"So . . . what now?" Daisy asked quietly. "Are we going after that historian?"
The common hall swam with halfhearted light seeping from ceiling spores. From the darkly dappled gold about the call mirror onward the glow intensified, the spectrum culminating in the writhing white fire that held Pyrrha's gaze. She'd often entered this refuge to see Maven staring into the flames as she was now, lips moving soundlessly, committing each vivid shift to memory as a sign for the future that had 'told her more than words ever could.'
Pyrrha saw only strife.
"Furnival, right?" Daisy's voice came somewhat tremulous in the wake of Pyrrha's admission. She'd apparently noticed; she took a quick breath and added with surety, "Before that woman gets what she needs from him."
"She's had it by now," Pyrrha said toward the fire. "She awaits word on my fate, I imagine, before she gives up her tricks." A thought struck, and she turned to approach the mirror. "I suppose I'll do her the courtesy."
"Is that a good idea?" Daisy said, hands clasped and fidgeting at her waist. "What if we tricked her, instead? Element of surprise and all that. We could make polyjuice from the . . . them." She nodded uncomfortably at the dead resting on the meeting table.
Hati yipped from his place by the fire, a noise of accord. They both glanced back at him.
Daisy smiled weakly. "That's two votes yes."
"We're not a democracy," Pyrrha said as she turned back around. She waved her wand over the round table when she passed, and the shrouded bodies there vanished, transported away. "Deceiving Aradia serves no purpose; she won't relent until she's seen me dead, and then she may strip the knowledge from Furnival for caution and secrecy. When she sees me well, she'll keep him intact in service of fear. I need only remind her what we have to gain, striving together."
"If you say so," Daisy said, sounding uneasy. She met Pyrrha's eyes in the grand mirror with anxious determination. "Should I hide myself, then?" She gestured at a corner of the room outside the mirror's view.
"Best if you wait in the hall, yes."
"What, really?" Daisy said, exasperated. "Damn it, Pyrrha, you've got to be—!"
"Please," Pyrrha added, "be patient. I'll have kept my promise by the day's end."
The thought of that looming conversation made her insides sink with sickly apprehension. One way or the other, their friendship would never again be as it was now; Daisy would either denounce her or persevere at her side, and Pyrrha didn't know which outcome was more terrible to bear.
"You bloody well better!" Daisy said. She made for a door, casting a strained backward glance on the way through. Hati stared after her for a moment before resuming the grooming of his silvery paws.
In a moment, Pyrrha took her gaze from the reflection over her shoulder and focused on the mirror itself. With her wand she drew a pattern in the air like a moth's meandering path, calling out across space to Aradia.
Like a stone dropped into a placid pond the mirror rippled, the common hall fading into fathomless dark, and Pyrrha waited before it in silence until it resolved into an elegantly appointed dwelling. There were delicately shaped wood furnishings set upon with elaborate fittings of iron and trappings of vivid fabric woven with indecipherable patterns, and a luxurious bed flanked by shelves with rooflike lanceted tops stacked with texts embossed with fine gold lettering down the spines. All was illumined from above by the gentle glow of countless candles in wrought sconces mounted across the carved oak walls. Before the vision was the resolute face of her cohort.
The change was immediately apparent at their intimate distance. Aradia's dusky countenance had an unnatural pallor, as if she had frozen to death where she stood; only her incisive eyes betrayed that notion as they raked, impassive, a moment spent lingering darkly on the scar. Her depthless brown irises were flecked with lurid crimson like unearthed shards of garnet that flickered and died at the whim of wavering light.
She'd split her soul. The realization drove the air from Pyrrha's lungs.
When she found her voice, Pyrrha said with a hint of awe, "You've foregone release."
The terminus of one with a fractured soul was no end at all, but a ceaseless existence spent senseless to anything save sundered agony. The love of a mother had conquered all dread for that calamitous fate. Pyrrha felt a brief, kindred ache in her chest; she knew what it was to sacrifice for those who mattered.
Aradia's stolid visage broke composure almost at once, twisting into deep-held enmity. Her voice flayed the air. "I have; a measure that had not been imperative until your foolhardy pursuit brought ruin upon us."
With outrage, iron reinforced Pyrrha's tone. "Don't presume to condemn me for your own decision. Foolhardy is a hastened horcrux if it's anything—such an act is never called for."
"You are not a mother," Aradia spat, and the scar was pure fire at the thought of Ashlin. "You are the very last to whom I would look for understanding, she who speaks without knowing and acts without thinking! Why have you contacted me this way, Pyrrha—why aren't you now storming our gates with eyes firmly shut?"
"I'm here to remind you of what you already know; for the sake of all, for the sake of your son, you must put aside your feelings. Divided, we lose everything at stake. We can right the wrongs together—only together."
"You are mistaken yet again," Aradia said, each syllable falling like slabs of stone. "No matter the means, we will never attain that perfect end. That path has been closed to us since the very beginning; events have now made this clear to me. I will divest the world of Morrigan myself. You," she added deliberately, "are a rampant force of chaos to be corrected. Nothing more."
Wrath twisted and thrashed in Pyrrha at Aradia's gall; to give up so easily, so close to the end, was unthinkable. The turmoil under her voice seemed to shake the mirror. "There can be no peace for your son without me."
"I will find another way, and if I cannot, then I will create the way. Your part in this is over," Aradia said, as if it were that simple. For a moment, a subtle play of bleak emotions warped her mask of iron. "I offer you one chance, here and now, to turn away from the Cabal. Leave what remains of us outside of your machinations. I do not wish to kill you, child, for all that you've earned it."
Pyrrha leaned forward against Aradia's gaze with her palms flat on the vanity, securing the old witch in a baleful stare of her own. "I've happy news for you, then," she said. "You can't."
Aradia's expression was grim as the dead. "We will see."
She turned and strode away, leaving the mirror to sink into darkness once more. Pyrrha's reflection swam ahead from the depths to match her stare as the common hall melted in behind; over her shoulder, Hati's patient silver eyes shimmered beside the fireplace.
While Pyrrha allowed her faculties to ebb down from their tumultuous heights, she studied the twining purple scar across her head. The shining red of burned flesh had faded to a pale pink that reflected light with a glossy quality, and in the center, the black site of impact dragged at the eye like a brand.
The wire-rimmed glasses she wore gave her an unpleasant lurch in her stomach; she'd nearly forgotten the need for them. She plucked them off and was instantly adrift in an indistinct sea of color. She replaced them again with another flash of anger.
A wave of the wand cast the mirror back into its inky netherworld. Reality bloomed from the center outward once more to reveal Wasila still laboring to maintain the pervading vapors swirling around the domed ceiling. Her appearance had changed again in their brief separation; her favored pale shade of skin had returned, offset by glossy dark hair that framed newly sculpted features and vibrant blue eyes glittering with energy. Her smile was already in place, that maddening expression that seemed to flaunt secret knowledge.
"I know that face," Wasila said. "How is dear Aradia? Does she still know best? I'll bet she does!"
"She's worried. Let's set her fears to rest."
"Wouldn't miss it," Wasila said, and the mirror went black.
Pyrrha turned away and flicked her wand at the door, and it swung open to reveal Daisy with her arms crossed; she started, then let her arms drop as she stepped inside, hands jumping back together like long-parted friends.
"So?" Daisy said breathlessly.
"Yes, it's time," Pyrrha said. She rounded the meeting table to stand before Daisy, looking down with all the gravity she could project; Daisy's eyes widened a little. "We're about to enter a perilous situation, and your company is against all my better judgment—perhaps that bodes well, in a twisted way, given what my judgment has wrought thus far—"
"Pyrrha—"
"—but you must heed my instructions, no matter what they entail. I can keep you safe, but if you defy me—if something—something terrible happens . . ."
Her heart was like dead metal in her chest pumping chilled blood that carved down her veins with frozen shards. What she was about to allow went against every fiber of her rational self. She considered once again breaking all bonds, overtaking Daisy's will in order to safeguard her life.
"Don't." Ashlin's voice echoed with loss and regret. The blistering burn felt born anew.
"Hey," Daisy said gently, as if Pyrrha were one to need soothing; the scar seethed in time with a twist in the chest. "I trust you, and you trust me; that's why I'm still here. I'll follow your lead, Pyrrha, and I'll watch your back at the same time, and guess what? We'll come out of this alright—better than that; the blighters won't know what hit them." She grinned, and the suddenness of it jolted Pyrrha. "Remember N.E.W.T. Potions?"
Pyrrha felt faintly dizzy at a recollection of rare happiness that came utterly surreal in their present situation. Over her protestations for Daisy's marks they had partnered for the practical exam, and had proceeded to surpass all expectations under Daisy's steady guidance. Then had come the written test, and Daisy had given a sneaky smile and quietly offered her mind, free of care for the trust it implied.
"I don't see that it matters," she'd said. "You might as well know everything I do—you'll always have me to ask."
Then Pyrrha had known at last what they were, had realized the conclusion of their school years wouldn't part them; her subsequent emotional lapse still conjured acute discomfiture.
"There you are. No more worries, alright?" Daisy's determined eyes glimmered with life; she drew her wand. "Let's get it done."
The door to the hall opened, and they turned. Wasila paused at the entrance, her smile adopting a mischievous shade. "Have I interrupted something?" Her brow lifted a fraction when she noticed Daisy's wand. "Is the Princess coming along as well, then?"
Daisy's wand arm twitched. "Who's that?"
"Wasila," Pyrrha said, giving the woman an irritated look.
"I strive to greet each new challenge fresh-faced. Didn't Pyrrha tell you?" There was a hint of a barb there, but Daisy didn't react beyond a frown. Wasila shrugged. "Do forgive my rhetoricals. We should get going, you know; with the time we've squandered, Aradia may well die of age before we can reach her."
With a sense of settling pressure, emotions drained from Pyrrha to leave behind an osmotic coating of perturbation under her skin as her goal came back into sharp focus. "No longer likely as you think. You'll see," she added at Wasila's inquiring look.
Pyrrha beckoned and led the way to the hearth. Hati stood and stretched his forelegs as they reached him; he looked up with eyes bright and expectant.
"Into the fire again," Pyrrha said. "Danger waits for us. Are you ready?"
Hati barked twice, deep and savage with eagerness, canines gleaming in the firelight.
A wave of Pyrrha's wand caused the fireplace to stretch and widen like a dragon's yawning maw until it was of a size to accommodate them; without ceremony she snatched up and tossed in a fistful of powder, and the flames belched emerald sparks across the dark wood floor.
"All together," Pyrrha said as she stepped within. "The trap will snap shut on the first arrival."
"No Irish goodbyes for us, then," Wasila said lightly.
Daisy drew up to Pyrrha's right, and Hati paced beside her left. Wasila stepped in primly on the wolf's other side.
The vibrant blaze licked at their legs with tongues of pleasant heat. A glance passed between Pyrrha and Daisy to convey another sort of warmth that was promptly doused by a thrill of dismay.
Pyrrha gripped the fur on Hati's broad back and held her wand ready. "Furnival residence."
The fire ejected them in a flash of neon ashes before promptly flickering out. Pyrrha advanced in front with senses attuned, then paused as she took in the space.
It was immodesty manifest, not so much a home as a grand edifice of stone that embodied an awesome cathedral of old. The far-flung hall returned their footsteps in an overlapping cascade of dull echoes, resonating between the colossal granite pillars that ribbed the sunlit chamber and stood fast under a wondrous vaulted ceiling of stained glass which captivated Pyrrha at once: the iridescent scenes depicted there were alive in their own time, bearing out momentous events of myth and legend in a contiguous sequence down along the chamber; there was Cuhulin writhing in his obscure darkness, laying waste to friend and foe alike; there was the mountainous wizard Dagda, with curse and conflict subverting the legions who sought his miraculous cauldron; and there was—
Pyrrha's heart skipped when she met the citrine eyes set not in the face of rot and ruin, but in a porcelain vision of beauty framed with wild black hair like tufted feathers dipped in ink. She stood beside a man with an auburn mane and proud features to match his bearing, and together they gazed across a raging field of battle between giants and men. Shards of ruby-hued glass splintered in all directions at each strike and curse to ravage the angular, puzzle-pieced combatants.
Wasila's voice snapped her back to awareness. "Something's off in the air."
It was immediately clear when Pyrrha tore her gaze back down; up the chamber ahead of them, colors shifted and blurred nearly imperceptibly, as if their party had stepped into a watercolor painting that had yet to dry.
"That—I've seen that before . . ." Daisy said, anxious and uncertain. She gasped and snatched at Pyrrha's rising wand arm, dragging it down. "No—no magic! Nobody cast a thing!"
"Not a thing? No cutting aspersions, or even a fleeting glance?" Wasila said as her glittering eyes swept the grandiose space, wand down at her side. "May I cast a vote in favor of a ready explanation?"
Daisy's chest heaved with building panic, but her voice was steady. "That stuff in the air, it's potion fumes—emissions from a very, very specific mistake in the process of brewing Kindledrake—"
Pyrrha cut her off intently: "What does it do?"
"Explodes," Daisy said breathlessly. "First hint of magic—it all explodes."
Alarm coursed through Pyrrha; they were near to stranded in the midst of an ocean of death without an oar, and clarity seemed to fade ever further even as she watched as if through welling tears. Hati growled beside her as the fumes spread like a creeping dream until it enveloped them, ensconced them in senseless color. The distinct lack of an odor unsettled her, that it was passing within her lungs and into her bloodstream entirely untraced. She slipped her wand into her pocket to forestall any reflexive action.
"Why haven't we died?" Wasila said, sounding merely curious. "It must be a simple thing to set off, surely."
"Doesn't work like that," Daisy said. She strained to catch her breath as if she'd been sprinting, rather than pacing restlessly. "Can't interact with it at all—not magically—too volatile, and the fumes propagate too quickly—they'd catch themselves in the blast if they laid a trigger. Have to find—find the cauldrons it's emitting from. I can neutralize it."
Pyrrha plunged ahead through the muddled expanse, Hati padding along beside her like a silver shadow in the obscurity. "Let's find them, then. Hurry."
The grand hall before them was a dim and sunwashed sea of the greys and whites of seamless stone architecture dotted with distant firelights that shimmered as if behind frosted glass, and it was these that guided Pyrrha ahead. Footfalls and clicking claws shattered grave silence anew with each half-certain step.
They passed looming statues settled intermittently between the chamber's ionic pillars, each hulking shape peering down with indistinct visages that still managed to convey ancient grandeur. Behind the sculptures, fluttering patches of color denoted tapestries or paintings or heraldic banners hung high. Abruptly, the rows of columns became blurred walls encroaching at half the previous distance, now blotched with identical splotches of mottled brown at precise intervals on either side: doors.
Pyrrha paused to regard the recessed portals cautiously, and Daisy spoke up.
"The cauldrons won't be through those," she said. Pyrrha could picture her strained expression behind the alchemical brume. "The vapors wouldn't have filled the air so fast by seeping between cracks. Let's keep on ahead."
The profound relief at having consented to bring Daisy built higher in Pyrrha as she led them further; Aradia had done well to exploit Byron's expertise. Never had Pyrrha encountered a phenomenon such as what swirled around them.
They advanced another dozen feet before a crash from behind stopped them in their tracks; they turned in time to watch the other doors fly open with bangs and rattles when they struck the walls until the blurs beside them swung free as well, followed by those on the path ahead all the way to the hall's end; out from each opening shambled indistinct figures with varied and unsteady gaits. They approached without a sound.
Bereft of magic, Pyrrha was at a loss. She fought down rising alarm and pulled a baying Hati with her while she drew back toward Daisy, and she thought furiously as the silent silhouettes beside them neared arm's length. Something warm was pressed into her free hand—a vial.
"Drink!" Daisy said. "We'll have to do this the muggle way."
"The muggle—what?"
A murky hand seized Pyrrha's arm in an iron grip and was torn away just as quickly; there was a blur of gold and a hideous wet shattering as the figure's head was smote from its shoulders. The thing collapsed to the floor like a discarded puppet.
"Drink and hit, Pyrrha!"
Hati snarled and dived into obscurity to bowl over an approaching shadow, and Pyrrha could hear the grunting and struggling of Daisy and Wasila, the crack and shatter of bones—she fumbled for the stopper and uncorked the vial, then downed the contents at once; the fiery liquid prickled through her sinuses as it went down with a strong coppery taste spiced with sunlight.
The rush of energy was a heady experience; Pyrrha's lungs seemed to expand and draw in every last gasp of air to fuel the fire burning through her feverish body. She felt as though she could pick someone apart with the ease she would an insect.
Cold and clammy hands wrapped around Pyrrha's neck from behind; she reached for her wand and stopped herself just in time as the hands clenched, crushing like a vise; she threw her weight forward and heaved the attacker over her bent back. The hands slipped away as together they tumbled to the stone floor, and Pyrrha coughed for breath while the thing stirred ahead of her.
Two more shades lurched in from either side. From where she sat Pyrrha kicked in the knee of one with a satisfying crunch, sending the creature toppling over. She scrambled to her feet as the other swiped at her with stiff arms wielded like blunt instruments; the sluggish swings swept foul air after her as she retreated only to trip on the creature she'd immobilized, and chilled fingers clasped her arm as if to anchor her for the thing's encroaching cohorts.
Pyrrha rose to her knees and swung her unburdened arm clumsily, and the assailant's skull gave way like a rotted melon, splattering coagulated blood that pattered across the floor like putrid rain. She pried her arm from the thing's stiffened grip and regained her feet.
The air was ripe with death: the choking stench of rot, the hollow crunch of brittle bones, the hunching grey shapes that filled more space than the arcane mist. Scuffing shoes across the stone were all that escaped the wraiths while they sought out every snarl and huff of exertion from those who still breathed.
Panic seized Pyrrha; she couldn't see Daisy for the mist. A guttural growl from behind accompanied frenzied tearing, and Pyrrha strode forward, barreled into the monsters in her way and ended them each with a brutal stomp as she traversed the fog in search of shining gold.
"Daisy, tell me where you are!" Pyrrha called into the gloom.
"Here!" Daisy's voice sounded from somewhere ahead. "I'm—ah! I'm coming!"
The hushed melee played out behind curtains of mist all around as Pyrrha inexpertly fought her way onward. Every movement made felt astonishingly weightless, as if she'd newly emerged from a lifetime underwater. The grim husks scrabbling at her from the mist were no more effectual than their restful counterparts at slowing her progress. Hati darted this way and that around her, pouncing and tackling one silhouette after another and rending them apart in short order.
Another figure glided into Pyrrha's path and she swung her fist down to hammer its head; its arm shot up and caught her around the wrist with startling swiftness, arresting her strike.
"Careful there!" Wasila said. "I'm not quite dead yet. Good thing for you—did you never learn to punch someone properly?"
"Inferi." Pyrrha reclaimed her arm. "Who did they come from?" she asked, mostly of herself. Was Aradia desperate enough to murder in cold blood? A frigid feeling crept over Pyrrha's skin; the answer had already presented itself in the old witch's eyes.
Before Wasila could answer, a fuzzy patch of gold materialized from the gloom and brought half a dozen shadows shambling at her tail. Daisy panted, but the cadence meant she was breathless with exertion, not panic or pain. Her hand found Pyrrha's for a brief, crushing squeeze. By wordless consent they turned to face the shades, led into the fray by a howling flash of silver.
Hati leapt at the first inferi he could reach, bringing it down heavily with a revolting noise as his weight crushed the undead's corroded torso. Its fellows fell upon the wolf as one like insect drones driven by pheromones; Pyrrha closed the distance briskly and yanked at their moldering clothes, sending two sprawling back for their mindless skulls to meet the heel of her boot. The pack turned on her, but Daisy and Wasila fell upon them from behind, and together they fought amidst the blinding miasma. Curdled gore showered Pyrrha's robes and suffused the air with rancid decay. As the final inferi fell she restrained herself from a reflexive, cleansing wave of the hand; her heart pounded at the near miss.
Only their labored breathing disturbed the silent aftermath. They turned about, loosely back-to-back, fruitlessly surveying the impenetrable wash of colors they were immersed in. Hati prowled circles around them as a softly clicking silver ghost. The mist shifted in a way unlike any natural fog; it was like all light was broken apart into limitless pieces no larger than grains of sand, and it all sifted itself around as if in search for the pattern that would make it whole again.
There were no more lurching figures, no more scuffing shoes on stone. The doors flanking their huddle had closed of their own accord. Pyrrha's limbs still buzzed with energy and tension; in the fleeting interstitium between the creatures' arrival and her imbibing of the vial's contents, she'd been utterly powerless. Nullified. Nausea clutched at her insides with noxious claws as a worthless man's lost expression intruded in her head.
Beside Pyrrha, Daisy bent double and retched. Pyrrha gathered her hair back as she expelled the contents of her stomach over the mess of viscera at their feet.
"You'd think a potioneer would be inoculated to pungent smells," Wasila said with a hint of amusement.
"The smell is the least of it," Pyrrha snapped. She felt the need to strike back; she knew Wasila hated when doubt was cast onto the facade she presented. "I'd sooner think on why you aren't disturbed—that paints a more perplexing picture."
The good cheer was gone from Wasila's voice, leaving it eerily flat, without affect. "Better for all involved if you rein in that reckless curiosity of yours, wouldn't you say?" The barb was unmistakable; the scar burned.
"Stop—" Daisy broke off to cough hoarsely as she straightened up "—stop that, both of you. It's really not the time."
"Are you alright?" Pyrrha said, squinting into the gloom. Even mere feet apart, she couldn't make out a single detail of Daisy's face.
"I am now," Daisy said. "I'll be even better when we counteract this bloody mist. It's thicker here; we were headed in the right direction."
"Yes . . . toward the firelights," Pyrrha agreed. "Stay vigilant."
She took the lead once again in the pursuit of the hall's end. They carefully chose their way over the broken bodies that lay bathed in the static blur, their stench like a tangible membrane stretching thinner and thinner as they pushed on ahead.
The torchlights swelled beneath the haze like hinkypunks' lanterns until Pyrrha reached the hall's end, marked by the disappearance of the close walls back into obscurity. If Furnival's home adhered to typical cathedral architecture, they had just arrived at the apse; the notion was reinforced by the relative distances of the surrounding firelights which hinted at the chamber's semicircular nature. The hemispherical ceiling was solid stone; feeble sunlight crawled in from beyond the preceding hall's exquisite mosaics to die at the apse's dim threshold.
The air was thick with heat. At the room's center was another statuesque outline leaning over twin fires that burned at the heart of the fog. Their corresponding cauldrons hung suspended from something Pyrrha couldn't make out, regurgitating grainy mist in great, stuttering gouts. Crackling flames worried at the quiet.
When they drew up to the burbling cauldrons, the catch became apparent; the vessels were hung at each end of a perfectly balanced brass scale sized to accommodate their considerable weight. Hati sniffed at the scale's circular base warily.
"Well, that's damned clever," Daisy said with a frustrated huff. "It's going to take both of us in perfect synch; I'll bet even the most subtle weight disparity sends them crashing down. The discipline to proportion them so exactly . . . it's impressive."
Wasila rounded the cauldrons with lazy steps that fell without sound. "I don't imagine we could simply let them spill from a safe distance?"
"Not if you want to keep your skin," Daisy said, a brief shudder passing over her. Curious, Pyrrha reached out and caught a flash of memory; a man writhing on a gurney and howling in agony, his flesh resembling bubbling red wax. "That stuff hits the fires, we're finished. I—we can stop it, we only need . . ."
Daisy's vague outline shifted as she rummaged through something on her person. Mutterings passed just under hearing while she drew out clinking jars and vials and clattering wooden cases; the commingled sharp scents of herbs and extracts drifted about. A steady stream of instructions followed, relayed in a calm and assured voice as Daisy pressed ingredients into Pyrrha's hands, the litany peppered with emphatic encouragements that betrayed her nerves.
"It's got to be exact, Pyrrha," Daisy said. "It's got to be perfect. We can do this."
"Can you?" Wasila said from a distance. "The degree of accuracy you're aiming for is inhuman, really . . . there must be some way to tilt things in our favor."
"We can't use magic," Daisy said. She paced restlessly before the righthand cauldron, and Pyrrha could hear her patting at her pockets, triple-checking the components gathered at the ready.
Grave quiet enveloped them as they considered their limited options. Wasila had retreated nearly beyond perception, a fuzzy patch of color leaning beside one of the many doors lining the preceding hall. Daisy kept pacing, kept muttering, and her blurred hands were never still, shifting round each other and parting to gesticulate, to articulate alchemical considerations that escaped Pyrrha's comprehension.
Pyrrha's mind labored at the problem before them. She felt thoroughly disarmed; without magic she was alone with her mind, powerless to bend the world to her will. They were at the mercy of their own wits and materials, their collective potioneering prowess.
The theories, the principles of potion brewing remained with her, retained as with all worthwhile knowledge, but she'd never possessed the intuitive spark of understanding that came naturally to Daisy. Pyrrha lacked the same instinctual notions of action and reaction. It wouldn't get them anywhere for her to venture for solutions; in all likelihood Daisy was far ahead of her already, and further than she could hope to go. Magic was where she drew her strength.
A swoop of vertigo accompanied the flash of inspiration that sparked in Pyrrha; she'd already used magic without thinking, and it hadn't registered with the mist. It seemed wandless Legilimency had negligible impact on the physical plane.
"Lucky for us," Ashlin murmured. "Wasila had a point about that curiosity, you know."
"I believe I have a solution," Pyrrha said. Daisy stopped and spun around expectantly. "Do you remember N.E.W.T. Potions, Daisy?"
Daisy was silent for a moment before letting out a delighted laugh. "That's—yes, that's brilliant! There's no tangible change that way—nothing for the blasted fog to react to. Oh, thank God for your brain."
"It's yours that'll extricate us. A moment, and you can lead us through the steps."
"Right, right, just let me . . ."
Pyrrha nodded, then remembered the fog. "Of course." After a few moments, she added, "Though it isn't necessary. Even were our attentions not singularly focused, I wouldn't pry."
"I know that," Daisy said with a hint of admonition. "And you know the unprepared might let something slip regardless."
Amusement colored Pyrrha's tone. "Are you hiding something from me, Daisy?" she asked rhetorically.
Daisy chuckled. "You're damned right, and you've got precisely zero room for objection."
"I'm all for levity in the face of death," Wasila called, "but not when it's my own, as it turns out. Have you any ideas?"
"We'll need your help," Daisy called back.
Daisy directed them to arrange a small variety of brewing components at the base of the scale, precisely between the cauldrons; they were fumblingly composed into the order they would be required. Authoritatively bidden, Wasila knelt there beside their careful arrangement in readiness to pass along herbal compounds and extracts and raw ingredients expertly prepared. The unmitigated heat of the fires swept past them in a continuous and sluggish wave, drawing forth beads of sweat it could only claim partial credit for.
Pyrrha and Daisy took a cauldron each, and at Daisy's cue Pyrrha reached out and caught tenuous hold of Daisy's conscious thoughts. The process began at someone's bracing breath. Pyrrha immersed herself in Daisy's patterns of thought and allowed the eavesdropped mental directives to guide her hands; in flawless unison they combined blisterbee honey with ground eola root and dripped the mixtures in three careful drops at a time. As one they passed their spent droppers to Wasila, who exchanged them for a particolored array of vials that bubbled or steamed or puffed sweet smoke when uncorked.
The churning substance in Pyrrha's cauldron darkened from orange to ochre as they labored. She suppressed the urge to glance away, to ensure she'd matched Daisy's progress; instead she followed another notion without quite knowing why, unstoppering a vial of tarry black liquid and pouring in only a third of it—she was nebulously certain any more would catalyze a troublesome reaction. Next went a splash of mooncalf tears and two full bottles of tempor sand tipped in with the left hand. A startling chill rolled from the cauldrons while they settled and passed from ochre to teal, and Daisy whispered something too softly to hear, but Pyrrha knew she'd said 'nearly there.'
The vibrant concoction began to fizz. The sight engendered sourceless alarm in Pyrrha; it was inexplicably imperative she introduce the ashes of a centennial phoenix, and she said as much to Wasila at the same instant Daisy did. Everything hung in the balance for a heart-stopping few seconds until they were provided for; they cast down the ashes in a perfect mirror movement, and the brew settled after a sharp, short hiss. Smoke ceased to billow as if it had been choked back. The surface of the potion paled into a grimy grey, patched with floating ashes like scraps of pond scum. An eye-watering smell akin to melting rubber stained the air.
At Daisy's burst of triumph Pyrrha gently withdrew herself, sinking into her own mixture of victorious relief and apprehension for what may come next. It didn't quite feel like she'd dodged death yet again, though she certainly had; the time spent with her mind mingled with Daisy's had left little room for anything that wasn't the next logical step. Pyrrha imagined it was a state of mind of a kind with what she felt, and didn't feel, in the thick of a deadly duel.
Hati paced between them excitably, panting against the sweltering heat, and Wasila sat back with a disgruntled noise as the wolf scattered her carefully arranged ingredients.
"That's done it," Daisy said with a disbelieving laugh. "We've neutralized them. That was—Pyrrha, that was . . ."
"It was," Pyrrha said. She allowed a bit of pride into her tone. "You saved our lives. Well done."
"Yeah, well—I mean, not quite yet, the fumes still need to dissipate, but . . . yeah," Daisy said faintly, "I guess I did."
"My eternal gratitude." Wasila managed to sound vaguely sarcastic as she rose to her feet. "How do we proceed? Shall we parade our unblemished bodies through the corridors until we spring the next trap?"
"We'll wait for the dissolution of the mist," Pyrrha said. "When we're free to work magic, we can find Aradia in an instant. She won't flee; she wants to see this through."
Wasila hummed thoughtfully, waving at the miasma that steadily thinned around them. "She can manipulate her lifesign—obscure it, project it elsewhere. I don't know how," she added, correctly anticipating Pyrrha's response. "Wish I did. Eminently useful ability, that."
The news was invaluable and unsurprising; Aradia had an affinity for souls, just as Pyrrha did for blood. Aside from Morrigan, she was perhaps the most dangerous individual Pyrrha could name.
"Can she do the same for Byron?" Pyrrha said.
"I don't know. When I asked, she made it out to be prohibitively difficult, and far more so regarding the soul of another."
"You believe her?"
Wasila chuckled softly. "I believe her assertion of the challenge it poses, yes. Do I believe the insinuation that she can't manage it? Most certainly not."
"Well, like Pyrrha said, she wants to be found, right?" Daisy said. "Wants it over with. No reason to hide, in that case."
"Of course there is," Wasila said. "Luring us into another ambush, in the main."
"I doubt she can put together anything worse than this," Daisy said, gesturing at the inert cauldrons. "I guarantee this setup took loads of time and effort, even discounting those . . . corpses. In fact, they'd just finished setting it off as we arrived, hadn't they?"
"Aradia's prowess rivals my own. Don't disregard any possibility where she's concerned," Pyrrha said. She bent down and began gathering up the materials left unused, and Daisy knelt beside her to help, dropping each case and bottle into the charmed pockets of her robes.
"Although," Pyrrha added as she handed Daisy the last quivering drawstring bag, "you could be correct. If I hadn't brought you, surpassing this wouldn't have been possible. My enlisting aid is the last thing she's expecting."
The fog hadn't quite dispersed, painting Daisy's expression into an abstract, blurry frown. "What would you have done? If I hadn't . . . ?"
"The explosion would've killed me," Pyrrha said matter-of-factly. She felt the outside tremor of distress as she stood and helped Daisy to her feet. Her answer was a brief, reassuring squeeze of the hand before letting go; gestures often served better than words in comforting her friend. "Don't dwell on what didn't happen."
"Wise words," Wasila drawled. She sauntered the length of the room and back, gracefully restless; she waved irritably at the waning mist. "This bloody hazard just won't abate, will it? Kindledrake, you called it?" she added offhandedly.
"That's what it came from, yeah." Daisy petted Hati's pale head while the wolf considered her with a bemused look. "When I was in training to heal, we treated a man for burns from the same sort of botched brew; he was involved in dragon husbandry, I think. The potion's supposed to be a nutritional supplement of sorts—like baby formula for dragons, you know?"
"I do," Wasila said. "Remarkable that you remembered how to neutralize it—what did it take, exactly? I'm afraid I missed a few steps, and it's certainly worth knowing after all this."
The subsequent explanation passed several minutes of time while Pyrrha thought; she'd already learned what was needed from Daisy in the process of their concerted effort. Morrigan consumed her attention, latched onto her consciousness like a leech. Excitement and satisfaction filled her at the notion of what she may learn of her enemy from Twyford Furnival. The tale in the book had had as much truth to it as Wasila's lighthearted masquerade, but unlike Wasila, Morrigan's story was ready and waiting to be absorbed. Pyrrha had but to make her inquiries.
The mist had faded to a thin film, a gritty filter cast over the room. Pyrrha could make out details: twelve burning torches ringed the room, mounted high enough to flicker just below the intricate scrollwork across the walls, bas-relief spiral patterns that marked the boundary between the top of the walls and the bottom of the domed ceiling's curve. A formidable wrought iron chandelier crowned the room; unlit, it appeared as an esoteric instrument of torture.
The towering statue bearing over them was that of a robed and hooded woman, her expression tender, almost loving, as if she were leaning over the cradle of her own child. Blemishes marred her face, pitted scabs that appeared like the sculptor had suffered a bout of malice, sullied her features with lifelike precision after the fact. The witch clutched her wand at her waist with both hands in a manner not unlike Daisy's; from her hands' positions she might have been wringing it, or preparing to snap it in two.
"Might we move on yet?" Wasila said after discussion had lulled. "It seems to be clearing up nicely, at last."
"Give it another minute," Daisy said. "The air won't quite explode anymore, but it'll catch fire. We'll be safe when we can distinguish the fine hairs on our fingers." She approached Pyrrha's side and joined her in considering the statue before them. "D'you recognize her?"
"The Blighted Bride," Pyrrha said. The tale weighed on her heart to remember. "She was a prolific witch known foremost as a healer, but she was also a builder, arbiter, protector—whatever needs beleaguered the downtrodden, it was she who fulfilled them. Her magnanimity didn't prevent her from making enemies, however. Perhaps it was even the reason why."
"The reason why . . . ?" Daisy repeated. She gave a quiet noise of realization when Pyrrha waved a hand at the witch's pocked visage. "Someone cursed her?"
Pyrrha nodded grimly. "On her wedding day. She became a walking plague in the midst of everyone she held dear and countless guests beholden to her. She was the sole survivor, or so the tale goes. It's that day alone she's remembered for in wizarding Ireland's histories; her great works are dust."
"That's horrible," Daisy said, looking faintly ill. Her hands wrung. "What—?"
"Anyone who meant her a life of misery," Wasila said from behind them, "could've simply let the ceremony proceed. Sounds to me as if they were all targeted. Any knowledge of the caster?"
Pyrrha turned with Daisy to see Wasila watching them with an air of interest. The chamber's atmosphere had cleared at last; past Wasila, the grand hall's stone foundations shimmered with a pale play of broken patches of light in every shade, emulating the movements of the charmed mosaics above. A set of arched double doors worthy of Hogwarts secured the far end of the voluminous building, so distant it could be fully obscured by an outstretched fingertip.
At Wasila's prompting eyebrow, Pyrrha said, "The fog is gone; so should we be. Aradia isn't sitting idle."
Two spots of light twinkled at Pyrrha's spell, and she led them from the apse without another word, heart thumping; the absence of a third life didn't bode well for Furnival. She knew Aradia had merely hidden him away, but doubt niggled at her at the thought of those stony, red-flecked eyes. Pyrrha brushed the notion away with a contingency; if Furnival had died, she would instead carve what she needed from Aradia's mind like an adze.
Corpses littered the corridor's floor like discarded dolls, shattered and splayed and riven of worldly dignity. Pyrrha paced thoughtfully among them and charmed their stench from the air as she examined them, the aftermath of Aradia's craft. What remained of the rotted figures indicated a few commonalities. Their robes meant they were wizards and witches all, and by their shabby quality, none of the victims had been particularly prosperous. A limited range of ages hid beneath their veneer of decay, difficult to postulate with any accuracy, but none had advanced beyond forty years.
"What are you looking for?" Daisy asked, following Pyrrha's roaming gaze, her lips drawn thin. "You don't think Furnival . . . ?"
"No."
Pyrrha knelt beside the body of a man with a cracked skull, his bloodless face locked in a taut grimace. Wiry stubble did nothing to hide deathly hollow cheeks. Dark magics clung to the corpse, spells that had safeguarded the empty flesh from the erosion of time. Hati sniffed at the cadaver, bright eyes narrowed.
Daisy crouched and gingerly lifted the man's sleeve; the bones of his arm and wrist protruded under pale, papery skin.
"He's malnourished," Daisy said quietly.
"He's dead," Wasila said, nonplussed.
"He was malnourished," Daisy amended. She peered around at the ruined bodies. "I think . . . I think they all were."
A flash of thought captured Pyrrha, and the indications fell neatly into place. She reached out and pressed her fingers to the man's cold, stiff lips, and pulled them apart to expose sickly grey gums and gritted yellow teeth. The canines were unnaturally long and sharp—the piercing fangs of a predator.
"Vampires?" Wasila surveyed the massacre with renewed interest. "Curious. Whatever does she have against the wretched things?"
Pyrrha stood and drew her wand again. "One way to know."
Guided by magics, they left the carnage behind and chose the proper door from the hall into a labyrinth of finely furnished rooms in a range of sizes and purposes, all sharing the smooth, sharp curvature and carved stonework Furnival was clearly enamored of. Through a sitting room and past a smoking lounge they traversed with caution, caution rewarded several times over as they dispersed the cursework laid in their way with patient counteraction.
The impediments left behind made a sure trail, even were Aradia to obscure her existential mark. They crept between eclectic treasures floating over granite pedestals in what appeared to be some sort of gallery, lit low by cold blue fires. The items on display were deceptively mundane—a knotted old wand here, a spade or a lorgnette there—but a passing look at the plaques set beneath them revealed their commonality; each object seemed to have once belonged to some prominent figure of distant history.
Wall-to-wall paintings greeted them in the next chamber, quite literally; their occupants launched into an uproar that drowned out all sense before the door had even closed behind Pyrrha.
"—strangers wandering about unattended—"
"—stained my canvas with his grubby hand, look—"
"—not invited—"
"—done to poor Dextra, she's not—"
Pyrrha swept her wand in a snatching motion; pale wisps flickered from the portraits' mouths to evaporate like breath in winter, and the room fell silent.
It appeared they had entered one sweeping wing of another, more elaborate gallery. In accordance with the previous, the room was scarcely lit, details drowned in halfhearted darkness. This time the glow shone from the paintings' white-gold frames to permeate the space with dreary, clinical light that was absorbed by rich purple carpeting, dark wood walls and the black expanse of the ceiling that soared out of sight. Rope barriers of velvet and brass encircled the immediate viewing spaces (each furnished with chairs of inviting quality), leaving one nonetheless expansive walkway down the middle of the chamber, terminating in an intersection.
The paintings' occupants glared daggers at Pyrrha as she led the way ahead, footsteps muffled; the mute hostility lent the silence an oppressive weight. She felt Daisy shiver just behind her. The beginnings of a deep growl rumbled in Hati's chest, and he returned the glares in kind as they passed.
"An unsettling reversal of roles," Wasila murmured, sounding more amused than disturbed.
Aradia's imprint led them down the intersection's lefthand hallway, a candlelit passage decked with aromatic potted plants and spun glass chandeliers that shifted languidly into a pattern of configurations; pristine pyramids dripped upward into fractured hourglass shapes, then unfolded into sunbursts backlit by flitting fairies that darted around the ceiling, peeking around behind their floating glass playgrounds as Pyrrha passed beneath them. From the corner of her eye, she saw Daisy give the shy waifs a parting wave.
The hall emptied them into another wing of the gallery. It was a grand space, clearly a position of honor for the finest portraits Furnival could claim. The chamber was circular with a domed ceiling carved of pale stone. A glass enclosure dominated the center; affixed to a low platform by a band of gold, it was wide and tall as the trunk of a centennial tree and infinitely less uniform, spiraling and twisting upon itself as it rose, giving the appearance of interlaced crystal that shifted and wove into an array of changing patterns, just as the earlier chandeliers had.
Inside the turning glass was a garden of sorts, though the mottled brown bushes twitching within hardly harmonized with the chamber's grandiose aesthetic. Illumination came from the hundreds of starflies that flittered throughout the enclosure among the shrubs that were their sustenance. The insects emitted lovely white light that subtly swished with the swarm's maneuvers, suffusing the chamber from the dome to the gleaming black marble floor.
"A bachelor's notion of opulence," Wasila said, eyeing the spectacle with a hint of condescension. "Like a child designing their own racing broom."
"Every room in this place looks completely different," Daisy agreed, rather wide-eyed. "He's got a talent for transfiguration, though."
"By your standards, perhaps."
Pyrrha crossed to the center of the room and examined the portraits hung around the outskirts, next to elegant settees flanked by silver smoking stands and liquor cabinets; Furnival was obviously a man who delighted in the company afforded by his portraits.
There were four of them, spaced around in an equidistant four-point orientation, and they watched Pyrrha as mutely as had the others, though she hadn't yet silenced them. Evelyn Dextra was among them; a prominent serial murderer of the previous century, she was renowned for intercepting and slaughtering dozens upon dozens of Azkaban's worst en route to and from the island bastille. The witch stared at Pyrrha with an oddly blank expression, though utterly affixed, as if she were Imperiused. A glance around confirmed the same enthralled state of the other three.
"Yes—something's wrong, how novel." Wasila gestured with her wand, and her eyes flew wide: "Watch it!"
Pyrrha had already felt the preemptive tingle of an incoming spell; with a fluid motion she drew up the marble floor around her into a wavering shell that rippled with the screaming impact of two curses; flashes of keening light burst from behind where Wasila and Daisy engaged their own opponents. The portraits' occupants had stepped from their frames into the third dimension easily as a doorway.
The attentions of two were fixed on Pyrrha; she let the risen floor sink flat as jagged arcs of crimson crawled across it like seeping lightning; with a whirl she twisted space, and a curse curved by as the burning arcs were guided toward Dextra. Reality reverted with a dizzying snap while Pyrrha sent curses ripping through the air toward the more distant wizard; a dazzling spark of red drew her attention as the arcs were broken with a screech; the air grew thick, and transfigured predators lunged.
Pyrrha's flick and gesture freed the air and birthed a radiant violet nova overhead; lions and leopards were torn from the floor along with the wizard, a second too slow to counter, and Dextra reclaimed full attention with a whipcrack of pale negative space. The lash hummed hollowly as Pyrrha turned it aside; it swept through the flesh amalgam that had landed, scoring them with pristine furrows, then slashed back; Pyrrha snared it with a charm like sentient color streaming down the whip's length until Dextra shattered the spell, snatching back her wand arm.
A bolt of lightning followed up before the witch could react, and instead of flashing through, Pyrrha maintained the current; Dextra jerked and thrashed, rooted to the spot while the burning air crackled; a swipe hurled the witch headfirst into the stone wall with a lifelike crunch of ruined vertebrae.
Whirling around, Pyrrha rounded the chamber's centerpiece with quick strides and beheld the other side; Wasila waved her wand across one empty portrait with desperate speed, fruitlessly, the occupant nowhere to be seen; Daisy parried and countered curses from a burly wizard with a thick black beard. Hati lay prone nearby, unmoving.
With a swift wave Pyrrha shattered the shifting glass enclosure and sent the flurry of shards surging; they curved neatly around a startled Daisy and disintegrated to glittering grit at the wizard's motion; instantly the debris reformed into knives the wizard vanished with a wild swipe, and he toppled backward when Daisy's curse caught him in the face.
Through an agitated cloud of starflies Pyrrha saw Wasila engaged in combat again, the opponent seeming to have emerged from nowhere; she spared Pyrrha half a harried glance as she neatly redirected split tongues of flame. "The paintings!" she cried.
The occupants were reforming from within their paintings—clarity came not a moment too soon. Pyrrha spun back around; the enclosure's shrubs had grown into long lashing vines barbed with wicked thorns. Dextra and the wizard advanced with flitting wands and blank faces.
Dappled white light danced wildly with the swarm as Pyrrha parried spells and slashing plants, twined the thorny vines into one and swung the tendril low; it came apart against the intercepted curses, sparing the second Pyrrha needed to uplift the soil and surround the two in a storm of dirt that dispersed the next moment with a rush of wind. The pair launched into a counterattack, and their spells passed through Pyrrha's mirror shadow.
She struck from the side, still moving; a brilliant green curse took the wizard on his shoulder, and he burst into dust and sparks; Dextra narrowly defended with a summoned settee, the flare of emerald obscuring violet fire streaking beneath like a serpent to coil around her legs. Dextra swiped desperately at the flames as Pyrrha curved them about the witch's torso with an ascending twirl of the wand; the witch met Pyrrha's eyes and shrieked until the curse curled around her head and went up in fleeting smoke, leaving only ashes.
A roaring blaze sprung up somewhere, a brilliant rushing plume of light that emitted a fierce wave of heat as Pyrrha met Dextra's painting. The room's swirling wash of luminous white had dimmed to a few faint, fluttering patches; the starflies had been incinerated, sinking the chamber into twilight.
A hand brushed across the rough canvas told Pyrrha enough in the peculiar tingle up her fingers. She made a complicated gesture; a colorless shine pressed in from the picture's surface to pass through the painted scene like a grand spotlight; a half-formed Dextra cringed away and ducked out of frame.
Pyrrha turned sharply and at range made the same of the wizard's portrait. From the other side of the chamber's ruined enclosure, a wizard was bellowing in anger or pain; Pyrrha quickly crossed to the middle of the room and mounted the low, empty central platform; she evaluated the scene through alternating dusk and brief burning light.
Daisy weaved and ducked around darting spells with prompt responses assayed, but the duel's momentum was steadily shifting against her; Wasila fared better, but her face was singed, strained with exertion, and the manifest portraits seemed never to tire.
Pyrrha pressed her wand to her throat, and her voice echoed off the walls, over the mayhem: "Find cover."
She didn't wait to ensure they heeded her; a precise flourish sent perfect shade blooming from her wand until nothing was anywhere, and everywhere was endless. All she could hear was the rush of blood in her head, the blood flowing from her to the tip of her wand; stark red light imposed itself over the pitch black canvas to paint the scene crimson, the sanguine spell shining for her eyes alone.
Daisy huddled over Hati's unconscious form, her raised wand emitting a barrier; she looked around blindly, frightfully. Wasila had vanished, and the rubious silhouettes of the portraits ventured indirectly toward Daisy, their attempts at charmed light swallowed by the dark; not even lifesigns could flourish within the spell's suffocating grip.
Pyrrha stalked toward the wizards with footsteps utterly soundless and took aim; the Killing Curse flew twice without light, one passing through an upheld barrier, and the wizards crumbled to crimson-tinted dust without so much as a whisper in the void.
As if reality itself had startled awake, the room tore back into existence when Pyrrha released her spells; the assault on the senses was briefly disorienting, faintly sickening. The vital red light from her wand winked out and relief blossomed from the tightness in her chest, echoed readily by an all-encompassing ache that sunk to the bones like a deathly illness. A sluggish upward gesture sent a more natural light soaring up to bob around the domed ceiling, relieving the room of its gloom.
As Pyrrha passed, Daisy dropped her charm and stared after her in something like shock. The expression gave Pyrrha a twinge of unease as she thought what Daisy might make of the display. She contented herself that it had been the safest, most expedient route. At their rate of progress, there would be little to no time to consult Furnival with any thoroughness. The plan had amended; the historian would have to undertake an unplanned trip.
The decision was reached as Pyrrha unmade the curses on the two remaining portraits while Wasila peered curiously over her shoulder.
They made their way back to Daisy across the devastated chamber; the walls reverberated with their footsteps against the marble, a hollow echo after the former chaos. Beside Daisy, Hati's chest rose and fell, and something in Pyrrha lightened with relief.
"I did all I could, Pyrrha, I tried, but that . . . thing, it wouldn't let up." From where she knelt Daisy stroked the wolf's silver mane, expression laden with guilt. "He took a nasty hit from a banished liquor cabinet, and then a curse while he was down—bloody animal." She glowered at the aforementioned wizard's empty painting. "The curse didn't seem to do much; I've checked him over, and apart from the battering, he's alright."
"His being is deeply attuned to magic," Pyrrha said. "I'd imagine he's near enough to a stunted giant in terms of resilience to direct spellwork." The invasive arts she'd once utilized notwithstanding.
"Explains why I can't revive him. His breathing's quickening, at any rate; he'll come to soon." Daisy stood and turned to face Pyrrha fully, her eyes shining with an indecipherable mix of fervent emotions. "I can't believe we made it through all this, and it isn't even over . . . are you okay? You're pale," she added.
"I'm fine, and you're right; this is far from finished," Pyrrha concurred. She informed them of their elapsing time, and advised of their adjusted objective; Wasila shrugged in assent, while Daisy appeared uneasy at the thought of removing Furnival from his home.
"We'll be doing him a favor, it's a bit of an eyesore at the moment," Wasila said, looking around at the smoky, debris-littered warzone made of the gallery. "Not that our accommodations have fared much better of late," she added, a little less lively. "I do wonder how the old bird'll react."
Apprehension and helpless frustration stirred in Pyrrha, mixed with a tinge of guilt. Maven and Irving weighed on her, though consigned to the background of her concerns, but their untimely ends were certain to disturb Aradia, who had long tended her Cabal like a domineering matriarch.
With a deep intake of breath, Hati roused himself at their feet; he sat up and gave a vigorous shake of his head, then stared around at them with silvery eyes narrowed. Daisy uttered a pleased chuckle and patted the wolf's muzzle gingerly.
"Don't worry," Daisy said. "You fought like hell, and that's all we'll ever say about it."
Hati's chest rumbled, almost surly.
"Time," Ashlin whispered, with a chastising flare of heat. "Wasting time."
Pyrrha could almost feel Morrigan's distant approach as a bleak looming feeling in her heart, a feeling she wasn't certain was entirely imagined. The chamber seemed impossibly wide as she turned and traversed the scattered wreckage toward the arched oak door behind which awaited Byron and Aradia.
"Keep alert," Pyrrha called over her shoulder to the sets of footsteps behind her. "This is where our task takes a turn for the difficult."