Ironic, then, that Viktor welcomed the quiet. It allowed him to bend his full concentration on his shadow, which hissed and spat beneath the silver manacles like a beast before flame. It worried and wearied at Viktor’s fading reserves, little caring that its freedom was the very proof Hargo desired.

And so Viktor hung in the near silence, eyes closed and torso sheeted in sweat. His skin crackled and tugged where the sun-staves had seared it. Wounds taken in battle with the Hadari had reopened under the strain, setting bloody rivulets trickling across his skin. And then there were the newer wounds – those opened by silvered needles at the points scripture taught offered access to the soul. Black blood for a black soul. Scarlet for a healthy one.

Thus far, Viktor’s had tended towards the scarlet. But if his shadow seeped free, who knew what dark miracles might be wrought?

He strove not to think of past or future, only the moment at hand – and when that moment had gone, the one that replaced it. But each existed only in a haze of pain.

Through the weariness, through the pain, Viktor clung closer to Calenne than ever. He’d see her again, whatever it took.

The cell door creaked open. Viktor opened a blood-crusted eye. Hargo held his leather satchel and a firestone lantern, his escort a sun-stave.

“Good morning, Viktor.” As ever, Hargo sounded overwhelmed with tedium. A man doing necessary work, all the while wishing he were elsewhere. “I thought we might renew our conversation?”

“When I get down from here, you’ll wish we’d never met.”

“Is that so?”

Fire blazed across Viktor’s spine – the familiar strike of a sun-stave at the small of his back. Viktor sagged against his manacles. This too was a moment, no longer or shorter than the others he’d endured. This too would pass. He closed his eyes.

The sentries wore the forest green surcoats of the Knights Essamere. For a moment Josiri was back on the battlefield, lost in the shouting, striving mob – fighting beside the survivors of Calenne’s charge. Less than a week, and yet more than a lifetime ago.

Malachi took Josiri by the elbow and led him away across the empty drill square.

“You’ve nothing to fear,” he said. “Kaleo Tassandra is an old friend.”

Josiri shook his head. Malachi wanted so badly to be liked, and to be trusted. While Josiri had little trouble acceding to the former, he knew the latter would come only with time, if it came at all.

“The mistress of a chapterhouse sounds like a useful friend to have.”

But then his mother had thought that too, hadn’t she? And at the end, every chapterhouse had betrayed that friendship.

“I’m not good enough for you?” Malachi smiled away his offence. “I’m sure introduction can be arranged. But you’ll have to wait until after I’ve presented you to the Privy Council.”