Morning did not feel like morning.

  Time had no obvious markers down here. The blue runes embedded in the stone gave off the same faint glow they had the night before, and the air held the same stale quality.

  The day simply started when Ard decided it.

  Once the camp was broken and the packs redistributed, he gathered all of us near one of the wider thoroughfares that cut through the ruins. The street had once been broad enough for carts, its stone paving worn smooth by centuries of traffic. Now it was empty, the grooves where wheels had run filled with dust and grit.

  "We move toward the center of the City," Ard said, his tone formal, practiced. "There, we shall locate the seal and assess the state of it firsthand."

  He produced a dowsing rod from his pack.

  I had seen them before, in the Forest, but this one was different.

  It was a thin rod of pale metal, forked at one end and wound with copper wire. A small crystal sat in a socket at its center, clouded like ice.

  "This will help us find the seal," Ard continued. "If it imprisons the old Demon Lord, it's certainly made of strong magic. It should have a signature."

  I exhaled slowly. "Finding it won't be enough."

  Ard's eyes fixed on me, sharp and assessing. "Pardon?"

  "Even if you find the seal," I said, "you won't be able to touch it. Not without specialized tools."

  He frowned. "Magic is magic."

  I scoffed. "I suppose then that makes me the Sage."

  Lumiere shot me a look.

  "This is nothing like magic as you know it today," I added. "It's a field. A pocket of sorts. Of suspended time."

  My hands floundered uselessly as I searched for the right words. But all I received were confused looks all around.

  I sighed. "It's... hard to expin."

  It was times like this that I wished Seraphine were here. Even if no one else understood, she would.

  Ard studied me in silence. Then something in his expression shifted, subtle but unmistakable.

  "You speak with a great deal of certainty," he said. "Should I take it that this too is the knowledge of a witch?"

  The air seemed to tighten around us.

  Benet straightened. Tomás swallowed. Even Veyne turned his head slightly, attention sharpening.

  "Bishop Halbrecht made it very clear to us," Ard continued. "Your intention here is to commune with an old god."

  His eyes fred white.

  "Your words may have fooled the High Synod," he said calmly. "But you cannot fool me. I will hold you accountable to your purpose, not endanger us over some folk tale."

  It was useless to deny it, so I didn't.

  "I understand your concern," I said. "But the two things are connected."

  Ard took a step closer. "Say it pinly."

  "The Mountain Guardian can give us a solution," I replied. "Tools to help deal with the seal."

  I gestured toward the ruins around us.

  "Marrud-Vael's old Forge. Khaz-Vorrim. That's where we'll find it."

  Benet snorted. "If it even exists."

  "It does," I said. "It should be somewhere in the northwestern reaches."

  Rocher gnced back the way we'd come, then toward the deeper city ahead. "It looks like the elevator set us down in the southeast. That's a long way through hostile ground."

  "Long, yes," I agreed. "But safe if we stick to the City's limits. Most of the danger is concentrated near the seal."

  Ard's expression did not soften.

  "You're suggesting we avoid the objective?" he said.

  "Just for the time being," I replied. "We'll return once we're better prepared."

  And once Seraphine has reached us, I thought.

  Silence followed.

  Then he nodded once, as if humoring a child.

  "Let's take a vote then," he said.

  Veyne cast his vote with Ard without hesitation. Benet followed suit, eager to align himself with authority. Tomás hesitated, then lowered his eyes and murmured agreement.

  Four to our three. Exactly as I had expected.

  Rocher and Lumiere lowered their hands in resignation.

  Ard turned to me. "It's settled. We move toward the center."

  I felt my jaw tighten.

  "How about we split?" I said. "You'll have your search. We'll go find the Forge."

  Ard shook his head. "The Saintess must remain in our sight at all times."

  Lumiere met his gaze evenly. "You have no authority to confine me."

  "It's not confinement, Your Holiness," Ard replied. "It's precaution. By order of the Bishop."

  The word hung there.

  I frowned and met Rocher's eyes. If they were intent on dragging her into danger, then we had no choice but to follow.

  "Fine then," I said. "We'll do it your way."

  I sucked in a breath. "But if what I say turns out to be true, we continue onwards. To the Forge."

  Ard nodded, satisfied.

  We moved inward.

  The streets narrowed as we went, the buildings crowding closer together, their carved faces eroded into something blunt and unreadable.

  The air changed first.

  Heavier. Hotter.

  Heat gathered in shallow pockets between walls, clinging to skin and cloth. Sweat prickled at the back of my neck despite the measured pace.

  There were still no signs of life. No movement. No sound beyond our own footfalls and the faint scrape of armor against stone.

  We were all the more anxious for it.

  Benet did not stay in formation for long.

  At first it was subtle. A step too far ahead. A pause to peer into a doorway as we passed. He drifted in and out of alignment like he expected the rules to bend around him.

  Ard noticed, shaking his head. But he didn't say anything.

  Benet slipped into the shell of a building, boots crunching softly on debris, then reappeared moments ter with an expression of mild disappointment.

  "Nothing here," he announced.

  Tomás just gnced at him nervously.

  A few minutes ter, Benet joined Rocher at the rear, close enough that I could hear him speaking in a low voice.

  Rocher's shoulders tightened, but he kept his pace.

  I gnced backward to let them know I was within earshot, but that didn't seem to deter Benet.

  He returned my look with a soft ugh, then whispered something else to Rocher.

  Rocher nearly stopped. "You should watch your mouth," he said between teeth.

  Benet raised his hands in mock surrender, grinning. "Rex. I'm just enjoying the view. Same as you."

  Rocher's hand flexed once at his side. His jaw set. Then he stepped forward again, resuming formation without another word.

  Benet watched him for a moment, amused, then drifted once more.

  This time, he matched his pace to mine.

  "That one's got a short fuse. I was just telling him, I like it better when you have your hair up like this," he said lightly.

  I didn't look at him. "Just shut up and keep walking."

  He chuckled under his breath and veered off again, boots carrying him toward another darkened archway.

  Then he screamed.

  It was sharp and unguarded, the kind of sound that left no room for dignity. It echoed once off the stone and then cut off abruptly.

  Rocher moved before the sound finished traveling.

  He broke formation, spear already in his hand as he sprinted down the side passage Benet had taken. Ard barked something behind me, but it was too te to matter.

  I followed, heart pounding, ntern light swinging wildly as the corridor opened into a wider chamber.

  Benet was on his knees.

  He had stumbled backward against the wall, one hand pressed to his mouth, the other braced on the stone. His face had gone pale beneath the flush of heat, his eyes fixed on something at his feet.

  Rocher skidded to a halt between him and the darkness beyond, spear raised.

  "What is it?" Tomás called, breathless, ntern bobbing as he came up behind me.

  I stepped past Rocher and crouched.

  A ribcage, half-buried in dust.

  It was enormous. Curved like the frame of a ship, each rib thicker than my forearm. Whatever flesh had once clung to them was gone, stripped clean down to pale bone that gleamed faintly in the nternlight.

  I reached out and brushed my fingers along one of the ribs. The surface was smooth, worn not by tools but by time and teeth.

  "Well, at least it's not human," I said.

  Benet made a small, choking sound.

  "Not First Men either," I added.

  They had been rge, yes. Broad and dense-boned, built for bor and endurance. But even their remains would not have looked like this. These ribs belonged to something longer. Lower. Built to move close to the ground.

  An animal.

  I straightened slowly.

  "It was food for something here," I said, keeping my voice level.

  Veyne scanned the chamber, eyes moving to the shadowed arches overhead. Ard stepped in beside him, jaw tight.

  "The First Men kept livestock," I continued. "Not many. Only what could survive down here. Hardy animals that could live on detritus and scraps."

  I gnced at Benet. "I wouldn't be surprised if they'd acquired a taste for flesh."

  He swallowed hard.

  "Be on your guard," I said. "Nothing stays docile after it's been exposed to demonic miasma for this long."

  Tomás let out a thin, shaky breath. "What manner of creatures were they?"

  He took a step back without looking.

  His boot came down on something that gave beneath his weight.

  Not a crack.

  A soft colpse.

  He froze.

  Slowly, he lifted his foot.

  The light revealed a string of goop between the ground and his heel.

  I raised the ntern.

  Hundreds of pale shapes clustered together in a shallow depression between stones. Each one was roughly the size of a fist, their surfaces leathery and faintly translucent, packed so tightly they pressed into one another. Veins traced beneath the skin in thin, branching lines, pulsing faintly in the heat.

  Eggs.

  Tomás made a thin, panicked sound.

  "I didn't mean to—" he stammered.

  Rocher hauled him backward at once, pulling him clear without waiting for permission.

  "Don't touch them," I said sharply.

  Too te.

  One of the eggs near the edge had ruptured under his heel. Clear fluid seeped out slowly, steaming faintly as it met the cooler air.

  The smell was thick, clinging to the back of my throat. Rot and bile yered over heat, as if the stone itself were alive and sweating.

  Veyne swore under his breath. Ard stood rigid, the dowsing rod in his grip vibrating almost imperceptibly, the crystal at its center glowing brighter than before.

  Benet simply stared, color draining from his face.

  I crouched, breathing through my sleeve, and examined the pattern of the nest. The eggs were not scattered. They had been pced deliberately, arranged where heat pooled and stone retained warmth.

  "We need to leave—"

  Something shifted. Deeper in the chamber.

  A slow, deliberate scrape. Stone against scale.

  Rocher stepped in front of us instinctively, spearpoint aimed at the darkness.

  "Everyone back," he said. "Now."