I submit.

No one has released me. I am still bound. And I do not know the fate of the ghosts the Nightbringer has already abducted. Whether I wish to fight his forces or not, I cannot let him steal away any more.

I reach for the scims gingerly, as if they will burn my palms when I touch them. Instead, they slip into my grasp like they have been waiting for me.

Then I leave the cabin and turn south to the Tribes, and the Nightbringer and war.

XXXII: The Blood Shrike

From the knolls and ravines of the Argent Hills, Antium is cloaked from view, hidden by thick fingers of evening mist rolling down the Nevennes Range. Its towers and ramparts disappear and reappear, a city of ghosts.

No. A city of living, breathing Martials and Scholars, waiting for you to lead the charge.

I used to love nights like this in the capital. My work would be done, Marcus would retreat to his quarters, and I’d walk the city, sometimes stopping at the stall of a Tribeswoman who brewed sweet pink tea sprinkled with almonds and pistachios. Mariam Ara-Ahdieh left Antium long before the Karkauns came. I wonder where she is now.

“Good weather for a battle.” Spiro Teluman hunkers down beside me, a scim hilt poking up over his shoulder. The smith’s legendary skills and long disappearance give him an enigmatic aura. The men around me, including Pater Mettias, eye him with a wary sort of awe.

Despite my gloves, my hands are numb. In the snow-choked dell behind me, five hundred of my men hunch in their cloaks, their breath rising in white puffs.

“Sword-breaking weather, Teluman,” I say. “I don’t like it.”

“The scims are Serric steel.” Teluman’s tattoos are hidden by the dark, form-fitting armor he forged. In the gloom he is nearly impossible to see. “They won’t break. How’s the armor?”

“Strange.” It fits like a glove, makes me difficult to see, and is so light that I might as well be wearing fatigues. But it’s strong—Harper and I tested it for hours before donning it.

Still, other than Mettias, the Martials refused to wear it. Witchery, they said. Teluman argued over it. But I wasn’t willing to issue a command that wouldn’t be followed.

“Shrike.” Harper appears on my right. My heart thuds a bit faster, traitor that it is. This is the first time he has spoken directly to me in days. “Something is off,” he says. “There aren’t enough guards on the walls. The streets are empty—the squares are empty. This doesn’t feel right.”

It is the last thing I want to hear. The people of Antium await aid. They await the weapons and soldiers that will allow them to cast out the Karkauns.

“Where the bleeding hells is Musa?”

“Here.” The tall Scholar, also clad in Teluman’s armor, materializes from the darkness like a wraith. “The wights say the Karkauns have gathered near a big, bloody rock close to the main palace. They’ve turned it into an altar. They’re shouting, screaming, murdering people—that sort of thing. And they’re leading prisoners there. Mostly Martials. Some Scholars too.”

He must speak of Cardium Rock. “Women?” My fist clenches on the scim at my waist. “Children?”

Musa shakes his head. “Men. Boys. Captured soldiers. Those who didn’t fight or couldn’t. There are thousands of them.”

“Our spies said the men were killed—”

“Does Antium have an extensive system of dungeons?” Musa says, and at my silence, he nods. “They weren’t killed, then,” he says. “They were hidden. Saved for . . . whatever the hells this is.”

“The Soul Catcher holds the ghosts,” Teluman says. “The Karkauns cannot summon them again to strengthen their army.”

“The Soul Catcher is hundreds of miles from the Waiting Place right now,” Musa says.

“What the ten hells is he doing so far—”

“Skies know, Shrike,” Musa says. “A wight brought me the information yesterday. I haven’t had a chance to send her back for details.” He levels a reproachful look at me. “Been a bit busy.”

“We can still pull back,” Harper says. “Get a message to Quin and Dex. Wait for a more opportune time to strike.”

“Gather the men,” I tell him, for there is no better time. I lost Antium. I let the Karkauns win. And Keris used my failure to steal the Empire from my nephew. I have to get it back for him. And I have to get it back for the people still suffering behind its walls.

When the men have gathered, I raise my hand for silence. They watch me with a flat sort of curiosity, even the Ankanese sappers, silent on the edges of the crowd.

“Tonight,” I say, “the Karkauns believe they will defeat us.”

The men hiss and spit, their rage as sharp as my own.

“They think they can turn our city into a butchering ground. They think their violence will frighten us. But we are Martials. And we fear nothing.

“Nearly every last one of you was in Antium. You saw what they did. You know what they’ve been doing since then. So I tell you now, no matter what happens behind those walls, no matter what horrors they have in store, there is no going back today. We will win, or we will die. We will take back our city for our people, or we will watch the Empire fall. Now. Tonight.” I put my fist to my heart. “Loyal to the end.”

They do not roar their support, for secrecy is our advantage this night. Instead, they thump their fists to their hearts once.

Then we are moving through the hills and down into the flats of the city, away from our mounts and the dozen men left to guard them. The cold drags at me, and my eyelashes frost over. But after a few minutes of running, I don’t notice it anymore. By the time we take out the Karkaun sentries, my cheeks are flushed, my fingers tingling.

We make for the northern wall, shrouded by thick, old-growth forest. Within is a door, boarded over, collapsed and forgotten behind a ton of rubble.

There, an Ankanese sapper named G’rus begins rigging the door with charges. His four comrades disappear, each escorted by a Mask. Four more of the Ankanese travel with Quin Veturius. We will see if they prove their worth this night.

Harper appears out of the darkness, a grappling hook in hand. “Soldiers,” he whispers. “Atop the wall, and headed this way.”

Moments later, voices carry down. There weren’t supposed to be soldiers near this side of the wall. According to my spies, it’s thinly patrolled.

A scream from deep within the city pierces the night, high and chilling. My men shift uneasily, and I grab the grappling hook from Avitas and march down the wall, far enough from the Karkauns that they won’t hear the hook land.

I cast it up, and when it takes, I’m moving up the wall, hand over hand, even as Harper hisses quiet protests beneath me.

Once at the top, I survey the two Karkauns. They are of medium height and build, like most of their people, with long, matted hair and skin as pale as mine. Their thick furs obscure both vision and sound, and before they notice me, I am upon them. The first manages a small yelp before I part his head from his body. The second draws his weapon—just in time for me to take it and stab him in the throat.

I drag the bodies to the side of the wall, throw them over in case any other Karkauns come searching for them, and rappel back down.

“That,” says Harper, his jaw set, “was foolish.”

“That was necessary,” I said. “Are we nearly ready?”

G’rus gestures for everyone to take cover as he lights the fuse. Moments later, a deafening boom tears through the air. It is followed by another boom moments later, farther down the wall, and then two more. Decoy explosions. They are larger, and closer to the center of the city. By the time the Karkauns ensure there are no intruders at those spots, we’ll be long gone.

“Shrike?” a soft voice calls through the dust and rubble, and a figure emerges out of the darkness. She is lean, with dark skin and curly hair. Neera, the woman who helped Faris and me escape the Karkauns.

I reach her in three strides, and before she can draw a weapon, I have a knife to her throat.

“Loyal.” She speaks the code she was given without the slightest hesitation. “To the end.”

“Well met, Neera.” I clasp her hand, and her smile is a flash of hope in the darkness.

“Quickly, Shrike,” she says. “Before the Karkauns come.”

My men enter the city two by two. They drip with weaponry, and each carries a long, thin package weighing five stones. Twenty scims, light and strong. They are concealed, wrapped, and strapped tight against the backs of the men. Ten thousand scims for our people, everything we could scrounge up from Delphinium and the now-shuttered Kauf Prison. Everything we could manage to carry.

“Go!” I hiss to the men. “Faster!”

Musa finds me moments later. “The Karkauns are on the way,” he says. “We have a few minutes, if that. And Quin is stuck in the tunnels. One of my wights says the passages you used are collapsed.”