sankofa (phr) "go back and fetch it"; the idea that reclaiming history is vital to taking ownership of the present.

Morning arrived late, as it frequently did in winter, lingering on the black slick of the window on the house opposite Zoran's window. Even the rain had crept aside, the better to allow the sun to lay its hands on every part of the street: the cobbles and the doorsteps and the tiny green shoots creeping along the edges of the roadway. The air was still and frozen, without even the wind necessary to stir the sunflowers in their soil-box by the northern gable. Zoran found himself staring at the little flowers Ina had painted on the western gable: little yellow camellias with big round pink petals. Here and there, unfinished wooden projects lay abandoned on the concrete of the roof; unread books littered the tiles.

Behind him, Ghjuvan said, "that's us gone."

Zoran turned. The blue material of the canvas chair in which he had spent the night protested the movement, creaking and squeaking as Zoran fixed Ghjuvan in his gaze and said, "so soon? You don't have to –"

"We do," Ghjuvan said, in a tone that brokered no argument. The warmth of the new day's light had richened his dark skin to jet, red and amber rippling along his cheekbones and jaw. Had he gotten taller, broader, stronger, overnight? Maybe Zoran had become smaller in their time here, shrunk down into a diminished facade of himself – he didn't remember Ghjuvan seeming quite so imposing when they were back in the academy. "Thanks for your hospitality, Zoran."

So formal? "Anytime." Zoran stood, slowly; it felt like his bones were creaking within him. He had spent the whole night awake, staring over the lip of his roof, thinking about strings and curses and dead men. He should have stayed with Ina – he had wanted to stay with Ina – why hadn't he stayed with Ina? It had all been such an abstract blur, of Azula sobbing and Nez staring and Khalore swearing and – Zoran didn't even remember how they'd ended up back at his place, not really. He should have told Ina to stay here, with him. Why hadn't he asked? "Where's Kinga?"

"Putting on her boots."

"Alright. I should say goodbye to her too–" Zoran rounded the canvas chair and wandered slowly towards the fire exit, while Ghjuvan watched him go. The stairs within were narrow stone; he had to stoop his head to descend back towards his living room, which was bare-walled and bare-floored. He hadn't bothered to decorate, to accumulate the detritus of life which would amount to clutter. He had only sorted out a bed after Ina's nagging to do so – and in truth, would rather have foregone the comfortable nights it allowed in favour of the nights he had spent with her, lying in spare blankets and old clothes, watching the stars through a hole in the roof. He'd fixed that too; it left a little brown constellation on the ceiling, bits of stone replaced with a wooden lattice to keep out the worst of the cold and the rain.

There had been some furniture here when he'd moved in – a wardrobe, a dressing table, a bookshelf. He'd disassembled much of it for use in the workshop, or for sale to the tagma who had come by canvasing for materials to rebuild Mønt, and covered up any of the reflective surfaces that remained. He hadn't thrown them out, though. He hadn't been able to. There was something trapped within each of them, something subtly different, something subtly valuable, and to throw out the mirror in which each thing was caught would have felt, truly, like he was throwing out the thing itself.

And, well, when thoughts like that crossed his mind, even he started to think that he sounded crazy.

What had Kinga said – tell Matthias Kloet to get out of your head before he confuses you any further?

If only it was that easy. If only he knew how.

Speak of the devil – Kinga had ripped down one of the blankets covering the wardrobe, the better to use the mirror to latch on her harness. The black lines criss-crossing her body looked like some kind of bizarre spiderweb; the sword, glinting at her hip, made Zoran think of their argument earlier and the way the vein under her jaw had pulsed when she spoke about Matthias. But there wasn't any malice in the lines of her body now. Maybe, Zoran thought, she had just needed a good night's sleep.

Or not. Her eyes met his in the mirror – russet brown, streaked with green and gold. She said, "sorry to take up your time."

"It was no bother." He paused. "Maybe you should stay. Just for… breakfast, or –"

She turned towards him. Oh. That wasn't Kinga in the mirror at all. Now that he could see its full length, he could see that the girl in the mirror was thinner, and blonder, with wild hair and smaller eyes, and a gaping wound where her heart should have been. Kinga spoke, and the reflection spoke with her. "We have work to do."

We. What a silent exclusion that was, for Zoran knew she didn't include him in that little word. He doubted very much that she included Ina either – maybe she had shrunk down her conception of we, of Warriors, of warmakers, into just two. Or maybe she had spoken without thinking. Zoran didn't see the point of holding it against her when she still looked this tired. "Yeah," he said, "I figured as much."

Kinga said, "thanks for the bed," and the girl in the mirror mimicked her movements as she stepped aside, racking the hook on her belt, tightening the straps around her leg. She hadn't used the bed. She'd slept on the floor in the workshop. "It wasn't the worst night we've had," she said. "Was it?"

"No," he replied, "we've had much worse."

She laughed. It was a sweeter sound than he'd expected; she so rarely laughed. "Okay, okay – be less enthusiastic, why don't you?" She tucked a strand of blonde hair over one ear and scuffed a heel across the floor, sending little clouds of dust buffeting this way and that, and scanned their surroundings, looking for any signs left behind that they had ever been here.

Arek said, "we're alive. That's the most enthusiasm I can give you."

"Did we cross the border? Did you notice?" Dagmara was brushing off her hands. She had bruises on every finger, narrow bands of black and blue, like some kind of ghoulish set of rings – one on each knuckle. She had a shotgun slung over her shoulder; she was dressed like a Nawian shepherd, with a fur-lined hood and leather boots. "Kreiner should be here by now, he should have met us..." She shook her head, and sighed deeply, tiredly. "You know, it's really unnerving when you do that?"

"Sorry?"

"Zoning out like that." Kinga was walking away from the mirror, towards the stairs. "I'll leave you to it. With any luck, you'll finally see something useful." That should have galled, but it had a note of mirth to it that suggested Zoran wasn't expected to take offence to it. Zoran opened his mouth to say something, but no words escaped; Kinga was already gone, taking the stairs two at a time, to where the sunlight spilled over the threshold of the otherwise gloomy apartment.

Somewhere beyond that, Ghjuvan was calling a goodbye – Kinga echoed it, more softly – and there was a hissing that marked their departure, as it always did, like a pneumatic releasing air, long and low and whistling. A hiss that went on, long after they were gone - on, and on.

It didn't stop. The hissing just went on and on and on, low and insistent. Avrova kicked the wheel, hard, and rolled her eyes, and said, in that low and beautiful voice of hers, "I feel like we should have expected that."

"Slashing tyres," Matthias said, "it's just… unimaginative. I think that's what disappoints me the most. The lack of creativity."

Arsen was reaching through the broken window to rip their supplies off the backseat. There was blood leaking through the bandages over his arms. He had a hard, cruel face, with a mouth inclined to sneering and eyes inclined to squinting which seemed more of a boon in a terrain such as this, where the wind howled and tore at their clothes. He had the same freckles as his cousin, like a constellation of brown marks across his brown skin.

The cousin in question, Voski, her arms crossed, leaned against the hood of the car; unlike her compatriots, she was dressed in a shirt and plain cotton trousers, looking as though she'd been interrupted on her way to the market rather than on a mission deep within the Himalayan mountains. Her hair was twisted into matching Dutch braids, hanging almost to her waist; her freckled skin seemed to glow slightly in the grey mist which snaked about them. She said, "any ideas, O vaunted Hierophant?"

"Matthias," Avrova said, "what are we going to do?"

Matthias squinted at the horizon. They were on the side of an enormous mountain, all grey peaks and snow-capped points, all icy canyons and silvery fog creeping from the gorges and ravines which pitted the land. He said, thoughtfully, "this is the battle of Muztagh, in case you were wondering."

Zoran blinked. "Sorry?"

"Why this was important." Matthias glanced at him. He looked gaunter than Zoran remembered seeing him in life – all sharp cheekbones and big dark eyes, his hair cropped short to his skull. "It's not. At all. Important, that is. One battle out of a thousands."

"Then why," Zoran said tiredly, "are you showing me?"

"Oh," Matthias said, "you're really not good at this, are you?"

Behind him, Voski said, "he's doing it again," and Avrova said, "no, no, he might just be thinking of an idea," and, in front of Matthias, someone that Zoran could not see with a voice that Zoran could not recognise, "did he just say this wasn't important?"

"No," Arek said, "I didn't say anything. Dagmara's just finally losing it."

Dagmara stuck out her tongue. Her blonde hair contrasted sharply with the olive brown tone of her skin, and more particularly, with the dark brown colour of her thick eyebrows. Bleached, then, or maybe a wig. She was a handsome woman, with a strong cleft chin and a jawline that could have cut glass; when she straightened to her full height, she was more than a head taller than Arek. "I almost wouldn't mind. Would probably be less stressful."

"Stressed?" Kreiner rolled his eyes. He was a man made in the favoured mould of powerful Warriors – tall and broad-shouldered and flint-faced, like he had been carved from stone. He had dark red hair, curly and unruly, clinging closely to the shape of his skull and threaded with dark grey even at his relatively young age; he had a wild beard in a similar shade, threaded with little bits of leaves and grass as though he had spent the night sleeping in a bush – and, yes, that idea had the air of truth to it even as it crossed Zoran's mind. It sounded like something Kreiner might do. He had a particularly pointed smile, like it had been cut into him. "Dagmara, don't you talk to me about stress."

Dagmara smirked. "Says the guy who was four hours late. Good lie-in? Good lay?"

"Three and a half," Kreiner corrected her, with a tone that suggested he believed this to be an important distinction. He was dressed similarly – though neither he nor Dagmara looked much like Nawia natives, they were both garbed like locals, including a brightly-coloured checked scarf wrapped around their throats. Unlike his comrade, Kreiner carried a machete on his shoulder, rather than a firearm; like his comrade, he had the air of a man prepared and trained to use it brutally. No one would ever have mistaken him for the xrafstar that he was; even fewer would think of guessing his actual title of Lover. "To a rendez-vous that was thirty miles off-target. All things considered, I think I did okay."

"Oh, I'm sorry. Did you hear that, Wyrocznia?" Dagmara's voice brimmed with laughter. "Three and a half. Okay. My apologies. I take it all back. Three and a half hours late."

"Still too late," Arek said, his voice soft. "Too late. About sixteen generations too late. Wind it back a little."

"I said a little," Dimitar said, irritably, "just a little, are you deaf as well as blind?"

The oracle flinched back, the paintbrush that was clutched in her hands trailing black ink across the parchment unfurled on the ground before her. She was a young girl, slight, with short-cropped hair; she should never have been set to serving the Warriors that evening, if the slight quiver in her hands were any indication of the nervousness within. She was dressed in the usual garb of the beggar – a plain cotton dress, striped with colours that suggested it had been sewn together from a variety of discarded garments, with a warmer shawl arranged around her waist and shoulders.

"Ignore him," Allegra said, her voice sweet, reassuring, "He's just shaking off the tremors." She glanced at her companion, and set a hand on his arm, shaking him gently. "See? He's just… a bit of a bastard."

Dimitar did not smile. The little girl did so, rather shyly, rather looking like she wasn't sure if she was allowed to laugh and didn't particularly want to take that risk. Her eyes stared straight forward, whited over by something that might have been cataracts, or maybe a childhood injury. She was one of a dozen would-be fortunetellers gathered along this New Russian alley, professing to tell the future for a small price – romantic prospects, or financial forecasts, or perhaps the promise of misfortunes lurking in wait.

Now Allegra crouched in front of her and, still speaking the local dialect, said, sweetly, "how much do we owe you for this much?" She began to count bronze coins into the girl's open hand, more than twice what she had asked, while Dimitar picked up the page upon which she had scrawled and glanced down at the prophecies enscribed within.

Allegra waited until they'd moved a little further down the street before she spoke. "You are the oddest duck," she said, "aren't you, Mitko?"

Dimitar raised his eyebrow. "What?"

"You're literally the Hierophant," Allegra said. "And you still ask street oracles for advice before you make an important decision?"

Dimitar frowned. "I don't see what's so odd about that."

"Well," Allegra said, "did she predict you good fortunes?"

"Not as good as I would have liked," Dimitar said, "but that's what happens when you consort with a Lover. You're clearly bad luck, Egga."

"Consort." Allegra rolled her eyes. The sky was darkening, skittering with dark clouds; cold was stirring in the streets. The oracles were beginning to pack up their stalls, and it was time to seek out dinner. "God, you make it sound so… sleazy."

"I'm sorry," Dimitar said, "that wasn't my intention. Only slightly sleazy." He glanced at his watch, and shook his head. "You're going to die," he said, "you're going to die, in pain, and slowly, and screaming. And it will be my fault, all my fault. Because that's what happens when you consort with a Lover. To insist on loving Ina is to deny what she has become, what she must be. And it has always been thus. From the beginning."

He shook his head again.

"Why are you creeping back like this, inch by inch? You've been there before."

Zoran had been here before. The sky above was grass-green, pale and crystalline; the grass underfoot was yellowed and browned, scalded away in black gashes of ruined earth, although when Zoran looked down at his own feet he found that there was mud rising up around his ankles, the colour of maroon and madder. Everything was so utterly still; the air was frozen around him in a perfect preservation of ruin.

As Zoran recognised it, there was an unpleasant tipping sensation, the world lurching around him, like the earth itself might buck him from its surface in rejection of his presence. The very soil under his feet was abruptly alive, and writhing.

The last time he had been here, it had been a desolate land. There had only been him, and Matthias, incongruously dressed in a brightly coloured shirt, standing on the edge of this cliff. Now, Matthias was gone, but in his place the world had been populated by those who rightly belonged to it. This was not the fall of Siarka, Zoran realised, and when he took another step he found that his foot sank into the ground, into and then through, like the world had lost whatever concrete quality it might have once possessed, like reality itself was unravelling beneath and around and above him. This was not the fall of Siarka. It was the moments immediately preceding it.

The sky was scarred deeply, withering back at the horizon like the curling edge of a burning page. And there, at the horizon, there were people – xrafstars, sorcerers in open battle as they never were in the modern age, users of dark magic unfettered by concern for the land around them. Desperation fuelled their every motion. As he watched, another gash was scored, deep into the sky, and fire poured forth from it, a strange white-blue fire that roiled and roared and took an animalistic shape as it spun across the land.

Zoran had only to think about drawing a little closer, trying to get a better look, and then he was there, just a few feet away, close enough to stretch out a hand and touch them.

And when he was, he rather wished that he wasn't, for the man standing on the cliff – the man who had replaced Matthias Kloet – was none other than Eero Hämäläinen. He was clad in armour that belonged to a long-lost era, golden armour, and the sword that lay on the ground beside him was not the straight-edge blade favoured by the Illéan tagma but an old-fashioned broadsword with a wide quillons embroidered with the intricate coat-of-arms of the Schreave family.

God, Zoran should have been able to hate him – hate him in a way he had been unable to hate Pekka, who had been kind to him, kind and brave and good. But Eero was all that and then some. Pekka had always considered him his better. He had never confided these thoughts to Zoran – what reason would he? – and yet, despite that, Zoran knew, as intimately as if the thoughts were his own. Eero had always been Pekka's better – thoughtful without needing to think, brave without needing to fear, kind without hesitation. If Pekka could only hope to dwell within the shadow of his goodness, that would be enough.

And now Eero was staring straight through him, and when Zoran turned, he saw that Azula was standing behind him, clad in an emerald cloak with a hood that obscured many of her features. Azula said, "dead," and yes, Zoran could see now that he was standing over a body – another figure, this one armoured in silver, the ground slowly opening up to accept it. Dark hair overspilled a broken helmet, a helmet whose visor had been ripped from its hinges. And within, those eyes….

He would recognise those eyes anywhere, those fallen-rose, sea-glass, leaden-heart eyes. Zoran's voice came out small and somehow pathetic. "...Ina?"

Silence for a long moment, and then –

"It's a metaphor, dipshit." Matthias sounded bored.

"A metaphor?"

"Their faces." The former Hierophant had appeared, quite silently. He was barefoot, and in his brightly coloured shirt once again. "Makes it easier for you to comprehend, for you to follow the… narrative, I suppose." He smiled, slightly. "I saw them as family members, the first few times. But you'll get to know everyone in time." He pointed at the xrafstar with Azula's face. "That's the first Devil, Vrata. She's a bitch."

"So," Zoran said, "this isn't… the end? Our ends?"

"It could be. The fall of Siarka has been, and might yet be."

"I don't understand."

"There's a surprise." Matthias' voice dripped with sardonicism.

Had he expected anything different? Could he have expected anything better? Of course he couldn't. There was only one other person who seemed to dwell within the fibres of his mind, as real to him as his own bones. There was only one other person he carried with him, a strange hitch-hiker composed of guilt and regret, hooked tightly onto his heart.

"I'm meant to be the Hierophant." Zoran's voice trembled.

"You are." For the first time, Matthias seemed alive with an emotion – seemed, for once, to escape his usual mode of dry, wry boredom or gleeful cynicism. He sounded almost angry. He sounded urgent.

"Then why," Zoran said, "don't I ever… ever see anything? Ever predict anything?"

Matthias said, "I'm dead, Zoran. Anything you think I've told you – that's you. That's the curse. That's you, hearing it from someone you'll actually believe. Someone you'll actually listen to."

"I'm just confused," Zoran said, "confused, and tired, all of the time – and I don't ever seem to see anything useful."

Silence, cold silence.

Below him, the Schreaves and their forces were forging forward; the traitor xrafstars – men long dead, wearing the faces of Pekka and Ghjuvan and Ilja, women long dead wearing the faces of Nez and Khalore and Hyacinth – were falling back. Above him, the sky was splitting open, wide and sharp, like the maw of a druj. Zoran said, "Matthias?"

"Matthias?"

The girl who had spoken was small, smaller than even the oracle Dimitar had been consulting. This was the sacellum in Opona, or what would one day be the sacellum. For now, it was a stone cavern, with a strange pool of water at its heart. The water within was a dark grey-blue, and clouds moved within it. A single touch, and it rippled with jewel colours, greens and reds and pinks with no obvious origins – and the girl who knelt at its edge, her clothes pooled around her, could not have been older than Azula or Hyacinth, her eyes wide and staring. She had wild red hair, and pale eyes, like Zoran, like Matthias, like the rest.

"Matthias?" she said. "Or Zoran?"

Zoran stepped forward. He said, "Are you…?"

She said, very sadly, "how many of you are there going to be?"

Zoran turned. Behind him, a line stretched out into darkness and obscurity – a line of children, standing as he stood, with their hands at their sides and their heads bowed. The boy immediately behind him was flax-haired, with dark hazel-green eyes, with a jacket two sizes too big, patched at the elbow, with a round face and a gap between his teeth. Zoran's heart jerked. He would have reacted regardless, he thought, but somehow it was so much more awful that he recognised the boy.

Gracjan Sokołowski. A neighbour's kid. Milena's classmate. A child. Seven years old – if that.

The girl by the pool, looking sorrowful, said, "how many more, Zoran?"

"...how many more, Zoran?" Dimitar's voice was hard, like he had been caught off balance, and strained with exhaustion; he was halfway through pulling a ring off his finger.

"…many more, Zoran?" Arek smiled, pushing hair out of his face, and pointed at the sky, like he was trying to gesture to something, some facet of the night's milieu.

"...more, Zoran?" Matthias was stone-faced, his fingers stilled on the keys of his typewriter, the room around him dark.

"Zoran?"

"Zoran?" Ina's voice was soft, soft and scared. He couldn't blame her for that. He loved her for it.

"Sorry about that." And he was. He meant it. The mirror lay in tiny sterling pieces around him, reflecting a thousand pale Zorans wearing a thousand pained expressions, his reflection all silvery as though painted in mercurial tintype. The real Zoran – such as it was – if that was who stood there – smiled, thinly, and said, "I was having trouble focusing."