She Who Rides the Storm (The Gods-Touched Duology)

Knox looked up at the drum tower as the late-afternoon signal rapped out across the city. From his spot in the alley behind the silenbahk milk booth, he could just see the governor’s roof sticking up from the other side of the Water Cay. Barriers had been set up along the Water Cay bridge to keep unwanted carriages out, just as Noa had promised.

Anwei’s shoulder pressed into Knox’s side as she leaned forward, a cascade of sparks sizzling up Knox’s torso. Sky Painter, he whispered inwardly to distract himself from the feel of Anwei against him. Storm Rider. Cloud Weaver. Counting off Calsta’s names very loudly in his head wasn’t helping, so he tried to edge away, but the brick wall was against his back. There was no escape.

Problem was, Knox didn’t exactly want to escape. “You’re sure about this?” he asked.

“It’s all we’ve got.” Anwei moved away from him, hands smoothing down her disguise to give it one last check. Her torso swelled out in front of her under a ridiculous frilly apron—the perfect disguise, she’d said. No one suspects a pregnant woman. “One Devoted-free party.”

Knox nodded, not bothering to add that there was another Devoted—a spiriter—who had somehow become lost in the city. There were only so many spiriters, and he couldn’t help but think that Lia could be here.

Here and lost didn’t really make sense, not for any spiriter.

Here and hunting him, however…

The former made him want to drop everything and start looking for glints of red hair. He’d missed Lia every day he’d been gone, missed the seclusion, missed the simplicity of being told what to do, doing it, and knowing he was on the right path, rather than this muddle he was in now.

The latter—that Lia could be hunting him—made Knox want to run. If anyone could find him, it would be Lia.

He pushed away both ideas. Any spiriter hunting him would be bad, and the Warlord wouldn’t have sent Lia to Chaol to find her closest friend—it would be too much to ask of any Devoted. The spiriter who was here could be anywhere. Running away like everyone seemed to think. At the party. Over the border in Lasei. If the spiriter had come to find Knox, there wasn’t much he could do about it dead. Knox stopped his hand before it could reach for the sword, and a warm glow bloomed at the back of his head as if Calsta was trying to offer comfort. Or maybe that was just Anwei. Because, for whatever reason, with Anwei, no spiriter would be able to find him.

He hoped.

From Willow, Knox had heard nothing. Anwei had stashed the sword somewhere, but when he’d asked what had become of it, his friend had shrugged and instructed him to help her gut slugs for some poor, unsuspecting customer.

He wasn’t entirely certain slugs had guts. It had all been about the same when he’d done the job. Mushy. The space inside his head had changed, though. The pull of the sword was still there, but Willow’s voice was gone, and he couldn’t pretend he wasn’t relieved.

Anwei gave her huge belly a fond pat, as if it actually were some sort of growing spawn attached to her, before she walked out of the alley. Knox followed, dragging a wagon of freshly cut blooms behind him. The florist’s apron obscured the straps that held the fake baby against Anwei’s stomach, but it was so… there. He knew it was just her medicine bag—padded to make it look less like a bag and more like a life waiting to spill out of her—but it still made his insides go all funny.

Turning to look at him once the guards had waved them over the bridge, Anwei asked, “Any sign of our little pineapple friend?” She twisted the top button on her florist’s tunic, every single button done clear to her throat, unlike any florist Knox had seen. He’d always wondered why she felt the need to cover every inch of her body, but after glimpsing the scars on her shoulders, he supposed he could understand. Sort of. Anwei wasn’t shy about much of anything, so hiding scars seemed odd.

Remembering the scars made Knox’s eyes fix on that button twisting between Anwei’s fingers, made him remember her shoulder, her collarbone. And the dream of Anwei kissing him. The one where he kissed her back.

Ageless One. Bright One. Honest One. Knox turned his eyes to the guards checking the small line of people waiting to enter the governor’s compound and made them stick.

“Knox?”

Knox blinked. She’d asked him a question. About pineapples? If he’d seen the Trib following them. Altahn. “Not today.”

Anwei seemed to catch herself fiddling with the button and forced her hands up to check the western-border scarf she’d twisted around her braids. “We’ll deal with it. Whatever comes.”

“We always do.” Knox stepped forward in line, his voice low. Anwei did her part, and he did his. He shook his head, thinking of Noa’s belly laugh and the way she’d dropped her blazing tethers at the Firelily, leaving the flames for someone else to put out. “I just don’t like relying on someone who isn’t you.”

Anwei smiled. He could feel it in his head better than he could see it from behind her.

Two more guards were standing watch at the governor’s gates, the first asking Anwei to turn out her pockets, a second coming to kneel by Knox’s wagon.

“Auroshe handler?” The man looked up at him for confirmation, the thick leather Knox had spent hours stitching into the neck and arms of his uniform setting him apart from other hostlers. Knox nodded, hoping very much that he wouldn’t be asked to perform any actual auroshe-related duties while inside the grounds. His own mount, which he’d left behind at the seclusion with little remorse, had always seemed to think Knox wouldn’t notice if he nibbled off one of Knox’s toes.

“And you’re feeding those things… chrysanthemums?” the guard asked, glancing down at the red flowers.

“They’re actually begonias.” Anwei pushed between him and the wagon, her perfect smile contagious. The guard fell back a step, making way for her overlarge belly. “He was so kind to help me when he found me struggling to get the wagon across the square. When I realized they weren’t letting any vehicles past the bridge, I thought that was the end for me.”

One of the guards gave her a small smile. “What florist would have allowed someone”—he faltered, eying her belly—“someone in your situation to drag something so heavy all the way from the lower cays?”

“Oh, I’m fine.” She smoothed a hand across her ridiculous apron. “Got to earn my wages so I can spoil the little monster rotten.” Anwei gave a little spin that was unbalanced enough it almost ended with her on the ground. Knox picked up the wagon’s handle, hoping the movement hid his involuntary smile.

“You’ll help me get it into the house, won’t you?” Anwei grabbed hold of Knox’s arm and turned her pretend gaiety full force on him, her chest and shoulder pressing into him as she started to pull him past the guards.

Protector of Souls. Blue Mage.

“Wait.” The second guard blocked their way. “We need to check under the wagon.” He bent down and pulled up the side. Flowers spilled onto the cobblestones.

“No! You’re ruining them!” Anwei threw herself to the ground, trying to hold the rest of the flowers in place even as they spilled into her lap. Tears were suddenly streaming down her cheek, as unexpected as a bolt of lightning. “If we lose even one, Madame Geller will flay me alive.…” She tenderly picked up the nearest fallen flowers and clutched them to her chest.

Knox knelt next to her on the ground. “Let me, you shouldn’t be doing that in your condition.…”

“I’m not in any condition,” she snapped. “Babies are normal and natural and beautiful!”

The guard not searching the wagon fell to his knees next to them, gingerly gathering the blooms. When the other guard finished his inspection, he grudgingly helped them gather the last of the flowers and resettle them in the wagon bed.

Anwei’s tears were falling in earnest now. “Some of them are bruised.” She gave a pitiful sniff.

“Chin up. You know, I’ve got two little babies at home myself, and I couldn’t bear to think of their mother being so badly treated as all this. We’ll walk you in.” The first guard gave Anwei’s shoulder a fatherly pat. “Make sure your master understands it was our fault.”

Anwei gave him a very brave look, her lip trembling. Knox barely succeeded in keeping his eyes from rolling. “Would you?”

The guard gave Knox a dismissive wave. “You go on now. We’ll take care of this.”

Knox hunched his shoulders and nodded. Anwei had known the flowers and tears would be enough to keep them from patting her down. He didn’t know how, only that she was usually right, deciding how people would act before she’d even seen them, as if they were her puppets on strings. He started across the paved courtyard toward the stables, the house with its three stories and gabled rooftop just the way he remembered it.

Anwei’s loud talk of flowers and wages and babies passed out of his hearing as one of the guards led her toward the main house. Even if the actual florist was waiting in the kitchen, Anwei would say something that would make them all laugh and believe her place was there. She always did.

Which was why Knox had been the one assigned to pick up the bag Noa had left for them in the stables while Anwei drew attention away from him. He walked past the wide-open doors at the front, where hostlers were gathered for some kind of scolding before guests began to arrive. Knox circled around to the back side of the two-story building, running a hand along the stone walls carved with dragonflies and water lilies.

At the back of the building, where the thatched roof dipped almost to the ground, Knox slipped through the much smaller door into the room where saddles and tack were stored, the inside pleasantly cool after the blazing afternoon sun. He scanned the building for auras, finding all but two of the hostlers clustered together at the front. One was working in a stall just past the tack room, and the second was on the upper level.

Knox left the tack room, walking purposefully down one of the aisles between stalls. There were three long rows of open stalls and stairs leading to the second floor, which covered about half of the building. His destination lay at the very back, past a reinforced barrier where the ceiling was high, skylights sending columns of afternoon light down to the bales of hay below. Against the wall, well away from the other animals, there were six completely enclosed stalls. Metal bars reinforced the barriers, the interiors marked with long, ugly gouges. The smell of blood was rank in Knox’s nose.

Three of the stalls were occupied. Some of the Roosters would be at the party, then.

Knox shuddered as he approached the auroshes. Even after years of riding them as a Devoted, he was still terrified of the beasts. They flicked their ears back as he walked closer, but none of them looked his way, as if they could lull him into believing they weren’t dangerous.

The one closest was the first to break the charade. Her skin was white with patches of brown, a single horn protruding from her forehead. She didn’t lunge or scream, just raised her head, black tongue flicking out to clean her long, jagged teeth.

The other two auroshes waited until Knox walked past them toward the stairs leading to the loft. The one in the center charged at his stall bars, mouth opening unnaturally wide as he tried to snap at Knox. He was a black bay, two spiky horns jutting from his skull. One of the two Knox had seen that night after the trade advisor job. Watching the creature carefully, Knox was on the first step before he really looked at the third auroshe.

Knox stumbled, barely catching himself.

The thing was silver with dappled spots down his shoulders and haunches. A single white horn twisted gracefully from his forehead, almost a thing of beauty until you saw his wicked black eyes. No pupil, no iris, just inky black. The creature’s teeth were jagged and white, his mane plaited more intricately than the other two.

Vivi. Lia was here.

Knox clenched his eyes shut, forcing his thoughts calm. His brain wouldn’t obey, though, splintering at the edges, begging to expand his aurasight. He didn’t know if he wanted to find her or run away before she found him.

When he opened his eyes, he found Vivi had crept to the edge of the enclosure. The creature pressed up against the bars as if he recognized Knox, wanted to reassure him. Vivi cocked his head, retreated a few steps—

Then darted forward, his long fangs silvered in the dim light as he snapped at Knox’s arms.

Knox jerked away and stumbled up the stairs. Vivi went still, his black eyes following as Knox climbed to the loft, his long, twisted horn pointed directly at Knox’s heart. The other auroshes wound their heads to track his movements, the straw that littered the ground around their hooves stained brown with old blood. Brownish-red clumps were caught in the fur across the paint’s muzzle and down her chest.

Knox shuddered, quickly moving to the supply shelves. If Lia was here at the governor’s house, then he and Anwei were done for. His hands shook as he pawed through the clay jars, the hooks and spiked halters, the bloodstained buckets that sent flies erupting into the air. How had Noa come up with this as a perfect place to stash their supplies?

The auroshes ensured not many people would come close, but the feeding loft was the only thing in the open second-story space, exposed for anyone to see.

It wasn’t until Knox got to the large clay waterpot between stacks of hay that he found Noa’s bag lodged between the pot and the wall. He half expected Noa herself to jump out from behind the haystacks and push him down into the stalls with a delighted cackle, just to see what color his blood was.

Maybe it wasn’t so odd that Noa had chosen the auroshe’s feeding loft. She seemed the type who’d like things with teeth.

As Knox looped the bag’s leather strap over his shoulder, his mind caught on one of the hostler auras moving in his direction. He looked up to find the man emerging from the first row of stalls, his chin tipped up to stare directly at Knox.

Knox dislodged a section of hay and dumped it into the first auroshe’s enclosure. The paint keened up at him as the dry stalks rained down on her, her black eyes following when he started down the stairs. She bared her teeth, as if memorizing his face for later retribution.

“I thought those things didn’t care for hay.” The hostler looked Knox up and down, eyes snagging on the reinforced collar of his jacket. “I haven’t seen you around here before, have I?”

“Sometimes they need something to settle their stomachs.” Knox pointed a thumb at the paint, flinching when she gave an angry screech. She started pawing at the hay, crushing it under her divided toes. “She’s been off her feed since we arrived. Went up to check her lines from above, but nothing seems amiss. Must be her gut.” It came out a little fast and dry.

The hostler shrugged, happy to look away from the beasts. His eyes slid down to the bag under Knox’s arm. There was a bit of silvered fabric sticking out of it, but Knox started walking before he could ask any more questions.

Outside, the sun was waffling just above the horizon. Servants coursed by in droves now, arms full of fabric, food, and various pieces of furniture, all dancing to the shouts of the woman Knox recognized as the housemistress. No carriages yet. Knox slipped back into the stables and found a dark corner where he could watch and wait.

He could see the auroshes, the bay and the paint pawing at their stall doors and snuffling at the ground in that alert, agitated way auroshes always had. Vivi was quiet, though, his head snaking over to look at Knox with those wide, dark eyes. He looked lonely.

Knox’s stomach clenched, twisting so tight he couldn’t breathe. Lia, who had talked him through so many lonely days and nights. Lia, who knew about his parents, his sister. Lia, who had cried herself to sleep every night for their first year at the seclusion, wishing for nothing but her own bed.

Lia was in Chaol. And Lia was missing.

Knox hid in the tack room until the brother moons had risen. Castor looked a bit blue from his spot higher in the sky, the two almost in line. Carriages had started arriving, announced by the clatter of wheels, horses huffing at one another, and hostlers leading them into the long lines of empty stalls.

After creeping out the tack room door, Knox followed the faint sounds of music coming from the house, candlelight blazing from the two-story windows. The shuffle of dancing and talking from inside was soft enough even he couldn’t hear much. Rounding the side of the house, he walked toward the west wing, where everything was dark.

Once Knox had ducked behind an ornamental shrub, he waited for a guard to pass before he started counting second-floor windows. The one he wanted—the lady of the house’s office—was completely exposed, but a tree grew a few windows down. When he and Anwei had been here last winter, they’d used this same entrance, but since the candlestick incident, the governor was said to have added locks to all the windows. The guard who had passed moments before was certainly a new addition.

Knox slunk across the lawn to hide in the shadows at the tree’s roots, waited for the guard to pass again, then ran at the wall. He launched himself upward, grabbing hold of the second-story window ledge with one hand. Dangling, Knox grabbed the sill with his other hand and pulled himself up. He didn’t need Calsta for something this simple.

Two windows down, the pane swung open. Knox jumped to the next sill and, using his momentum, continued into a leap toward the open window, grabbing the window frame to change directions, and slid in feet first. He rolled once to absorb the momentum.

“Flashy. As usual.” Anwei had retied the scarf binding her hair, the side artfully arranged to mimic a first khonin knot. Her medicine bag was still buckled tight over her stomach, the dreadful bulge jarring enough that Knox had to force his eyes away. Anwei didn’t seem to notice as she closed and locked the leaded-glass window, then dropped to her knees to open Noa’s bag. Knox let her take it, dusting himself off. The whole room was dusty, long unused.

“Noa set some curtains on fire during dinner and loosed some rats among the musicians, so the guests were already on edge when I came up here. The ghosts should be starting about now.” Anwei dug past the ruffles of silvery fabric in the bag and pulled out the envelope of lockpicks stuffed at the bottom. They’d been too heavy and too incriminating to risk hiding on their persons on the way in. Next Anwei pulled out the swaths of silvery fabric, which turned out to be the dress Noa had insisted was necessary. Anwei held it up, looking it over with a sort of trepidation Knox didn’t understand.

“Don’t like the cut?” he asked.

She ignored him, squishing the ruffles back into the bag and going to the door to check the hallway. Knox pulled off his hostler jacket, turning the sleeves inside out to bare the side that was made to look like the uniform of one of the governor’s house servants.

“The guards have been cleared?” He finished buttoning the coat to his chin, then smoothed down the gray front, hoping his black hostler pants would pass muster.

“Noa should have started by now, so hopefully they’ll all be running toward the ballroom. I’m going to open the door. Keep watch for me down here.”

The governor’s study was at the end of the hall, so Knox took his position just inside the office while Anwei knelt before the locked door. She pulled out two different picks, then shoved the first deep into the tumblers. Knox’s ears seemed to hum, searching for evidence that Noa had started screeching ghostly threats at the guests, but there wasn’t anything to hear of ghosts or otherwise. After a moment Knox slid into the hall and backed his way toward Anwei, eager to be finished with the job.

When he got to the study door, Anwei was sticking her tongue out the side of her mouth in concentration, breathing in softly as if she could somehow smell the lock open. Knox looked away when a dark tendril of purple bled through her aura, blocking her eyes.

She’s doing it again. Right in front of you.

Willow’s voice slipped into his mind, a whisper. So she wasn’t gone.

He recoiled, pushing the voice away. Fenced it off in his head, built a wall of brick and stone and ivy and iron around it, but still he could feel his fingers twitching for the pockmarked sword. Calsta’s power had shielded him from that voice for so many years, but lately the goddess’s fire had been too weak in the face of Willow’s ice.

Just stand a little closer, Willow hummed. That’s all I ask. Her aura is right there.…

Knox took a step forward.

Calsta’s voice warmed his thoughts, but it was as if she was far away. Stay where you are, Knox.

Knox looked down at his hands. They’d come up, stretching toward Anwei. He reached for Calsta, for her burning fire. Help me! he called.

Her voice was barely a whisper. I can’t help you now. That’s why I brought you to Anwei.

Anwei? Knox couldn’t focus his eyes, Willow like a frozen blade stabbing into the center of his brain. Calsta… please… you know what is going on. You know how to stop Willow. Why won’t you just tell me? Why don’t you just fix it, the way you promised back when I first found Willow with the sword!

But Calsta was only a flicker of flame, not the burning wall that had protected him from his sister at the beginning. So he tried to do as she said. Knox grasped for the spot of Anwei in his head, hiding underneath it just the way he’d hidden under her aura that day on the wall.

Immediately Willow’s claws of ice seemed to melt away. Not erasing her—he could still hear her muttering at the back of his head, but a weight had been pulled from his hands and arms, as if Willow had been trying to wrest control away from him, and he’d noticed only when she couldn’t touch him anymore.

Anwei looked up abruptly, sending a flutter of alarm through Knox. He was wearing her like a coat, hiding under her like a blanket, and she was just looking at him, confused. “You all right?” she asked, the lock clicking open under her fingers.

“I…” Knox’s whole body was shaking. Anwei suddenly felt altogether too close, too intimate inside his mind.

The night before last, Calsta had been painfully direct in telling Knox not to let himself get distracted by Anwei, and now she was saying this mind-bonding awfulness had been the plan the whole time? That somehow the goddess was losing the battle with Willow in his head, and so she was tying him to a Basist instead? How was that supposed to work?

Knox gritted his teeth as he pushed through the governor’s study door. The problem was, that seemed about right for Calsta. It was like she had an entire plan for fixing Willow, fixing Knox, fixing the world maybe, only she hadn’t told anyone and was doing it backward.

The study was crowded with the rich purples and reds of old leather. Shelves of books lined each wall, the old tomes interspersed with little bits of pointless junk that only rich men seemed to find interesting. The governor’s desk squatted at the center of the room, bent under the weight of scrolls and a thick sheaf of vellum. While Anwei locked the door behind them, Knox went to the desk. He flipped through the loose sheets for anything about the dig, uncomfortable even looking at his friend.

“I don’t see anything here.…” Knox glanced up to find Anwei pulling the florist’s tunic over her head. He dropped his eyes, concentrating on the letters in front of him. Something about fish. Lake fishery quotas. Fishhooks. Fish… food?

“It doesn’t have sleeves.” Anwei’s voice caught.

Knox chanced looking up again. Anwei was holding the silvery-gray dress to her shoulders, ruffles cascading to the floor from the waist. She was still wearing a long-sleeved undertunic that covered her up to her neck and down to her wrists, the medicine bag with its extra padding discarded on the floor next to her.

“I told her it had to have sleeves.…” She poked the neckline, which appeared to be slit clear to the knees.

Crouching, Knox started opening desk drawers. The first was full of inkwells and quills, weights for scrolls. “Wear your tunic under it.” That would be better for him as well. Much less to look at.

Anwei pulled the cascade of gray-silver ripples over her head. He glanced up when she started laughing. The dress had thin straps that hardly seemed capable of holding the weight of the ruffles, the neck plunging down to Anwei’s waist. It was made from a shiny fabric that was creased and rumpled by design, her undertunic a glaring white against the silvery color. It looked, at best, awkward. “We’re supposed to fit in, Knox.”

“You look fine. No one is going to be paying attention to dresses when we meet up with Noa. They’ll all be screaming about ghosts. Are you doing the shelves?”

He could almost feel Anwei rolling her eyes at him before she moved to the other side of the room, where the shelves were stacked with papers rather than books. Turning back to the desk, Knox found the second drawer full of vellum bound into ledgers. Shuffling through them, all he found was house logs and inventory lists. The third drawer was locked. The fourth was full of odds and ends. No dig reports.

“I need you to do this drawer with your picks when you’re done with those shelves. Unless you find something first.” Knox pointed at the locked drawer, making sure Anwei saw it before he moved to the shelves opposite her. He ran his fingers along the books’ spines, searching for anything that looked official, but there was nothing except for a complete history of the Commonwealth, several guides to Elantin sculpture, a beautiful atlas, and three separate copies of A Thousand Nights in Urilia. One of them had been shoved hurriedly behind a row of books, the scandalous drawings inside hidden from view.

“About twelve minutes left, including the walk to the entry hall,” Anwei said from where she was crouched in front of the desk, jamming her picks into the drawer’s lock. When she pulled the drawer open, Anwei gave an aggravated sigh. “Nothing in here but a report about some kind of assassination attempt… some letters…” Her voice caught. “Letters from the Warlord.”

Knox spun around. “What?”

“Knox, she’s coming here.” Anwei held up a sheet of rice paper, her eyes wide. But then she looked at it again, her mouth pursing. “Maybe it’s not so bad.”

Panic was like a wild thing inside of Knox. “Not so bad? Anwei, if she comes to Chaol—”

“To discipline the valas?” Anwei waved the thin paper at him. “And to inspect the dig? She’s not here for you any more than the Devoted are.”

“It doesn’t matter why any of them are here.” He forced his hands to keep searching. The Warlord. She was coming. “They’ll find me.”

“Honestly, you aren’t that self-centered, are you?” Anwei was using that playful tone that stung the most because she wasn’t trying to hurt him as she teased, but it still sort of did. “They probably haven’t given you a second thought. You’re free.”

“Free Devoted aren’t a thing.” Knox went to the next shelf, frantically looking for anything that might be of help. Only, he knew what was going to help: finding the shapeshifter.

She’s going to try to take me away. Willow’s voice slunk through a crack in the defenses he’d made of Anwei. Master Helan probably told her all about me, so she knows why you ran away.…

“Are the reports in there?” Knox asked, his voice a croak. Lia was here in Chaol. And she’d disappeared. What had seemed like an impossible circumstance suddenly bloomed into all his worst nightmares. Everyone knew Lia hated the seclusion. He would at least have stopped to listen if she’d shown up at the apothecary door asking for help, and the Warlord must have known it. Lia missing had to be a trap.

The thought twisted like a knife in his gut. Lia wouldn’t be party to such a scheme, not if it meant he’d die. Would she?

“No reports… oh, wait a second.” Anwei’s voice turned him around. “This thing has a false bottom. But why would he hide…” She grunted. “Come help me.”

Knox walked back to the desk to kneel across the drawer from Anwei. She pointed toward the far side, gesturing to the wooden drawer bottom. “I think if you pull up while I press here…”

Jamming his fingers into the tiny gap, Knox pulled up the bottom with a jerk. A spray of dust jetted out from the opening directly into his face.

Anwei froze, her hands groping for her medicine bag. “Knox, don’t move.”

Knox obeyed, his muscles going taut. The dusty smell crawled up his nostrils, then wormed down his throat and into his mouth. He sneezed.

Anwei pulled out three separate envelopes from her bag, muttering angrily to herself. “The nameless god must be laughing.” She threw one of the packets back into her bag and grabbed for another one. “It’s poison, Knox, and I didn’t smell it. How could I not have smelled it until it was in the air? I knew something was odd down there, but it was masked somehow… the dirt on these papers, or… it shouldn’t have been enough to block poison.” She swore, dumping little red petals into another of the envelopes, purple strings twisting through her aura like little worms.

“What is it?” Knox kept his voice calm.

“Does it matter? I don’t have the right things to get rid of it. Best I can do here is slow it down.”

The feeling of fullness in Knox’s nose and mouth began to press against the back of his throat, the skin and tissue stretching tighter than a first khonin’s purse. Anwei extracted what looked suspiciously like bug legs from the third envelope and added them to her mix, then began furiously kneading the little pouch with her fingers. The purple strings in her aura thickened, turning syrupy and grotesque.

“Anwei.” Knox choked on her name. Willow was breathing in his head, pulsing bigger at the sight of Basist magic coursing through the air. “You can’t… you can’t do that.”

Anwei’s fingers stopped, and her eyes narrowed when she saw him looking at the envelope. A cough bubbled up from Knox’s throat, tearing out of him like a fistful of gravel. “Just so we’re clear, you’d rather die right here in the governor’s study, where they’ll strip you down and give your body to the wardens to use for target practice, than let me help you?”

Willow began pushing against Knox, testing the barrier Anwei made in his head. I’m so hungry, Knox.

“That’s n-not what I… m-meant,” he stuttered. He could barely speak, his hands flexing and clenching. His throat was burning, the roof of his mouth on fire. The purple strands congealed, turning opaque around Anwei’s face, and his connection to her seemed to fray, Willow seeping through the holes. Shapeshifters. My job is to stop them. If I let Anwei do this… He couldn’t let her use the nameless god’s magic on him. And if he did, what would Willow do? She’d talked about hunger, about feeding, and now she was suddenly stronger. What do I do, Calsta?

But Calsta wasn’t there. As usual.

Anwei was staring at him, rage and sadness like a war in her eyes. The thoughts in Knox’s head turned gummy, melting together. Anwei was beautiful. Anwei was made of purple smoke. Anwei was the nameless god’s. He shook his head, trying to clear it. “For Calsta’s sake, just fix it.”

Then her fingers were in his mouth, pushing his tongue up and emptying a foul-tasting powder underneath. He gagged, sagging to the ground.

“Hold it in your mouth until I tell you. Then swallow.” Anwei’s arm threaded under his, guiding him back until his spine hit the desk. She moved next to him, but his eyes were underwater, all of him was underwater until she thrust something into his face. A small glass bottle from her bag. “Open and swallow.”

The word settled in his head, the meaning taking a beat too long because Anwei pressed a hand on his cheeks, forcing his mouth open and emptying the vial inside. He swallowed it gratefully, the taste of glass on his tongue.

“You’ll be clear for a few minutes—it might come and go, but if we don’t get you back to the apothecary in the next half hour, you’ll die.” Anwei’s cheeks were pale as she dove into the locked drawer, pulled out a book, and flicked it open. The first page seemed to be a map of some kind. The rest were sketches and lists that swam before Knox’s eyes. “This is exactly what we were looking for. He’ll see if it’s gone… but we don’t have time… and he’ll see the poison was triggered even if I put it back.…” That seemed to decide it for her. She grabbed Noa’s bag and the padding she’d had under her tunic and threw them into the drawer. The book and the lockpicks went into her medicine bag, though they hardly fit, the seams on her bag straining.

The burning in Knox’s throat had begun to recede. Anwei rammed the false bottom back into the drawer, dropped the letters on top of it, then slammed it shut. She grabbed Knox’s arm and helped him up, his head spinning. The floor seemed to be washing this way and that under his feet like a beach in the tide.

She’s right there, Knox, and I need her. I need more or I’ll be gone forever. You have to take her.

Willow again.

Knox screwed his eyes shut, pressing his hands to both sides of his head until it began to hurt. The ghost’s voice was running through him like acid, and he didn’t even know what she was asking. “Go away,” he murmured to himself. The connection with Anwei had helped, so he concentrated on her warm glow once again. Willow’s icy cold drew back a hair.

“Knox? We have to move. You have to walk.”

A flare of energy blossomed next to him, Anwei crowned in purple as she pulled him toward the door. Knox opened his eyes to look at it. It was beautiful, her magic. The thought felt wrong, like watching a thousand murders only to find one performed gracefully and calling it art.

It wasn’t murder, though. She wasn’t murder. She was Anwei.

Willow shrank back with a cry as the bond seemed to grow, burning up inside of Knox. But then he was too close. He could feel Anwei’s concentration as she forced his stumbling feet past the desk. He could feel her fear, the weight of him pulling her sideways as she tried to support him. Anwei looked up at him suddenly as a swirl of inky purple washed across her face, and she jerked back in alarm, swatting at the insubstance of her own aura as if she was seeing it for the first time.

Knox hurriedly pulled his mind back from his partner, closing his eyes and concentrating on making his feet move toward the door. But there was something wrong. A sound like tapping coming from outside that shouldn’t have been there.

Anwei grabbed for the door latch just as the sound pushed through the fuzz stuffing Knox’s head. He lurched forward, knocking her hand away. “Someone is coming!”