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“Final offer.”

Mat swiped the money so fast that it barely felt like it had been there at all. He nodded once, drained the last of his wine, and said, “Onward.”

“Don’t you have to pay for the drink?”

Mat winked at her. “Not if we move with haste.”

As he slid out of his seat, Ren scowled. The last thing she needed was a waiter pursuing them through the streets. She set a much smaller coin on the table and followed her unlikely escort. Mat was taller than her, and at a glance, looked at least five years older, even though they were the same age. The city had truly worn him down to the bone, though he wore a fashionable scarf to ward off the growing evening chill, and his boots looked finely polished. The only memories she had to compare with this version were from their time in school. Back then he’d been full-cheeked, a bright and foolish kind of creature. This version had come face-to-face with the real world. It did not suit him.

“I think you’ll like them,” he was saying. “The Tin’Voris.”

Ren frowned. “Oh? Why is that?”

“They’re like you. Focused.”

“You’ve managed to make that word sound like a curse. Do you see focus as a bad quality?”

“No, of course not. Obviously, you’ve ended up in a far better spot than I did. Cheers to you for that. It’s just notable. I don’t know how else to say it. You were that way in class. You’re that way now. It’s like you have one thing on your mind and nothing else matters. These two, the Tin’Voris, they’re the same way. You’ll see what I mean when you meet them.”

Ren counted that in their favor and tried her best not to be too bothered by Mat’s condescension. She was considering a new topic of conversation when he stopped abruptly. They’d crossed a single bridge and stood within shouting distance of the fish house. She could still smell the baking bread. Without ceremony, Mat gestured to a brown-stoned building on their right.

“That’s the one. They live on the third floor. Western corner of the building.”

“Seriously? Why’d you arrange our meeting so close to where they lived?”

Mat shrugged. “Why not? I thought it would save time.”

Ren felt like that broke some protocol of espionage, though she couldn’t logically explain why she was annoyed. It felt like something she’d read in old stories. Maybe she was just nervous. This was what she’d come all this way to do. She thought she’d have a long walk to properly steel herself, but now she stood on the precipice of what would either be a colossal waste of time—or an entirely new path forward. That thought had her heart pounding in her chest.

“Well,” Ren finally said. “Lead the way.”

Mat faltered. “Really? I thought… Don’t you want to chat with them privately?”

“Proof of purchase. You can leave after I’ve seen them with my own eyes.”

Mat dramatically adjusted his scarf.

“Oh, fine.”

She found herself wishing she’d spent more time with him at school. If they hadn’t both been desperately seeking the approval of the chosen ones at Balmerick, maybe they’d have become friends. Or maybe not. As a general rule, Ren didn’t like people. She smirked before following Mat into the waiting building.

The interior offered no signs of wealth. The carpets were plain, discolored in places where heavy rains had caused substantial leaks or flooding. The place was almost pure functionality. Long halls that led to a series of separate apartments. Paint-peeling stairs led up to another floor that was an exact replica of the first. The only ornamentation that Ren saw were the knockers on the doors. They were small, made of an iron that verged on the black of night. Each one was a different animal. Hawk, dragon, mongoose…

Ren followed Mat to the third floor. All the way down a narrow, poorly lit hallway. He paused in front of the door that supposedly belonged to the Tin’Voris. Their iron knocker was shaped like a wyvern. Her breath caught at the sight. She knew it was unlikely that they’d chosen this particular room. Far more probable that they’d simply taken whatever was available.

But the wyvern felt like a wink of fate. Incredibly difficult to tame. Incredibly useful to the one who could. She’d witnessed the sheer power of these creatures the year before. Out in that wilderness, when Theo’s mating dance had nearly worked. Ren remembered the way Theo’s stomach had ripped open, all the blood gushing out. Was that how this encounter would inevitably end? Mat Tully was watching her, waiting on her. She quietly set the memory aside.

Reaching for the handle, she knocked.

12 DAHVID TIN’VORI

Dahvid was growing restless.

He recognized this as a quality he’d inherited from his father. As a child, he’d been tasked with observing his father’s reception of the daily reports. It was a lesson on how to run an estate. The assumption was that Dahvid would eventually lead the family, even though he wasn’t the oldest.

He used to watch his father’s countenance as servants detailed the shifting affairs of their house and business. His father never sat for those meetings. Instead, he paced the length of his study. Sometimes, he would completely turn his back on the speaker, tracing an idle finger down the glittering spines of the books he kept in his personal library. No matter how distracted Dahvid’s father appeared, though, he never missed a single detail. He used to say that he kept his hands busy to keep his mind still.

Now Dahvid paced their own cramped quarters. He tried not to dwell on the fact that the three of them lived in an apartment that was smaller than his father’s study had been. Cath and Nevelyn were bent over the kitchen table. Dissecting the most recent copy of the Kathorian with surgical precision. Nevelyn was the first one to find an article of worth. It detailed the casting choices of an upcoming opera in their old city. The name “Tessa Brood” stared up at them from the third line. Nevelyn carefully extracted the article, holding it out for him. Dahvid accepted the task gladly. He pinned the article up in the closet with the rest and resumed his pacing.