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But evidently the Chasm was not how Tenny was to meet her untimely demise. Without warning, the man changed directions and began jogging along the wall. Tenny swung her head to find they were approaching a run-down shack that sat no more than ten feet from the edge of the world. She yelped as she was placed back on her feet, then ushered inside. Her boot caught on a broken floorboard, causing her to stumble directly into—and somewhat on top of—someone new who was waiting inside.

Or rather, someone decidedly not new, as it turned out.

“Quartered hell, Ten, that’s my foot!”

Relief and bewilderment speared through Tenny at the sound of the all-too-familiar voice. Her eyes adjusted to the low lantern light inside the shed, and Tristan’s face materialized in front of her.

“Quartered hell me? Quartered hell you, Tristan Hale! What in Aurelia’s name are you doing? Who was—what was—” Whipping her head between Tristan and the large bearded man now standing in the doorway, she forced herself to take a deep breath. “What is going on?”

The man closed the door behind him, and his shoulders immediately dropped. There was something melancholic about his expression as he turned to face Tenny and Tristan. “My deepest apologies, my lady,” came a voice that was vehemently mismatched with the person standing before her. It was soft and feminine, with a distinct accent and⁠—

“Stars above,” Tenny whispered. Green light burst from the man’s burly form, his silhouette shimmered, and a half second later, Tenny found herself staring not at her bearded assailant but at a slight sylvan woman with short, forest-green hair and wide, apologetic eyes.

“I’m so sorry for alarming you,” said Zephyr, her eyes downcast. “The villagers here don’t, ah . . . They don’t take too kindly to strangers, we’ve found. Had to be a little obvious about where it looked like I was taking you. Unlike Ollie, you’d already been spotted by some of the folks in the chapel, and I couldn’t⁠—”

Tenny threw her hands in the air. “What in all four hells are you talking about? Where is Ollie?”

“I’m right here, Ten.” Ollie emerged from a shadowy corner of the room with a wry grin on his face. He exchanged a look with Tristan, and his grin broadened.

Tenny narrowed her eyes at him. “Enjoying yourself, are you?”

“Is life even worth living if you can’t find the sight of your friend being manhandled by a shapeshifted sylvan entertaining?”

She rolled her eyes, then turned back to Tristan. “The time for speaking is now, Sir Hale,” she hissed through clenched teeth.

“Whew, where to even begin?” The knight raked his fingers through the mop of dirty-blond hair atop his head. Dirtier than usual, Tenny realized. As were the clothes he was wearing. She cast a quick look around the shack, which appeared to have been long abandoned, and saw a large bundle of blankets shoved in one corner and what appeared to be a pile of Tristan’s travel armor hastily piled in another.

“You’ve been living here?” Tenny asked, incredulous.

“I’ve been staying here the past few nights, yes,” Tristan replied defensively. “As Zephyr said, this place is . . . By the Five, I truly don’t even know where to start.”

Zephyr stepped forward, looking even smaller than normal in the oversized shirt and overcoat that she had donned as part of her disguise. “We came here because this is where those cultists we . . . er . . . ran into outside of Daeglen were from. They’d made it sound like their entire village had been coerced into joining the Cult of Malakar, and Cedric thought if we could find any members willing to defect, they might help us locate Elyria.”

“But Elle is already safe, as you know,” Tenny said, “so why would⁠—”

“And thank the stars for it,” said Tristan. “But we were already nearly here by the time we learned of this, and I knew Sir Bleeding Heart would still want us to see if we could help free any of these people from the oaths they’d sworn to the blood king. And he’d made a promise of his own to Ignatius before he, uh, passed.”

Zephyr nodded sadly. “Mira.”

“Yes, Mira, his daughter. So, we came, and we asked a few careful questions. There was no Mira to be found here, but some of the other villagers seemed interested in learning more about what we came to say. One of them put us up for the evening, said we’d get to chat more in the morning.” His throat bobbed.

“And?” urged Tenny. “What happened then?”

Zephyr averted her eyes.

“And then, in the middle of the stars-forsaken night, we were ripped from our beds and tossed right into the bloody fucking Chasm.”

Tenny and Ollie gasped in synchrony.

“Yep. No warning.” Tristan sighed. “Maybe this place was different back before Ignatius and Tyrren left on their mission to Nyrundelle. Maybe it was better then. But it’s starkly clear that the entire fucking village is suckling from Malakar’s teat now. We didn’t even get a chance to plead our case.”

“Motherfuckers,” Ollie muttered.

“How did you survive?” Tenny asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Tristan jutted his thumb at Zephyr. “Only because of this one. She shifted mid-fall. Caught me. We hid on a ledge partway down the Chasm until we were sure they’d all left, then made our way back up. After that, we found this place, and you can work out the rest.”

“Why did you stay?” Ollie said gently, tucking a lock of Tristan’s hair behind his ear. “Why didn’t you just come home?”