My heart pounded in my chest, and I fought the urge to vomit.
People screamed as they raced along bridges, reached for each other as they staggered across catwalks. They were ordinary people, I realized, perhaps the hands of the confiscated ships, perhaps the sons and daughters of pirates past, living in the only city they’d ever known, eking out a living in a world both hard and cruel. These people, the Bilgefolk, were not to blame.
Was Thanavar? Were we?
The knot in my stomach drew tight as I watched the men, women, and children racing for safety, clawing for a rail to brace against the storm that followed us.
And what the hels was thisNil’hellyn?
TheTouchstonehad said a word earlier.
Sister.
And I knew she didn’t mean me.
I frowned and slipped the doll into my waistcoat. I had to do something.Anything.
I’d spent my life running—before dawn, before trouble, before it could cost me more than I was willing to give. But not now. Not here. Running wouldn’t save them. I had to stand. I had to try. Even if it killed me.
The chimeric—the deadly, savage, articulating chimeric—was the source of all magik.
I pulled the gloves from my hands.
How did you stop the shot from theEndorathil?
The longboat bucked and wove through the waves as Bilgetown shook herself apart all around us.
I just formed a protection spell and willed the chimeric to compound it.
But I’d also formed anAuctorusthe other night. I’d sent oneinto the gap. I’d managed to bind, protect, and hold with one wylde spell.
I drew a long breath and held it. The cries of the Bilgefolk pressed into my bones, steel rivets screaming, planks creaking and snapping. Then I released the breath and closed my eyes.
“Auctorus praesidium in ligus.”
I began to cast, knowing deep down that the magik didn’t start in my fingertips. It never did anymore. It started in my gut, between my ribs and beneath my heart, right in the middle where you could put a fist. Heat and light as one, patterns formed behind my eyes, danced across my tongue, and left my body in a rush of breath and sparks.Auctorus praesidium in ligus.She would not fall, this horrible, filthy, desperate city built on stolen dreams and loss. She would not fall because of us.
Time slowed, hulls slowed, planks and bridges and glass slowed.
“Auctorus praesidium in ligus,”I chanted, steady and strong. Again and again.
And the runes answered. They sizzled along my skin, lit like firebrands, a thousand thousand needles digging into my flesh, searing down to the bone. My lungs burned, each breath a forge bellows. I was on fire. Iwasthe fire.
My hands trembled as I traced the air. Fist, fist, crook and tuck. Left finger swooped. I forced the words out, over and over, willing them to hold. Willing the world to just this once not leave destruction in my wake, not leave a hollow in my chest.
“Blue.”
And the world obeyed. The air thickened, humming with power. Runes flared against the storm, etching themselves across the rain, glowing lines binding ship to ship, plank to plank. The swells that should have swallowed Bilgetown shuddered, split, and broke harmless against the glowing net of magik.
“Blue!”
My body shattered, but the city stood.
“Blue! Now,” said Buck. “Gate!”
I opened my eyes, wiped the rain from my face.
We were near the Bilgegate, and while it was hanging askew, it was still barring our way.
