“If I am a good friend, then why are you letting the wineskin sit by your knee while I die of thirst? Pass it here.”

Endri handed it over, and Porto took a long draught. It was sour and tasted strongly of oak, from one of the last and smallest of the barrels the army had carted north from the Yistrian Brothers’ vineyards, but at the moment it was all he wanted. It tasted like salvation. It tasted like home.

A feeling of something close to security had stolen over Viyeki since he and the rest of the Hikeda’ya had reached Three Ravens Tower. He knew it was foolish—in truth, the danger grew greater by the moment, not just to themselves but to their entire race. If some miracle beyond foresight did not occur, the mortal army outside would follow them to Nakkiga if it could, take their race’s last city, and destroy Viyeki’s people, murdering every last man, woman, and child as though they were vermin. But even with the knowledge of the horrors that were surely to come, he felt better than he had since the terrible moment when the Storm King had been defeated and the great tower had fallen in Erkynland, crashing down in smoke and dust and the last flickers of magical flames, taking with it all the People’s hope of making the land theirs once again.

In fact, at this instant Viyeki felt almost ordinary, as though the last horrible months had not happened. It was largely the sturdy stone of Three Ravens Tower that reassured him, the way it wrapped around them like the protective mantle of the mountain Ur-Nakkiga itself. The ruins of Tangleroot had never felt like more than a broken place, suitable only for a desperate, doomed resistance to the inevitable. Resistance here was no less doomed, Viyeki knew, but unlike Tangleroot Castle, this tower still had a roof. Just sheltering in the starless dark beneath it reminded him of his mountain home. It had been a long time since the Hikeda’ya had felt safe beneath open sky.

But there was another factor of reassurance, one that he was only beginning to understand, and she stood before him now, conversing with his master Yaarike. General Suno’ku still wore her battle-stained armor, but despite the fierce fighting she had sustained only a small cut on her neck; the line of dried blood made a wandering stripe down her throat and disappeared into her breastplate like a road on an antique map. Her pale eyes showed no trace of the exhausting week passed, the numerous skirmishes fought with Northmen scouts as she led the survivors to Three Ravens Tower. Viyeki had a beautiful, clever wife back in Nakkiga, but he had never felt anything quite like the fascination that Suno’ku evoked in him. Just listening to her firm, quiet voice he felt as though half their problems were already solved. Viyeki’s master, however, seemed less convinced.

“But we still have most of my Builders,” Yaarike told the general. “It is true we cannot perform the spells of Binding—not with the strongest of our Singers in such condition.” He gestured to Host-Singer Tzayin-Kha, who lay senseless on a makeshift pallet a short distance away, tended by two of her acolytes. Her pale skin had darkened into bruised shadows around her eyes, temples, and throat, and her every ragged breath sounded like it came with terrible effort. “But what Tzayin-Kha and her order cannot do by songs of Binding, mine can do by skill and application.”

“No. It is pointless trying to defend this place for long,” said Suno’ku. “We must return to Nakkiga as quickly as we can.”

“Nakkiga?” Yaarike allowed himself a tone of measured irritation. “You said there were no Sacrifices or other fighters left in Nakkiga, General. That means our only choice is to hold this part of the wall until the mortals give up and go home. A few months at most. The winter will drive them out, even with the Storm King banished to the lands beyond the veil of death.”

Viyeki wondered how they would feed themselves. The fields between the Wall and the mountain were empty, burned by years of frost and neglect. Some of their people had not eaten in weeks. But he said nothing aloud.

“The problem remains,” Yaarike continued. “You command the last of our warriors, General. There is no defense for the innocents in Nakkiga if we fail or falter.”

“I said there were no fighters in Nakkiga when I left, High Magister,” Suno’ku said. “But they were trickling back. The survivors were scattered widely after the Storm King failed and are returning by many routes, some very long and arduous. I myself took three hundred Sacrifices and members of other orders out of Erkynland and back through the coastal hills of Hernystir, fighting angry mortals all the way. Others are doing the same.” She smiled, but it was no more than a slash in her pale skin, a bloodless wound. “No, we must return to Nakkiga. Word of our defeat in the south has given the human creatures courage. These Rimmersmen may be the first to come against us, but they will not be the last.” She made a gesture of negation. “Now, attend me closely. If we try to hold this wall, we will fail. But at the same time, we must hold it, at least for a little while.”

Viyeki did not understand her. Neither did his master, it seemed; the magister narrowed his eyes but spread his fingers in the sign that meant, “I am listening.”

“We must hold this wall long enough for most of those with us now to return to Nakkiga,” she said. “Nakkiga is where we must make our stand, with whatever forces and weapons we can assemble. Even though the queen slumbers in the grip of the keta-yi’indra and cannot defend us, you know as well as I that we have not entirely exhausted our resources. There are things in the lower levels—dreadful things . . .”

Yaarike cut her short with another gesture. “How can we accomplish it, General Suno’ku? I admire your Order of Sacrifice, but this tower is meant to be held by a garrison of a hundred, at least. In time of desperation we might halve that—it is said that the great Ruzayo held Midwinter Sun Tower and the wall against an army of giants with but two dozen Sacrifices—but with all due respect, none of us here are Ruzayo Falcon’s-Eye, nor even the mettle of his Twenty-Four.”

“I will task each Sacrifice I leave behind with remaining alive until they have taken the lives of at least ten mortals,” the general said. “With the help of a dozen or more of your Builders, I think this tower can be held until the rest—”

A strange, croaking sound interrupted her. Suno’ku turned, as did Viyeki and his master Yaarike. Tzayin-Kha, the Host-Singer who had given her all to make the fires speak at Tangleroot Castle, was now struggling to sit up.

“Mistress, no!” cried one of the Singers who had been tending her. He bent to help Tzayin-Kha lie back again, but the Host Singer grasped his arm and flung him away with such astounding force that he spun halfway across the tower chamber, hit the wall with a terrible, muffled crack, then lay still.

Tzayin-Kha slowly rose, clumsy, tottering, her limbs as stiff as alder branches, but it was her face that drew Viyeki’s startled attention: her eyes had rolled up until only a crescent moon of white showed in each, and her jaw was working up and down soundlessly, chewing at the empty air.

“I will bring help!” shouted the other Singer. “She is having a fit.”

“You . . . will . . . do . . . nothing,” were the words that came from Tzayin-Kha’s gnashing mouth, each syllable thick and misshapen. Viyeki recognized that grating, deep voice. It did not belong to the dying Host Singer at all, but to someone far more frightening.

Suno’ku drew her great sword, Cold Root, and leveled it at the thing’s breast. The blind, upturned eyes could not possibly see the gray blade, but Tzayin-Kha’s slack lips suddenly curled in a smile that made Viyeki feel ill.