Safiyah shrugged. “They have been rebuilt and repurposed and renewed so many times… What all these parts and pieces originally did, no one is certain. Even more important, it’s quite possible that none of the organic circuitry here is original. It’s all been changed many times. And unless someone has a record of what it was supposed to be like… well, we can all breathe well enough.”

Nyx stared up at the great guts of the beast.

“Come now,” Safiyah said. “Let’s build a proper glamour.” She raised her hands, and Nyx felt a wave of nausea. Next to her, she saw Khatijah’s image waver, then bleed into the long, leggy form of one of the Aadhya. Her features, coloring, clothing—it was all different, and so much like Shani that Nyx had to resist the urge to draw her blade again. She likely looked the same. When Nyx looked back at Safiyah, the magician, too, had taken on the guise of an Aadhya. She was, admittedly, more conservatively dressed than either of them, in a short red tunic and burnous in addition to her turban.

Safiyah smiled. “Must be a new thing for you two, running off into the desert to save men instead of kill him.”

“We have to find him first,” Nyx said. “Khat? Ideas?”

“I guess we go deeper into the hold, and find out how many people we’re dealing with here.”

“And hopefully who,” Nyx said. She glanced back at Safiyah. “You can really hold this glamour the whole time?”

“As long as you like.”

Khatijah led, and Nyx took the rear, protecting Safiyah’s back in case someone broke her calm. Though honestly, the way things were going Nyx was beginning to think that few things would do that.

Nyx heard voices ahead, and fought the urge to pull a weapon. She needed to walk carefully, here. Smoothly. Like she belonged.

Khatijah rounded a corner. The three of them passed into a massive room. It appeared to be an eating or gathering hall. There were over a hundred men there, eating and talking in loud voices.

Khatijah glanced back at Nyx. Nyx urged her on, gesturing to what looked like another door on the far side of the hall. The men here were all tall and lanky desert men, with the same reddish skin and dark hair as Shani and her sisters. As long as no one tried to have an extended conversation with them, they should be able to pass through.

Nyx was four steps into the hall before she realized there had been no men among the people Shani brought with her. She stopped cold.

Three men at the end of a table nearest to Khatijah yelled something at her. They stood. A few more heads turned. The men began gesturing at Khatijah angrily.

“Safiyah,” Nyx said. “Do men and women generally hang out a lot among the Aadhya?”