The clerk's name was Tomas. By morning, he had told Maelin where the remaining records were kept, where the captives from the mill had been intended to go, and which road the keepers used to move prisoners south. He would not say those things while Sevenofknine was in the room. She waited outside the chapel, watching Luvztospoon try to fasten a borrowed scabbard around the stump of his sword.
“That won’t hold.”
“It holds if I don’t move.”
“Useful in a fight.”
She knelt beside him and adjusted the buckle. When she finished, the shortened blade sat securely at his hip.
“There.”
“You’re enjoying this.”
“A little.”
He touched the ribbon at her wrist. She left his hand there until Maelin came out.
“There’s a foundry at the southern road station,” the priest said. “A Horde supply detachment uses it. We take the others that far, find you a smith, and send word about the quarry.”
“Will they let you in?” Sevenofknine asked.
“They let me mend their soldiers. I expect they’ll let me talk.”
Maelin handed Sevenofknine a small packet of pale ash.
“The ward in your glove is nearly spent. Keep this dry. A line across a threshold may buy you time.”
“How much?”
“Enough to close a door. Don’t plan on more.”
✦
They traveled with the three captives and Tomas until noon. Snow began to fall in broad wet flakes. The road descended into a valley where an old stone bridge crossed a narrow gorge. Beyond it stood an abandoned tollhouse and a marker for the southern road station. Luvztospoon stopped before the bridge. Fresh wheel tracks crossed the snow.
The grooves were too sharply defined to belong to a wagon that had passed in the morning. Snow lay inside them only in loose flakes, not in the fine settled powder around the bridge. Someone had crossed recently and made no effort to conceal it. From the tollhouse a shutter hung open though no smoke rose from the chimney.
Luvztospoon's first instinct was to put Seven behind him. He stopped himself. She had seen the marks at the mill, recognized a trap he would have walked through, and kept them both alive more than once since the camp. She was already studying the ironwork on the bridge while he watched the road. Without speaking, they spread enough apart to cover both approaches.
“Maelin.”
She halted the others. At the far end, a wagon had been parked sideways across the road. Someone stepped from behind it. The stranger from the quarry wore a bandage around his head. One side of his face had swollen until his smile tilted unevenly.
“I expected you earlier,” he said.
Sevenofknine drew her sword.
“We had people to help.”
“So I see.”
Armed men appeared beside the tollhouse. Behind the travelers, boots crunched among the trees. Luvztospoon counted six ahead and heard at least four behind. The stranger looked at his shortened sword.
“That seems inconvenient.”
“Come closer.”
“No.”
He lifted his coat collar. A blue mark shone at the base of his neck. Sevenofknine staggered, but stayed standing.
“The ring’s gone,” Luvztospoon said.
“Iron can break. Faith requires more effort.”
Tomas whispered behind them.
“Malrec.”
The stranger's smile vanished.
“You had one simple task.”
Tomas retreated behind Maelin. Malrec made a small gesture. The men behind them advanced.
✦
Sevenofknine threw the ash across the bridge's entrance. The mark on Malrec's throat flickered. He recoiled as though something had pulled a hook through him.
“Go!” she shouted.
Maelin took Tomas by the coat and led the captives onto the narrow maintenance stair cut into the near bank. It descended below the road toward a footpath along the gorge. Luvztospoon turned to meet the men coming from the trees. The first carried an axe. He swung high, expecting Luvztospoon to block. Instead Luvztospoon stepped inside the blow and drove him against a pine.
The second man had a spear. Sevenofknine caught it beneath her blade, twisted it aside, and cut the strap holding his shield. Luvztospoon struck as it fell. Two men withdrew toward the forest. On the bridge, Malrec knelt and scraped at the ash with a dagger.
“Down the stair,” Sevenofknine said.
Luvztospoon backed toward it. The last captive was halfway down when a bowstring sounded. An arrow struck the stone beside Maelin's head. Above the far bank, another bowman nocked a second arrow. Sevenofknine looked from him to Malrec, then to the captive moving painfully along the stair. Luvztospoon felt the darkness rise inside him. He could pull the bowman from the ledge. He could end this.
His hand lifted. Sevenofknine caught it.
“That’s what he wants.”
Malrec had stopped scraping. He watched Luvztospoon with an expression of hungry attention. Sevenofknine let go and ran onto the bridge.
“Seven!”
She crossed the ash. Blue light leaped from her sword to the iron rail, racing ahead of her in branching threads. Malrec cried out and fell to one knee. The bowman turned toward her. His next arrow missed the stair. Maelin pushed the captives down the path. Luvztospoon followed Sevenofknine onto the bridge.
✦
Halfway across, a line of blue symbols woke beneath the snow. Iron spikes had been driven into the joints between the stones. Wire joined them beneath a covering of loose grit. The trap had been waiting for them both. Luvztospoon stopped as light closed around his boots. The wound in his shoulder opened with a sudden, tearing pain. Sevenofknine turned.
She saw the wire. She saw Malrec rise beyond it.
“Get back,” she said.
Luvztospoon pulled one foot free. The other would not move. Sevenofknine came to him and drove her blade beneath the wire. The blue light climbed her sword arm. He caught her waist.
“Leave it. I can break—”
“No.”
She looked up at him, her teeth clenched against the pain.
“Let me do this.”
He loosened his hold enough for her to twist the sword. The wire snapped. His trapped foot came free. Behind them, the near end of the bridge shuddered. Mortar fell into the gorge. A slab of paving tilted, exposing rotten timber beneath an old repair. Malrec shouted to his men. They moved toward Sevenofknine. She shoved Luvztospoon toward the near bank.
“Maelin needs you.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“I know.”
She untied the ribbon from her wrist and pressed it into his palm.
It was a small knot. He had taught it to her in sunlight by a stream far from this gorge, and she had learned it badly on purpose so she could make him show her again. Now her fingers were awkward with cold and the pain running beneath her skin, but she did not drop the cloth.
He felt the red ribbon fold against his gauntlet. Her expression changed as she watched him understand. For one brief instant, she looked not frightened but sorry, as if she had found another way to hurt him while trying to keep him alive. He reached for her hand again. She stepped out of reach.
“Then keep this.”
He understood a heartbeat too late. She stepped onto the cracked slab and kicked its loosened edge.
The bridge fell between them.
✦
Luvztospoon caught the near rail as the stones dropped. His good arm took his weight. The other hung uselessly beside him. Across the widening gap, Sevenofknine stood with her sword raised. Malrec's men approached from both sides of the wagon. Luvztospoon dragged himself onto the broken lip of the bridge. He could jump. He looked at the distance and knew he could not, but crouched anyway.
Sevenofknine saw him.
“Luvz. Look at me.”
He froze at the sound of his name.
“The records are at Hollow Crown,” she said. “I’m going to find them.”
Malrec struck her sword arm with the butt of a spear. She turned on him, but two others seized her from behind. Luvztospoon reached for his power. The iron spikes on his side of the bridge glowed at once. Sevenofknine shook her head fiercely.
“Don’t give him the other half.”
Hands forced her to her knees. Malrec caught her chin. Luvztospoon took one step onto the broken stone. It crumbled beneath him. As he fell, he saw Sevenofknine drive her heel into the knee of the man holding her. He heard her shout his name.
Then the river took him.
✦
Sevenofknine fought until she could no longer see him in the water. After that, she saved her strength. Malrec fastened an iron clasp around her neck. It held no carved ring, but its inside edge bore the marks from the mill ledger. She felt them bite into the old bond.
“He’s dead,” Malrec said.
She looked at the river. On the near bank, a figure had appeared among the trees. Someone was running downstream, keeping pace with something she could not see. Sevenofknine lowered her eyes before Malrec could follow her gaze.
“Then you’ve lost your other half,” she said.
His grip tightened on the clasp. She let him think he had hurt her. Inside her coat, the copied page crackled against her ribs. He had not searched her yet.