THE BLACK BLADE was nearly as long as I was tall, and twice as wide at the base as my hands. It tapered to a square end, and all along the blade were the ticks and chips that told a story of long, hard use. The iron was pitted, bearded and stained with orange. At first, I thought that was rust, but as my fingers played over the iron, I realized that the late Baron had kept it polished. Not corrosion, then, but something else. The hilt was wrapped in a pale leather I dared not consider too closely, and the hilt was a great iron ball. Heavy enough to balance that enormous blade, I thought, peering at it. My mouth drew down in surprise as I realized the pommel was not a exactly ball, or a disc, but fashioned to look like a dog’s head. The features were flattened, but the effect was unmistakable.

I wrapped my fingers around the hilt, and lifted the blade. Not as heavy as I thought, but no feather, either. There was no way I could wield it with one hand alone, but with two… Such a thing could cleave through enemies, could drive back crowds. I knew from bitter experience that it dealt no light sting.

It was mine now. And it needed a name. I whirled in, allowing ancient memory to flow up through my arms. The blade hissed like a silver promise as it came up into a high guard, the roof form to shield the head and shoulders. I stepped, cutting into a lower guard, the pike, which was a near-perfect guard to the man with courage to hold his ground.

I had the passing feeling of light through glass, of things drawing closer in my memory. Yes, I had once wielded a sword like this. My hands were old friends with the weight of such a tool. I drew it to the side in a salute.

Bloodfang, came the answer. I froze, waiting for more, but I was met with only silence, and the heaviness of the caveran.

“Bloodfang, then,” I said aloud. I had no way to sheathe such a sword, so I propped it on my shoulder, tucked the silver tear in my makeshift belt, and marched back to the church. Only one thing remained before I made for the river: a bloodletting.

The bowl drank deeply of the radiance I let flow into it from my hand. Warmth and strength ebbed until I felt enough had been offered, and I could risk no more. There was power yet to the radiance I did not understand, and to travel too weak seemed foolish.

As I staunched the flow, the Velkiryml stood. Perhaps Zeniel drew her own strength from the blood sacrificed into the golden bowl on the altar. She stretched her wings, and turned to face me, granting me a view of her calm beauty. A serenity that was alien to this barbarous, tortured place.

“The hill is quiet,” she said. “It sleeps for a while yet.” Her eyes caught the bladk sword that leaned like a blasphemy against the white altar-stone.

“The witch helped me kill him.” I explained the contraption, and the plot. She listened, but her face saddened with the telling.

“Long was she lost in her grief. You have done her a great mercy, Cinderborn,” Zeniel said.

I held out the silver tear. “She gave me this, when she faded. Can you use it?”

Zeniel looked at it. Her hands rose, trembling terribly, as if she wished to seize it. “I could remember the stars. I could remember my home.” The eagerness made her sweet voice tight, harsh. “You would give it to me?”

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“For answers,” I said. There were too many things I did not know. If I were to cross the river, to survive, I needed more information.

The Velkyrim looked at me over the tear. I caught a fleeting sense of her own isolation, reflected there in the dark pools of her eyes. Whatever crushing abandonment I felt, I suspected hers was a hundred times worse. She had bathed in the starlight of the gods; served the mightiest there in their silver palaces atop the shining peaks. She had heard the music of truth, and drunk the mead of beauty, and—the memories had come unabated. Flowing from her eyes to mine, I thought, a brief glimpse.

And then the fall. Catastrophic, but not commanded.

“I cannot. To remember would be unbearable. I could not remain here, if I knew more than I do now. No,” Zeniel said, shaking her head. Her four wings flared out behind her, more majestic than any queen, more terrible to behold than any curse. “Ask your questions, Cinderborn, and I will serve you as I can. The velkirym serve.”

I let the silver tear lower slowly. She did not look at it again. Slowly, I said, “What is Sangkva?”

“It is a word of the black speech. It means meat, or slave. Or perhaps worm.”

I sensed the truth of that, though it did not endear me to the Baron. I nodded. I knew Zeniel could not lie, but I did not know whether she could obfuscate the truth, either. “What lies across the river?”

“A plain of misery. The black sands, and the children’s forest. Beyond that, the city of Ulstassi, the City of Statues.”

“And beyond that?”

Zeniel shook her head. “I do not know. My star fell not so far.”

“Is this truly hell?”

“Not as you know it. It is worse!” The Velkyrim was beginning to turn to stone again. I could see her slowing, could feel the light of her grace fading. She thrust her finger out, and I knew without looking that she was pointing toward the white city on the far wall of the cavern. “This the Way Between Worlds. The fundament. But is infected, Cinderborn! You must cleanse it. That is your great task. You must do what we could not!”

I got out a last question, before she froze entirely. “What happened to the other Cinderborn? The Baron knew of more. You said there were more. Zeniel!”

Her jaw was locking up, and only her eyes still shone. I saw fear there. Fear and desperation. “Scattered to the winds,” she managed. “Find them. Perhaps together…”

She could not finish. The stone locked around her, freezing her again. This time, she stood with her wings outthrust, her finger pointed toward Ulstassi. I hung my head, wishing I’d gotten more.

But the truth is, nothing she could have told me would have prepared me for what lay ahead. And so, clad with only Bloodfang, my sword, and the clothes on my back, I left the church behind, put the graveyard and at my back, and made my way to the dark waters.

A little pier stood out on the water. Rickety, made of rotting, sagging wood, I doubted it could hold my weight. There was no boat in sight.

I knelt beside the pier, and touched the water gently. I was thirsty, but the fear and pain, and the triumph, had pushed it from my mind. My throat felt ashen, and I realized I’d eaten nothing since first awakening in the dark pit. Nor had water touched my lips. I cupped the water eagerly, bringing it to my mouth. It was dark, oily, but I didn’t care. And yet, try as I might, I could not slake my thirst. Though I filled my mouth, I could not feel the water. It was as if it evaporated from the moment it hit my tongue. It made the thirst all the worse. Another bitter betrayal.

“Curse this place!” I cried out, and hammered the water with my fist, thrashing wildly.

“This river is made of sin,” said a dry voice.