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As Aurienne strode towards the door, Wellesley’s men-at-arms glanced at him. He made a curt gesture. In a body, they gathered in front of the door, all armed with swords and lances and shields.

There were no shadows for the Fyren to work with. Aurienne made eye contact with him to enquire whether they should be concerned.Mordaunt lounged against the wall, unperturbed. Which was probably bad news for Wellesley and company.

“Tell your men to stand aside,” said Aurienne to Wellesley. “They needn’t die today.”

It was the second time in so many months that she’d asked a man to stand aside to avoid a massacre. Would this one listen?

No. Wellesley merely looked at her in disbelief. The men guffawed.

“You do realise,” said Wellesley, “that you’ve only got one man here.”

“No,” said Aurienne, with ruefulness born of sad truth. “I’ve got a monster.”

Now Mordaunt moved. With a clang, one gauntlet hit the floor. With another clang, the other fell.Clang.The helmet came off.Clang.The pauldrons.Clang.The chest plate.

Wellesley’s men watched the performance with their brows raised, and with reason, because her guard was armouring down rather than armouring up, as one might imagine a Swanstone sergeant ought to be doing when his Haelan was being threatened.

Finally, Mordaunt stood before them in shirtsleeves and braces, dusting off his palms.

“Hiya,” he said. He gave Wellesley’s men a coy wave. His tacn was a red glow among the room’s white lights.

There were gasps. There was confusion. There was a shrinking back of the assembled men.

“Fyren,” someone gasped.

“There are no shadows—he’s powerless,” said Wellesley, who had himself taken several steps away. “He’s got nowhere to hide. Kill the bastard.”

Mordaunt flashed a smile uncannily like his deofol’s grin.

“Don’t,” said Aurienne. “Youwilldie. Step aside, all of you—just step aside, for Fria’s sake, and let me leave.”

“Skewer him,” snarled Wellesley, and his men surged forwards.

“Your cheeky little lights didn’t get rid ofallthe shadows,” said Mordaunt to the approaching men.

And he shadow-walked to the only dark places in the room: their insides.

The first man burst in a wet, bloody slurry as Mordaunt materialised in his chest cavity. The second became a many-legged anomaly as Mordaunt walked through him. The third collapsed into an indistinct pile of organ, bone, and limb. Then the next. Then the next. For added efficiency, Mordaunt held the Swanstone sword at neck height, and decapitated those he wasn’t stepping through.

When he had dispatched the men, Mordaunt, dripping with guts and blood, looked down at himself, and said, “Well, this shirt is ruined.”

A long piece of intestine slid off his shoulder. A split pancreas dribbled down to the floor with a softsplish. He plucked a stray patella off his trousers.

Wellesley, still next to Aurienne, made the mistake—the very grave mistake, the last mistake he would ever make—of laying a hand on Aurienne.

He pulled her against him with a knife at her neck and spat at Mordaunt: “Stay back.”

“That,” said Mordaunt, “was a bad idea.”

But Aurienne, unfond of knives at her throat, did not wait for rescue. She pressed her tacn to the back of Wellesley’s hand, sent her seith into him, and pinched his carotid artery shut.

An act which oughtn’t have killed him, but, just as everything else today, it derailed spectacularly, and instead of slumping against her into a faint, Wellesley fell backwards and, with a sick crack, smashed his skull open, and scattered his brains on the stone floor.

There was a long silence.

“Shit,” said Aurienne.

Mordaunt eyed her with a new interest. “How did you do that?”