Jezal watched the figures come closer, trudging along the crumbling track that led up through the steep rocks to the temple, a great deal of space between the two of them, almost as if they were walking separately. Closer still, and they began to look like two prisoners that had escaped from hell. Their clothes were ripped, and torn, and utterly filthy, their dirty faces were hard as a pair of stones. Ferro had a scabbed-over gash across her forehead. Logen's jaw was a mass of grazes, the skin round his eyes stained with dark bruising.

Jezal took a hopping step towards them. 'What happened? How did—'

'Nothing happened,' barked Ferro.

'Nothing at all,' growled Ninefingers, and the two of them scowled angrily at each other. Plainly, they had both gone through some awful ordeal that neither one wished to discuss. Ferro stalked straight to the cart without the slightest greeting and started rooting through the back. Logen stood, hands on his hips, frowning grimly after her.

'So…' mumbled Jezal, not quite sure what to say, 'are you alright?'

Logen's eyes swivelled to his. 'Oh, I'm grand,' he said, with heavy irony. 'Never better. How the hell did you get that cart out of there?'

The apprentice shrugged. 'The horses pulled it out.'

'Master Quai has a gift for understatement,' chuckled Longfoot nervously. 'It was a most exhilarating ride to the city's South Gate—'

'Fight your way out, did you?'

'Well, not I, of course, fighting is not my—'

'Didn't think so.' Logen leaned over and spat sourly onto the mud.

'We should at least consider being grateful,' croaked Bayaz, the air sighing and crackling in his throat as he breathed in. 'There is much to be grateful for, after all. We are all still alive.'

'You sure?' snapped Ferro. 'You don't look it.' Jezal found himself in silent agreement there. The Magus could not have looked worse if he had actually died in Aulcus. Died, and already begun to decompose.

She ripped off her rag of a shirt and flung it savagely on the ground, sinews shifting across her scrawny back. 'Fuck are you looking at?' she snarled at Jezal.

'Nothing,' he muttered, staring down at the dirt. When he dared to look up she was buttoning a fresh one up the front. Well, not entirely fresh. He had been wearing it himself a few days ago.

'That's one of mine…' Ferro looked up at him with a glare so murderous that Jezal found himself taking a hesitant step back. 'But you're welcome to it… of course…'

'Ssss,' she hissed, jamming the hem violently down behind her belt, frowning all the while as if she was stabbing a man to death. Probably him. All in all, it was hardly the tearful reunion that Jezal might have hoped for, even if he did now feel somewhat like crying.