“… so eager for blood, dear mongrel…?”
“… SO EAGER TO RUN, LITTLE MOGGY…?”
“I appreciate the sentiment, Eclipse,” Mia whispered. “But living to fight another turn is probably the goal here.”
The shadowwolf growled grudging assent, and Mia turned to Ashlinn.
“Right. You can get off this roof two ways. Feet or face first?”
“Is … this a t-trick question?”
Mia dug the razored point of her blade into Ashlinn’s skin. Gravebone was harder than steel, sharp enough to bleed stone. One soft push …
“You try to make a break, or even breathe in a way I don’t like, we paint the cobbles an interesting shade of Ashlinn. Are we clear?”
“… mia, we must go…”
The blade twitched. “Clear?”
Ash winced. “As Dweymeri crystal.”
Mia slipped her belt from around her waist. “Hold out your wrists.”
“Didn’t know you were so inclined,” Ash smirked. “Honestly, all you n—”
The blade sank deeper, and Ashlinn winced in pain. With a hurt glance, she offered her wrists. Mia looped the belt around them, cinching tight. She could hear the legionaries clearly now, a multitude of citizens gathered beyond the cathedral gates, looking in horror at Jessamine’s dangling corpse.
Mia stood, pulled on the leather strap.
“Move.”
She led Ashlinn to a downspout behind the bell tower. A gargoyle spewed rainwater from its mouth into the churchyard two stories below.
“Traitors first,” Mia insisted.
“Going to be hard climbing with my hands tied, neh?”
“You’ll manage. And don’t even think about running when you hit the floor. Throwing knives run quicker than you, and I’m carrying six in your size.”
Ash scowled, but for all her moaning, shimmied down the spout without much trouble. Mia followed, Mister Kindly whispering urgent warnings in her ear. The girls ran across the basilica grounds, past a necropolis littered with familia tombs. They vaulted the iron fence as a troop of Luminatii rounded the cathedral, shouted, “Halt!” Mia snatched the belt around Ash’s wrists, dragging her captive into the streets.
The legionaries were wearing steel breastplates and carrying burning sunsteel longswords, but they vaulted that fence quicker than Mia would’ve given them credit for—a murder on Aa’s holy ground was no chucklefest for his faithful. Mia looked at the crowd around her, pausing to snatch the full braavi purse from Ashlinn’s belt.
“Corvere, don’t you fucking d—”
Mia slung the bag in a wide arc, scattering a shower of glittering gold into the mob. The reaction was instantaneous, astonishingly violent, the people around them erupting as they realized the sky had somehow rained a living fortune. People flocked into the street from the taverna and stores all around, beggars, bakers, butchers, cutting off the cadre of Luminatii and punching and shouting and kicking over Ashlinn’s gold.
Ashlinn wailed as Mia dragged her away through the driving rain. They dashed over a broad bridge, into the warrens behind the administratii buildings, and there, finally, Mia pulled Ashlinn into a small alcove.
“Do you realize how much—”
“Shut up,” Mia hissed. Reaching out to the shadows around them, Mia plucked them with clever fingers, twisting and weaving them into a mantle about her shoulders. With a flick of her wrist, she enveloped Ashlinn as well, just as she’d done the turn they stole into Speaker Adonai’s chambers. Memories of their turns in the Red Church made Mia think of Jessamine, the sight of the Hand’s body dangling from those wrought-iron spikes burned in her mind’s eye.
Jess, Tric, every Blade murdered in the Luminatii pogrom, the capture of the Ministry … Ashlinn was responsible for all of it. The girl in her arms might as well have been a snake, coiled and ready to strike.
“Not a sound,” Mia whispered, pressing her gravebone blade to Ash’s throat.
All the world was black beneath Mia’s cloak, but she still heard the legionaries shouting to each other as they searched the Godsgrave backstreets. The girls waited, pressed against each other beneath Mia’s shadows for endless minutes.
A whisper finally rose over the pattering rain.
“… they are gone, mia…”
Ashlinn swallowed against the blade at her throat. “You kill me now, I swear by the Mother you’re never going to see that map they’ve got you chasing.”
“Good thing I’m not going to kill you, then,” Mia said. “Mister Kindly, you check the rooftops. Eclipse, you scout ahead, make sure the way back to the chapel is clear.”
“… SO BE IT. BUT IF YOU MURDER ANYONE WHILE I AM GONE, I WILL BE MOST UPSET…”
She felt the shadows about her ripple, the not-cat and not-wolf slipping from the dark at her feet. Mister Kindly flitted up the wall, shadow to shadow, Eclipse spilling across the cobbles and off into the street. She could feel Ash’s heart beating, smell a faint perfume of lavender and fresh sweat on her skin.
“You’re taking me back to the chapel?” the girl asked.
“There’s a dose of Swoon on the blade at your throat, Ash. I don’t much fancy knocking you out and carrying you back, but I will if must. Now, shut the fuck up.”
“They’ve been hunting me for eight months. They get their hands on m—”
“You can count the shits I give on no hands, Ashlinn.”
“I didn’t want to kill Tric, Mia.”
Ashlinn winced as Mia pushed her gravebone stiletto up under her chin.
“Don’t you dare say his name.”
Ashlinn raised her hands, spoke slow and careful. Mia could hear the fear in her voice, the slight tremble that told her that, for all Ash’s front, the girl didn’t want to die.
“I wanted the Ministry, Mia. Anyone else was just wrong place, wrong time.”
“Including your own brother?”
“So. It was you that killed Osrik.”
“No,” Mia replied. “But only because Adonai ended him before I got the chance. The pair of you killed Tric. You betrayed your vows. You betrayed the Church.”
“To avenge my father! You of all people should understand that.”
“Don’t push your luck, Ashlinn.” Mia tightened her grip. “My father is dead.”
“Aye?” Ash snarled. “Well, so is mine.”
That gave Mia pause. Unspoken questions hanging in the air. The rain was dying now, the skies still a sullen gray. Ashlinn drew a long ragged breath.
“We dodged the Church and their Blades for eight months,” she murmured. “They finally caught us in Carrion Hall. My father was good. One of the finest Blades to ever serve the Black Mother. But everyone’s luck runs out eventually.”
Mia simply shook her head, refusing to bite. Ashlinn J?rnheim was made of lies. She’d lied all through their training at the Church. She’d lied to the Ministry, to Mia, to everyone she ever met. She’d struck at the heart of Jessamine on the basilica roof, she was striking at Mia’s heart now. Every word she spoke was poison.