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“Your weakhold,” Kosmina repeated. “A pup of a vampire outwitted you. And now you have to kill him, or else other boogeymen will slink up behind you or something? The details don’t add up.”

He scowled. “My bounty was the longest-standing in the Lore for a reason—it was the most dangerous. To guard my holding, I let a pack of a hundred wendigos, like the ones back there”—he pointed over his shoulder—“patrol my valley. Past that was a field protected against tracing vampires and demons, one filled with ravenous, subterranean gulgs.Past them, two sand scyllas with esoteric powers nested at the base of the structure, their tentacles forever combing the walls. I inscribed the bricks with spells to repel break-ins and teleportation.” The scyllas alone had been worth their weight in Sorceri gold. “So how did your brother get past measures that foiled so many other hunters? You know, don’t you?”

She just smiled, irritating him the way sand in a shoe might irritate others.

“Why would he become a bounty hunter anyway? A prince like him wouldn’t need money.”

Her smile widened, displaying flawless teeth and two tiny fangs. “This fact is going to sting, but . . . he isnota bounty hunter. I’m fairly certain you were his first job.”

That fact stung like scorpion venom. As Silt dug for patience, lightning forked out over the sky and a strong wind gusted to pelt them with stinging rain.

Most people kept their heads down against the elements. The princess raised her face, as if the weather were an enemy she’d decided to defeat. And so he kept his head up to watch her.

Irritating, frustrating female.

When the ground rumbled in a series of small quakes, she said, “There’s a lot of seismic activity here. Unless one of your subterranean gulgs is beneath us.”

Silt ran a palm over his mouth, a suspicion arising.I prefer the gulgs.Volcanoes, geysers, and quakes hinted at dimensional instability. Some realms convulsed in the beginning, some toward the end. Despite a lack of weathering, Nightside had existed for ages.There might be a clock on my escape.

“Whatever it is, I’ll face it.” To herself, she added, “Adversity builds mettle.”

Who the hell was this vamp? At times, she seemed far wiser than her scant years. Other times, vulnerable and impressionable. Was she innocent? He believed so, her shirt’s message notwithstanding.

He cast her a considering look, again struck by her beauty, even with her wan skin and the strain in her feminine features.

While his concubines varied—he had no preferred type—he’d never bedded a fey-looking vampire before. Nor had he slept with sexually innocent females. Maybe he should make an exception for revenge.

No hardship there.Her wet T-shirt clung to plump breasts that bounced as she ran, captivating him. She was, in fact, abraless babe. He imagined plucking that shirt off and covering those mounds with his roughened palms, gripping her as he leaned down to suck?—

“Tell me more about our jail,” she said, rousing him from his fantasies.

“Jail?”

She pursed her lips as if she’d detected the direction of his thoughts. “If this is the origin realm for all undead creatures, then they must have escaped Nightside. How else would their contagion exist in the mortal world?”

“I see the wheels turning. You think that proves there’s a way out, maybe a portal or a rift. But if an escape once existed, the Gaolers sealed it. Otherwise, these beasts would have flooded the humans’ realm.”

She frowned at him. “How do you know so much about this place anyway?”

“Before I resigned myself to exile, I tracked down every rumor of Nightside and its wardens to uncover weaknesses. I talked to mystics who’d had visions of this place. I questioned others experiencing the same dreams I had—before they were collected, one by one.” Only those in Poly eluded the Gaolers’ reach.

“What would you do if you somehow escape before I kill you? Won’t you be recaptured? At least Dacia will provide me some protection.”

“If an escape existed, I would return to Poly and work on my defenses.” The prospect of more exile there made him queasy. “The Gaolers won’t enter that realm. No one knows why.”

“I read it’s unforgiving there.”

“Just as bad as this realm, yet freezing too.” But unlike Nightside, sand covered it.

She cocked her head, listening for the wendigos over the now pounding rain and wind. Did they already near?

Silt told her, “You were seeking a purpose for our imprisonment? Maybe Nightside is a menagerie of undead creatures, andweare the food.” At her disbelieving look, he said, “In the Lore? Why not?”

The prospect didn’t faze her for long. “This isn’t the end of my story. I won’t consider the battle lost till I’ve no more moves open to me.”

“Are you never daunted?”

She raised the makeshift sword he’d foolishly given her. “As long as I have a weapon, I will find my way.”