The Goat chortled. “A bolt in the gut won’t kill you for a day or two. A week with the charms I know. Oh, it’ll hurt like hellfire.” He lifted a shoulder. “But I’ll still get paid. Now come along quietly, unless you want a new rib when we get to Linura.” He pointed her in the direction of the ridge and the ruins at its top, to where the Hawk lay passed out.

“Up you get,” he said. “Let’s not wait for the grass to grow.”

“Why—”

“Think I don’t know where that tether leads? Walk.”

Anji watched the Goat snatch up the blue bag. He studied it for a heartbeat, then tied it to his belt and made a shooing motion with one hand. She set her jaw and trudged up the slope.

Keeping her arms up made the trek more treacherous than the journey down. She stumbled a few times—much to the Goat’s delight. They ascended in silence but for Anji’s panting breaths and the man’s boots stomping in a steady rhythm at her back. She wondered whether the Goat would shoot the Hawk while she slept or cut her throat.

Her knees buckled as they came level with the ruins. She gasped in air as the Goat aimed his crossbow into the darkness.

“Hawk!” he cried, voice echoing through the pass despite the mask. When no reply came, he motioned with the crossbow.

“You first,” he said.

But no trace of the Hawk remained among the ruins, save for a spot of bare rock where she had lain. Keeping the bow pointed at Anji, the Goat slipped one of the glass tubes from his belt and shook it in one gloved hand. The walls illuminated in brilliant purple light, revealing nothing but snow and stone.

“Where is she?” said the Goat, rounding on Anji. Her hands shot into the air again without instruction as he shoved her back out onto the trail.

“How should I know?” she said, and though she would have lied just to spite the man and his hideous mask, she was being honest. “We’re not exactly bosom friends.” She scanned the ridge, vacant save for the Scorphice’s corpse, in which the Goat showed little interest. Her stomach turned at the sight of it lying in a crumpled mess atop the slope, its eerie white carapace coming into vivid relief with the day’s growing light. The sky was now empty of stars, lightening to deep purple.

The Goat clicked his tongue. “Blast it,” he said, craning his neck from one side of the gully to the other. “Hawk! Show yourself! I’ve got your prize here. Shame if I were to walk right off without—”

“Will you shut up?” Anji hissed, slapping at the Goat’s arm. “You’ll start an avalanche, you idiot—”