It was morning when Xheng staggered out into the street, his belly feeling like a barrel filled with odds and ends of fishfood churned in ocean brine, sweat clinging to him like a second skin. The light was still not fully ripened, the sun’s lamp only tentatively raised, making the shadows of Daggerhand long and deep, the alleyways like paintings cut by iconoclastic blades.

  The streets were a hinterland between dead and alive. As he wandered down the main thoroughfare of the city, he marvelled at the silent windows and doorways which mere hours before had been thrown open, at the deserted streets which had clamoured like the over-full rivers of The Fester in the embrace of night. But where the people lay asleep, drugged by the heady mixture of bitter reminiscing and dreams of future hope, the rats and the dogs saw opportunity. They rifled through the leftovers and sniffed at the few drunks who had taken to sleeping in the streets.

  But Xheng was not the only soul who had risen at dawn. There were a few others who had either gritted their teeth against the strain of nausea, or else who had not succumbed to the carnival and dance last night.

  Nearer the gate, he saw two Wagemasters—looking worse for wear but like the rats unwilling to sacrifice even a day’s opportunity—sat outside an eatery, sipping korlash from cups of fine porcelain. When he heard their topic of conversation, Xheng paused in the shadow of an alley and listened.

  “Did you hear? The Governor of Virgoda is still missing.”

  “Aye. And they’ve yet to rebuild Daimonopolis fully. The fires near burned the whole city to the ground.”

  “They say a crazed dragon did it.”

  “Makes me glad there’s no dragonport in Dashar...”

  Xheng grimaced. These events had become legends and mysteries, but he had been a part of them, if only in a small way. He regretted that he had never been able to avenge his brother and slay Governor Lucan. He had expected the Governor to turn up in Memory, but Qala’s letters made no mention of him. Perhaps that was simply to spare Xheng the pain of knowing another man had taken the Governor’s life. Or perhaps Lucan had simply died some ignoble death at sea. It seemed increasingly likely Xheng would never know. Still, he thought. What would Qala say? “The whirligig of time brings all things to completion.” It was a quote from The Immutable Way, and brought a great measure of comfort. Things always looked incomplete from the human perspective, but time changed all. And that offered hope.

  He grinned, then, thinking of Telos.

  He had to admit, against his better judgement, he missed the wily fellow. He’d felt no small degree of competition with the bastard, especially as Qala seemed to taken with him. But he realised now that what Qala saw was not a prospective mate, but a valuable asset, a great tool that she could leverage to obtain the throne.

  And as for Xheng, he had no intention of wooing Qala himself. He charmed pretty women with roguery and romance merely to prove that he could. It was a game to him. His real interests lay elsewhere.

  “There has been another Daimonic attack, I hear,” one of the Wagemasters was saying. “Over near Brimfast in Phaedril. The Emperors keep denying its Daimons, but what else could it be?”

  A sharp pain erupted through him. It took all his will not to cry out and alarm the men upon which he had been eavesdropping. Shuddering, he withdrew further into the shadow of the alley. He doubled over, his right arm clutching his left, as though he would be able to feel some change in the cool, supernatural metal to indicate what had gone wrong. He slid aside the cloak which he used to conceal the armoured fist, raised his left hand and flexed the fingers. Pain shot through him again and he went down to one knee. He could hear words at the edge of his awareness, whispered, but urgent. They sounded like a warning but he could not decipher the meaning. The pain had now gripped his entire left side. He could feel it coiling in the base of his left foot, all the way up his hamstrings, through the left buttock, into the torso, where it crossed over his heart and gripped his neck and skull like a noose just now tightening its deadly knot. He had seen men garotted by their own poor ties aboard galleons, swept suddenly off deck by a flying rope that constricted them like a serpent of the Fester. This was how he imagined that felt, except it was the tendons and muscles of his own body constricting him, the pain unbelievable.

  Then words—real, spoken words—burst through the silo of agony.

  “Come on!”

  “I said no! Back off!”

  “Listen, you little bitch, you aren’t half pretty enough to be picking and choosing.”

  “Touch me and you’re dead.”

  Laughter followed those words.

  “I’d like to see you try.”

  Xheng rose, gritting his teeth. Someone was in trouble. He realised that the pain now seemed to be outside of his body as well as within, shimmering almost, like a translucent cloak blowing about him. He followed where the invisible winds prompted, going deeper into the alley. It did not take long before he saw two men, both large, wearing leathers, and armed with knives, and a woman, who was unarmed. She was wearing traveller’s clothes: boots, tunic, a knapsack. She had probably just arrived by the first ship to dock this morning, having spent her New Years’ celebrations at sea. She was… familiar, though he could not place her at the moment, or in the darkness of the alley.

  Her hair was mousy and long, tied in a loose ponytail. Her eyes reminded him of the cormorants he used to watch as a child, swooping and arcing over the cliffs of Qin’yad.

  The men had her cornered. They were learning. Their eyes shone a little too brightly in the gloom and Xheng realised, with a strange jolt of intuition, that they had consumed some form of Daimonic part.

  The arm, Xheng thought. The arm knew a Daimonic presence was nearby. It warned me.

  Xheng stepped out of the shadows. The pain had subsided, though he was still breathing heavily from the exertion of fighting through it. The men glanced his way but, seeing his diminutive stature, and judging him to be unarmed, merely snorted in derision.

  “Beat it, jade,” one said.

  Xheng could tell these were not Daimomancers, not in the true sense. But they had both imbibed the dust of a specific type of Daimonbone to enhance their “prowess”—at the cost of reason. Their story was writ plainly on their faces. Even with all the drunken revelry of their night before, with the intoxication of ceremony and fin de siècle, they had not managed to score the interest of a woman. Thus, inflamed, and with nowhere to vent their frustrations, they had—like the worst of all animals—turned to force.

  “Let her go,” Xheng said, firmly.

  The woman, to Xheng’s infinite surprise, rolled her eyes.

  “Allow me,” she snarled.

  Her fist was moving before they could react. It connected with the man on the left and sent him reeling back—so far he struck the far wall of the alley. The other man yelled, bared his teeth, and went for a stab with the dagger. He would not have his prize if he murdered her—the Daimonbone had destroyed his reason entirely— but that did not stop him going for the kill.

  The woman was fast, though. Lightning fast.

  She parried the arm swinging the knife with a deft move of her left hand and jabbed with the right into the man’s throat. He spluttered and gagged as his trachea was collapsed. He, too, stumbled away. The woman stepped in, delivering an upper cut into his diaphragm that had him double over and vomit over the cobblestones.

  But the woman did not see the second man had recovered. Perhaps it was the Daimonbone driving him into frenzy, or perhaps he was simply pissed. Xheng knew what men could get like when denied their pleasures. He had seen it at sea. Tempers, normally controllable, rose to bestial levels, and usually only the shedding of blood could abate them. He raised his dagger and struck her with the pommel round the back of the head. Her eyes rolled into the back of her skull for a second and she swayed. For a moment, Xheng thought she was going to throw it off—and nearly gawped at the constitution required for such a feat—but then she fell forward, landing with a hard smack on the stone that split her lips wide open, gushing blood.

  The men leered down at her.

  Xheng closed.

  “I told you, beat—”

  He caught the hand brandishing a knife with the black hand of Beltanus, forged from the God-steel of Nilldoran—and squeezed. The would-be assailant screamed as bones cracked. He dropped to his knees and whimpered. Tears ran down his face. Xheng delivered a sharp knee to the thug’s chin and consciousness fled from him. The other man stared at Xheng. Then, with a flick of his wrist a knife was hurtling in the pirate’s direction. An average brawler would have been caught off-guard by a such a move, but Xheng had a keen eye for tells, and had seen these kind of cheap fighting techniques before. His reflexes were arguably his greatest asset.

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  With his supernatural hand, he snatched the knife out of the air. It still zinged in his fingers. He could feel the vibrations of motion still running through the metal, as though the steel hand knew its own kind, and felt sympathy.

  “Cheap shot,” Xheng said. “Allow me.” With a cheat’s sleight of hand, he reversed the knife and drew his arm back to throw—but the other man was already sprinting to the end of the alley, tail tucked between his legs.

  A groan at his feet told him he should not pursue. The woman was surfacing. He knelt, slowly helping her to roll over on her side. He had seen people in this condition before and knew to try and get them up too quickly would do more harm than good.

  “Easy,” he said. “Easy. That was quite a blow you took.”

  The woman spluttered a little, as though phlegm or blood had built up in her lungs. She was struggling to focus her vision, but she was certainly fully aware and conscious. She spat a mixture of bile and blood from her broken lips. Now he was so much closer to her, he could see she bore many pale scars on her face.

  “Bastards,” she said.

  “Indeed. An entirely unnecessary evil. There are whorehouses aplenty in this city.”

  The quip had its intended effect, as the woman frowned and stared at Xheng.

  “A strange thing to say, to someone who has just been assaulted.”

  Xheng shrugged.

  “I am a strange man. The sea will do that to you.”

  She nodded.

  Limb by limb, joint by joint, he helped her to stand. She leant against the wall of the alley, recovering her breath. She wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry. And Xheng was still curious where he knew her from.

  “You’re staring,” she said, finally.

  And then it clicked.

  “We’ve met before,” he said. “In Aurelia. Azalton…”

  Her eyes went wide.

  “Oh Gods… But you…?” She look at the black arm soldered to his shoulder. “That’s not armour, is it?”

  “No.” Xheng smiled. “This is the hand of Beltanus. It is… a long story. As is yours, I am sure.”

  Emerza—that had been her name—laughed.

  “You can say that again. But while I have had my fair share of adventures, I am not sure anything I could tell equals wearing the armament of a god.”

  A flash of pain blasted across his mind, as though he were reliving it. A blue beam. The hum of god-weaponry. Agony beyond calculation. Then the swimming void that followed. “My memory of that night is hazy,” he admitted. “But aren’t you a captain? Where is your armour, your battalion?”

  She laughed bitterly.

  “I was permanently relieved of duty. A town levelled. A regiment missing for two moons. The blame was laid at my feet. They were right to do so, in one sense. I should never have allowed Albron to commandeer my unit. I only did so because the order came directly from the Emperor.” Her brows knitted. “That still bothers me.”

  “Tell me.”

  She stared at him, and he sensed she was suddenly suspicious. There were always reports of Qi’shathian spies in Aurelia; it was practically drilled into Aurelian children to be wary of them. Never mind that all the nations spied upon one another and employed men and women of discretion to infiltrate governments and guilds to their highest echelons. But the west was always guilty of this contradictory thinking: their priests and kings condemned secrecy whilst plying it with extraordinary vigour. Meanwhile, in Qi’shath, secrecy was praised as a virtue, and people were expected to practice it for the good of their families, towns, and nation.

  “I don’t wish to pry,” he said. “I am just… curious. As you gathered from our last meeting, we are involved in some… important work.”

  Emerza smiled.

  “I assume because the world has not yet ended that all went to plan.”

  Xheng grinned in return.

  “The end has at least been delayed, somewhat.”

  “That is encouraging. The charming one who talked too much—Telos, was it?—is he with you?”

  Xheng hesitated. Qala had told him what to say. He did not like to lie, but he saw the importance of doing so.

  “I’m afraid he’s dead.”

  Emerza cast her eyes down.

  “I am… sorry.”

  “He died for a good cause.”

  Emerza nodded.

  “That is all we can hope for.” She sighed. “That is all I hoped for. To lose my station was worse than death.”

  Xheng laughed.

  Emerza looked at him sharply, wounded.

  “Fuck you!”

  “I am sorry,” he said quickly. “It is just, I am Qi’shathian. Such ideas are alien to us.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Death is never preferable to dishonour. Honour, after all, only lasts an hour. How many great heroes have proved villains in retrospect? And how many villains proved ultimately to be heroes? Time changes everything. Perspective most of all. To die is to lose your next chance. I lost everything the day I met Telos Daggeron. I miss my ship, my crew, my Demons. But I have never wished to join them. One day, I will go to the Seventh Gate. But until then, there is more work to do, more sights to see, more fun to be had.”

  Emerza snorted.

  “I wish I could share your happy-go-lucky attitude. But not all of us can ride the misfortunes of life with a smile and a keg of rum.”

  Xheng grinned.

  “No? Well tell me this, former-Captain Emerza—from one former captain to another—why have you come to Daggerhand?”

  She shrugged.

  “To see what work I can find, I suppose.”

  Xheng nodded.

  “There are plenty of mercenary groups here. It’s all the good steel around. I’m sure you’d do well, probably rise in the ranks. You look young enough that you might still have a chance at making Guildmaster before you’re too old to wield a blade. But all the while you’ll ask yourself: What’s the point? I have a better idea. You see, I am looking for soldiers. There is a war that needs to be fought, a war to rectify a great injustice.” Xheng knew he had her curiosity at least. Her eyes were on him with the intensity of a hawk.

  “What war? Do we not have troubles enough with Daimons and Gods returning?”

  “The immediate concern of the Daimons has been dealt with,” Xheng said. “The story is far from over, but we have bought ourselves time enough.” He leant toward her, meeting her gaze with eyes equally bright and steady. “But there are other concerns in the world. Grave concerns. Especially for Aurelia. A dark lord rises in the East.”

  Emerza laughed.

  “You use words out of a children’s storybook.”

  Xheng shrugged.

  “Think of it as childish if you will. But when Quen Yu takes the throne of Qi’shath, and rules over the Jade Empire, it shall not seem so funny then. Children’s stories endure because they contain deep truth in their simplicities. You will think back on my words, and you will realise that I was not lying to you. However prideful Aurelia is, its people know Qi’shath is a danger to them. The Empress has no desire for war. But Quen Yu, Quen Yu is a different story…”

  She pursued her lips, deep in thought.

  “What has he done to deserve the title you give him? I’ve dealt with a lot of criminals in my time. And madmen, too. No one is entirely evil or entirely good.”

  Xheng saddened.

  “I never said he was entirely evil. I am sure, somewhere deep, deep down, there is a Quen Yu who remembers what being a child is like. But that is not the Quen Yu who would sit upon the Jade Throne. The Quen Yu who would sit on the Jade Throne would frame and betray his sister, murder his mother, and anyone else who gets in his way. To call him ruthless is like calling the Fester wet, or the sun hot. He puts on a pleasant face and believes no one can see who he is truly is. But the rot has set deep.”

  Emerza sighed. She looked wracked by a great doubt, as though two Daimons were vying for supremacy within her. After a while, she spoke, regret making her words leaden bullets:

  “This is not my war. I am not Qi’shathian. I have no stake in this. Besides, it sounds like Quen Yu is not Emperor yet.”

  She shrugged, as if that was the best she could do.

  “I see,” Xheng said. “Very well.” He strode toward the mouth of the alleyway, leaving Emerza leaning against the wall. Just as he reached the end, where light was spilling into the dark avenue, casting his weatherbeaten features in a mantle of gold that could not quite erase the hardships of his life, he turned back. “When you were ordered to apprehend Telos and the rest of us, that was not your war. Why, then, did you go?”

  She opened her mouth to respond, but Xheng cut across.

  “When those men attacked you just now, it was not my war. Why then, do you think, I intervened?” The tiniest smile lifted the corner of his lips. “When you killed the mad dwarf, and saved all our lives, was that your war? I learned something from my time with Telos: our souls are shaped by the wars we choose, not the ones that are chosen for us. May the sea winds blow favourably upon you!”

  With that, he swept out of the alley, and into the sunlight.