The Scorphice shuddered under her, loosing not a roar, but a whimper. Anji heard a hiss from where she’d stabbed it, like steam issuing from a cooling kettle. She gripped the sword’s hilt, pushing it farther, deeper—the cold steel digging into her palms until she couldn’t press anymore—until her arms shook. The hilt trembled and Anji squeezed at the leather grip as the thing descended to the ground, its many legs clacking out of sync. Warmth spread around her knees as blue-black blood gurgled from the wound, glossy eyes twitching, taking a last accusing look at Anji. It clicked one claw in a spasm, the other dragging through the snow. Anji wrenched the sword out and made to stab into the soft meat again, more if she had to, but as soon as she raised the sword her leg slipped and she fell to the ground, her shoulder exploding in pain as the world upended.

The Hawk was there, a shadow blotting out the newly risen moon. She bent and tugged at Anji’s jacket collar. Anji kicked her legs, trying to stand, to gain purchase on the slick ground, now an exposed layer of ice under swept-away snow. She finally got to her feet, chest heaving, shoulder throbbing, and let the Hawk hustle her away from the dying thing. They collapsed as the Scorphice crumbled in on itself, claws and spiked legs scraping huge gouges into the ice.

Anji knelt in the snow, watching the result of what her hands had done. She blinked at the Scorphice, beautiful even in its death throes, leaking steaming black blood over the trail. It scrabbled toward the ledge, toward its home far below, but collapsed in a heap of bloody limbs. She felt sick watching it die. Wished it would just get on with it, but much like Molli, much like Rolandrian even, death came slow, and traumatic, and gasping to the last. The Scorphice’s legs clattered against the bare rock of the trail, sending bits of stone flying. It hissed and cried and whimpered, let out a horrid convulsion, and finally lay still.

Something crunched in the snow at Anji’s side, and she spun, sword raised. But it was only the Hawk, back on her feet with one gloved hand out.

Anji gripped the leather hilt and jerked away.

“Don’t—” the Hawk panted, her sword’s tip at Anji’s throat like it had been forged there. “You know better. Save your strength.”

Every muscle, every frayed fiber of Anji’s being wanted to strike, to fight to the last. But the Hawk was right. She was outmatched, manacled, and utterly exhausted. She just wanted to throw up and lie down and shut herself away in a dark hole somewhere.

Avoiding eye contact, she handed the sword over.

The Hawk sheathed it, her spare still poised at Anji’s neck. She dipped her head toward the structure down the trail.