“Shut up, both of you, stop distracting me,” said Storme. “Almost . . . ah. Brace yourself, Ayla.”

Panicked, Ayla screwed her eyes shut. There was a weird smell, like sharp bitter smoke, then a noise like a dozen snakes hissing at once. Then a flare of heat on her inner wrists, painful enough that she sucked in a breath—and the iron manacles cracked open like oyster shells, releasing another curl of smoke just as she dared open her eyes. They fell from her wrists, clanking on the stone floor.

“Oh,” said Ayla. “Well, all right.”

Storme snorted. Within a minute, he’d repeated the same process for Crier.

“Let’s get out of here,” he said.

Rubbing her aching wrists, Ayla got to her feet. Crier was still crouching; she seemed a little shell-shocked. Ayla bent down, holding out a hand. “Come on, Just Crier,” she said. “Time to go.”

Crier’s dark eyes flicked to Ayla’s hand. She took it, and Ayla pulled her upright, and—there was a moment in which Crier was standing over her, very close, and Ayla was tilting her chin up to meet Crier’s gaze. Their hands were clasped between them.

“Will you please,” Storme whisper-yelled from the doorway.

They followed him, slipping out of the cell and into the dark stone corridor beyond, and they did not let go.

Storme led them through the veins of the Heart. It was clear something was going on—they kept hearing what sounded like distant explosions.

“That’ll be the diversion,” Storme said. As they ran, he explained: “Me and Queen Junn’ve been keeping an eye on these mountains for ages. We’ve been spying on the Watchers, tracking the shipments of heartstone, trying like hell to find the Heart itself. Trying to find a way inside. But we weren’t just spying on the Watchers. Junn’s always known Kinok would be a greater threat than anyone believed. Since the beginning, since the first whispers of him leaving his post as Watcher of the Heart, she knew. She said, Nobody does something like that unless they’ve got something else planned. Something much bigger.”

He led them down a corridor so narrow they had to walk sideways, inching their way along the wall. “Shortcut, sorry. Anyway. That’s why we went on that ‘diplomacy tour,’ that’s why we visited the sovereign’s palace. To observe Kinok. Maybe you already knew that, Lady Crier.”

They emerged from the shortcut and Ayla’s stomach dropped—there were people waiting for them on the other side. But they were dressed in green, the queen’s emerald green, the crest of the phoenix at their throats. Three humans, two Automae, all of them grimy, the humans panting and bloodied.

“Adviser Storme,” said one of the Automae. “The human prisoners have been delivered to safety. Only two of our own have fallen. We’ve come to retrieve you.”

“Wait,” Ayla blurted out. “Which human prisoners?”

The Automa gave her an odd look. “I believe they were captured earlier today. From the mountain pass.”

Ayla and Crier exchanged a glance. “There’s more,” Ayla said. “Not all of them are alive, but—there’s this room in a corridor right off the forge, round like a hatch. There are humans inside. They’re being tortured, they’re badly hurt, they need help. Please.” She turned to Storme. “Please. I’ll go alone if I have to.”