“I don’t know that I can save anyone,” he said quietly. His face was pale, and his eyes were dark as he stared down. “I’m not a medic, but I’m not a fighter either. A nurse I know needed help, and I wanted to help . . .”

“You can’t think too much out here,” I said. “You gotta keep moving. You gotta help those you can help. You gotta keep yourself alive.” I pointed to the dead shelled monster behind me. “And stay away from the murder snails if you don’t want to end up like her.”

“Thanks.” He nodded grimly, then jogged off with the stretcher in the direction of someone crying out.

From a crumbling stone house half hidden in the fog, I heard swords clashing and men arguing. I went closer to it to get a better look, and I saw them walking backward up a mossy staircase.

Jem-Kruk was on the defensive, nimbly blocking the aggressive blows of a man in a cobalt kaftan.

“It never had to be this way,” Jem was saying.

His Älvolk aggressor retorted through gritted teeth, “No, this was always how it ended. You dying by my hand.”

“Your arrogance will be your downfall, Indu,” Jem said, but he sounded weary, and he stumbled on the stairs.

“But I will be yours,” Indu snarled.

I raced up the steps, running at Indu’s back as fast as I could, but I wasn’t fast enough. Indu stabbed Jem-Kruk through the chest, and then he tossed the body off the third-floor landing and it fell on a pile of rubble with a wet thud.

He finally turned around and looked down at me. And for the first time in my life, I was face-to-face with the man that impregnated my mother. I was a few steps below him, and he tilted his head, giving me a curious expression, like he recognized me from somewhere.

Indu looked more like Iver—my father, the man who raised me—than I had thought, and it was disorienting. I had expected a stranger’s face, but the familiarity was unsettling.

Just before I had left Doldastam a few days ago, I had gone to see my parents. I forgave them for keeping this from me—I knew they had their own complicated reasons for it. Dad told me that he’d always love me, no matter how I felt about any of this, and I told him that he was my dad and always would be.

I cleared my throat and asked, “Indu Mattison?”

Realization flashed across his face, and he smiled. “You’re Runa’s daughter. My daughter.”

“My father is in Doldastam,” I corrected him, and tightened my grip on my sword. “As far as I can tell, you’re nothing but a womanizing sycophantic murderer, and you just killed my friend.”