“I’m fine,” Aletheia said. She held a bandage to her leg. “Really. It barely hurts.”

Mother examined her wrist. “You should not have staked so much on your ward. Beyond losing it for good, you might have broken your arm.”

“A jade ward is just a thing. It’s worth spending to win.”

“Is a limb?” Mother asked.

“That depends on what winning means.” Aletheia looked to Corvo.

Corvo twirled his own ward that he wore on his left wrist. If it could cause him as much pain as it seemed to have caused Aletheia, he didn’t want it anymore. But then if it could keep him safe from a lion—maybe he did.

“I suppose I’m optimistic hoping anyone might explain what the hell is happening anymore,” Dorian said. He had been holding Corvo since the fight’s end, but now he let him go, and he gazed at the shelves around them more closely. “It all looks like it’s hardly been here an hour.”

“Halting decay is a simple spell,” Mother said. “One we are fortunate the Magisters of old used so often. As for what ‘is happening’, the runes across the lion rendered it immune to most forms of magic, although not their secondary effects. I could not restrain it or Disintegrate it, at least not without a great deal of mana.”

“We’re lucky we removed a few of its plates before the fight started,” Aletheia said. “But it’s fine. It’s over now.”

They all glanced at the lion’s corpse. It looked like nothing now except a pile of slag, like the refuse from a factory, limp and inert.

“That’s it, then? It’s settled?” Dorian asked.

“Not quite,” Mother said. “We must first look around this vault and determine if there is anything worth swiping for ourselves.”

Mother picked Corvo up and put him on her shoulders. She almost never carried him that way anymore, not for years since his infancy, but for the time being she could still manage it. Together they searched the shelves.

She found countless books she intended to take for herself. But each time she sighed and put it back, saying, “Deror will notice their absence. I cannot take so many.”

Meanwhile Aletheia and Dorian whispered to each other.

“It was the Shadow Man,” Aletheia said. “I know it was.”

“He’s here,” Dorian said.

“He’s always here. The lion could detect him, somehow, when we never could.”

“Maybe we should have kept him around. The lion. We might have had a use for him.”

Aletheia shrugged. “Maybe we’ll find some other way. It’s a start.”

Mother came to a shelf of artifacts. On a metal stand were three orbs, similar to the arcane focus on her staff, but smaller, and tinted red. They looked more like ornaments to Corvo than anything else; but when Mother saw them, she gasped.

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She put Corvo down and reached for them without delay.

“What is it?” Aletheia asked, turning that way.

When her hand touched the first sphere, a light within it seemed to activate. It glowed bright red, like the lion’s gem had, and it raised itself slowly into the air.

She touched the next. It did the same, and so did the third.

When she stepped backward, the three orbs lurched after her. They levitated at shoulder level; then they floated toward her, until one was above her head and two were over her shoulders.

She made a gesture and one of the orbs floated down to her wrist. Another, and it returned.

“It is a set of sanguine spheres,” she said. “Arcane foci, similar to mine, yet far more powerful. They are—ancient.” Her voice was giddy and filled with excitement, like Corvo when he was explaining the joy of a new toy. “Sanguine spheres can be used to modify any spell. They possess intelligences of their own—it is said that the Essence of a Magister dwells within each, and has but one purpose: to mold mana to the bearer’s will. Three powerful men died to make this artifact.”

Aletheia rose to meet Mother.

“Are they real?” she asked.

“I do not—yes, they are. It is hard to tell, but—they are real.” Mother looked over her shoulder. “Did Deror knew of these? Is this why he had us come to this vault?”

The party fell silent.

Corvo grew quickly bored. He was sick of this place, and the hulk of the lion still drew his eyes frequently, as he feared it might rise again. He scanned the lowest shelves of the vault nearby for anything interesting, without much thought.

He found it a moment later. On the lowest shelf, below where the spheres had been found, was a smooth obsidian shard, polished black on both sides and pointed like an arrowhead.

He ran his finger across it. It was impossibly smooth, and when he grabbed it, he could see his own reflection in its polished surface.

He wanted it. It was pretty. And so without any more thought than that, he grabbed it, stuck it in his pocket, and turned his attention back to Mother.

“I could ask if I might keep them—ask, and then hope to avert what conflict might follow,” Mother said.

“You’d be insulting him,” Aletheia said. “Of course they can’t let you keep them.”

“But I found them!” But she sighed and looked to Corvo. “I will never find an artifact such as this again.”

“Some things are more important than artifacts,” Aletheia said.

Mother put her head in her hands. For a brief moment the sanguine spheres twirled around her head. But she stole a glance at Corvo, and when their eyes met, she gave a long, frustrated sigh.

Then with nothing more than a thought, Mother commanded the spheres to return to their stand on the shelf.

They obeyed. They floated there, and their lights went out.

“You are right,” Mother said. “We have not come here for riches. Our side of the deal has been fulfilled; we cannot afford to strain our relationship with Deror any further. Let us hope he is an elf of his word and will do as he has promised. And that… is enough.”

“You’re not taking anything?” Dorian asked. “Not even that?” He gestured to a pile of large golden coins on one of the shelves.

“These are just things,” she said. “They are not worth my son’s life. Now proceed. I am sick of this place.”

They rendezvoused with Deror at the entrance to the tunnel, where the ridge met the luminescent forest.

“It is done,” Mother said. “The spell is lifted. You may raid this ruin at your own leisure.”

“I can feel it. Thank you. And what did you find within?” Deror asked.

“A guardian,” Aletheia said. “And a few things worth guarding.”

He nodded. “And what did you take?”

Corvo had a strong impulse to admit his theft. He felt the obsidian shard in his pocket. He did not want to make Mother a liar, and he knew stealing was wrong. He had stolen this, hadn’t he? Shouldn’t he have given it back?

But it was nothing magical. It was a piece of rock. That was all. And he liked rocks, especially fancy rocks. So he said nothing.

“We took nothing, elf,” Mother said. “The contents of this vault are yours. We are generous in asking for nothing more than what was promised. Will your Huntresses lead us to the City?”

Deror nodded. “The Huntresses will lead you to the edge of the forest, and no farther. You will see them not after that. But we will no longer interfere with your business in Seneria.”

“That is all we ask,” Mother said. “Now we have spent as much time as we can afford here. Please. Return us to your village, and allow us to travel hence.”