Gerrin set his slab of stubbled jaw and turned, grabbing Cabel by the arm. He pulled him into motion, drawing him toward the door. “It’ll be all right, boy. You’ll get the help you need on the other side.” The youth’s eyes were big and bright with fear, where once they’d been dark and devious, the eyes of a killer. It was sad to see him fallen so low.

The pair disappeared inside.

It happened so quickly, no more than a blink; one minute they were there, then they were not, swallowed up by the lightless, soundless, void. Harden sucked a breath. “Where…they just vanished.”

Ilith presented that smile. “The portal is no normal door, Harden. It moves matter through space almost instantaneously. It is too quick for the eyes to see.”

It did not help with Harden’s anxiety, try as he might to hide it. A rictus smile clung to his thin grey lips. “They’ll be there, then? In Ilithor, already?”

“It will only take a few moments,” Ilith confirmed. “To them it may seem slightly longer, but not to us. Sir Gerrin will return to us shortly.”

He was right. Once more, it happened in a blink, Gerrin reappearing as though from thin air, popping into existence before them. Harden stumbled back in surprise, gasping, and almost fell. Embarrassingly, it was Amilia who had to steady him.

Gerrin went to one knee, breathing hard. He shook his head, staring down at the stone, steadying himself, then stood. Several hard blinks and he was ready to speak. “Cabel’s through. Tunnel’s clear. Bit of fallen debris, but…” He took a further moment to compose himself, rubbing at his eyes, grimacing. A gnarled finger stabbed into his right ear, twisting. Then he went on. “But the tunnel looks clear, from the glance I got. Won’t know for sure until we start the trek, though.”

Harden was staring at him. “How was it?” Jonik had never seen him so tense, this grim spare sellsword who’d travelled half the world. It was almost enough to make him laugh. Harden glanced over at him, scowling, as though knowing. Then he looked back at Gerrin. “It’s not so bad, is it?”

“It’s fine. Strange, but fine. Best just get it over with, Harden. Like jumping into a lake. Sink or swim.”

“I can’t swim.”

Gerrin shrugged. “Just do it.”

“Fine.” Harden stepped forward, pausing as he stared into the shimmering nothingness, the empty space, shuddering. Jonik could almost smell the piss leaking down his leg. For a long moment he just stared, delaying. Jonik gave a silent sigh, met eyes with Gerrin, nodded, and the former Shadowmaster closed in behind Harden, quiet as a cat. One hard shove and the sellsword was tumbling forward, vanishing, his grunt of surprise abruptly cut short.

Ilith gave a chuckle. “That is one way of doing it.”

“Some men need a little push, my lord.” Gerrin grinned and reached out a hand, palm up. “Your Highness,” he said to Amilia. “There really is nothing to fear.”

The princess snorted. “Do I look frightened?” She strode forth, chin raised, her long lustrous brown hair bouncing at the small of her back. She brushed aside Gerrin’s hand, said, “I’ll see you in a moment,” to Jonik, with a side-glance, and was gone. Not so much as a look at Ilith in parting, which Jonik understood, though didn’t much like.

“Gerrin,” he said, “go after her. Make sure Harden didn’t land too awkwardly.”

There was a twist of Gerrin’s lips, and glint in his hard grey eyes, and into the void he went.

Then it was just the two of them. The demigod and his herald. “I will speak to her, my lord,” Jonik said. “I know you would like her to help.”

“She will. In time.”

Do we have time? He decided not to ask. “I’ll return as soon as I can. With another blade or bearer at my side.”

Ilith nodded, staring forward. There was something sad in his eyes all of a sudden, as though a memory was resurfacing, something painful, a recollection of regret. “I was going to link all the north,” he said, in a voice that was half a whisper.

Jonik barely heard him. “My lord?”

“This portal, Jaycob. It was to be the first of many, a network to connect us, bring us closer together. Can you imagine? A web of these pathways, opening to all the major cities in the north? How easy would it have been, then, to do what must be done?”

Jonik did not know what to say. He chose flattery, and truth. “You built the world, my lord. Isn’t that enough? There is no one in all history so respected as you.”

His smile twinkled, though a little less brightly, as a dying star in the high night sky. It seemed to Jonik that he had aged, a little. A sinking of the posture, a wrinkling about the eyes. It concerned him.

“My lord…”

“You are kind, Jaycob, to say so. Another man of great kindness said the same thing to me once. Right here, it was. Not long before I died.”

Jonik waited, wondering.

“Hamlyn,” Ilith whispered. A tear welled in his eye, dropping, wending down the side of his cheek to hold in the corner of his mouth. “Never was there anyone closer to me, Jaycob. That he died, so I could live…” He looked over. “Do you imagine a demigod’s heart could be broken?”

Jonik’s voice was choked. “I…suppose so, my lord.”

A sad smile tugged at Ilith’s lips. “Ignore me, young one. Here I am lamenting the loss of my friend and you…you stand before your dead mother. I am sorry. That was insensitive of me.”

“Not at all.” I never really knew her. He shuffled his feet, awkward. “And she is a great loss to you as well. To Tyrith, I mean…he knew her well.” Better than me. “He was as a son to her too.”

He sensed that’s what it was. Demigods did not weep, as far as Jonik knew. This was Tyrith’s influence, Tyrith’s emotion, Tyrith’s mortality and weakness.

“My lord, I should go. The others…”

“Of course. Yes, of course. They need you. The world needs you, Jaycob.”

Jonik bent down to lift his mother, carefully picking her up off the floor, cradling her. He caught a whiff of putrefaction, though the worst of the decay was kept behind the layers of linen. My own mother, rotting in my arms. He stepped toward the door, the black void filling his vision. Behind, the light of Ilith was glowing softly, radiating from his skin, his hair. Jonik had once been told that the hottest flames burned out the fastest. He glanced back, wondering. The spirit of a demigod, in the body of a mortal. How long can that flesh sustain him? How much time do we really have?

In Jonik’s head, a clock was ticking.

He stepped forward into the void.

3

“You’re welcome to rest here as long as you like,” Lord Botley Harrow said. “A minute, an hour, a day. Stay forever if you want. The gods know we could use you.”

Everywhere can use me, Elyon thought. “I stopped only to speak with you, my lord. I don’t mean to stay long.”

“Of course. Of course.” Lord Harrow lifted a hand to his mouth, suppressing an audible yawn. Such was the hour, and such the haste of Elyon’s arrival, that he had not been given proper time to dress. From beneath his nightrobes, thick, tree trunk legs sprouted, muscular at the calf, with slippers on his feet. His hair was dishevelled, heavy jaw thick with two-day stubble. “You’ll have to forgive the garb, Sir Elyon. If I’d known you were coming…”

“It’s late, Lord Harrow. You needn’t explain the nightclothes. I landed only to hear if you’d had any further word from Varinar?”

The man gave a despairing shake of the head. “None. Not since that crow came the day the city was attacked.” He rubbed at his forehead. “You spoke to my man, then? Sir Hutchin. I sent him as soon as I received Sir Bomfrey’s note.”

“He arrived at King’s Point only hours ago,” Elyon confirmed. “That’s why I’m here, my lord.” He turned his eyes across the lord’s chambers, where he’d been taken upon landing upon the high sturdy walls of Crosswater. On a table he saw a tray of sweetbreads, cheese and cured meats, with a large jug of wine on the side. He would not partake in any drinking, but the food was a welcome sight. “Do you mind if I…?”

“By all means, go ahead.”

Elyon stepped over to eat. Lord Harrow went with him, poured a large cup of wine, and drank deep. “So…King’s Point. How…how is it?”

Elyon took a bite of bread. “Destroyed,” he said, chewing. “Almost entirely in ruin. We lost over half our men.”