Dropping the arm bone, she stood straight, suddenly reinvigorated.

She shut the gates—resealed them seamlessly by twisting together the old magic. It was better this way. If anyone checked, they’d never guess how she’d gotten in, or that she’d used magic to do so.

The lower town was almost unrecognizable. Six years ago the shops had been busy, and bright market stalls were set up in the square. Now it was nearly empty, black windows gazing out over slick cobblestones, the noxious cloud crawling in between. It flashed and flickered intermittently, blue and light green, and a rumble sounded close to her ear, startling her. The storm cloud—yes, that’s what they were calling it. Peering at the inhabited houses with their windows glowing softly, she glimpsed ragged curtains, dirty blinds, gaps in doorframes stuffed with old rags. Homes under siege.

The road to the top of the mountain, to the castle crouching on its summit, was steep and ill-maintained—she stumbled several times, leaning heavily on her cane for support, relying on the tick-tick of the clockwork in her mask to filter out the vapor and its effects. She passed through the upper town, whose mansions and grand houses appeared to be entirely abandoned. All the way up the mountainside, the storm cloud lay like a slumbering beast stirring in its dreams. Only as she neared the summit did it start to thin, the castle towering overhead. By now she knew she was close to spent, a bead of cold sweat trickling down her brow.

“Who goes there?” Two figures stood on either side of the wrought-iron portcullis at the top of the narrow path, designed for defense. As she drew nearer, she heard the ring of two swords pulled from their scabbards, glimpsed a dull flash in the semidarkness. “Stop, in the name of the Duke!”

She obeyed, a few paces short of the portcullis. “Is this how you treat all your visitors?” she remarked drily.

Hurried footsteps approached, another figure emerging from the gloom. The masked lady saw the hulk of a thick fur cloak, a sword hilt peeking from a shoulder-bound scabbard. “What’s going on here?”

“An intruder, my lord,” said one of the guards.

“I’m no intruder,” she said, surprised at the strength and clarity of her own voice. She drew yet closer, and as a bank of fog passed by, clearing the space between, the guards gasped.

“What kind of creature—”

“Stay back!”

Both raised their swords across their torsos, unbalanced in their haste. Beneath their peaked iron helmets, the masked lady saw the whites of their eyes. She hesitated in confusion, but quickly realized their mistake. She could imagine how her clockwork mask appeared to them: an expressionless metallic facade, a grimacing mouth, and wide circular eyeholes, demonic in the gray daylight.