Feastbeggars crept toward me in torn robes, reaching with crooked fingers. But smoke drifted into the tunnel, and they halted. Their onyx eyes swam. “The master has come!” Their whispers rushed like wind as they bowed to someone behind me.

Mirkra cried, “Run!” and a feastbeggar pounced toward his cell.

I couldn’t move.

Nightflesh was silent, like he wasn’t breathing.

My watery gaze fell to my Revelation Orb flickering light beneath my shirt. A quiet hymn touched my ears; a tune I knew.

“Zane?” I rasped, spinning. I blanched when I realized what I’d done.

Hidden in the darkness, a tall shadow watched me from behind a metal helmet.

I gasped awake, the warmth of my orb dissipating at my chest. Someone held me, the scent of pine and mint flooding my senses.

“What did they bloody do to you?!” Zane yelled.

I blinked at the log room, the slat ceiling, the hanging chains. I flung around and pressed my ear against Zane’s chest, listening for the sweet, slow tune. A hot tear spilled away as my fingers curled around his jacket.

“Helen, I thought you’d been whipsteamed to death when they tossed you in!” Zane’s arms tightened around me; I could feel his heart slamming against my cheek.

Slowly, I unpeeled my fingers. It took me a few tries before I was able to speak. “You got treated worse than I did,” I rasped. “I don’t have any bruises.”

Zane grunted. “They didn’t hit me to make me talk, Trite. They hit me because that soldier spoke to me in a scotchy, condescending tone. So I slapped the snooty pine sipper.”

I laughed through a mix of tears, lip quivering.

Zane tugged me off him and held me out, squinting to look me over. “Lucas and your sister are still untouched. I’ve been tossing cutlery with the sputtlepuns since you left. The fork and spoon keep coming back, so they must still be over there.”

As he said it, two pieces of brass cutlery soared through the gaps in our ceiling and clanked off the log wall.

I crouched and dragged the spoon to myself. “I saw him.” My voice dipped. I bit my lips together so I wouldn’t whimper like a child. “Nightflesh.”

After a long moment of silence, Zane picked up the fork and twirled it slowly in his fingers. He dropped to a knee and tilted the spoon in my hand so that I could see myself in the warped, oval mirror.

“It’s no brush,” he said, holding up the fork, “and I’m no Apple Dough. But if it’ll bring you a pinch of cheer, Helen, I’ll fix you up best I can.”

Zane took a lock of my frayed, knotted hair and began combing through it.