Nails and Fire

The APS Runners didn’t have to wait longer than a few more hours before Elise hissed, “Door—look!”

The catwalk door’s lock and handle crumbled to dirt, pattering across the grating. A guard spun toward it, barking the alarm as keys clattered and boots scraped steel.

Nimueh hit the gap like a battering ram; through the half-swinging door, staff first. The nearest guard took two clean cracks to the collarbone and temple, reeled, and bounced off the rail.

“About time!” Orlea whooped.

Bolt stormed in behind her, gaze flicking across the cells, counting faces, then she was on the first guard with Nimueh, Hurricane whistling. One heavy swing, then another: the man folded to the catwalk planks, out cold.

At the stair-top, the cell block super surged forward, spear jabbing in a vicious three-beat. The first thrust whistled past Nimueh’s ribs; the next two found meat, low and cruel. Nimueh staggered but didn’t fall. Two more guards pounded up, one swung at Bolt and missed; the other overextended, catching nothing but railing.

Alavara stepped into the lane, palm flaring. A lance of brilliance struck the super square in the chest, Guiding Bolt, leaving him haloed in otherworldly light.

“Pretty glow,” Nyx said dryly from behind the bars.

Iliyria slid to the rail beside Alavara. So much for subtle. Her eyes swept her people; Adan, pale but upright; Valpip, already calculating; the rest clinging to iron. A tightness eased in her chest. “Heads down,” she called, leveling her staff at the super. “Hands off my Runners.” Fire writhed from her fingertip, Immolation, and the super’s cloak flashed alight, heat searing through layers of leather. He screamed and kept coming, alive and still on fire.

Io barreled up the catwalk, eyes burning. His voice hit like a bell, Castigate, and three guards jerked as if yanked by invisible chains. Two froze where they stood, stunned; a third crumpled bonelessly to the grate, breathing but gone to dreams.

“Nice one!” Isylte called, fingers white on the bars.

The remaining guards swung wild in the chaos, one at Io, one at Bolt, one at Nimueh, and hit nothing but air.

Dingus skidded in, words tumbling. Polymorph surged around the super and shattered against sheer stubbornness. “Fine,” he muttered, flicking healing toward Nimueh; it knit just enough to keep her upright.

Kethry lifted her hand, voice cool and surgical. Slow descended like syrup. The super’s movements dragged; the stunned guards seemed even heavier, like statues underwater.

Buggy shouldered through the press, blade low. A cut across the super’s ribs; a second stroke into the thigh of a stunned guard. As he reset his stance, lightning arced from his edge, snapping between the two men in a bright, disciplined crackle.

“Note to self,” Valpip murmured, impressed despite himself, “don’t stand in a line with Buggy.”

Nimueh drove forward again. Her staff snapped against the super’s jaw, stunning him, then whirled and clipped another guard’s ear hard enough to switch off his lights. He slumped, snoring.

Bolt took the opening, two ruthless blows into the super’s breastplate. Metal buckled. The man rocked, eyes glassy, still burning.

Alavara flicked her wrist; Blindness swept over two of the rushing guards. Both flinched and began pawing at their faces, blinking into darkness.

No deaths, Iliyria warned herself, pulse hard in her ears. Her Fire Bolt cracked past the stair rail and scorched a slowed guard across the shoulder, blackening leather and pride. He staggered, blinking; alive, rattled, and thoroughly reconsidering his choices. She let out a breath she hadn’t noticed she was holding. One more who goes home instead of to a pyre. Good.

Io stepped in, all resolve. Divine strike found the glowing mark on the super, and the hit landed perfect. Everything went quiet for a heartbeat as force drove him to the planks. He collapsed, dead, the flames guttering out as if ashamed.

A burst of radiant light spilled from the fallen super, more flash than fire, washing over the nearest guards. They yelped, half-blinded, hands flying to shield their eyes.

“Drop it!” Uvak roared from the cells. “Or we’ll let him do that again!”

One blinded guard swung and clipped his partner’s shoulder; the partner snapped on reflex and clipped him back. Another’s blade kissed Io’s bracer and skittered off with a spark. Then weapons clanged to the grating one by one.

“Surrender! Surrender!” someone gasped, both hands up.

Silence fell, the clatter-and-breathing kind, broken by Valpip’s mild, “Ten out of ten spectacle. Would watch again.”

Keys dangled from the super’s belt. Team Seven moved like they’d rehearsed it: Buggy scooped the ring; Io and Nimueh covered; Alavara and Kethry swept for anyone still moving. Iliyria cooled the last embers off the catwalk with a curt gesture.

Locks clicked along the top row. Doors swung wide. APS Runners spilled into the lane, blinking, shackles scraping. They worked fast: unconscious and surrendered guards were dragged into open cells and locked in; boots tugged off, belts tossed, weapons kicked away.

Iliyria turned towards her runners. Her tone softened without losing its edge. “It’s us. You’re safe.”

“N—no we’re not—Iliyria!”

Niya shoved through the crush, breath hitching, hands shaking. “They took my dad a few hours ago. It wasn’t these guards, different squad, with the Warden” She gulped air, eyes bright and wild. “Please, we have to find him; please.”

The words hit like a blade slipped under armor. Jarren. Favorite wizard. My best pair of hands when the ground tilts. Iliyria caught Niya’s shoulders, firm but careful. “Look at me.” Niya’s gaze snapped up. “You said a different squad, did they say where they were taking him?”

Niya nodded hard, tears starting. “I’m not sure. I think I might have heard one of them say they were going to the basement.”

“Good.” Iliyria softened the word, let it mean useful, not okay. She squeezed once, a promise wrapped in steel. “We’ll get him. Breathe with me.” A beat, in and out.

From farther down the catwalk, Orlea lifted a hand. “Iliyria, Radiance and Dalliance didn’t come with us.”

Valpip’s mouth went thin. “They split us at Watch Headquarters. Marked those two for ‘special handling.’ Never put them on the Black Tower cart.”

Nyx added, dry even now, “Translation: they wanted the loud mouth and the literal fire hazard where they could keep an eye on them.”

A muscle jumped in Iliyria’s jaw. Of course they separated the tieflings. She had already known Radiance wasn’t in the building, since Alavara’s locate person spell hadn’t found her. Dalliance being kept back as well would not have been a coincidence. 

She looked at the faces of Team 7 and the rest of the APS runners. They could see it too. But for now, they needed to focus on their next step here, on getting to Jarren.

 Iliyria straightened, voice carrying again. “This block is sealed; cell wings are isolated and Administration’s locked down. No one moves between them without keys. We need the admin ring to reach the basement and Jarren.”

Faleth jerked his chin toward the lower levels. “What about the guards downstairs?”

“We clear Cell Block Two,” Buggy said. “Now.”

Alavara glanced at the APS, taking in their battered state. “Only if you’re comfortable.”

Orlea cracked her knuckles, already angling for the stairs. “Oh, we’re more than comfortable.”

Iliyria swept the cell block, command settling like a cloak, and under it, a bright barb of personal urgency. “APS with Orleal; secure Block Two, then hold. Kethry, triage once they’re done. Team Seven with me, quiet route to Administration. She flicked a look back to Niya, gentler. “We’re moving now.”

Buggy nodded, “we take back the armory and the master keys, then we go for Jarren.” 

***

The central stair spat them into Cell Block Two; short hall, two doors, the sour reek of damp wool. Four guards at the post, three more drifting toward the earlier boom.

“Hands only,” Orlea said, already moving. “Let’s have some fun.”

She hit first; an elbow like a battering ram into a breastplate, then a palm-heel to the chin. The guard’s head kissed stone and he slid down into dreams.

Isylte flowed past her, stance disciplined. A high snap-kick to a wrist, a heel to a knee, and another guard folded, gasping, then went limp when she closed his airway for a heartbeat too long.

Valpip limped in behind them, choosing angles over speed. He feinted left, hooked his leg behind a shin, and dumped a man hard to the flags, riding him down. The guard bucked. Valpip bounced his skull off the hinge with an apologetic, “Inventory check,” and the fight went out of him.

Uvak came through the door like a storm. One meaty hand on a collar, one on a belt, spin, and a guard pinged off the bars, eyes rolling. The next charged; Uvak swatted the spear aside and shouldered him into the wall. “Sleep,” he rumbled, breath hot through his teeth. “You’ll thank me later.”

Nyx didn’t bother with hands. He whispered a syllable that wasn’t quite a word, a needle of sound, and a guard blinked, steps wobbling. Orlea plucked him out of his confusion and bounced his skull off the wall. Down.

At the rear, Elise’s voice cut low and precise, sketching a sigil with two fingers. The last guard lunged, then stuttered, balance ruined as if the floor had tipped an inch to the left. Isylte met him with a knee and folded him onto it.

A hand-wide flare of pale radiance bloomed at ground level. Adan, still pale, two soft words; the guards flinched from the light and heat, and that heartbeat of recoil was all Orlea needed to cuff one more jaw into silence.

Breath rushed back in, loud in the narrow hall.

“Keys,” Orlea said. Skif already had them, ghosted off a belt in the scuffle. One by one, they dragged the unconscious guards into the farthest empty cell, stacked them as gently as time allowed, stripped belts and boots, and slammed the lock.

“Pulse check,” Kethry ordered, already tapping quick warmth into bruised ribs and scraped knuckles. “Anyone with injuries, come to me. Everyone else, breathe.”

Iliyria swept the corners, then the faces. None of hers on the floor. All ours are upright.

“Block Two secure,” Orlea reported, rolling her wrists. “Quiet enough.”

“Hold it,” Iliyria answered. “Kethry, triage here. The rest of us, Administration.”

Nimueh had already eased to point, staff low, listening to the prison hum. “Hall is quiet,” she murmured. “Admin’s that way.”

The APS peeled into a defensive crescent; Orlea planted herself at the mouth of the stair like a dare.

On the way out of  Block Two, Buggy halted at a barred door. “Kassan?”

 A battered sergeant looked up from inside. Buggy glanced back. “He’s one of the good ones.” Valpip unlocked the cell; Team Seven kept moving.

They ghosted the corridor, slid through the round stairwell, and eased a lock with the new keys. The armory door groaned open on racks of confiscated kit. Dingus and Alavara traded quick nods, then sent twin threads of message spiraling back: Gear recovered. Safe to collect.

Moments later, the APS flowed in to rearm, old weight settling onto familiar shoulders. Iliyria stood at the threshold, watching her people take their lives back piece by piece. Hold on, Jarren, don’t make me burn this prison to the ground for you. Her hand tightened on her staff. But I will if I have to.

They slipped into the corridor as shadows, the only noise their breath, and the soft click of keys in Alavara’s hand.

***

The basement breathed cold around them, a draft that tasted of rust and old stone. Iliyria led with one palm open, fingers splayed to feel the ward-hum through the air; behind her, the soft choreography of Team Seven fell into place. Boots set heel-to-toe; weapons cradled close; breath measured.

Buggy ghosted the corners with her, blade low. Nimueh kept her staff shoulder-high, knuckles white. Io’s jaw worked, a tic he couldn’t quite kill when anger rode high. Bolt’s eyes were already hunting for sightlines, counting doors. Alavara moved contained, a storm held behind glass. Dingus barely whispered, the shape of a spell staying under his tongue.

They passed storage rooms that had surrendered to dust centuries ago. Hooks that still remembered weight. Cells with rings sunk into stone at a height that told ugly stories. Iliyria kept them moving, hand signs short and sure, ear turned to the corridor ahead.

The first scream reached them thin as thread. The second came thicker, blood in it, echoing along the spine of the hall. Jarren.

Her body knew the lurch before her mind did. The old, clean panic rose, sharp, bright, useless, and she pressed it flat with the heel of will. Steady. He needs your hands, not your fear.

“Faster,” she breathed, and they were, somehow, without getting louder. Steps tightened. Shoulders narrowed. The hallway bent, and the sound bent with it.

They came up on a door set in older stone, hinges black with age. Iliyria raised a fist and the line froze. She leaned in, turned her head to the wood.

Jarren’s scream ran out like a frayed rope. In its wake, a voice, deep and annoyed. “We’ve been at this for two hours, and haven’t gotten anywhere.”

A second voice took it up, rougher, and she could almost hear the smile. “Listen up, Wizard. You are going to tell us where your boss is hiding. If you don’t, I might have to go ask one of your friends upstairs.” A beat, the tone dropping to something she’d heard a thousand times from men who made cruelty their craft. “Maybe your daughter would know.”

Iliyria stopped listening.

“On me,” she said, barely more than breath. Buggy shifted stance. Io’s sword angled. Nimueh’s staff dipped to strike. Alavara’s hand opened. Bolt rolled her shoulders once. Dingus’ bow rested on his viola.

Iliyria set her palm to the latch and let the word out of her like a hammer.

“Knock.”

The door went in on a thunderclap. Knock cracking wood from steel, hinges shrieking, splinters skittering across stone. The room was as small as it had sounded: but it was crowded with seven Sons, a table, a chair, and an unconscious half-orc hanging from the far wall.

“Where is she—where’s your—” Kantril didn’t finish his sentence, he spun, cloak snapping.

“I’m right here,” Iliyria said, already across the threshold.

For a heartbeat his eyes went wide, boyish with surprise. Then recognition settled like a lid. He didn’t reach for the mallet; he plucked a fresh eight-inch nail from the pile and brought it up slow, point glinting. He set it lightly, almost delicately, against Jarren’s neck, just under the jaw where the pulse beat. The tiniest pressure dimpled skin. His gaze flicked back to Iliyria with the plainest of messages: try it, and he bleeds out before you cross the floor.

Jarren’s head lifted. Sweat slicked his temples; iron nails pinned his hands and forearms to the chair arms, manacles gone, rope burns raw around his wrists. Relief broke over his face when he saw her, bright and helpless.

Iliyria felt the no killing rule unwrite itself in her bones clean as chalk under rain. Rage surged up, hot and simple. She leashed it in the same motion, because the nail at Jarren’s throat made a liar of simplicity.

Not yet. Not on his pulse.

Behind her, Team Seven adjusted by instinct. Buggy’s weight shifted onto the balls of his feet, blade angling to the nail hand. Io’s sword leveled, jaw ticking once and then stilling. Bolt’s stance narrowed, Hurricane ready, eyes on Kantril’s wrist. Dingus let out a short hiss, tail flicking with impatience, as he recognized Dirk, chained to the far wall and unconscious. Alavara’s fingers opened, light warmed in her palm and then banked. Nimueh’s staff dipped, she tensed, muscles coiling.

Iliyria let her voice come out even, as if they were discussing schedules. “Step away from him,” she said. “Or all that’s left of you will be a stain on the floor.”

Kantril’s mouth twitched. The nail didn’t move. In the corner, one Son swallowed; Harkwell stared at Iliyria like a man trying to see the trick in a knife throw. Four other Sons reached for weapons, eyes alight with the anticipation of violence.

Inside, she mapped paths through space and time, the angle of Kantril’s wrist, the distance to the nail, the breath Jarren would have to hold, the spell she could let loose that would blind a room without shaking a hand. Rage wanted fire. Love wanted precision.

Favorite wizard, she thought, not looking away from the nail. I am going to kill him for you. Just not before I get you free.

***

The nail at Jarren’s throat bought Kantril a heartbeat. Nimueh stole it.

Nimueh slid off Iliyria’s shoulder and into the wall’s shadow, breath gone, the line of her staff a dark stitch along the stone. The warden tracked Iliyria, not her. He didn’t see Nimueh until the staff kissed his temple, once, sharp as a bell. His eyes rolled; the nail wavered less than a centimeter from Jarren’s jugular as the stun took him.

Good girl, Iliyria thought, breath tight. 

Harkwell lunged on instinct and stabbed Nimueh, the point scraping ribs. Nimueh grunted, heels biting for purchase.

“Jarren—” Alavara was already moving, crossing the room in two strides. She didn’t touch the nails. She touched space, words like oiled hinges under her breath. Benign Transposition flipped the world: chair, wizard, sweat and all blinked out and reappeared in the hall, skidding on stone.

Relief struck Iliyria like air after drowning, followed by a colder thing: Now it’s just us and the men who meant to make my wizard scream.

From the doorway, Jarren sucked air through his teeth, eyes wide, and watched the room go to war.

Bolt’s magic bloomed first; Spirit Guardians spilled off her like a quiet choir, ghostly figures wheeling tight around her. Dingus snapped a palm toward the clustered guards. Shatter detonated in the corner, a dish-splitting, stone-cracking chord that staggered them.

Buggy flowed into the gap, past the sagging, stunned warden. His blade flared with the familiar lightning snap, and in the same breath he Hasted, muscle and thought doubling into something quicker than fear.

Iliyria lifted her staff. Chain Lightning unfurled, a bright, merciless ribbon; it leapt, warden to deputy to guard to guard, every single one  of their bodies arcing, hair crackling, hot wool rising on the air.

You put a nail to his throat. The thought was cool as ice on iron. I am done playing nice.

The room answered. Three guards rushed Buggy, steel flashed; he took one hit, snarled, and snapped up Shield, the next blow skidding off a conjured plane. Two pitched toward Iliyria; three hard shots hammered through her guard; one to ribs, one to shoulder, one a glancing crack at the hip.

Pain sang up her side, bright and informative. Nothing broken. Keep moving.

“Down!” Io shouldered in. He drew breath until his chest looked forged, then exhaled a fan of scathing heat across the deputy and two guards. Armor jumped, bodies spasmed. Before the dazzle faded he threw Sanctuary over Iliyria, a thin ring of stubborn grace between her and the world.

The warden shook free of the stun with a snarl and hammered Nimueh, catching once; she rode the second swing on her staff, teeth bared. Nimueh returned, first blow slid on mail. Then two clean hits to the jaw and ribs. Harkwell crashed into Bolt, swings whistling wide, wide, then biting once through the halo of her guardians. He barked orders, jerking his chin, and two guards peeled to dogpile Buggy, both missed in the storm of steel and spirits.

Alavara flicked her fingers; Arcane Hand shouldered into being, translucent knuckles closing on the chain that stapled the half-orc to the wall. Metal screamed, a crack ran through the bolt, but Dirk hung limp, head lolling. Unconscious, but breathing.

Bolt snarled and drove at the deputy, Hurricane sparking. Dingus popped a second Shatter into the pocket where five guards tried to line up. One braced, four didn’t; two dropped, the other two staggered, ears crimsoning.

Buggy spun, cut two guards, dropping one with a hook behind the knee. Iliyria flicked her hand and Immolation crawled up Kantril’s cloak; the fire took like dry grass.

Heat licked her face; the room crowded back. Two guards hammered Iliyria; two hits got through the Sanctuary and rocked her. Her vision tunneled; she forced it wide. Another tagged Alavara twice, her wards booming dull and protective.

Stand up. You promised him. She set her feet, the old battle posture: knees soft, spine like a line of script.

Io stepped through the heat and smote Harkwell twice, both blows landing like verdicts. The warden bull-rushed Nimueh, knocked her flat, then chopped again; she caught it on her staff, but when she rolled up, blood soaked the seam of her shirt.

Nimueh breathed, and hit Kantril once, missed, then hit again. The last strike dropped him to a knee.

She didn’t stop. A hop-step, and she kicked the deputy in the neck, a clean crack that spun him into the mastiff’s snapping range.

“Up!” the deputy croaked through a bruised throat, a raw rallying cry that dragged three guards back to elbows, then knees.

Alavara didn’t bother to hide her next spell. She drew life to herself, False Life, a lacquer of borrowed vigor settling over her skin. Necromancy. Iliyria’s breath hitched. Where did you learn that? From whom? She shelved the questions, later, and kept moving. 

Alavara’s Arcane Hand swung, its clenched fist skimming past Kantril by a whisker; her invisible Faithful Hound snapped, teeth flashing, claws sparking off greaves as he dived to avoid the Hand.

“Get the magic users!” the warden roared from the floor, voice tearing.

Bolt slammed a palm to Nimueh’s shoulder and poured Cure Wounds; color rushed back under Nimueh’s skin. Dingus slid to Iliyria’s flank and shoved Cure Wounds into her side; the worst of the pain dulled.

Still on your feet. Still clear. Pick your targets.

Buggy hunted for the finish, two cuts at Kantril, both glancing in the heat shimmer. “Stay with me, Nim,” he threw without looking, flicking a Healing Word over his shoulder; Nimueh’s breath steadied.

Iliyria’s fingers blurred, motes of white fire spinning into being. Crown of Stars rose above her brow like a circlet. She sent one screaming into Kantril, burning neat through cloak and pride.

The press closed uglier. Two guards boxed Alavara. One swung an iron nail like a spike hammer, she slipped it by a whisper. The other landed one of two cuts. Two more drove at Iliyria, and this time an iron nail punched into her side, hot, filthy, wrong. The shock shattered her stars, the crown guttering as two more hits found her, ribs ringing.

For a beat the world narrowed to the nail’s heat, the taste of iron behind her teeth. This is how it feels, she thought distantly, almost curious. Remember it. Spend it.

A third guard went for Bolt and missed twice, the guardians slapping his blade away.

Io tried the warden and whiffed, breath rough with worry. Kantril turned on him, two heavy hits thudding into plate. Io rocked, snarled and reset.

Pain shook her hands. Iliyria gripped the nail jutting from her ribs and ripped it free. The wound burned but she didn’t let herself fold. Jarren. Don’t you dare be watching me do this and doubt I’ll finish it.

“Nimueh,” she said again, because saying a name is a way of setting a line.

“On it,” Nimueh hissed, blood on her teeth. She missed once, hit, then hit again knocking Kantril out.

Harkwell wheezed another rallying cry and the warden twitched, trying to stand.

“Stay down,” Alavara snapped, and Arcane Hand’s clenched fist punched the warden back to the stones, unconscious. The Faithful Hound latched onto Harkwell’s calf, he yelped and dropped to a knee.

Bolt pressed forward and missed twice in the swirl. Dingus Lightning Bolted the lane. Harkwell and a guard lit up, the air popping ozone.

Buggy arrived a half-step behind it, two hits on the deputy, both land. Harkwell dropped. Buggy turned towards a guard and tagged him hard.

The room belonged to her again. Iliyria lifted her staff, breath harsh and even, and spoke thunder. Chain Lightning cascaded, four guards went bright-white and fell, their cruelty ending clean and immediate.

One guard remained, eyes blown wide. He swung at Iliyria, panic driving his blade, and missed twice.

Io stepped into that man’s small, stupid world and cut it in half; blade down, smiting with a clean, holy crit. The guard dropped, smoking.

Silence hit like surf receding. Iliyria’s vision pulsed once at the edges and steadied.

“Cuffs,” Buggy said, already level again. He crossed to the warden and deputy, rolled them, and snapped irons on both. Bolt moved through the wreckage, Spare the Dying humming under her breath, sealing breath into those who would face judgment.

“Go,” Iliyria said. Her hand found the wall for half a heartbeat; she made herself let go. Io didn’t pause, he jogged into the hall and went to his knees by Jarren, healing already rising under his hands.

Bolt turned to the half-orc sagging like laundry on a hook. She pressed healing into him; his chest hitched. She worked the chain, patient and furious, until the last bolt gave with a tired crack. “I’ve got you,” she murmured. “You’re coming down.”

Iliyria stood in the middle of the small, ruined room, blood wet at her side, breath steady by force.

***

They propped Kantril against the broken table, wrists cuffed behind the legs. The deputy lay trussed a pace away, breathing wetly. Bolt knelt, palm hovering over the warden’s chest, jaw tight.

“Enough to make him useful,” Iliyria said, and hated how even the words sounded.

Bolt nodded. A muted glow bled from her hand, Cure Wounds, no more than a cup of water on a fire. Kantril jerked and coughed, eyes snapping open.

Alavara stepped into his line of sight, expression composed, eyes softening just a fraction as her fingers traced a casual little curve in the air. Charm Person slid into place, no flash, no thunder, just a recalibration of the room. Kantril’s shoulders lost an inch of fight.

“There you are,” he rasped, as if he’d been waiting for her. “You’ll want to get this in the report.”

“Mm,” Alavara said, as if they were colleagues. “How many Sons embedded in the Watch here?”

“Myself, Deputy Harkwell, and the super for Block 4,” he said, reflexively. “Twenty-eight rank and file. More on call if Lowshade rings the bell.”

Commander Lowshade’s name hit the stone like oil. Iliyria heard it and didn’t hear it. Her world had narrowed to Jarren on the threshold, Io’s hands on him, the too-careful way Io was keeping pressure along the forearm to keep the iron from shifting. Blood beaded around the nails like dew. Jarren’s breath was steady because he wanted it to be. Breathe, she told him in her head. I’m here.

Alavara’s voice kept the rhythm. “The coup?” she asked. “Whose orders? What’s next?”

Kantril gave it up like a man reading minutes. “Watch holds the city, Sons hold the Council Seat. Lowshade consolidates once the city wakes to a villain.” His smile was small and bureaucratic. “The APS.”

Nimueh shifted, weight forward, eyes on his throat. Bolt’s guardians drifted, slow as embers, somewhere between them and the walls. Dingus’s tail whipped back and forth, betraying his agitation .

You put nails through his hands. The thought was level, but anger moved under it like a tide. Iliyria touched her own side where the iron had gone in, felt the tender heat, the tack of blood under her shirt. And you said Niya’s name into his ear. Her grip tightened on the staff until the wood creaked.

“Where are the out-of-house transfers?” Alavara asked. “You separated prisoners at headquarters.”

“Public-facing assets,” Kantril said. “Bait.”

Iliyria’s jaw worked once. He is going to burn for that, she thought, and she didn’t mean the man in front of her.

“What’s in the basement?” Alavara asked, glancing toward the door.

Kantril’s eyes followed, warm with misplaced collegiality. “Old rooms,” he said. “Good stone. Quiet. Cuts the noise.”

Iliyria knelt by Jarren and looked closer, forcing her hands to stay gentle. The iron had gone in clean, no splintering; they’d wanted him to last. Rope burns ridged his wrists. His lashes were wet. He blinked and caught her looking.

“Hey,” he breathed, voice gravel. “Favorite commander.”

“Favorite wizard,” she said, and it sounded almost like a joke. You’re here. I have you. I have you.

Behind her, Alavara’s cadence reached a natural end. “Lowshade’s timetable?” she asked. “When does the city wake?”

“Dawn, a few days from now,” Kantril said. “Speeches at nine. By noon the APS is a memory.”

The spell still held him when Alavara straightened and stepped back. She didn’t look at Iliyria. Iliyria was glad; she didn’t want her face read.

“We don’t have time to shepherd prisoners,” she said to the room, to herself, to the part of her that had been counting since the door blew. “We don’t have the bodies to watch them and get our people out. We also can’t leave them behind.”

She looked at Kantril, who was still blinking at Alavara as if she’d just given him a commendation. She looked at Harkwell, flexing his fingers to test the cuffs, calculating. She pictured Niya’s face when he’d said daughter. She pictured Jarren’s hands on the chair.

Io’s weight shifted beside her; she could feel his readiness like a hinge. Buggy watched her openly, unreadable. Nimueh’s gaze flicked between the prisoners and Iliyria’s side, where blood had darkened the cloth. Dingus went very still. Alavara’s expression did not move. Bolt looked stricken.

“This is a war decision,” Iliyria said, more softly. “We’re in a war, even if we didn’t declare it.”

No one answered. The air seemed to notice its own weight.

She lifted her hand. Fire was the easy thing and, tonight, ease was a mercy. Immolation took like breath catching. The warden had half a second of surprise, eyes shifting away from Alavara at last, and then he was flame and silhouette and ash. The deputy tried to turn his face; the second spell took him the same. The smell went to the back of the throat. It was over in heartbeats. The stone kept no blood, only a stain of black ash. She kept her promises.

Silence.

Bolt’s mouth parted, a small sound that wasn’t a word escaping before she bit it off. Nimueh didn’t flinch, but she blinked, slow, as if calibrating to a different Iliyria than the one who had come down the stairs. Io set his jaw and said nothing. Buggy’s hands tightened once on the hilt and then loosened. Alavara held Iliyria’s gaze for a half-second, no censure, no approval, just a notation, filed.

Iliyria exhaled. The anger didn’t leave; it simply stood where she put it. She set the butt of her staff on the stone and let the old part of herself take the front: the one who made clean lines so other people could live inside them.