Just after I leap over a low stone wall, just when the courtyard is within reach, the hound decides it’s time to act. I hear a grunt, as if it’s launched its whole body into the air. I change course, trip over a low marker, and fly forward, skidding across the courtyard bricks on stomach and hands. The hound lands headfirst against a mausoleum. Its skull cracks against the marble wall.

By the time I scramble breathlessly to my feet, the hound has recovered, so that when I turn, I see it for the first time.

Sel’s hound looks the same as the first hound I’d laid eyes on, but his is far, far bigger, and fully corporeal. It throws glowing silver aether off in waves. Details I’d missed before are clearer now, even in the dim light: its long snout with nostrils flared and tipped like a bat’s. Sel’s given it the Shadowborn’s heart-blood eyes, dark and impossibly red. I can’t look away; I can barely move for terror that when I do, it will strike.

I edge one foot back, and my heel hits something hard, vertical, smooth. Another mausoleum. I know without looking that the door is out of reach. The only escape routes are between the corners of the buildings and the fourth, open side I’ve just come through—the side that the hound is now closing off with its massive body.

It snarls and snaps its saliva-drenched jaws, in delight or fury, I don’t know. It lowers itself into a crouch, ears flicked forward. My heart accelerates into a full gallop, blood pounding in my ears. “Call it off, Sel!”

Sel drops down silently beside his construct, landing in a crouch and rising with a satisfied smile. “Just as I thought. A coward and a liar both.”

Sel’s hellhound pants at me, its mouth wide and open in a doglike grin. “Call it off!” I press my back into the wall.

Sel crosses his arms over his chest, pleasure painted all over his face. “Once a true hellhound has the scent, it never gives up its prey. The only way to stop it is to kill it. As much as I despise those Shadowborn beasts, I find I’m much the same way. So I decided to give you two final options: reveal your true form, or kill me.”

“You set me up!” Adrenaline and rage surge through my veins. “You planned to corner me here.”

He groans, as if correcting a dense student. “Of course. I must admit, I was inspired by what you said yesterday in William’s infirmary. You were right—all of this cat and mouse is getting old.”

I risk a step forward, but the hound snaps. I fall backward onto the bricks. “Why are you doing this?”