She edged sideways and looked down at the sea to their right. The Bay of Cantrassa reflected the moons, surging waves rippling across its surface picking up the death moon’s yellow and spreading it like a slick of rot. The life moon caught the very tops of the highest waves, as though trying to urge them higher. She leaned left, looked down at the land, and saw the seaport of Conbarma nestled in its own natural bay. She was glad that the fires of battle had been extinguished, though she could still smell the hint of cooked flesh on the breeze.

S’Hivez plunged his hands into the dead hawk’s neck and brought it down, curving into a glide that would take them into Conbarma from the sea. They passed just above the waves. The hawk’s trailing tentacles skimmed the water, throwing up lines of spray behind them, and by the time they reached the harbour there were several living hawks aloft, their Krote riders armed and ready to repel an attack.

Lenora managed a smile. How their moods would change when they saw what this thing brought in.

S’Hivez landed the hawk on the harbour’s edge. He extracted his hands from its dead flesh and flicked them at the air, sending fat and clotted blood to spatter the ground. Lenora wondered whether he saw the symbolism in this, but she guessed not. Angel had always been the one who loved the stories behind action or inaction. S’Hivez simply existed.

The hawk deflated beneath them, spreading across the ground like a hunk of melting fat, and immediately its stink grew worse. Lenora glanced at the boy lying between the Mages. His chest and stomach were open, as was his head, skull tipped back so that she could see the hollowness it contained. She wondered why Angel had brought him this far.

Lenora slipped from the hawk and had trouble finding her feet. Nobody came to help. She looked up, hands on knees, cringing as her legs tingled back to life, and then she realized why. The Krotes were not looking at her.

The Mages were kneeling side by side on the ground. Their hands were pressed to the dusty surface before them. S’Hivez seemed to be chanting, though it could have been the sound of the sea breaking rhythmically against the mole. Light began to dance between their fingers. Dust rose. Stones scurried away from their hands like startled insects.

Dozens of Krotes—those with whom she had flown from Dana’Man and fought for Conbarma little more than a day before—had gathered around, faces growing pale in the moonlight as they saw who had ridden in on this dead hawk. One or two glanced at Lenora and then away again, back to the Mages, fascination overpowering the fear that must surely be settling about them.