Lily appeared in view, her face brimming with incipient thunder. Constans hooked his hand into claws and spun gleefully towards her.

“Then you’d best hurry,” said Josiri. “I fear you’re about to lose a son.”

“There are limits to all things,” Malachi said airily. Lily stalked back up the garden path, her hand tight about Constans’ collar. “But you’re right. He’ll be my son for the foreseeable future. I hope he learns better sense as he grows.”

“The same might be said of us all. I’ve made poor decisions of late. I can’t afford any more.”

And there it was: brotherhood born of common cause. Or something so near to it that divergence didn’t matter. “Viktor was right to send you to me.”

“Viktor has an annoying knack for being right. Can you help him?”

“Yes.” Malachi imbued the word with confidence, and hoped it was true. “Hadon may not often see eye-to-eye with his son, but I can’t imagine he’ll allow Viktor to go to the pyre. Given the Council’s denuded state, that’s no small prize.”

Josiri set his back to the garden. “What’s happened to the Council?”

“What hasn’t happened? We were five, saving yourself. We’re now three. Lord Tarev embraced the Raven and so, they’re saying, did Lady Marest.”

“You don’t believe that?”

“As a vranakin tried to kill me less than a week back, no I do not. Neither do Ebigail nor Hadon.” Malachi forced a smile he didn’t feel. “A rare moment of unity.”

“Hence the curfew?”

“Hadon’s idea. Ebigail backed him. I don’t blame her. Her daughter’s missing. Knowing the Crowmarket, that means she’s dead. But curfews don’t stop assassins. They simply make everyone feel . . . safe.”

“My mother spoke of the Crowmarket,” said Josiri. “She sought their help, but the price was too steep.”

Malachi shuddered. Given the ease with which the kernclaw had infiltrated his home, it was easy to conjure how Katya’s rebellion might otherwise have ended. “Did she say what they wanted?”

“They wanted her. Obedient and blind. But my mother was nobody’s puppet.”

“So I understand.” A newly freed Southshires would have been profitable ground for the Crowmarket. “She made the right decision.”

“Did she? I think her pride got in the way. One life in sway to the Crowmarket to free thousands. It’s not such a poor trade, is it?”

The skin on the back of Malachi’s neck prickled. “If you thought that, you’d have made your own deal by now.”

“Maybe I’m proud, too. But maybe I’m learning to put that aside. I’m hoping you’ll offer a different path.”

He spoke the words as simple matter-of-fact, without malice. But there was threat, all the same.