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“For what it’s worth, Aspar annihilated me afterward.

I almost failed the assessment for incontrovertibly poor communication .

That’s why she gave me Carduban. But worry not, my darling Bloodmoon.

I’ll claw my way back to the top.” Then, with a flourish of her black ash wand, Nissa finished, “ Don umbracelon. ”

Shadows spilled from her achullah pipe in dark, inky whorls and swallowed her whole.

The sound of footsteps echoed down the street before disappearing entirely.

Saff exhaled slowly, as did the nearest row of books.

She didn’t know whether to be unsettled or relieved that Nissa knew of her assignment.

It was one more potential leak in the pail, yes, but Saff found herself oddly comforted by the knowledge that it was no longer only she and Aspar who knew the truth.

This way, if something happened to her captain, there was still someone inside the Silvercloaks who could vouch for her.

Pulling her drab black cloak more tightly around herself, Saffron rounded the final corner.

Celadon Gamehouse was bright and sexy and magical, every inch of it designed to lure citizens inside—and to disguise the rot at its heart. There was a beguiling feel to the place, a tug beneath the ribs, a primal desire to go inside.

Golden lights announced the name, and the merry jingle of coins sounded from the slots.

Manning the front doors were not sinister Bloodmoons in scarlet cloaks but rather two neatly dressed bouncers with black three-piece suits and golden bowties.

There was the distant sound of live up-tempo music—saxophones and trumpets, pianos and a distinctive Vallish flambone.

The scents of spiked cherry sours and honey-roasted rivernuts mingled on the breeze.

Beneath it all was something richer, more metallic, like achullah blended with coppery blood.

Notched into the outer walls were rows and rows of glass jars, inside which were hundreds of naked dancers shrunk down with waneweed elixir.

Miniature mages put on the performance of a lifetime, twirling and leaping around their tiny vessels, gesturing pleadingly to the small slots in the side of each jar, through which patrons could slip ascens as tips.

Saff found herself watching the tiny dancers for far longer than she should.

As she stepped toward the entrance, there was a ground-shaking thud on the street behind her—the kind of sound you heard with your bones, not your ears.

A ripple of screams carried through the gathering crowd as Saffron swiveled.

Three naked mages had fallen from the sky.

They were tied together at the waist, deminite shackles around their wrists and ankles, skulls cracked onto the cobbles like eggs.

Their backs were inked with white wings tattooed over jutting shoulder blades, marking themselves rather heavy-handedly as Whitewings—a rival gang of thieves rapidly gaining power in Atherin, much to the Bloodmoons’ ire.

The Whitewings bled from their eyes, their chests, the cavernous gapes in their heads.

Their bodies were mottled with cuts and bruises and other signs of torture, including shattered kneecaps and missing thumbs.

The oldest mage’s mouth was agape, revealing empty, blood-soaked gums. Their final moments had been filled with agony—agony so intense that their magic must have churned with raw and monstrous power—but shackled by deminite, there was nowhere for the power to go.

Pain, the ancient survival mechanism, hadn’t been enough to save them.

Saffron’s mind reeled. There were rumors that some dark mages had found a way to siphon pain’s potency away from the recipient.

They could inflict torture, and instead of bolstering the victim’s magic, they could steal the power without having to endure any hurt themselves.

The Silvercloaks hadn’t found any evidence to back up this theory, but if any sect was likely to have mastered such a thing, it was the Bloodmoons.

Her detective’s instincts urged her to examine the mutilated bodies, but she couldn’t. Tonight, she was a simple patron.

And so she stood there, watching the carnage, feeling strangely, horribly detached.

Not just because the most formative experience of her life was a violent one, but because her five years on the streetwatch spat out such nightmares every week.

She had stared down the red holes of headless necks; stepped over the bodies of naked, humiliated Ludders; comforted innocents burned from head to toe with cruel blackfire; borne witness as children grieved parents and husbands grieved wives, so overcome with the sheer magnitude of the suffering that her body rejected it entirely.

It soon became apparent that she wasn’t the only bystander to feel numbed to it.

Already the echoing screams had died down.

Three mages lay mutilated in the street, yet the patrons moved around them like a river around a rock.

They filtered into the gamehouse, their eyes glazed and happy, their heels jumping with anticipation.

Two Silvercloaks approached the mangled bodies, and Saff jolted at the sight of them.

Auria and Tiernan, dressed in hallowed silver.

Neither of them noticed Saffron, who stood several yards away from the corpses, but she pulled the black hood up to disguise her distinctive hair anyway.

Auria crouched to the ground, futilely feeling for pulses, while pale-faced Tiernan hastily set up a perimeter around them.

His days of vomiting into gutters were behind him, but he still looked like he’d rather be anywhere else.

Saffron watched as he moved in concerted arc-like patterns, always making sure Auria was covered, peering over his shoulder at regular intervals to make sure she was alright.

At one stage his palm found the hollow in the small of her back, and she looked up at him, grim-faced but smiling.

So they’d finally heeded their love for each other.

About damn time.

Saff ached at the sight of Auria’s nose scrunched in concentration, at the reminder of Tiernan’s nervous, puppet-like movements.

She longed for the warm fire of their common room, for long nights spent poring over spellbooks and dog-eared case studies, for sunset dueling in the cobbled yard until they collapsed into their four-poster beds, breathless and exhausted and deeply fulfilled.

Her time at the Academy had been one of the brightest spots of her life. She cupped the memory of it somewhere deep inside, like palms protecting a candle from a breeze. The Silvercloaks were her home, and she would find her way back.

Nodding at the black-suited doormen, she took a long, steadying breath and stepped inside the gamehouse.