Billos ran blind into the blowing wind, across the center of the town, past Smither’s Barbeque, and into the alley before pulling up, panting. He spun back and tried to make sense of what was happening, but his mind wasn’t working right.

His heart, on the other hand, was pumping on overload, shoving pain through his veins. Details that seemed so vague only minutes ago now sat vividly on the horizon of his mind, like statues to the dead.

He’d accepted the invitation of the Dark One to enter the books and had woken in a place in which Black gave and took powers to serve his purpose. But it was Billos’s own ambition that had blinded him to the danger.

Darsal had seen what he had not. Like a child ignoring his father’s warning not to touch the fire, Billos had touched, had shoved his hand into the flames, had thrown his body onto the coals.

He paced, scrambling for a course of action that made sense, snapping his fingers uselessly. A gun still hung on his hip, but one futile pull of its lever and he knew the suhupow was gone forever. Without it he didn’t stand a chance against the throaters, whose guns would still shoot this suhupow called bullets.

“Darsal . . .” Billos whimpered, hands gripped in fists. He paced, desperate to be dead, his only escape now. But Black didn’t want him, not even as a sacrifice for Darsal. Only Elyon knew what atrocity was building behind that temple.

Billos lifted his chin to the black sky, let his mouth open in the face of the wind, and sank slowly to his knees. His body shook with each sob, but each cry only brought a greater sense of finality.

A lone cry drifted on the wind. It was light and too high-pitched to be Darsal. Why had the stubborn wench insisted on offering herself as well? Wasn’t Darsal enough? Karas was a fool, a Scab pretending to be clean, a runt of a girl who had no business being here.

But all of that was a lie! Karas was his savior! He would worship the thought of her, give his life to save those like her. Elyon, Elyon, how foolish had he been? Billos wailed at the sky.

“Hello, Billos.”

He started and jerked his head to his right. The young blond-headed boy who’d warned him about the Dark One stood in the alley, hands limp by his side. Samuel.

“Now do you believe me?” the boy asked.

Billos gripped his hair in both hands, lowered his head so that his chin rested on his chest, clenched his eyes tight, and cried to cover his shame.

“There is a way, you know,” the boy said.

Billos looked up. “What? It’s hopeless! They’re dead already!”

“For you, I mean,” Samuel said. “It might be too late for them, but there may be a way for you.”