it, a thickening in the air that brushed across his skin. In the quiet places of his mind, he could sense the comforting warmth of his Disentropic Stain, the corona around his soul that flowed through and about him.
The basic formulae of minor cantos flickered in his mind. Causes and effects were calculated, assessed, discarded to make way for more feasible hypotheses. The various arcane cantos were built upon causality, the knowledge of one thing leading to a predictable other. Though his mind was dulled by the effects of the shackles, solutions finally, slowly, presented themselves.
Satisfied he had found the answer he sought, Indris flexed his will and—
The spike of agony pierced him from the top of his skull to the base of his spine. Bile rose, to pour in an acid burn from his mouth, which had opened in an involuntary gasp of pain. His wrists and neck burned where the salt-forged steel touched them. Indris fell back against the wall, chest heaving. The formulae simplified into a useless abstraction, then faded away.
Despite the pain, he calmed his mind and entered the trance state the Sēq Scholars called the Possibility Tree. Questions rose in his mind, a series of hows and whys that led to other hows and whys until possibility had been narrowed to a probability of either success or failure. He played scenario after scenario in his mind. Escapes. Rescues. Negotiations. Pardons. Indris smiled bitterly. As a former knight of the Sēq Order of Scholars, he had been taught the only certainty was a solitary death. Knowing it was different than facing it.
In agony and too tired to think, Indris closed his eyes for a moment, and memories of a war he would rather forget played across the dark canvas of his lids.
Indris’s head snapped up at the rattle of a key in the lock. The parquetry door opened with barely a hint of noise. He eyed his visitors with apprehension. The first man through the door was enormous, muscular, and hard, the skin of his bare arms and neck littered with tattoos. His tunic was stretched across his broad chest, and legs like gnarled tree trunks emerged from his kilt. He was followed by a smaller, older man in a soiled linen coat, his left hand replaced by a bitter hook of dark metal. Thufan, Corajidin’s Kherife-General and Master of Assassins, with his giant son, Armal. They were Corajidin’s law keepers. Those who entered next were easy to identify. Belamandris’s hauberk of ruby crystal scales and his ruby-sheathed amenesqa—the long, gently recurved sword named Tragedy—marked the man. The other two men in red-and-black silk would be Corajidin himself and his heir, Kasraman. Behind them was a squad of five Iphyri, so tall their horse heads almost scraped the high ceiling. Their hooves clopped against the old stone flagging as they settled. Their armor creaked, metal harnesses chiming. They held hook-bladed axes in their enormous hands.
Indris frowned at what he saw in Corajidin. The man was clearly very ill, his skin waxen beneath a sheen of sweat. His red-blond curls were streaked gray, lank against his scalp. His face was drawn, hollow. The stooped rahn of Erebus wrung his hands as if they were in constant pain.
Indris held his banded wrists up with a smile. “I take it the confusion has been sorted and you’re here to release me?”
“Where’s Far-ad-din?” Thufan cuffed Indris on the side of the head. The blow rattled Indris’s skull. Thufan’s breath was sour with rot and rum. Indris winced at the reek.
He glared at the rank old villain. “I surrendered to Rahn-Ariskander as Arbiter of the Change. I’m his captive. A Näsarat wouldn’t give an Erebus the time of day, let alone a prisoner who was also a family member.”
Thufan coughed, a wet rattle from chest to throat. He spat at Indris’s feet. “You’ve been hung out to dry. Your uncle has given you up. Now, where’s Far-ad-din?”
“Far-ad-din? Have you checked the Rōmarq?” Indris said helpfully. “He was escaping in that general direction when I saw him last. Now take me to Ariskander.”
Thufan rested his hook against Indris’s throat. “You’re going to die anyway. Can be easy or hard. Your choice.”
Indris felt the heat build behind his left eye, the unwilling pooling of disentropy. A wave of nausea rose in him. He blinked slowly to calm himself. When he opened his eyes, he caught Thufan’s gaze and held it. “How about not at all?”