Eshe shook his head. Since Khatijah nearly got devoured by wild animals, Eskander had only gotten madder. He wasn’t even sure why Nyx pretended the “magician” knew where they were going. He slid down the dune and met Nyx as she was pulling up her trousers. Khatijah had already finished, and stood at the height of the rise, favoring her bad leg, watching them all like a disapproving squad commander.

“She has no idea what she’s doing,” Eshe said.

Nyx said, “That makes seven of us.” She moved past him.

“I say bleed her out. Kage can eat her,” Eshe said. Khatijah was just out of ear shot.

“We can ask somebody at the next settlement,” Nyx said. “There were nomads earlier. One of them will know the way.”

Eshe snorted. “The way? The way to where?” He stepped forward, and—dropped.

He felt the rush of grainy soil, darkness—

Eshe landed with a painful thump on spongy ground. He heard voices coming from above him.

“Fuck!” Nyx said.

Then Ahmed: “Wait. I’m lighter. We have a rope?”

Eshe shook his head, and tried to push himself up. The floor was sticky. Blood? God, he hoped he wasn’t bleeding. The darkness was absolute. His fingers touched something, the edge of some textile, non-organic. He yanked his hand away.

“Go!” Nyx said—the voice sounded muffled, but still intelligible. “Khat, help me hold him!”

Eshe reached into his pocket and pulled out a fire beetle carapace. He tore the frayed end of his burnous free, and lit it with the beetle.

A flare of light hurt his eyes. He heard a sputtering above him, and a shower of soil.

Just above him, twice as high as he was tall, he saw Ahmed’s torso burst through the grainy ceiling. Ahmed windmilled for a moment, his torso hanging suspended in the air.

“Eshe? Are you hurt?”

Eshe saw large, spiky protrusions all around him. Like teeth. It was a blessing he hadn’t hit one. He was becoming aware of a pain in his leg, though, the one he’d landed on. He moved the light toward the textile he had brushed in the dim, and caught his breath.

“There’s something down here,” Eshe said.

“Yeah. You’re down there. Stand up. I need to know how much rope we need. It looks like there was a glamour or organic skein or something over this pit.”

“Where’s Nyx?”

“Who do you think is holding me up?”

“Tell them there’s a body down here.” Eshe waved his fiery rag over the wizened leg beside him, tangled with a very new-looking sandal. The body had begun to mummify, but Eshe still recognized the features, and the shiny token hanging from the corpse’s throat.

“What does it matter?” Ahmed said. “Get up here.”

“I know her,” Eshe said.

It wasn’t the only body in the cavern.