Kell grasped a sword off the wall and Alize kept on his heels as they both bolted towards Davram’s chamber. Kell reached the doorway first, his blade brandished.

A harsh blue light lit up the hallway, propelling Kell to slam against the opposite wall. His sword flew from his hands, the tip swinging perilously closely to Alize. His eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped to the floor.

Alize reevaluated her strategy. She could still hear Davram struggling, but she tiptoed to the doorway, heart pounding. The room sounded still except for Davram’s soft protests.

“Come in, Alize,” a woman’s voice sang low and clear. “If I wanted to attack you, I would.”

Alize pressed against the wall, restraining her ragged breathing as a gift to the silence.

But she felt the lines of magic grip her body, tugging her towards the doorway like as a farmer steers his goat to slaughter. In her fresh fear, her memory connected the sensation to another experience, in the Temple, when Omurtak had forced her prostrate before him with a magic so much stronger than her own.

To accept her weakness required more strength than fighting it, and Alize fought like an animal, pulling at her limbs and twisting, roaring her defiance. She tried to strew her limbs, to press her heels and stretch her body across the floor, anything that would give her a semblance of control. Her bones ached with the effort, subjected to the competing forces, but still her body slunk forward under the unrelenting power of the unseen Conjurer.

And then she was in the doorway, and she only had to look up.

A woman in gray robes knelt on the floor next to Davram with her fingers pressed to his temples. She glanced at Alize, nodding slightly, as if to confirm her arrival. Davram lay limp, exerting sporadic resistance against the woman’s magic. He stammered, flinching away from her, but her power held him immobile as surely as it held Alize. Davram’s face twisted in pain but the woman’s brown eyes were untroubled.

“You’re-” Alize began, but instantly she felt her chin thrust upwards, exposing her neck. Her breaths became shallow with surprise and panic, her words silenced.

“We did not think we had any more to learn from Davram’s memories,” the woman announced, “but imagine my astonishment to discover that you live. You, the fire from the Temple. Alize, alive. What shall we do now?”

Alize felt her head released. She lowered her gaze to the woman. The Conjurer acknowledged her with an expectant stare, dulled to anything resembling astonishment. She raised one eyebrow as the only indication of her curiosity. As if she thought Alize owed her an explanation. Her gray robes pooled around her, their folds mimicking the delicate wrinkles in her pallow skin, a surface forced into three dimensions.

“You are violating the Mage’s creed. This is not pacifism.” Alize jeered.

The Mage sat up with sharp movements, her eyes shifting to where her carved staff rested against the bed.

“Our creed bends to fit our needs,” she replied. But under Alize’s steady gaze she released Davram. The Sargon’s face relaxed and he slouched onto the headboard, unconscious.

The woman’s eyes remained locked on Alize. “Besides,” she added, “outdated rules can only confine us. They are weakness.”

Alize quelled the fury in her stomach as she looked at Davram’s limp body, “It is greater weakness to claim values only when it is convenient.”

The woman grunted, drawing herself up. “You and I agree then, that the Magi are weak.”

Alize cocked her head. Either the woman did not understand her, or truly felt no shame for her desecration. Alize could relate to the former, but not the latter.

“Mage Onder is dead.” The Mage stated. “According to the memories of this Sargon, this buried prince, you shared the fight that killed him.”

“I could have told you that at the front door,” Alize spat. She had always assumed that any group that denounced harm against its own members would endeavor to reciprocate the favor. Yet this woman had been satisfied to injure Davram rather than attempting an alternative method.

Still the raised eyebrow. “But would you have? When so much violence traces back to you?” The woman’s eyes clouded for a moment and then focused on Alize anew, “You and Davram also met Mage Amrea shortly before her death,” she hummed, “How fascinating.”

“Surely you know they both died at the hands of the Kogaloks.”

“Nothing stands certain at this time,” the woman rumbled. Her voice jarred against the consequence of her words. “We did not suspect you had survived. Perhaps I shall return for your memories, although,” the woman gestured carelessly to Davram, “his memories attest that your knowledge is too limited for our purposes. The Hrumi kept such secrets from you, didn’t they?”

Though spoken so very gently, Alize’s entire being recoiled. She hated that the Hrumi faults had been laid bare to this pitiless woman. But Alize also revolted against another idea. This woman could take her memories from her time at the citadel.

That information changed everything. Alize could not bear to have that condemnation wrenched from her.

The woman took a step closer, curling her fingers into the air, her middle fingers stretching towards Alize’s temple while Alize kept her face calm, burying her fear and feigning her courage.

“You can ask me who I am,” Alize purred, taunting the Mage with a ferocity she almost did not recognize, “Perhaps I will tell you.”

The woman dropped her hands with an irritated flourish. “You do not know,” she said, disgusted.

“I could guess. Perhaps I am winter come to claim this land, gather it in my grasp and squeeze.”

“What idiocy.”

“Perhaps I am weakness personified,” Alize rolled her words off her tongue while she glared at the Mage, “to plague those deluding themselves strong without conviction.”

The anger that ricocheted across the Mage’s face made plain she understood Alize’s implications. “Enough!” She yelled, her magic flinging Alize to slam against the wall with a sharp thud. “You hold no moral highground here. You may tell your Sargons you come here for peace, but I am no such fool. A Hrumi is a flame in the tinderbox.”

Alize’s head stung with biting heat where it struck the wall, but she barely paid it any heed. The Mage’s words resonated more far more painfully. “Then pray ignorance to recognize you own misjudgment.”

“It is no consequence to me how the Hrumi decide to destroy themselves. But,” the Mage’s tone softened, thick like syrup, “despite your vulgarity, it has been most enlightening to make your acquaintance. I will relish our next encounter.” The Mage rose, retrieving her staff and smoothing her skirts.

“Pity I can’t say the same,” Alize called. “What have you done to the Sargons?”

“Nothing permanent. This one, Kell,” Alize grimaced that the woman addressed him so informally, so intimately, from the friendship of Davram’s memories. “He begins to stir now, see? I’ll be on my way before he seeks his sword again. We shan’t risk making this situation worse than it already is, shall we?”

The woman smiled nonchalantly, departing the room with her robes dancing around her. The fabric caressed Kell’s skin as she stepped over him in the hallway. Kell groaned softly, as if it pained him.

Alize trailed the Mage to the landing to watch her descend the stairs, all her thoughts of retaliation shoved aside because they were useless against the Mage’s power. Still the indecision rotted her. She gripped the banister with white knuckles and wore her rage more comfortably than her own skin.

The front door thumped closed with finality.

Alize released her breath. In an instant she knelt at Kell’s side, her fingers testing his head for swelling. He shifted on the floor with his eyes closed.

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Alize grasped his shoulders. “Kell?” Alize could not bear to say his formal name when she wanted to help him, when she needed him to trust her.

“I’m fine,” he rasped, “check Davram.”

Davram only snorted loudly as Alize shook him. But his pulse thumped in his neck with a steady, reassuring rhythm.

Alize returned to Kell’s side to help him to his feet. He brushed off her hands, though she could see him wincing.

“Let me get you some water,” Alize offered.

Kell followed her down the stairs, twisting his torso testily. “Who in the gods’ names was that?”

“Apparently the Magi are trailing Davram.”

“Why?”

“They appear to think we’re responsible for Onder’s death,” Alize answered with false brightness.

“More good news.”

Alize knew exactly what Kell meant. The Magi swore to kill any person who unleashed violence against them. Judging by the gray lady’s allusions, that part of their creed remained firmly upheld. Their investigation of Davram, and Alize, was hence deeply unsettling.

Kell pressed past Alize into the kitchen but she stopped him with an outstretched hand.

“Sit.” She gestured to a chair.

He accepted the cup of water she handed him and drew a deep breath.

Alize wondered if he recognized what the water meant. Not important now. She faced the hearth, rolling up her sleeves. She took her time lighting the fire. It gave Kell some privacy to recover from his assault, his defeat. She knew all too well the shame that racked her after a failure. When she turned back to Kell, he hung his head and heaved his breaths. Seeing him, Alize felt an urge to speak some comfort, to tell him it was not his fault. All he had done was help Davram, and still he blamed himself.

“Are you hurt?” she asked tentatively.

Kell dragged his gaze upwards and grimaced. “No.” A tremor shook him. Without warning he flung his cup against the floor. The ceramic shattered loudly in the din.

Even with the fire burning, in that moment the world seemed darker, the shadows longer, their tendrils smoothering the light that dared defy them.

Kell dipped his head in his hands once more. “So now the Magi attack us?! Is it not enough to have Davram useless, my colleagues suspicious, and the Hrumi dying around me while Icar breathes doubt down my neck?! And you show up, from the jaws of death, with nothing but accusations! Why bother with any of this?!” Kell rose, forcibly knocking his chair over. It clamored against the floor with a noise that overwhelmed Alize’s ears. The roaring almost obscured Kell’s footsteps thudding up the stairs.

Alize did not even register scrambling to her feet, but when she reached the doorway she consciously chose to pause. Instead of following Kell, Alize retrieved his bag from where he had discarded it next to the door. After shuffling through its contents, she organized the herbs before her and set two pots on the fire to boil.

It was later by the time Alize faced the stairway again. She questioned each footfall that led her towards the Sargons. She had no weapons to fight the despair that awaited there.

It sat deeply rooted in her own body.

But she could provide it company. Alize had suffered enough to understand that such comfort has its own worth.

Kell lay sprawled on the floor next to Davram’s bed, his limbs listless and his gaze hostile. The older Sargon snored slightly while Alize checked his vital signs once more, satisfied that the Mage had not harmed him.

But Kell flinched when Alize placed the stewing pot on the carpet beside him.

“Leave me,” he murmured as Alize lit the candles on the wall.

“I’m going to have a look at your face while I’ve got you on your back.”

“Sounds romantic,” Kell spat.

“Don’t be mean,” Alize countered coolly.

Kell blinked several times and his face softened. Alize settled next to him on the floor. He did not object when she reached forward to probe the cut on his cheek with her fingertips.

“Ow.”

“Hold still.” Alize tugged her poultice from the pot. She tested the temperature on her skin before pressing it to the Kell’s welt.

“Ow,” Kell grumbled more adamantly. “You’re doing that on purpose.”

“Only a little,” Alize rolled her eyes as she eased the pressure. “How did you get this anyways? It looks like you caught a metal scrap in the face.”

Kell scowled. “Luckily a small one. I got clouted.”

“An angry Hrumi?” Alize sighed.

“No, actually. This is the handiwork of Icar himself.”

“Your prince?” The responding fury that rose in Alize surprised her with its magnitude. She expected the prince’s abuse towards her sisters, but not towards his own Sargons. Only a man without honor could punish those who carried out his own commands.

“Icar was none too pleased to learn that Essa had passed peaceably in the night.”

His words registered in Alize’s mind with the gentleness of caress. Peaceably, he said. A fate Essa would not have dared hope for.

Alize shifted the poultice on Kell’s face, this time pressing with much more care. Her tenderness was lost on Kell, who winced all the same.

“Icar’s a fool to do this to you,” Alize growled, “A coward.”

Kell sighed. “Icar’s not like Jorin. He treats his servants like chattel if they step out of line, but turns a blind eye to the ministers that cull the coffers. Steal a coin, loose a hand, but jeopardize the treasury, and you’re qualified to be finance minister. He doesn’t understand that their loyalty isn’t to him, but to his blindness.”

“But don’t you support him?” Alize asked in surprise. She had never even considered that Kell might disagree with the Parousia prince.

“It’s death not to, in this city. Even if every Sargon alive objected to his behavior, he’d order us all killed for treason before he would change it.”

“How civil.”

Kell’s responding snort assured Alize he too recognized the inconsistency.

“It’s sort of tragic, actually, that the Hrumi see us as this unified, monolithic enemy when we’re just as embroiled in infighting as I’ve observed they are. Probably much more so. All the steppe provinces are just a giant mess masquerading as functioning societies.”

His tone made Alize chuckle.

Kell’s reticent smile turned almost genuine. It made his face look much more familiar and Alize treasured the flickering candle light on his cheeks, and the way his smile glowed in his eyes. She wanted to drink in every detail; never had she felt so parched. Alize broke eye contact so she could stifle the urge to smooth his hair, to flit her fingerstips over his skin instead of resting them on the poultice.

“You must think I’m a monster, Alize, for everything I’ve done,” Kell murmured.

“No.” Alize adjusted the poultice. “I think you’ve been forced to play the monster to mollify those that would do greater harm. It requires more strength, I think, than playing a hero.”

Kell’s eyes danced on Alize’s hands before he met her gaze. “You called me arrogant that day, before the Temple battle.”

“And you called me a coward. Obviously you know that’s not true.” Alize grinned a little.

“Obviously,” Kell laughed softly but his smile faltered. “I have to be the monster for the Hrumi. You said yourself they don’t know how to deal with a kind Sargon. I give them something to recognize, to grant them enough strident virtue to provoke their perseverance. It’s easy, really, because they only want to see a monster.”

“They broke their hunger strike,” Alize conceded. “That’s a massive victory.”

“Only to spite me! Is that funny or sad?” Kell sighed. “I told them Prince Icar wanted them all to die to spare him the trouble of actually addressing the Hrumi problem he had inherited. They hated to think they were helping him.”

“That’s brilliant.” Alize had found something to agree with Kell about. It spread warmth in her chest, a simmering of bright stars. “And what did you do for Essa?” For she was certain, in her heart, that Kell had helped Essa somehow.

Kell furrowed his brows.

Alize could not restrain herself. She reached to smooth Kell’s forehead as she replaced the poultice. His skin was warm, soft. His eyes flashed to hers, and this time he did not acknowledge the sting of her medicine.

“The night the Hrumi held me prisoner in the camp, before the Temple Battle, I received belladonna, a noose, and a dagger.” Kell answered. “Your clan leader was certainly brutal, but she gave me a choice. Perhaps it was all a manipulation on her part, but that choice…I guess maybe I understood what you said about needing to exercise control, even in a prison cell. I tried to do the same for Essa, although I could only manage the belladonna.”

Alize hesitated for an instant before leaning forward. Though clumsy, she pressed her lips to Kell’s forehead. He smelled of dust and iron, sweat and something bitter, an anger rendered from his skin. But still too lingered the faint smell of cardamum, a fragile sweetness, reassuring as a soft melody to a tormented mind.

Alize’s heart thudded, her entire being swarming with gratitude for Kell’s unassuming but irrefutable humanity. He shattered all the walls the Hrumi had built simply by refusing to believe they existed. Alize’s admiration gave way to a more urgent emotion, an unspoken desire that nearly overwhelmed her carefully crafted control. Alize felt the erosion and it frightened her.

Kell frowned as she pulled away from him.

Alize blinked, clearing her throat and her mind. “Break all the cups you like, Kell.”

Kell’s smile reappeared when she spoke his nickname, “I’d rather not have to.”

His fingers curled into Alize’s hands and then trailed up her forearms, gripping her elbows to pull her back to him.

Alize found nothing within her prepared to resist him

But that was the moment that Davram gasped loudly, struggling to sit up.

For an instant Kell’s eyes remained locked on Alize’s, their breaths poised in joined stillness, but with sad resignation Kell shifted his attention to his friend.

Alize rose with him and darted downstairs to fetch the other pot from the fire. The rest of the world seemed paler than the moment that she and Kell had shared, all the colors muted into grays.

When she returned with stewing pot, Kell’s corresponding smile was tired and joyless. He insisted he could tend Davram alone. The older Sargon was swearing vividly in his haze, hurling abuses at his friend. Kell ignored them as he urged Alize to leave.

Alize understood Kell meant to protect Davram’s pride, but her heart ached for him as she watched him sigh off his friend’s animosity. It was an ache both familiar and new, for though she recognized the sorrow, the wistfulness accompanying it seemed like a minor chord in a song that had once been merry. Alize watched Kell and her affection engulfed her with such strength that she recoiled, the same response to an adversary. A coercion to force her hand without obtaining her consent.

But she made no move. Slowly, as if peeling back the cobwebs of clouds from the sky to reveal the sunlight, she recognized she held power in the balance. Her actions were her choice, as long as she was prepared for the consequences. And what, Alize wondered, have I to fear from helping a friend against the swarming darkness?

With that clarity, Alize stepped forward. She longed to speak the words that might make Kell smile as he had once that day in the Hrumi tent, with autumn clutching them both tightly in its dying embrace.

But Alize faltered. She did not know those words.

Kell glanced up, his features blurred with weariness and despondency. It almost made Alize doubt that he had ever smiled at all.

“Please, Alize, just go.”

So with her lips still slightly parted with unformed thoughts and unspoken words, Alize halted. Her mouth tasted acidic as she acceded and excused herself for the night.

She could not have known that Kell’s eyes on her back matched her own in their melancholic yearning.