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The carriage rounded the corner, pulling onto the hot cobblestones. Applause and cheers filled the streets, rising over the tops of the buildings like thunder. Everywhere Crowe looked people stood shoulder to shoulder. They lined up before the barriers that had been set up in the center of the street to create a path for the carriage to travel. Were it not for the guards who stood vigil the practitioner sensed they would have jumped over the barriers to surround the carriage. The sorcerer now un

The cask of aether wine turned out to be a big mistake. The sound of a fist knocking into the door reverberated like hammer blows, waking Crowe out of a drunken sleep. He rolled over with a groan, burying his face deeper into the pillow. As if he could hide. “Twin o’rre,” Barghast whined. “There’s someone at the door.” “Make them go away,” the practitioner murmured. “Tell them I am not to be bothered.” Before the

“That’s the last time I’ve seen or heard from Bennett. I don’t know if he’s alive or dead. He could be here in the city or somewhere out there, fighting for his life, injured, starving. I haven’t been able to get him out of my mind and I don’t know if I can forgive myself for how I treated him in those final moments.” After what felt like an eternity of talking, Crowe drew his recounting to a close. He looked into the fireplace and was surprised to see the log had burned down to glowing embers.

By the time Crowe reaches Jeb’s cabin it is past midnight. The temperature has dropped, chilling Crowe to the bone in spite of the extra layers he wears. Jeb climbs down from his horse and glances at the cabin. He makes a warding sign over his broad chest, muttering under his breath. The practitioner doesn’t need to go inside to know that something is wrong. Very wrong. He can already feel it. There is an air of oppression about the place that has nothing to do with the dar

For the next three weeks nothing of incident happens. Petras returns to his bed-ridden self. With this shift back into sickness comes the loss of motor functions, the loss of independence. The loss of self. Crowe returns to his duties of tending to him while also trying to keep the house from falling down around their ears. While the worst of the blizzard has passed, driving winds continue to buffet the house, making it groan in protest. As if Petras and the house are one. When he dies will the

The peals of the bell mark the top of the hour. A cold hour on a cold day. The few streets that make up the village of Annesville are covered with snow and ice; snow so high it comes up to one’s kneecaps. The blizzard has passed, but the winds still blow, chapping hands and faces and tearing off shingles from the roofs of homes. The villagers are used to such weather for few have ventured beyond the borders of their town. And they are used to the war: for what is war but another storm.

The moment he touches Felisin’s hand, Mother invades his mind, a mental assault unlike anything he’s experienced before. He shouldn’t have been surprised. Mother is the oldest thing he’s encountered, the strongest, and she bats him aside as if he is little more than a flea. He tries to catch his balance but he has no arms, he has no legs. The mind is without shape, without a body. You are a mistake, she tells him and her voice rings with fury. You’re not meant to be here.

Only it wasn’t. Not the Petras he knew. Not the old man who had laid in bed, demented, often incoherent and sometimes violent. This Petras was younger, a middle-aged man with silver streaks in his raven black hair. Dressed in black robes. Still the resemblance was uncanny. The remote expression. The mouth that twisted in a permanent scowl. Hardened eyes, unreadable, fathomless, unpredictable. It was like looking into a mirror and seeing one’s own reflection. Crowe want

Time did not run normally in this place. Minutes could stretch into hours, hours into days, in the dark until one could not remember what the sun felt like on their face. In this place one could get lost and never find their way out…like a little girl who had run into the caves to escape monsters, only to become one herself. Perhaps this place will make monsters of us all, Crowe thought. Algae and moss climbed up the ancient rock walls, seeping out of cracks, branching into

For a split second Crowe plunged, his feet curled into his chest, his arms hugging his knees. He had just enough time to suck in a breath before he slammed into the water. He unfurled himself, waving his arms to slow his descent towards the black jagged rocks below; they looked sharp enough to cut flesh on. He reached into the pocket of his robes, gripping his dagger in one hand and his blasting rod in the other. Preparing himself for battle. Mercius’s fire burned within him, yearning to be rele

Crowe ducked into the cold shadows of The Salander. Lask, Augusta, and Boomer waded ahead of him, shouting for Stamets, spraying salt water in every direction. The inner chamber was flooded, the water rising to hip level. Lanterns bobbed in the dark, diminishing as the demolition team ventured deeper into the bowels of the large pirate ship. A terrible blood-curdling howl cut the air behind him, bringing the practitioner to a stop. A knot of terror twisted in his belly. Barg

Crowe slept but his slumber was not peaceful. It felt as if his mind shifted between two realities, only one slightly more desirable than the other. In the one he preferred he rested in the arms of his lycan, safely tucked against his chest. When he returned to this reality it was easy to burrow into warm fur and forget that they were trapped in a cave full of monsters and that he had lost a lot of blood. In this reality the illusion of safety was a lie. In the other he was pinned at the bottom

Every time he breathed wet ash clogged his lungs. It constantly drifted down from the black clouds overhead. It bubbled up between cracked cobblestones. It clung to him until it made a quilt against the cold and yet it was no match for the press of dead bodies that smothered him from all sides. It took all his strength to raise his head. He listened for the sound of boots sifting through the black snow. He knew he wasn’t alone. There were always the carrion birds who came to

Crowe leaned against the stone wall, his heart a nervous tic in his throat. He watched the darkness at the end of the corridor, waiting for it to part and for his lycan to appear. He tried to distract himself by looking over the map but fear kept pulling his mind away. He gripped the map with clammy fingers. The others were quiet. Lask had ordered them to stop and take a break while Barghast scouted ahead. Lask nudged Crowe, startling the practitioner. “You’re worrying so mu

Barghast was a dark outline against the explosion of blue light that pulsed from within the depths of the cave. He had to duck to be able to squeeze himself through the entrance; after a few steps he faded out of sight. Crowe stopped, waving for Lask and the others to do the same, waiting for Barghast to reappear. A dull whine like the buzzing of insect wings filled his ears. It was impossible to tear his eyes away from the light. It tugged at his mind the way the tide of the ocean pulls at a bo