The palace was a crumbling ruin, walls and windows bulging outwards grotesquely. In places, sections of masonry had already collapsed or windows shattered, and from within spilled pulsating fungal growths so purple they were almost black. They were digging into the mushroom-festooned cobbles of the square, squirming blindly over the fallen bodies of feastgoers, palace guards and infected alike. Aelyn found her gaze drawn skywards, towards the ghastly spectre that hung above the city, and she flinched as she realised that its expression had changed subtly. Surely features wrought from mountainous stone couldn’t change – and yet she was sure they had. The Bad Moon grinned ghoulishly, and she almost felt it was waiting for something.

As though the thought had brought it, the ground shuddered beneath her feet.

‘Another shockwave,’ gasped Bartiman, teeth gritted as Romilla did what she could to patch up his wounded shoulder.

‘No, that was something else,’ said Aelyn. ‘Something from below. We need to move quickly, now!’

The ground shuddered again, and across the square she saw a drain cover fly into the air like a cork from a bottle of spice-wine. Aelyn grimaced as something black and undulating flowed up out of the ragged hole it left. Insects, she realised: thousands of squirming, ­scuttling beetles and millipedes and realms knew what else.

‘Really, we need to move right now,’ she urged. Borik and Olt appeared at her side, accompanied by Morthan and all nine of the watchmen who had crammed into the carriage with her. The captain’s followers gaped in open horror at the state of the palace, recoiling as another wing burst asunder and collapsed to reveal more bulging, swelling fungus.

‘We’ll meet you in Fountains Square,’ called Romilla as she, Barti­man and a limping Eleanora hurried away towards the city end of the tunnel.

‘Cover your skin as best you can,’ replied Aelyn, wishing she had not left her hooded cloak behind at the inn. ‘Only what it touches, remember?’

Romilla waved understanding, and the three of them pulled sleeves down, dragged hoods forwards, and did whatever else they could do to keep the moon’s light from their flesh.

‘And stay alive,’ muttered Aelyn as her comrades departed.

‘Let’s concentrate on doing that ourselves, shall we?’ asked Helena Morthan, looking grim.

‘Now or never,’ said Borik, eyeing the spreading tide of darkness that was the insect swarm. It looked like oil, spilling over the moon-slick cobbles. ‘I’ve no desire to get in the way of that lot.’

‘On my word, then,’ said Aelyn. Fear tried to clamp itself around her heart at the thought of stepping out into the open beneath that daemon moon once more, but she knew it had to be done. It was that or flee the city they had sworn to save, and for her, that had now become a quest that both the Saul brothers had died for. She would be damned to Shyish before she abandoned their memories.