“They are children who can never grow,” Cleric replies. “They could do no different.”

“I-I loved-loved them-them. I-I loved-loved them-them so-so much-much.”

“So did we all, at one time.”

“They-they betrayed-trayed.”

“They were our punishment. Our pride was too great.”

“They-they betrayed-trayed. You-you betrayed-trayed …”

“You have dwelt here too long, Cousin.”

“I-I am-am lost-lost. All-all the-the doors-doors are-are different-rent, and-and the-the thresholds-holds … they-they are-are holy-lee no-no more-more.”

“Yes. Our age has passed. Cil-Aujas is fallen. Fallen into darkness.”

“No-no. Not-not darkness-ness …”

With a flourish, the Nonman King comes to his feet, his hands thrust out and back so that his spine arches, and Mimara can see that his robe is in fact no robe but a dark bolt of silken material wrapped about his armpits and across his shoulders. The shimmering tails of it fall to the ground. His corselet is sleeveless, yet hangs to his sandalled feet, revealing as much of his graven nudity as it conceals. His phallus hangs like a snake in the shadow of his thighs.

“Hell-hell.”

Still kneeling, Cleric gazes up at the impossible figure, anguish and indecision warring across his expression.

“Damnation-shun, Cousin-sin. How-How? How-How could-could we-we forget-get?”

A sorrow flattens the glittering black eyes. “Not I. I have never forgotten …”

The points of their swords sinking, the Skin Eaters gape at the two Nonmen, the living and the dead, for they understand that the one bearing the crown draws no breath. Mimara wants to flee. It seems she can feel the whole of her skin, from the cuts about her knuckles to the folds of her sex, alive to some plummet she cannot see or fathom. But she remains as motionless as the others.

Cleric knows him.

The wind prods her in contrary directions, thumbs without substance. The jutting bones of iron hum and howl, a dirge to dragon hollows. The cage-ringed walls rise into black. Across the rising tiers, the ancient bronze begins to creak, to rattle …

The lips of the apparition move without sound.

Mimara whirls, sees Pokwas groan and curse beneath the astonished eyes of his fellows. And Achamian too! The old Wizard has rolled to his hands and knees. She flies to him, clutches his shoulders. He blinks at the wrinkled stone beneath his fingers, frowns as though it were a language he should be able to read. He spits—at the taste of qirri, she realizes.