Page 42 of Lady of Doom and Devotion

We hurry through the middle-ward streets. The buildings loom closer together here than in the inner wards, but still with a stately grandeur that you won’t find very far beyond the old city walls.

The immensity of the task ahead of us starts to creep up over me again. We have to not just oust the usurpers and their murderous magic but unite the different levels of the city to do so.

I’m ashamed that I never thought all that much before about the lives of the citizens on Florian’s fringes. Or the peasants in the towns and villages outside the city. I had a hazy idea of their existence and that they deserved to be happy just as nobles and royals do, but when did I make any effort toward putting that principle into practice?

The world my mother trained me to perform for was nothing more than a gilded bubble. The real crime isn’t that I’ve deviated from her wishes so far but that I didn’t realize I needed to sooner.

The sentry weaves through streets where the cobblestones become more worn and the buildings droop lower. They’re still a far cry from the dirt roads and ramshackle wooden homes in the neighborhood around Crow’s Close, but farther from the elite hub of the city all the same.

As we approach a stable, her steps slow for caution. She leads me around back to a shed attached to the building.

From the smell of leather that permeates the space we step into and the tools hung on the walls, I gather this is a workshop for mending saddles and bridles. At the moment, no one’s inhabiting it except for a skinny man who looks to be in his mid-twenties, huddled in one corner.

His tawny hair is rumpled. Both grit and a reddish scrape mark his face. He considers the two of us with nervous eyes, looking ready to try to bolt past us if he feels the need.

He definitely feels under threat. From us, from the people he’s run from, or both?

A couple of paces away from him, I crouch down, putting us on the same eye level. In the fading light that filters through the shed’s small, grimy window, I examine his face and body language for every hint at his emotional state.

I pitch my voice low and soothing. “I hear you’ve had a rough time of it.”

The man shrugs and tucks his arms tighter around his pulled-up knees. He has a shallow cut on his forearm too, a thin line of blood seeping into his sleeve on either side of the severed fabric.

Whatever happened between him and his former associates, it ended violently.

“We’d like to help you if we can,” I go on in the same calm tone. “We’d rather not see anyone getting pushed around or beat up from now on.”

The man wets his lips. “How do you think you’re going to manage that? You don’t know…”

He trails off, looking abruptly more anxious than before. His fear appears totally authentic.

“About what the Order of the Wild can do?” I fill in. “Actually, we know exactly what they’re capable of. We’re well aware of the magic they’ve been turning to and the lengths they’ve gone to so they can enhance it and their manpower.”

The man makes a scoffing sound. “Then what do you think you can do about it?”

“We have our own strengths. We simply need enough people willing to take that first step to stand up to the Order, and then we can set Silana back to rights. But for now, you could start by telling me your name.”

He hesitates again. As he opens his mouth, his arms loosen, his stance relaxing just slightly. “Filip.”

I nod. “And why were you being chased by the Order, Filip? Why did they attack you?”

He sucks in a sharp breath. “I was supposed to— I didn’t want to do everything they said we should. It sounded amazing at first, but once I actually saw…”

He trails off, his body deflating. Does he still look just anxious or sad as well?

It’s not surprising that he’d be incredibly fearful about his former comrades getting their hands on him—and of how those of us who oppose the Order might retaliate for the harm he’s helped carry out. But we still have to be careful ourselves.

If they won him over with promises of glory before, he could be swayed in that direction again.

Thankfully, I’m the best possible person to evaluate his priorities.

“Realizing you’ve made a mistake and refusing to do so again is a brave thing,” I say, and extend my gift toward him.

A tingling shoots through my gums where I sacrificed my back molars for this magic. An ache ripples through my skull, but with it comes a current of impressions straight from the man in front of me.

What could I do that would make him happiest in this moment?

I catch fragments of meetings, Lothar looming tall over his followers; a child standing before a cleric; a surge of tingling exhilaration; a rush of fear. Then a bone-deep desperation that yawns open ever wider.

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