The whole corridor is filled with smoke and it will very soon spread to the entire Ship. Tirad can hear the guards running down the stairs. He opens Hurmaz’s former cabin door. Akhgar is sleeping on his bed, passed out and drunk. Tirad could leave him inside and let him die in the smoke and fire. He lets him be, to die in his sweet sleep. He stands behind Akhgar’s door. The thick smoke has filled the space and he can hear the guards coughing, but he knows they wouldn’t dare to come down and are probably trying to empty the other stories. Tirad walks towards Mart’s cabin. His eyes are soaring and he keeps coughing. He can hardly see ahead and needs to be careful not to stumble on the passed out bodies of the guards that he had stabbed.

Mart is sitting on his bed calling for help. He screams but his voice won’t reach anyone through the shouting and running of the scared Ship residents on the upper floors. Even if his cry for help reached them, they wouldn’t risk their lives coming to save him. No one dared to come down in such smoke and flames that are spreading in the corridor, making their way up the stairs. The thick smoke has blinded Mart’s eyes and he can’t see. He coughs and screams. Tirad stands above him. Mart hardly opens his eyes and sees him. He asks Tirad to help him but the smoke has filled his lungs and he suffocates, passing out on his bed. Tirad wanted Mart to be lucid for this confrontation. He wanted to beat Mart to death, to watch him suffer and twist around in pain. But he has no time; he too might pass out from the smoke any moment.

He looks at Mart one more time. He seems to be in a deep sleep. He could just leave him there and get out like he did to Akhgar; let the smoke and the flames take him in. Yet he can’t go. He can’t forget Lealy’s livid body hanging from the Parsana ladder, Lealy’s fearful face in the boat as they were sailing to Oxan and again Lealy’s image as she was burning in the Oxan harbour fire. He hadn’t seen the last one himself but had seen the burn marks on her body and it was enough to let him know how she had suffered. Tirad takes the dagger – still bloodstained from impaling the guards – and stabs it into Mart’s heart. He lets the warm, red blood flow on his fingers. He twists the dagger in Mart’s heart, enjoying the sound of his flesh tearing inside. His eyes are filled with tears from the smoke and he can hardly breathe. He leaves the dagger in Mart’s chest and rushes towards the stairs. The flames have devoured the wooden planks of the corridor and are moving on. They will get to the first steps any minute now. Tirad jumps up to the stairs. His leg is burning, caught on the flames. He looks at it and hurries up hoping that he won’t pass out from the pain like he did before when Dalia torched his arm tattoo.