the field transporter after a contract that'd gone wrong.

  "Drink," Yule said without looking up, snatching a bottle out of the work bag on the floor beside him and throwing it blindly at the sound of Mirk's voice.

  Mirk drank it down without question before speaking again. Only a moderate blocker, but that meant he'd be able to keep his wits about him, be capable of doing more than being pulled from patient to patient in a healing daze. The pain faded to a manageable level as it started to work its magic on his empathy, dulling it. "Should I go to the back?"

  Yule sighed, letting his hands fall away from the woman's legs, rubbing his own temples with his bloodied fingers instead. Danu knew what the gesture meant. With a frustrated curse, she drew her own hands back, folding them and pressing them over her heart, watching with blackened eyes as the woman's soul slipped away and her body went still. Mirk was glad the blockers were taking effect. He wasn't able to sense her passing, the end of her pain. "We'll take care of things here. Eva came, so did Sheila's team. You need to take care of that."

  Mirk followed Yule's pointed finger into the empty room. Sharael must have fought fiercely. All the furniture in the room had been reduced to splinters and ash, the walls splattered with blood and the floor littered with clumps of snow-white feathers, some of them with flesh still attached. Hesitantly, Mirk ventured into the room, lowering his shields just far enough to sense if Samael had managed to leave him some sort of empathic message. Instead, there was nothing but the residue of his terror.

  "Where did they take them?" he asked no one in particular, crouching down and picking up one of the feathers. He could feel that it was Samael's, the terror growing so intense that he had to draw his shields back up once more.

  "You're the best empath we have. And he's ten times worse than you. You should be able to feel him, as long as things haven't already gone to hell back in the City," Yule said. He got back to his feet and gathered up his things, searching for something to throw over both of the dead bodies outside the door. He came up empty.

  There was another scream from the back room. "Ella! Peggy, where's Peggy?"

  After exchanging tired stares, Mirk and his team made their way to the back room. Just as Yule had said, Eva and Sheila's team of healers were all hard at work on the wounded, Eva doing surgery atop the back table where Mirk had left Joan bleeding out hours ago while Sheila and her healers did their work on the long counter, all of its mirrors and boxes of makeup and curlers shoved to the floor. Already, three more lifeless bodies had been carried to the far side of the room, out of the way.

  Alice was fighting against Fatima near the bodies, trying to beat her way through Fatima's restraining arms to search through the dead for her daughter. "She's not there!" Fatima growled. "Rita snatched her and took off."

  As if something had swooped down out of the shadows gathered near the ceiling and stolen all the life from Alice, she went limp, cursing down at the floor as she stared at the bodies. "He got Peggy. That son of a bitch, I'll kill him, him and all them—"

  "Save it," Fatima said, reaching up and smacking Alice across the face, just hard enough to bring her back to the present. "I'm guessing since they found us so easily, Casyn's the little secret you've been keeping from us?"

  Alice nodded wordlessly, tears rolling down her face. She pushed past Fatima and stared down at the bodies lined up against the wall. Mirk went to join her, keeping quiet, offering nothing but whatever paltry reassurance his presence could offer. Among the three dead was the old woman who Alice had entrusted her child to, stabbed through the chest Ella had been sleeping against hours ago.

  "'m sorry, Peggy," Alice mumbled. "You deserved better."

  "I'm sure one of them would have sorted it out soon enough," Fatima said, though she didn't turn to look back at Peggy’s body. "Casyn just made it faster. It was that job I gave you at the end of summer, wasn't it?"

  Alice nodded again. "Took what he wanted and left me in a closet."

  "Gave you something in return, though."

  "I should have gone after him. Should have taken him out before..."

  "That's not how this works," Fatima replied, limping across the room and going to a knocked-over table that had been laden with weapons and other supplies the last time Mirk had been in the bordello. Mirk noticed that Fatima's cane had changed. Rather than leaning on a bit of dark-varnished wood, now Fatima was leaning on an unsheathed sword, though its hilt bore a striking similarity to the plain silver head of Fatima's usual cane.

  "She will recover," Eva said, stepping back from the table, both hands bloody and raised, still gripping her surgical tools. She nodded at Slava, who was hovering beside the table. He'd been stabbed in the shoulder, but was too preoccupied to be troubled by the pain. "Take her to a room and bring in the next."

  "How many?" Mirk asked her, as he watched Slava shove his arms underneath the groaning woman on the table and haul her off to the rooms usually reserved for the bordello's paying clients.

  "Eighteen left," Eva said, meeting his eyes only for a second. "Most will make it. It was Percival's doing, mainly. He found a sword."

  "And doesn't need magic to cause a mess," Sheila added. "Though he has it now. You need to go after him, Mirk."

  "What about Ravensdale?" Mirk asked.

  Fatima turned back to face them all with a vicious grin, her arms full of spare crossbow bolts. "Screamed and ran off when I got him in the leg. Jackson was a useless little bitch twenty years ago, and he's still a useless little bitch now. Take your bolts and get going, Alice. Where's your djinn army?"

  "Me?" Alice asked, as if she couldn't believe her luck, crossing the room to take the arrows from Fatima. "What about you?"

  "We'll clean things up here and follow after. You're more useful in the vanguard." Fatima paused, frowning, turning around and scanning the far corners of the room. "I'm shocked Big Nose isn't here telling us all what to do next. Did you lose him?" she asked Mirk, turning back to face him.

  "I'm...I'm not sure." Mirk swallowed down his guilt at leaving behind the wounded, at all of it, and went to help Alice with her arrows. "Methinks we should go look, Miss Alice."

  Nodding and cramming more arrows into every pocket and slit hidden in the folds of her servant's uniform, Alice headed off back toward the front room. When they got there, Mirk wasn't surprised by what they found waiting for them. Am-Hazek and Am-Gulat arguing, while the others looked on with worried expressions.

  "Angel children don't matter a copper to me," Am-Gulat hissed, gripping his war hammer with a menacing air. "We need to free the others, before the worm takes them."

  "The worm, as you put it, will be with the children," Am-Hazek replied, his hands clasped behind his back. He was as unimpressed by Am-Gulat's grimacing and seething as he was by any nobleman's posturing threats, calm and polite as ever. "The most prudent way to proceed would be to find the children, Monsieur Am-Gulat."

  "Leave your human titles," Am-Gulat snapped. "Or have you been bowing to them for so long that you've forgotten your true nature?"

  Am-Hazek dipped his head in a conciliatory nod that only served to annoy Am-Gulat further. "My apologies. I have perhaps grown too accustomed to their ways, wajinn."

  "You abandoned your kin ages ago. Servile idiots, was it? You want a servile idiot for your wajinn?"

  Am-Hazek's composure broke just long enough for him to rub a pair of fingers against an ache in his temple. "I was harsher on you all than I'd meant to be. But we all do foolish things when we're upset. Which is why we must put the worm, as you call him, aside. And consider more practical things."

  It would have been prudent for Genesis to step in to mediate, Mirk thought. But the commander was nowhere to be seen. K'aekniv recognized the impasse as well, however, and shoved himself between the pair in his place. "Listen. Who knows which thing will fuck us harder in the end? Not me. We don't need thinking now. We need fighting."

  Am-Hazek blinked at being pushed back a pace by the half angel, but didn't bristle at it. Nor did Am-Gulat, who, despite his war hammer, was still a bit cowed by the sheer size of K'aekniv. Even though Am-Gulat wasn't short, he was lean and wiry, even more than he ordinarily would have been, owing to Ravensdale’s abuse and neglect. "But which should we fight first, Comrade K'aekniv?" Am-Hazek asked.

  "Simple. We do a little of both.” First, K’aekniv turned to Am-Gulat. “You and me and that bitch Richard, we'll go get the other djinn. I can bust into that prison easy, and he can help with the collars.”

  Then, the half-angel turned back toward Am-Hazek. “You and Mirgosha, you go look for the kids. Mirgosha's head magic works with the little one. And since you know Mirgosha, you'll fight better together if Jackson tries to fuck with you. Everyone else, you go where you want. Maybe you two take him since you'll need a big person and Slava's busy," K’aekniv finished, waving Er-Izat over toward Am-Hazek.

  "How will we know where the worm is?" Am-Gulat asked him.

  "We don't. When one of us finds him, we'll give the signal. Some big magic we can see over all the buildings, or whatever."

  Am-Hazek sighed, dipping his head once more, though the gesture was closer to a bow when he did it toward K'aekniv. "It will have to do, I suppose."

  "Anything is better than wasting our time arguing," Am-Gulat admitted, grudgingly.

  "Good. I'll get my people together and we'll move out. Orest, you're coming with too. The place they keep the djinn is close to the stables. There'll be fighting in the streets once the sun comes. I want the horses."

  Mirk grabbed hold of K'aekniv's arm as he hurried off toward the back to muster his men. "Where's Gen?" he asked, still scanning the darker corners of the room for the commander. Even though the shadows lingered thick everywhere, the front room's mage lanterns knocked over or broken from the struggle that had taken place there before they'd arrived, Mirk couldn't see or sense Genesis anywhere nearby, even when he lowered his shields a fraction to take a harder look.

  "He ran away when you did," K'aekniv said, sighing. "He looked sick again, maybe. A shit time for it, but there's nothing we can do. He'll be under some bed somewhere, probably."

  "Sick?"

  "The bread Mordka's people make has still been fucking with him. I hope that shit book was worth it. Otherwise we'll be really fucked."

  K'aekniv had been putting on a confident face for the others, Mirk realized then. The worry Mirk felt press against his shields, just for a moment, before K'aekniv refocused on the task at hand, was just as sharp as the tension tying his own stomach in knots. After asking Am-Hazek to wait a moment, Mirk hurried off back into the warren of rooms that separated the front of the house from the back, lowering his shields to search out where Genesis had hidden himself rather than allowing the others to see his weakness.

  He found Genesis inside a room that'd been turned out for the night but never used. Or, rather, he found his magic. Even though the room's magelights weren't lit, Mirk could sense a certain restlessness in the darkness inside, the churning of the shadows matching the turmoil of their hidden master. Mirk ventured in, cautiously, electing to close the door behind him. "Genesis? Is something wrong?" he called out into the darkness.

  "...no."

  Sighing, Mirk rolled up the sleeve of his justacorps, illuminating the magelight on his wrist that he'd gotten so much in the habit of wearing that he hadn't even considered taking it off, even though it didn't match the rest of his outfit. It didn't do much to push back the shadows. Mirk lowered his shields, navigating by feel to the far corner of the room. Genesis had pressed himself into it, his back to the wall, eyes closed and teeth bared in pain as he clutched his midsection.

  "You're sick again," Mirk said as gently as he could, doing his best to ensure there was no hint of accusation in his tone. Though he knew full well Genesis probably wouldn't have noticed any exasperation in his voice even if some had slipped in.

  "Moving...others through the Abyss...unsettles the chaos."

  "I can see that," Mirk mumbled. It was as if the shadows had decided to strangle their master for once instead of the object of his ire. They were wrapped as tight around Genesis as his own arms were, cloaking the pain that Mirk could only feel the vaguest pinpricks of. But it had to be severe, considering how pale Genesis had gone. And how there was sweat beaded on his brow. Mirk didn't think he'd ever seen the commander sweat before, no matter how dire the situation or how hot the weather.

  "I will...recover in time."

  "We don't have time," Mirk said, taking another step closer. "I know that potions don't do anything to help, but methinks I might be able to do something about the swelling....or, euh, there's another word...everything red and hot..."

  Genesis shook his head, once. Sharply. The shadows swelled between them, making it difficult to see him even with the help of the magelight around Mirk's wrist.

  "Samael and Sharael are missing," Mirk said, after a long pause, when the shadows failed to subside. "I...methinks that spell that Yule's friend showed me at the tavern..."

  The name coiled out of the darkness in a low hiss, like it was the most vile curse Genesis could think of. "Imanael."

  "I took his name out. But I don't know what the spell does, Genesis. What if it wasn't enough? If Ravensdale calls him, you're the only person who’ll know what to do. We'll need you."

  The pain in Genesis's voice, the resignation, made something deep inside Mirk's chest ache. "I am as much his...slave as the djinn were Ravensdale's."

  There was no potion, no salve, no amount of life-giving potential that could take that fact away. Not even Jean-Luc's staff was able to do anything to the spells carved into Genesis's arms. Mirk had never tried to ask the presence hidden inside the wood to free Genesis, but he had a feeling that if it could have broken the spell on Genesis, the commander would have asked for his help. Mirk took another tentative step forward, ignoring the way the shadows curled around his ankles, tensing as if they were fully prepared to hurl him through the door and back out into the hall if he came any closer. "Please, Genesis. There must be something I can do. Even if it's only a small thing."

  The shadows drew tighter. Then released him, with the sound of a defeated, sibilant sigh from the corner. "Come...here."

  The shadows thinned a little as Mirk closed the gap between them, just enough so that Mirk could see Genesis again. He'd pried his arms off his midsection, his hands twitching at his signs with the desire to clutch once again at the aching in his stomach. His eyes were still closed, his face pointed up at the ceiling rather than down at him. Mirk called his healing magic into his hands in preparation, his attention divided between the disruptions in the flow of Genesis's magic through his rail-thin body that he could see with his mind's eye and the way the shadows writhed in anticipation at the prospects of life and warmth to devour.

  "That...will not be necessary," Genesis said through gritted teeth.

  "Euh...methinks I don't understand, messire," Mirk said. "I can't heal you just by looking at you."

  "It is not a matter of healing. It is a matter of...settling." Mirk could hear the commander's teeth grinding as his arms twitched at his sides. Upward, the slightest hair outspread. "If you wish to help...come here."

  Mirk only managed to take one more step closer. Then the shadows enveloped him, not to hurl him back out into the hall, but to press him tightly against Genesis's trembling chest.

  It startled a laugh out of him. Above his head, Genesis hissed something. Whether it was a curse or a command, Mirk couldn't be certain, but the shadows released him. A moment later, they were replaced with Genesis's hands. Not embracing him, precisely, but keeping him pressed close, his palms flat against the middle of his back.

  The absurdity of it should have washed away all of Mirk's worry. To think, what Genesis needed, the mysterious solution to his body's desire to destroy itself, a conundrum no healing magic could touch, was a hug. But the way Genesis's body shook against him, the way Mirk could feel all his muscles straining, the cold radiating from him still despite the sweat he'd seen beaded on his brow, made Mirk’s heart ache almost as much as Genesis's curt reminder that he was as much a slave as Ravensdale's djinn had been.

  What had been done to Genesis, what had his magic done to others, to make something as simple as asking for an embrace, as much of an impossible struggle as trying to split the earth in two?

  Now wasn't the time to ask that question, Mirk sensed. Instead, he immediately responded to Genesis's unspoken request by wrapping his arms around him in turn.

  Genesis pressed him tighter. "Weight. Presence. Listen." he heard him hiss under his breath, as if reciting something from one of his crumbling grimoires, his voice barely audible over the hissing of his chaotic magic against Mirk's mind.

  Mirk didn't have the heart to bother him. To ask him why, precisely, this strange request of his helped. With his mind held open and his shields banished, Mirk could feel that it was helping the commander regain his usual inhuman control over his magic and body nevertheless. The flickers of pain didn't cease brushing against Mirk's mind, but the cold subsided. Genesis's trembling faded. And though he couldn't hear it, Mirk assumed that his heartbeat must have slowed, since the rise and fall of the chest he had his cheek pressed against had.

  He was sure his own heart had. Mirk hadn't been aware of how close he'd been to breaking, how near he'd been to the edge of panic over seeing the bordello full of the dead and wounded and being unable to do anything about it. And beneath that fresh despair was all the tension and the worry that'd come with the ball: what all the other mages must have thought of him for involving them in his schemes, Seigneur d'Aumont's disappearance, how frail and small his godmother had become once she'd spent the last of her magic.

  But there was something soothing in being so close to Genesis, despite the urgency of the situation. How his formal uniform smelled of the same cleaning potions the commander used on everything, how the presence of his staticky magic made the world silent in a way that was more peaceful than unnerving. The faint pleasure, even in that dark hour, of being alone in his mind while not being alone in body. Of not being forced to know, to understand, but to be able to come to it slowly, out of his own desire to comfort Genesis.

  For once, Genesis didn't need to be forced into obliging him, once his magic and body had calmed, though the pain in his midsection remained. Mirk could sense it twisting against his chest, even though he couldn't truly feel it, not like he could an ordinary person's pain. "As I said...systemic issues are...difficult to manage. However, if one...focuses on an external presence and weight rather than the...internal pain...it becomes more manageable."

  "I can still feel it," Mirk said, softly. "Sort of. But it is a little better, methinks. You don't feel as upset, anyway."

  Genesis let out a long, hissing sigh. But his breathing returned to its same, precise, deathly slow pace a moment later. "Are the others...well?"

  Mirk nodded against his chest. "Am-Gulat, Niv, and the rest are going to the barracks to free the other djinn. Monsieur Am-Hazek and I will look for Samael and Sharael."

  "I...see."

  "Will you come with?"

  "I will...go where needed."

  Mirk didn't ask how the commander could possibly know where he was needed or when. Some trick of his magic, doubtlessly, his uncanny ability to always arrive precisely on time, not a moment sooner or later. But he did decide to speak his own mind, since Genesis had elected to be open with him about how he dealt with the pain coiling inside his midsection. "You don't have to be afraid to ask for this, messire. If it helps, then it helps. I don't think any less of you for it." Unbidden, a smile came onto Mirk's lips. "You know how I go clinging to everyone without even asking first."

  "It is...pathetic," Genesis said, after a long pause.

  "It's not. It only means you're just like everyone else. Even if it looks a little strange."

  A moment of silence passed between them. Mirk savored it, his eyes closed, relishing the strength in the hands pressed to his back and the coolness of the body against his own. Then Genesis dropped his hands.

  "If Imanael does come...I will know."

  Mirk took a few steps back, nodding. The commander's face had assumed its usual blankness, though there was still more color high on his cheekbones than usual. And there was still that dampness on his brow, though the instant Mirk let him go, Genesis whipped out one of his innumerable handkerchiefs to blot it away. "Hopefully it won't come to that, messire ."

  "If it does...I am prepared. I have the t’akakk. The City will listen."

  Genesis stepped around him, then vanished.

  Only not entirely. Mirk had no idea how the commander could still move so quickly while so indisposed, but he got the impression that rather than slipping into the shadows and crossing away into the Abyss like usual, Genesis was still in the room. Head tilted to one side, Mirk listened, surveying the room's corners and shadowy places. He'd gone under the bed, if Mirk had to guess. Why that was helpful, or what he was doing under there, Mirk didn't have the slightest idea.

  Chuckling to himself at the thought of it, of Genesis curled up under the room's bed like a sullen cat that had put himself out of reach of a nosy human's clumsy palms and sticky fingers, Mirk went to rejoin the others.