Page 110 of Brimstone

“I don’t doubt it.” The old man narrowed his eyes at me accusingly. “She’sSaeris. Of course she’s alive. But it looks like she’s jumped out of the frying pan and straight into the fire with this one, doesn’t it?”

Carrion slipped behind me, pressing his back to the door so that Elroy couldn’t open it. “He isn’t arebel, El.”

“I can see that plain as day. He’s a Fae warrior, and he’s about as subtle as a sledgehammer.” He shoved the end of the poker he was holding into my face. “Those shadows you just cast across the whole city? That could have gotten us all killed. How would that have helped your cause?”

Gotten them all killed? Gods alive, thedramatics. “It would have helped immensely actually. If everyone in Zilvaren was dead, I’d be able to justgo home,” I growled.

“He doesn’t mean that! He doesn’t mean that. Okay, whew, everybody just take a deep breath.” Carrion dragged his hands through his hair as he paced in front of the door. “You’re going to have to forgive my friend here. He hails from cooler climes. The heat makes him irritable.”

“Don’t apologize forme!” I was going to open-palm slap him. “If he wanted cordiality, he shouldn’t have struck me, should he?”

Shouting from the street cut off whatever angry retort Elroy had been about to fire back at me. The ground rumbled with the thunder of many boots. The forge boasted one small, shuttered window; Hayden had cracked the wooden shutters open an inch and stared morosely out of the gap like he was watching the end of the world unfold. “We can’t go back out there,” he said. “Not yet.”

“Youaren’t going anywhere,” Elroy stated. “Saeris would string me up if she knew I let you leave with him.”

I bared my teeth. “Who do you think sent me here tofetchhim, old man?”

“All right. We’re done with this!” Carrion had found a hammer. Not a difficult thing to do, considering where we were. He held it up like a gavel, a very serious look on his face. “Normally, I’m all for a solid argument in the name of fun, but over the past few days I’ve been stung by a million scorpions, been chased repeatedly, and had to kill a ravening lunatic, and I just watched a woman who cared for me and protected me go up in flames. So now . . . we are fuckingdone.” His voice cracked. He shrugged, laughing that roguish, devil-may-care laugh of his, but I’d heard the break in his voice. Elroy had, too. I watched, amazed, as the fight visibly drained out of the old man.

“I was heartsore to hear about Gracia, Carrion. I really was.”

Carrion lowered the hammer. “She was old.” He said this with no emotion at all. As if he’d said this to himself a million times over the past few hours, and the words were the only things holding him together. “I just wish I’d been here to say goodbye. She was . . . the last of her line. There won’t be any more Swifts.”

I felt the gravity of that in my bones. The Swift women had cared for Carrion and explained away his existence over the course of centuries. As far as the outside world had known, they had been his sisters. His mothers. His aunts. His grandmothers. But they had been his friends. His protectors. And now they were all gone. Carrion had lived in Zilvaren a long, long time, but he hadneverbeen without a Swift.

For the hurt the smuggler was enduring right now, I set aside my irritation and took a calming breath. “Tell me, Elroy. How many promises have you made to Saeris and then broken?”

The human’s eyelids shuttered. “None.”

“Me either. And I plan on keeping it that way. Make no mistake. I will burn worlds to keep my word to her, old man. There isn’t a single person in this realm or any other that I wouldn’t sacrifice to make sure I don’t let her down. I promised her that I’d bring her brother home. Will you test my resolve in this?”

A loud crash shook the air outside, followed by a piercing scream. Elroy stared at me, the lines around his eyes tightening a fraction. I met his scrutiny, unflinching. The old man looked away. “No. I don’t suppose I will.” Resignation colored his words. “But the boy should have a say in the matter, don’t you think? You say that you’ve made a promise to bring him home . . . butthisis the only home he’s ever known.”

Murder. Starvation. Oppression. Hate.

These were the foundations Zilvaren was built upon. It was no wonder the footings of this city were incapable of holding itself up. This place was nohome. It was a cage. A death sentence. But the old man was right. Itshouldbe the boy’s choice.

Reluctantly, I dipped my head.

Three pairs of eyes turned to Hayden Fane.

Gods, he was nothing like her. Nothing like her at all. But when he met our gazes and I saw the resolution in his eyes, the way his jaw set, I saw the fleeting shadow of her there. A part of her I recognized. Something I could get behind. “It’s okay, Elroy,” he said. “I want to go.”

Carrion explained everything.

I sat at the window, watching the people of Zilvaren slowly disperse back to their homes. Hours passed, and I listened to Carrion’s story take shape. Every once in a while, a unit of guardians marched past the forge, armor clanking loudly, feet striking the sand with purpose. It was rare that the guardians patrolled the Third in these numbers. Saeris had explained that many of them believed the lie Madra perpetuated—that the Third was a plague ward. Infected. It helped her cause if her own soldiers were afraid of the people here. An army wasn’t as effective if it didn’t hate its enemy.

Elroy paced the forge as he listened to Carrion speak. Occasionally, he worked the bellows, feeding oxygen to the fire that burned in the hearth. I saw Saeris’s movements in him. The way he held his tools. The way he simply moved around the space. But they werehismovements, I knew. He had been the one to teach Saeris how to work a forge, after all. He said nothing to interrupt Carrion. Not when he explained about the Fae. Histransformation. The portals that enabled transport between this world and Yvelia. Hayden interrupted plenty, rapt, eyes the size of saucers. But not the old man. He took it all in stride.

When Carrion was finished, Elroy sat down heavily on a rickety stool that looked older than he was. The weight of the entire realm seemed to be pressing down on his shoulders. I left the window and faced him, arms folded across my chest.

“How do you know all about this?” I demanded.

The clues were all there.

He’d called me a Fae warrior.

He’d known they weremyshadows, blotting out the suns.