“Miguil, can you make a splint?” Dualayn said, his voice a distant buzz intruding on the turmoil of Ōbhin’s thoughts.
“Yeah.”
“Good. Bind the topaz to Dajouth’s arm when you do. Place it over the break.”
“Sure,” Miguil answered, sounding sullen.
Footsteps thudded behind Ōbhin. He didn’t look away from the debris. Avena was just beyond there, helpless in that thing’s arms. What would it do to her? Had he trapped her alone with the impostor by caving in the ceiling? Had he killed them all—her!—in his desperate gambit to defeat the crystalman?
“I wouldn’t brood on Avena,” said Dualayn as he knelt beside Ōbhin. The older man pressed a topaz healer against Ōbhin’s foot and activated it.
Orange light flooded up Ōbhin’s leg. The pain he’d been ignoring retreated before it. Ōbhin let out a sigh and glanced dull eyes at Dualayn. A drained lethargy weighed on him like a diamond-belly egg snake had crept into his nest, cracked his shell, and sucked all the yolk out of him. It left him hollow, on the verge of collapse.
Brittle.
“This is going to hurt,” Dualayn said as he grasped Ōbhin’s ankle. “I need to set the break so the Topaz can restore the bone properly.”
Ōbhin shrugged. “I don’t—”
Dualayn wrenched his ankle with a hard jerk. Pain exploded. The agony shot through Ōbhin’s dazed thoughts, focusing his awareness on the grinding bones. He leaned back on his hands, head snapping back. His scream echoed around the ramp. It shouted back at him again and again. Then the topaz’s gentle tone soothed the pain.
The touch of a mother. Of Aliiva’s healing song.
“Avena is smart and capable,” Dualayn said as he bound the topaz to Ōbhin’s ankle. “She has the map and knows how to read the characters of Old Tonal. She’ll find her way to the Hall of Communication on her own.” He smiled. “She might even find it before we do.”
“And if she can’t?” Ōbhin asked, his mind working as the pain retreated. The topaz soothed him the way his mother’s lullabies had as a small child. She would take off her mask to sing to him, exposing her face, her smiling joy and shining eyes, to her child.
“She can always leave. Unlike us, she has a path she can follow back out. We’re the ones who might never find our way out.”
Ōbhin glanced at Dualayn. “Fingers was carrying her. I saw that during the collapse.”
Dualayn nodded. “I saw her standing before the ceiling came down. Perhaps she was injured by the car the crystalman threw, or perhaps she suffered more interference.” He finished tying the knot and then clapped a hand on Ōbhin’s shoulder. “She has a healer in her bag. Fingers knows how to use it. He cares for her. She’ll be fine.” Dualayn grinned, his gaze growing distant. “She’s brilliant, you know.”
The smile on Dualayn’s dusty lips comforted Ōbhin. It shocked him a moment later. Dualayn didn’t feel like a monster. At that moment, his thoughts cleared by the jewelchine driving back the pain, Ōbhin realized what angered him the most about Dualayn. Not just the betrayal, but the man’s caring attitude. He genuinely wanted to help people. He was almost a good person who was too driven to accomplish his goals.
Too willing to cause a little pain.
It unsettled Ōbhin at how pernicious it was. This man would gladly spend all night fighting to save your life and the next day decide that chancing your death would aid him in understanding more about healing and jewelchines.
“We need to keep moving,” Ōbhin said. He rose with a grunt. Putting his weight on his left foot flared the agony. The topaz healed him, but the bone felt fragile. He limped on it, keeping his weight on his right as much as possible. “How many packs do we have?”
“Three,” said Miguil. “Only your pack was lost.”
Ōbhin nodded. “Dajouth? Can you walk?”
“Better than you,” the young man said, his face tight. “Black-cursed roaches and rats! Hurts to move my arm wrong.”
Ōbhin almost laughed. “Eat rations, drink water, and then we’ll find where this ramp leads.”
*
The dream of the ancient battle against the ant demons—are they the darklings? she wondered—faded. Avena became aware of her body cradled in strong arms. Not Ōbhin’s. She could feel a padded gambeson stretched over a large frame.
“Fingers?” she whispered.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice hoarse. He slowed and stopped. “You okay?”
“My shoulder still hurts,” she groaned.
“Lost the healer,” Fingers said as he set her down.
“The ceiling collapsed on it,” Bran said.
Her insides stiffened.
The impostor Bran stood nearby, holding a pair of diamond lanterns. He had his backpack on, a fine layer of gray dust covering his entire body. His eyes were shiny holes through the grime. The same coated her. She grimaced, feeling the grit in her mouth. Her lungs.
She coughed, leaning against Fingers while her insides broiled. She couldn’t help but stare at Bran. The impostor. He looked at her with delight, a boyish smile crossing his lips. All a lie. That exuberant, bright lad snuffed out by this thing.
Then Avena blinked. “Where are the others? Ōbhin?” Her voice echoed down a tunnel. Water dripped from overhead. “Ōbhin!”
“He collapsed the roof of the carriage house on the crystalman,” Fingers said.
“It was amazin’ to watch,” Bran said, his eyes bright. “He slashed the column.” He mimed the swings while making swishing sounds. “Just like that. Then he baited the crystalman to punch it and . . . BAM! The ceilin’ came down and crushed it.”
“I ran carryin’ you,” Fingers added. “I followed the dogs. They were fleein’ and they led me to this tunnel. Bran . . .” The older man studied the
