Ah, well. It was a pleasant thought.

Ahead, voices echoed; a madlings’ clamor, but with something else running through it, a single voice like a silver thread. The incline had ended at last, the path level beneath his feet. Frowning, Vorax quickened his stride. There was light ahead; not marrow-fire, but candlelight, warm and golden. Through a narrowing passage, he glimpsed it. He picked his way with care, easing shoulder-first into the gap. His armor scraped along the rocks, getting scratched and dented in the process.

Unexpectedly, the passage widened.

Vorax stumbled into open space, catching himself. It was a rough-hewn chamber, a natural space vastened by the efforts of a hundred generations chipping at the stone walls. Everywhere, butt-ends of tallow candles burned, wedged into every available niche and crevice. Scraps and oddments of carpet covered the floor, and the walls were covered with scratched messages; some legible, most a garble of words. There must have been a dozen madlings gathered, light glimmering from their eyes. All of them whispered, hissing and muttering to one another.

One was kneeling before the figure who stood in the center of the chamber, grimy fingers plucking at the hem of her blue robe as he raised a face filled with hope. “Me?” he said. “Me? Lady see me?”

The Lady Cerelinde bent her head, cupping the madling’s face with both hands. Her hair spilled forward, shimmering in the candlelight, veiling her features. “Ludo,” she said softly, her silvery voice ringing. “You were a wheelwright’s son. I see you, Ludo. I see what might have been. I see you with a plump wife, smiling, and laughing children chasing one another in your father’s yard.”

“Lady!” He gasped the word, face shining and distorted with tears, and rocked back and forth, wringing the hem of her robe. “Lady, Lady, yes!”

Cerelinde released him with a gentle smile, lifted her head—and froze.

The madlings wailed in chorus.

“Lady.” Vorax took a further step into the chamber, his sword rasping free of its scabbard. He met her oddly fearless gaze, and the blood seemed to sing in his veins, a high-pitched tone ringing in his head. He raised the blade, angling it for a solid blow, watching her expose the vulnerable column of her throat as her gaze followed the sword. His voice, when he spoke, sounded strange to his ears. “What is it you do in this place?”

“I might ask you the same,” she said calmly. “Do you desire a glimpse of what might have been, Lord Vorax? It is a small magic, one of the few which the Rivenlost are afforded, but I am willing to share it. All you must do is consent in your heart to know.”

He gritted his teeth. “That, I do not.”