"Aim for his head!" she yelled to Wynn.
But Wynn stood frozen in place. Tears ran down her cheeks.
The world slowed to a stop and all three stared at each other in silence.
If Wynn would simply fire, there would too much pain for Chane to defend or flee. If Wynn did not, Magiere's wounded leg might stop her from catching him.
Chane searched Wynn's face as if looking for something in it.
"If you take a step toward Magiere-or try to cast your magic," Wynn whispered, "I will shoot."
Chane took one stumbling step back, disbelief on his face.
"He's a killer-a monster," Magiere shouted to the sage. "Shoot him!"
Their positions were all wrong. If Magiere tried to close, she would simply be in Wynn's line of fire.
"Wynn?" she snarled. "Pull the lever, damn you."
But Wynn didn't move or take her eyes off of the undead.
Chane looked at her. The crystal of his irises faded to deep brown as a strange loss passed across his face. The tall undead turned and fled down the tunnel.
The dank air caught in Magiere's chest as she tried to stumble after her prey and nearly fell in the sewer water. She turned to Wynn.
"What have you done?"
"He may be a killer," Wynn whispered with effort as the crossbow sagged in her arms. "But I am not. Not like that. He spared me-and you."
"He didn't have a choice!" Magiere snapped back.
Wynn dropped the crossbow with a flinch, as if discarding something repugnant to the touch. She stepped down into the water and lifted Magiere's free arm over her shoulders.
"You made me believe we hunted savage beasts," the sage said accusingly.
"You stupid… girl," Magiere answered. What lunacy this woman had developed amid dusty books and isolation from the real world. "That's all they are."
"Then why did he let me live?"
"You were his tool."
"No," Wynn said firmly. "Now we must leave and see to your wounds."
Magiere drew a long breath, prepared to tell this idiot what she thought of her grand ethics, and the sound of footsteps resonated into the intersection.
"So much for your mercy," she said. "He's coming back to finish this."
She was about to shove Wynn away when she realized the footfalls were against stone and not splashing through the water. Slow and even, they came from up the wide flow way toward the city's center rather than down the tunnel into which Chane had fled.
Magiere's night vision was almost gone. Hunger had faded with the fury to call back her sight, leaving only frustration and fatigue. She barely made out the dark figure moving along the left-side stone walkway, and heard his voice echo to her.
"A moment, if you please."
Hollow and cultured-and familiar in a way that made Magiere tense.
A figure of medium height stepped into the far reach of the torchlight, wearing a black cloak over dark clothes that obscured him from view. With black-gloved hands, he pulled his cowl back, and even in the low torchlight, Magiere caught the streaks of white at his temples. Her leg gave again, and she leaned on Wynn.
"Welstiel?"
"Not quite what I expected," he said, ignoring her puzzlement as he glanced down the side tunnel Chane had taken. "But your skills are increasing. And I suppose this was still a worthwhile lesson. Never depend on anyone beside yourself, except perhaps for the half-blood or the majay-hi."
His voice. It was strangely familiar, urgently so, aside from when she'd last seen him in Miiska.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
Again he ignored her and looked at Wynn. "Leave."
Magiere felt Wynn's grip around her waist tighten. Weistiel lifted one black-gloved hand to point down the side tunnel.
His earlier words came back to Magiere-a moment, if you please.
She shoved Wynn in the direction Welstiel pointed and stumbled over to snatch the loaded crossbow, cradling it across her sword arm.
"Run now," Magiere ordered. "Find Leesil."
Wynn looked between Magiere and Welstiel in confused panic, then turned and slogged away into the tunnel.
Magiere leveled the crossbow directly at Welstiel.
Leesil watched in frustration and rage as Ratboy vanished.
Chap trotted down the slope to him, pushing his nose through the iron bars. At least he was all right. As much as Leesil should thank the elf for this, he was too angry.
"Open the damn gate!" he shouted.
The elf gazed at him from the top of the passage and turned aside out of view. Leesil heard rattling gears and chains, and the gate slowly lifted. When it was but halfway up, he ducked under and hurried up the walkway, picking up his torch along the way and gripping it along with the blade in his left hand. Chap followed close behind him.
The chamber was a large half circle, its flat side holding the archway entrance. Along this same wall, to either side, were narrow passageways. Ratboy had likely fled down the one to the left, and Leesil saw the elf standing on the right side, cranking a metal wheel. The man flipped a lever, locking the mechanism used to open the gate.
The walls reached up to four times the height of a man. High in the curved wall, a wide chute spilled a steady but light fall of water to the chamber floor. The smell of brine thickened here, and Leesil guessed this place was beneath the salt mill, where excess seawater was pumped in to flush the sewers.
"We're going after him," he said to the elf. "Are you coming?"
Chap began softly growling at the mouth of the left passageway, and the elf watched him with a puzzled expression that made Leesil briefly follow his gaze.
"You are alike," the elf said. "You care for only one thing-to kill the dead. Why?"
Leesil had no time for this. Ratboy was escaping yet again.
"Because they prey upon the living," he answered quickly. "No one else will… can hunt them, so we do."
"Humans," Sgaile said, as if spitting out something foul to the taste. "They feed on humans, are spawned from them. That creature serves his purpose in thinning the blight upon this world. These humans have even failed to remember their own folly that brought the world to the edge of death in their long-forgotten past."
"Then why didn't you kill me, a half-human?" Leesil asked in spite. "Why did you come after me at all?"
"An error of judgment was made-we do not kill our own," the elf said with difficulty, though his study of Chap made Leesil believe there was more to it.
"Slaughter, you mean," Leesil retorted. "That's what you do, just like these monsters." And he pointed down the passage Ratboy had taken.
"Is this why you abandoned your parents-to hunt the humans' dead?"
Leesil tensed. What did this elf know of his past?
"I left because my life was a horror, and I could no longer do as Darmouth forced me. I know they both were executed because of me."
"I care not what happened to your human sire," elf replied. "But Cuirin'nSn'a is a traitor to her people and their future. She will never again teach another our ways. And it matters little if you choose to waste yourself in such meaningless pursuit."
Chap snarled and lunged at the elf, and the man backed away two steps. But Leesil was only barely aware of this. For a moment he couldn't breathe.
Father had called mother Nein'a, and that was close to the name the elf had spoken.
Chap lunged again with a snap of teeth, backing the elf against the wall. The anmaglahk looked at Leesil as if he were something unpleasant that couldn't be discarded.
"I came to you for one reason," he said with reluctance, not letting Chap slip from his field of view. "To tell you that you must never step in our way, or our shared blood will not save you from the fate of a traitor."