He doesn’t smile. “You have two broken legs, Vis. And that ‘brace’ you are using to walk is making you bleed everywhere.” I glance down, surprised to find he’s right; there are trails of blood all the way down my legs, and the base of my torn and dirtied toga is soaked in red. “I know you are a Quintus, and angry, and whatever your Dispensator made you might be dulling the pain, but your body will not last like this. Itcannot. So rest, just for a few minutes, and I will keep watch. Rest, or I will make you rest.”
I scowl at him, but now I’ve sat down it feels impossible to get back up again straight away. “Fine. But I’m not going to sleep. I’ll raise the signal again.”
I send my metal shards high into the air, well above the rooftops. Carefully form them into the only meaningful shape I can think to make. An inverted Hierarchy symbol, three lines descending into a single point.
Eidhin peers upward, looking a mixture of impressed and worried. “You’re sure he will be able to see them?”
“They’re imbued. If he’s like me, and anywhere close by, it’ll catch his attention.” Alone, the Will in each shard wouldn’t be enough. Arranged together as they are, though, they pulse in my mind, clear against the smoky night.
A massive arrow in the sky, pointed directly down at us.
“Are they going to fall on top of us if you lose concentration?” Eidhin gazes upward worriedly.
“Maybe. Probably not. Don’t think so,” I reply hazily. My pounding heart is easing. No immediate danger, and as the fear departs it leaves only exhaustion in its wake.
Unwillingly, I close my eyes.
“FOR A MAN NOT SLEEPING, YOU ARE NOT VERY ALERT.”
I start and twist awake at the gruff voice in my ear. “Rotting gods.” I sit up, repressing a groan at the action. “I was thinking.”
“Ah. Practicing. This is good.” He pats me on the shoulder. “How are you feeling?”
I consider. “Better.” Not a lie, insomuch as I don’t feel as close to dying as I did when I closed my eyes. I check the pulsing symbol high above us. Still hovering where I left it. “How long?”
“A half hour.”
Too long. Not long enough. I take in Eidhin’s spent visage. “Your turn.”
“I don’t need—”
“Your turn.” I gesture upward. “It’s a big city. If he’s looking for me, we need to give him time to get close enough to see it. I can manage.”
“Not if you can’t walk and don’t have a weapon,” Eidhin observes.
I sigh, hating the logic, but he’s right. Command the hovering pieces to return, to form the braces around my legs again. The fiction of my arm. My mask. None of it’s comfortable, but once set it will stay in place. Better to do it now than be forced to under pressure.
We sit mutely for a while, and though I can see Eidhin’s eyes droop more than once, he doesn’t drift off the way I did.
“What made you change your mind?” The question comes abruptly, out almost before I realise I’m asking it. I smile weakly. “It sure as all hells wasn’t this plan.”
“That, I promise you, is true.” Eidhin stirs. Massages his shoulder, which took a hit from a Sextus earlier. “No. The measure of a man is not whether he does the wrong thing. It is whether he accepts that he has. When you told me the truth—showed me that mask …” He sighs heavily. “I was angry. I still am. But you were right. About crossing lines because we feel forced to. Perhaps we will save my people from Redivius, perhaps we will not—but if I had pressed on, if I had stayed trapped, it would have eventually been the latter.” He frowns at the ground. Speaks slowly. “But Vis? It was also because you came. You came on two broken legs, and you asked. You would not have forced me to stop, but you were willing to strip yourself bare to save me. You reminded me that we are not friends. You are mybrother. My kin. To abandon you to the right and narrow path …”
He trails off. Silence, and then he drags himself to his feet. Walks over slowly and offers his hand to pull me up. “If we are staying here longer, we should try and find a position with a better view.”
I let him haul me to my feet and then wrap him in a fierce embrace before he can resist. Impossible to describe what his words mean to me.
He grunts. Allows it, then pulls away. “It is still an awful plan,” he growls.
I cough a laugh, and we start to pick our way out again across the rubble.
I round the broken wall and immediately shrink back, motioning urgently to stay quiet. Someone is standing in the street. Visible as little more than a silhouette.
Watching the house.
“Carnifex.” The voice rings out into the black.
I glance back at Eidhin, who motions that he’s going to circle around the other way. I nod affirmation, steel myself and emerge at a safe distance. “Who are you?”
