Zaethan halted when something crashed against the double door from inside the Boreali suite. A second crash rumbled the hinges, followed by warbled shouts in foreign syllables.

Zaethan rushed back and pounded on the surface. “What’s going on in there?” He jostled the handle. Locked. “Open up! This is Kasim, al’Haidren and Alpha Zà, head of the prydes and local sentry.”

At his command, a weight blasted into the other side, thumping him backward. The yelling increased, and the door cracked open. A frazzled and pale, doughy woman with exceptionally large teeth stood behind the gap.

“Not the best time, milord.” A blonde tuft from her braid smushed into view as she looked back and shrieked, “Shores of Aurynth! Heh’ta, you mangy, war-tainted mongrel! I’m warning yeh, stop this insanity at once!”

The maid yelped, her teeth consuming her bottom lip, as the door wrenched from her grasp and bashed into the stone. The hybrid wolx reeled into Zaethan, hurling him to the floor. The animal’s voluminous tail swished buoyantly as the enormous crossbreed dashed down the passage. Its claws, too long and dangerous to be trapped in a stone cage, clacked against the tiles as he skidded around the corner. Scrambling to his feet, Zaethan took off through the halls of the palace after the rampant wolx.

Panting, both from fatigue and genuine panic, he chased the animal as it launched down a stairwell, destroying a few banisters, and escaped into the lower levels. A group of yayas chucked their piled platters aside, screaming when the creature bolted through the entry to the kitchens. Puffed pastries flew through the air, pelting Zaethan in the face. The wolx weaved between the servants and scurried to a stop in front of an old hatchway, surrounded by soiled meat buckets and discarded produce.

Cautiously, Zaethan unsheathed his kopar, angling for its throat. At the whistle of the iron, it snarled, barring its serrated teeth. Spittle leaked off its lengthy canines. But instead of attacking Zaethan, the animal’s snout lowered toward the rusty padlock. The Orallach wolx thrashed its head and yipped, jaw snapping savagely.

“Your mistress—she already went after him, didn’t she?” Zaethan asked it.

At his mention of the Boreali al’Haidren, the amber fur along its spine lifted, hackles rising. The wolx yowled and pawed at the hatch. With the tip of his kopar, Zaethan lifted the broken lock. Flinging the door open, he gazed into the darkness below.

“Show me the way.”

THIRTY-FIVE

Luscia

   The unrelenting rain beat down upon their backs. With her hood pulled taut, shrouding her face from Aurynth’s watchman, Luscia stared through the curtain of droplets spilling over the edge, blinking it out of her line of sight.

Her spine pressed into the broad support of Marek’s back as he watched the streets from the edge of Marketown. Conversely, Luscia searched the threads patiently, awaiting another disturbance.

“Anything, Ana’Sere?”

“Niit, Brödre,” she muttered, her lips barely moving.

Most of the alleys had already cleared, slickened from the downpour. The clouds rumbled and shifted overhead, casting eerie shadows over the uneven pavers reflecting the moon, mirroring Naborū’s display in the Hall. Robbed of a noble audience, the clouds thundered their applause as they showered the city, the clamor for an encore pouring into the drains.

Like threads in a loom, the lumin carved patterns through the city, more radiant than she’d ever been led to believe was possible so far from the Dönumn. It enveloped the buildings and cradled everything in between, snaking around to the back street, to climb the heights of the busted masonry. Light twinkled and reached for its brethren across the rooftops above, as if it held Bastiion together from behind the veil. Crowding cracks in the brickwork, it balanced the brokenness, offering recompense from the Other.

At the thought, Luscia felt an odd sensation tickle her temples. Poised and controlled, her eyes slid, peering to the side. Beside the wet fabric covering her head, a tendril of light drifted by her cheekbone. She stared at it, allowing the rain to drown her vision. The tendril seemed to stare back, hovering inches away.

“Luscia….”

The tingling intensified, a severe pain forcing her mouth open in a silent wail. Luscia gasped as the tendril writhed in place, its light contorting. The rush of whispers returned, roaring and wailing.

“Ana’Sere!” Spinning toward her, Marek’s hands clutched her shoulders.

Luscia looked up through the opening of the alley and into the empty street. Suddenly, every thread trembled, the light of the Other sputtering angrily. Beset by a second storm invisible to Marek’s eyes, the city flashed with ethereal lightning. She felt its wrath turn her stomach over, knotting it mercilessly. Nausea clambered her throat, burning under her awful scar. Flashing as if in warning, the threads snapped into place, fortifying their glow.

“Luscia….”

The whispers layered in unison, harmonizing her name. Luscia spun in her crouch toward the opposite end of the alley. Brilliant and volatile, the harbinger thread appeared in the distance. The beam quivered erratically, beckoning her to follow.

Springing from her position, Luscia darted after it, plunging deeper into the glittering web in a capricious race through the Other. In her periphery, details in the darkness blurred, her Sight anchored onto the thread’s bright, fractured light. Luscia skidded around a corner and, seizing a rusted pole, catapulted through a second-story frame. The harbinger thread shuddered, encircling it. Grasping the splintered wood, she swung her body into the dirtied apartment. The moment her upturned boot landed on the creaky floorboards, the stench of rot and waste assaulted her nostrils.

Creeping forward on the balls of her feet, she followed the crackling thread. Abruptly, a child’s scream sliced her ears, chilling and horrible. Her grip on the Sight broke, jerking Luscia to the front of the veil. She shook her head, feeling suddenly bereft, but continued toward the cracked door at the end of the crooked hall.

The slightest scuffle signaled Marek’s arrival at her back. Luscia raised two fingers, communicating absolute silence. Najjani silence. With another step, she touched the door, pausing to tilt her head and observe the scene within. Through the slim opening, a cloak swayed, dusting the wood floor. A tall man angled over a quaint bed. Even without the aid of the moon, her Tiergan eyes read the outline of a simple dagger as the man lifted it over the frightened child.

“Niit!” Luscia shouted, ramming the door open and diving for his middle.

Tumbling across the floor, the man’s revolting odor filled her nostrils, making her gag. Luscia heard the cross-caste child crying from the corner of the straw bed. The man shirked her hold on his torso when she glanced to the little girl, distressed by the amount of blood on the sheets. In her distraction, his cloak fanned out, lashing her across the face. He leapt for the window, shattering the glass, his hands protected in fine leather gloves, and plummeted into the street.