Melanna Saranal’s sword. The kernclaw from the foundry. A dangerous combination. So much for the Crowmarket having wholly abandoned her cause.

“You’ll not have my mother!” shrieked the kernclaw.

Mother? That explained part of it. Now he saw her in the light, the resemblance to Sevaka was undeniable.

Viktor hurled another armchair by the headrest. The kernclaw dived back and it shattered against the wall with a crash. But it had bought time. Viktor dragged his claymore free of its slings.

The kernclaw darted in, sword flashing. Viktor’s shadow screamed fit to wake the dead. What should have been a simple parry became a desperate, scraping block. The kernclaw’s shoulder took Viktor in the chest and sent them both crashing across a table. Already off-balance from his shadow’s scream, Viktor sprawled across the floor, claymore abandoned.

The kernclaw landed atop him, knees on his chest and silvered blade at his throat.

“I’m glad it was you.” Viktor barely heard Ebigail’s words over his shadow’s distress. “Malachi wouldn’t have come alone, but you’ve always been proud, young Viktor. Always so certain of yourself. But even the strongest man has a weakness.”

Viktor strove to blot out his shadow’s wail. One last miscalculation in a day filled with them. Only this time there’d be no one to rescue him from arrogance.

“I will be remembered.” Ebigail stooped over him, eyes alive with amusement. “But not by you. Apara? Stop toying with him. It’s time to go.”

Viktor pinched his eyes shut and wrestled with his shadow. It spat and seethed, coiling away. But something else answered. Something the same and yet not – a piece of himself he’d forgotten in the tumult of the day. Viktor gripped it tight, his command more unvoiced instinct than intent.

The weight on his chest shifted. A wet, tearing rasp choked away a distant scream. Warm red rain spattered Viktor’s face.

Gasping for breath, he opened his eyes. Ebigail and the kernclaw stood locked in a motionless embrace, the daughter with her arm tight about her mother’s back, and the mother with her face buried in the daughter’s shoulder. A touching tableau, but for the sword buried deep in Ebigail’s belly.

His shadow finally a distant ache, Viktor sensed a cold, umbral tether binding him to the kernclaw – to the scrap of himself he thought lost in her escape from the foundry. He stumbled to his feet. As he rose, the unseen bond ebbed. The kernclaw jerked – a woman awakening from nightmare into something far worse. Ebigail and sword slipped free into the spreading stain.

“No!” Her voice racked with mewling, stuttering sobs, the kernclaw backed away. She raised a bloody hand to her face. Eyes widened in horror. “What have you done to me? What did you make me do?”