"Go," Eragon said, prying off her caved in chestplate. Saphira stretched her wings and winced. "Get them as fast as you can."
Does it look bad? It felt bad. It felt like the axe was still stuck in her chest.
Eragon grimaced. "Fly carefully. If you can make it." He sent his mental reassurances. Saphira felt his nerves. He worried of fighting the Shade.
Good. That ought to keep him alive.
Be safe.
"Harry will be with me," Eragon reassured her. "Now, shall we see if that spell of Harry's works?" He stood atop her saddle and jumped, skipping straight over Vol Turin and plummeting through the air.
Saphira harrumphed. She padded to the edge, slipped off the outer ledge of the dragonhold, and flared her wings. The air under her wings tugged against her chest, pulling the wound further open. She descended in awkward half plummeting falls, catching the air to stop her fall in bursts.
She spotted the elf and Eragon's grumpy dead-dragon Rider father waiting in front of a grand sealed door into the heart of Tronjheim. Her landing was inelegant.
"Saphira! Where is Eragon?" Brom demanded the moment she touched down.
She did not much like touching the minds of others. Except Eragon. Grudgingly, she extended herself to speak.
He went to help Harry fight Durza.
Brom and Arya exchanged glances. "You're wounded," Arya noted.
Yes.
"The doors are sealed," Brom reported. "The doors on the upper levels too. We couldn't get in on the second floor. Can you fly?"
One at a time. Maybe.
Brom glanced at Arya as if gauging if she was lighter than him. Arya shook her head.
"We are close enough. Go, help your son. I shall climb as high as I can elsewhere."
Saphira lowered herself to the ground and allowed Brom into her saddle. It felt odd to have someone else there. She didn't like it. That was Eragon's spot.
No one else is coming?
Arya shook her head. "Not for a while. An ordinary warrior has no hope of helping in this fight. The Varden has all but won the invasion already. Ajihad is flushing out the tunnels as we speak, accompanied by one of the Twins while the other finds targets on the live map. Durza is the only enemy left."
"But a dangerous one," Brom warned.
The old man knew how to hold his weight in the saddle. Even while barely brushing against his mind, Saphira felt an intense longing from the Rider. The thought of such a fate befalling her own Rider spurred her to ignore the pain in her chest and flap harder, clawing each painful yard of altitude from the air.
Brom shifted on her back.
You shift as much as a rocking ship, she sent. Saphira caught more feelings from him. Worry for his son at the forefront now. Brom settled.
The harder she flapped, the harder she had to breathe, and the more her chest. Hurt. Halfway up the long, long ascent (why in the stars and sky did the dwarves have to build such a tall city?) Saphira began to struggle.
"We can take a rest," Brom offered.
Saphira was too prideful for that. By the time she flopped down limply on the floor of the dragonhold, the agony in her chest had grown terrible, and she was out of breath. Brom dismounted and breathed in sharply.
What? She asked, annoyed.
"You need healing," Brom asserted. Saphira wriggled backwards, noting the streak of blood she was leaving on the floor of the dragonhold. The wizard would love to come up here and lick it up, she thought, flicking her ears.
Your son will need healing if you do not get down there and help him.
Saphira scooted to the hole in the center of the dragonhold. Leap down from the saddle. The wizard's magic will stop your fall at the bottom.
Brom climbed back up onto the square of leather and stood on her back. He paused. "I know dragons well enough to know you're a prideful bunch, but consider what you'd do to Eragon if you tried to come down and fight Durza in this state and died."
Saphira extended her mind far downwards to touch the little one. He was singularly focused and struggling to keep up, but had not been dealt any serious wounds. I will consider it.
The older man drew his sword and nodded sharply, then dove from her back and into empty air.
The tunnels were dim and the torchlit shadows stretched and flickered such that vision was unreliable. Ajihad nearly missed the attack.
It was over in hardly an instant. The Urgal struck out at him, Ajihad deflected the blow, the Urgal's sword cut into his leg. The twin barked a word and the Urgal collapsed.
Hissing, Ajihad leaned against the tunnel wall. It seemed to accommodate him, a chair growing out of the stone for him to sit upon. Despite assurances that the maze would help him and only trap the invaders, nothing quite set his nerves on edge like a moving maze he was in the heart of. He set his torch in a mysteriously appearing bracket and rolled up his pant leg to examine the damage.
It looked like a flesh wound. His shin guards took most of it. When the Urgal drew back his blade, the edge had sliced through the side and cut him, shallow, short, but painful enough to give him a limp.
He glanced at the twin, who shook his head. Of course. Not their area of expertise.
"I would not like to fight injured," Ajihad voiced. "How far are we from an exit?"
The twin closed his eyes for a moment. "Not far, but we are closer to another point of interest."
"Go on."
He led their party for a minute and a half, taking two turns into inviting tunnels before they arrived at a gleaming metal door.
"This is?" Ajihad asked.
"The wizard's lair," the twin answered. He pushed the door open, light spilling into the tunnel.
"He leaves it unlocked during an invasion?" Ajihad wondered.
But on the other side of it was a human, one he recognized as Misha, the cartographer he'd sent to work with the wizard. He looked pale and his eyes kept darting past Ajihad.
"Of course." Ajihad should have guessed they would subvert one of the wizard's men. Or women. Conniving was second nature to them. "Are the elves here?"
Misha looked to the Twin, then nodded. "Aye. They're waiting for you."
Ajihad followed him into the tunnel. He had to admit, he was curious. He'd seen the fruits of Harry's labors, but never the trees. Misha led Ajihad and the twin inside, then halted the rest.
The rest of the party did not look happy at the idea of navigating the evil tunnels alone without a magician, but Ajihad had some confidence they would make it out alright. A magic tunnel that could provide him a chair when he was injured could guide lost men to the surface.
Misha shut the door behind him. Ajihad didn't know what he was expecting, but he was sure it wasn't this. The tunnel was bright and cheery, and hardly longer than the distance from one side of his office to the other. The door on the other end was open to a staircase. Ajihad's bearings were not as good as a dwarf's, yet he was certain the staircase should have led up to the surface somewhere near the walls of Tronjheim.
The stairs were likewise mysteriously short for the distance they seemed to cover. Harry had access to or could make his own glass, apparently, for the strange rotating door they went through. His ears popped as he limped out. Ajihad turned back to the twin with him.
"You should go back and assemble another party. I want the Urgals flushed out from beneath Farthen Dûr before we consider lowering our guard. Do you have any word on what happened to Durza?"
"The doors to Tronjheim's central hall are sealed on all levels," he reported as they rounded an archway. "The fight is ongoing."
Ajihad stopped despite himself. "By Unulukuna." Working with an unpredictable, dubiously loyal man was worth it indeed if it meant this kind of power was on the Varden's side. Machines clacked away weaving fabric, little floating devices harvested food, huge furnaces whooshed, producing stacks of billets of steel. Projects and workspaces were dotted all around the colossal room. He caught sight of the weaver, Maria, he'd sent the wizard, working at a desk near the strange looms.
"Come," the twin insisted. Misha led them further in. Ajihad frowned. He'd seen those green potions Harry had supplied the medical tent with further back.
"There were potions back there," he observed as they passed by Maria's desk.
Misha didn't meet his eyes. "The elves wanted to speak with you."
Ajihad knew he was lying. He maintained an even expression while the hair on his neck raised. He glanced between the men on either side of him.
They passed a couple of the wizard's astounding projects, metal birds in the midst of assembly, nesting in a mess of walkways, scaffolding, parts, and tools. One was a fair bit smaller than Saphira, the other was absolutely massive. Massive cylinders wider than he was tall were bolted to the colossal wings, and the tail jutted up over half a hundred feet.
Misha urged him from his spot, gawking at the craft.
"Time is of the essence," the Twin said. "If anyone is to reinforce the warriors fighting Durza, it is these elves."
Why were they waiting then? Arya did not take orders or wait for commands. She acted. Ajihad limped on. He stopped his hand from touching the hilt of his sword.
They came upon another craft, this one bigger than Saphira, but not monstrously so. This one was finished and had the markings of use.
"Come," the Twin said. With a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, Ajihad rounded the edge of the craft to stare at an empty interior.
"Slytha," came the hiss from behind him.
"Can you fight?" A gruff voice asked. Harry felt a weathered hand grasp his and help him to his feet. He summoned his glasses and blinked his vision clear.
His whole body was sore and twitchy. Durza's cruciatus curse was perhaps worse than Voldemort's. Or maybe it'd just been long enough since he'd been hit with it that he'd forgotten just how awful that curse was. The Shade's torture curse had a unique flavor to it. The overwhelming agony was there, but there was also an emotional torment to it, a gnawing feeling of emptiness and despair that reminded Harry of a dementor.
Harry conjured himself a crutch. Brom had his sword drawn and was watching Durza fight his son with a grim look. Eragon was doing fine, he had not taken any serious hits, but it was clear he could not win by himself.
Harry summoned his sword – Durza's old one, the one he'd enchanted – and handed it to Brom. "U-use this," he chattered, his jaw twitching. His outstretched arm trembled.
Brom accepted the sword, twirling the pommel in his grip and hefting the blade. He nodded to himself. Brom's armor was not quite as magnificent as Eragon's, but Harry had made it with all the same protective runes. "Arya's up there with Saphira," Brom said. He turned and jogged over to help his son with the Shade.
Eragon was singularly focused on the fight in front of him. Durza had long since realized he could not kill Eragon with his sword, at least not in a remotely fair fight. He had poured all his effort into the mental battle.
Nothing in his training had prepared him for the onslaught the Shade put his mind under. Razor sharp spikes of invasive determination needled his haphazard defenses. It was the first time he'd really had his mind tested, and Eragon knew he'd have lost that battle too, if he had not been so protected from the sword fight that he could recklessly attack to break Durza's concentration.
He was in the middle of blocking a swipe from the Shade when he turned around in exasperation, batting away a thrust.
"The sneak attacks are getting old," he snarled at Brom, three quick blows maneuvering Eragon's father onto the defense. Eragon struck at Durza while he was distracted, and the two of them began trading the Shade's attention back and forth.
Frustrated, Durza snarled and barked a command in Urgalish. At once, the thousands of Urgals encircling them woke up and advanced. Eragon had to spare hardly a moment of worry before Harry took care of it.
With Brom to help him with Durza, Eragon had enough focus to spare to actually catch what the wizard was doing. It made him very glad he did not have to fight him.
Tronjheim warped around the Urgals. At first, Harry raised a stone wall. When the Urgals began scaling it, he vanished it and let them fall to the granite. To stall them again, he made a dome.
For a moment, the field was plunged into darkness. Harry added a brilliant light in the middle of the dome. The Urgals were stalled for a moment, then they began breaking through the stone on all sides at once and when the dome threatened to collapse on them, Harry was forced to vanish it again.
Durza refocused on Eragon, and he could no longer watch. He heard the snarls of a thousand lions, saw jets of fire surging out towards the edges of the room, waves of red light, spears hurtling through the air, and the sounds of Urgals grunting and shouting, but never speaking.
It was as if Durza had reduced them to animals with his command, and the only thought in their minds was to attack.
A torrent of water sloshed into the room, enough to drown them all. Eragon leapt over the wave, but his armor bore him down. Durza and Brom were similarly anchored to the floor underwater.
Before Eragon had even gotten acclimated to being submerged, he felt a riptide pulling him to the sides of the room. He hunkered down and resisted the tug.
His head burst above the water as it whirled and sloshed in a massive vortex around the center of the room. A vast majority of the Urgals were caught in the surge as it spun, the speed of the water increasing as the vortex crept higher against the walls, clearing more of the floor.
The sloshing water whirled higher and higher, passing the first balcony, then the second. It was thick enough to hide the balconies beneath the surface. At the center of the room, Harry conducted the hurricane with his arm. He slashed his hand and in an instant, the hurricane froze.
All the ice kept its momentum, sloshing on like a glacier under the mountain. Eragon heard shrieks of agony among the sounds of the icy avalanche. Many more were entombed far beneath the surface.
"Liquesco," Harry said quietly, once the glacier had settled. The ice melted, falling to the ground. Harry held up a pointed finger. A river of water, Urgal blood, and Urgal bodies bent from the pool and siphoned into the tip of his finger, vanishing from the room.
Before long, the last of the water vanished, leaving perhaps a third as many Urgals as had been in the hall before, laid on the ground chattering in cold and fear.
Harry joined in the assault then. Durza ducked and twisted and dodged under a hail of blows from all sides, skirting beasts that appeared from thin air and vanished when vanquished, thunder strikes, grasping stone tentacles at his feet, and jet after jet of red light, winging across the enormous hall beneath Isidar Mithrim.
The Shade was growing frustrated and furious, his army killed or incapacitated, under assault from three different directions. He furrowed his maroon brows and mouthed a word Eragon did not catch.
Darkness fell.
A chant came from within the pitch black, of a language Eragon had never heard. He cast a spell for light and felt the drain of the magic taking effect, yet the darkness remained as impenetrable as before.
"Stop him!" Harry's voice came from behind. He sounded on the verge of panic. "Expecto patronum!"
Like a spot in his vision from glancing at the sun, a blob of brightness materialized in the darkness, some sort of bird that wasn't yet fully sculpted, its borders undefined. It dissipated quickly in the oppressive blackness. Durza's chanting voice grew quicker and more urgent.
A shockwave struck Eragon. There was a massive bang, so loud Eragon clutched his ears, thrown off his feet. Still, Durza kept chanting in his ringing ears. Another, bigger explosion shook the hall.
Durza's chanting turned triumphant, shouting the last few words with glee.
Eragon followed his voice, groping with his gauntleted hand. He prayed Durza was as blind as he was in the unnatural darkness. He reached with his mind, trying to distract or disrupt Durza's focus. The Shade was focused on his chant with frightening intensity. Trying to break into his mind was like trying to grasp the void. Eragon used the Shade's mind to close on his location.
"Finite incantatem!" Harry shouted, suddenly much closer.
The darkness vanished. He, Harry, and Brom had surrounded Durza. Harry's eyes had gone solid green, focused on Durza's chest. He had another sword in hand, and did not hesitate to stab forth.
Durza twisted around and presented Harry with the result of his spell. Eragon could not see what it was that was cupped between his fingers. Whatever it was, it terrified Harry, and that was enough to terrify Eragon. Harry's skin had gone pale, his scar standing out in livid red. Durza's face was lit from beneath, a bloody red light flickering between black and orange.
Eragon felt his feet rooted to the ground, the moment frozen in time as Durza and Harry stared at each other, locked in an impasse.
"It will kill you," Harry said with certainty.
Durza tilted his head. "Do you think it would count? I don't know any Shades that were burnt alive."
"It destroys everything," Harry said, still utterly confident. Durza's eyes flicked up to his lightning bolt scar, then back to his intent green eyes.
Eragon saw Harry's lips move silently. His vision changed, a new layer to his sight appearing. He saw Harry's muscles, veins, and bones through his clothes, his organs inside his chest and ribcage, his bruised brain, and his eyes, glowing a brilliant green.
He saw Durza's body as well, and in the very center, a black and malformed organ that expanded and contracted lopsidedly.
"Even your friend?" Durza asked innocently.
Harry's lips tightened. He opened his mouth to speak–
"Catch!" Durza hissed, grinning, and hurled the contents of his cupped hands at Harry.
The wizard dove to the ground. Eragon stabbed forth, Zar'roc flashing in the dim light. He saw the blade pierce Durza's blackened heart.
A gust of wind and a horrible screeching noise raced out from Durza's body. Eragon smelled stone dust and the chilled, stale air of a tomb. A chorus of unearthly, gasping screams pierced his ears. Durza's body went rigid, vibrating in place.
Eragon was flung backwards by a shockwave. He glanced off a pillar and fell in a heap, his armor again sparing him crippling injury. Eragon got to his feet in time to see black mist pouring from Durza's eyes, ears, mouth, and nose, smoking off his skin and billowing up into the air, coalescing into a form with livid, glowing red eyes that shone through the smoke and mist.
Brom had not been hurled as far away, kneeling, supporting himself with Durza's old sword. The Urgals that had survived the flood were waking up and eyeing each other suspiciously, pacified by watching the spectacle in the center of the room.
The shape tried to charge Harry, but he was guarded by a luminous stag that burned away the encroaching darkness. The mist turned its malevolent gaze on Eragon.
Abruptly, it charged towards him. Harry shouted something lost in Eragon's ringing ears. The white stag raced after the mist, herding it away from Eragon.
At the last second, the entity juked left away from the stag. Before Harry's spell could ward it off, the mist plunged into Brom's chest. Brom screamed in agony, his shouts echoing off the granite walls of Tronjheim's great hall.
"No!" Harry shouted. "Chase him out, Prongs!"
The radiant stag galloped across the smooth floor, its hooves hardly touching the ground. It lowered its antlers, charging towards Brom. With a great flash of light, the creature struck his father head first, kicking the misty shape out. It chased the black mist around Tronjheim until the spirit surrendered and slunk beneath the floor.
One, two laps the stag circled the room before it looked to Harry, knelt, and dissolved into light.
Eragon finally allowed himself to catch his breath, hurrying over to check on his father. "Brom!" He was still able to see through his father's body. The line of radiant gold that shot up his spine had dulled, broken up by lengths of muddy brown.
Before his very eyes, crimson light shot up and down that pillar in his back, spreading out across the lines in his body. Brom writhed on the ground, muscles and tendons standing out rigidly against his skin. Eragon watched horrified as the storm of red light sank into his muscles. Brom squirmed in agony, spasming on the ground.
"Get him out of here!" Harry shouted.
Eragon looked up. The wizard had finally drawn his wand, a plume of golden sparks falling around him. A breeze buffeted his hair and an aura of eldritch power surrounded him.
"Go!" Harry shouted.
Eragon looked past him. The thing Durza had thrown had grown. It was a sort of fire unlike any Eragon had seen. Dark and malevolent, the inferno had a darker hue than any Eragon had seen, and it burned on stone as easily as tinder.
Mesmerized, Eragon gazed into the flickering crimson as shapes formed, leaping out of the blaze. Serpents, birds, all manner of exotic creatures snarled, their very bodies wrought from the unholy flame.
"RUN!" Harry shouted again urgently, his voice magnified a hundredfold. "Alohomora!"
The doors to Tronjheim slammed open. Above, Saphira spiraled down, Arya on her back.
"Get them to evacuate," Harry's voice boomed, reverberating against the stone. "Everybody. Dwarves, Urgals, Humans. Out of Farthen Dûr."
"Get Brom out," Eragon instructed Saphira. "He's hurt."
He felt her mind touch his, examining him only long enough to conclude he was alright before landing next to Brom.
"Eragon, you need to get out of here," Harry insisted. "I have no idea how to stop this."
"What is it?" Arya called, watching the red flames warily. Dragons had begun to emerge from the inferno, soaring away from the spot where it had started, setting new blazes all over the room. The beasts roared and screeched, seeking to attack the Urgals closest to it.
Harry stood his ground, wielding his wand, beating back the beasts with blasts of water and jets of light. Nothing fazed the fire for long, even the deluges of water simply made the fiery beasts growl and back off for a moment before regrouping, bigger and angrier than before.
The Urgals had the sense to begin fleeing the central hall. "Fiendfyre! Take them all out of here," Harry called to Arya. "I'll buy you some time."
Arya's gaze lingered on Harry for a moment. "Where are you headed after?" she asked.
"The workshop is the furthest place I've been," Harry called back. "Just GO!"
Arya hauled Brom onto Saphira's back. Eragon paused at her foreleg.
What are you waiting for? Saphira demanded.
Can you carry all three of us? Eragon worried. I can run beneath.
Get on. Saphira glared at him. Eragon crawled up and sat behind Arya. Saphira lurched forward, beating her wings furiously. She managed to get into the air with the help of the enchantments on her saddle lightening the load. Even so, it was a struggle to stay airborne as she soared through a doorway and down a tunnel to the edge of Tronjheim.
"The command tent," Arya called to Saphira over the wind. "Please!"
Brom tossed and turned, moaning in agony. Eragon cradled his head in his lap and held on tight. Brom's legs were half dangling off the saddle that was far too small for three.
Eragon watched Harry and the fire recede down the tunnel and worried something horrible would happen to him before he saw him again, if he made it out at all.
Saphira landed at the command tent. Eragon helped Brom down. "Get him to a medic," he demanded of the first person that caught his attention, an armored man with a pike.
He and Arya rushed into the tent.
The tent was crowded, many more people there than before the battle. Eragon sought out Ajihad, but could not find him.
Arya went straight to King Hrothgar. The crowned dwarf stood by the live map amongst half a dozen of his countrymen, fixated on the swarming dots now all headed for the margins of the parchment.
She spoke with him in low, urgent Dwarvish. King Hrothgar's eyes widened. He stood up and announced something to his dwarves. The tent quickly filled with jabber. Eragon glanced around the room for the Twin who was supposed to be here to relay orders. Humans and dwarves stood up, speaking and moving about, making it impossible for Eragon to pick people out of the crowd.
"ENOUGH!" a boom echoed through the tent, every voice quieting and turning to King Hrothgar, who had pounded his hammer against the ground. "We will evacuate. It costs us nothing if we are wrong. The Urgals are fleeing, Durza is dead. Most of our work is done. With Ajihad gone, Jormundur has command. I will march mine armies to the east gate, and we will join with the families that have fled. We may all return together when this is over. Oin, Sigmund–" Hrothgar switched back to Dwarvish.
Jormundur began speaking to his commanders as well.
When the flurry was over and many of the men and dwarves in the crowded tent had gone to follow their orders, Eragon crossed to Jormundur. "Where is Ajihad?"
Jormundur shrugged. "He went with one of the Twins and a group of men to chase Urgals out of the tunnels beneath."
"And the other Twin, the one that's stationed here?" Eragon pressed.
Another helpless shrug. "The dwarves say he left half an hour ago without stating a reason. Otherwise, we'd be able to find Ajihad."
Arya's gaze darkened from across the tent. "Pray he is not beneath Tronjheim, and pray the Twins have good reason for their absence."
"Pray for Harry," Eragon muttered under his breath. Arya caught that too, and her expression turned to worry.
Seamstresses gossipped. A dozen women couldn't sit with their hands busy in a room in silence for hours without talking. Every good gossip knew when to shut up and listen, and every good gossip knew when they were hearing something they weren't meant to know, and to be quiet and look busy when it was happening.
Maria knew something was happening, something she was not meant to know about. She kept Harry's sheet of paper tucked into her jacket and worked at her design. She kept her head down and made no more noise than necessary.
Ajihad had gone into the plane with one of the twins and had not yet returned. The elves that were supposed to be on that plane were nowhere to be seen.
More people entered the workshop. Maria did not glance up from her work or get up from her desk, even when the coke oven began to leak creosote oil onto the floor.
She kept her head down as the newcomers passed, looking up through her hair at the pair of strangers heading through. The other twin, and an old woman he led firmly by the arm.
The first twin stopped at Harry's desk and began looking through his things, tugging on the drawers and opening the mailboxes. Nobody paid her any mind, busy at her desk working on weaving designs for the looms.
Misha came back from the plane, still without Ajihad.
"The wizard came back here before the battle, did he not?" The twin at the desk asked, pausing over a letter.
"Aye," Misha said quietly.
"He would have had a sheet of paper with him."
Maria's pulse quickened.
"He often brings in paper," Misha said.
"Mmh. Do you know how to open these drawers?"
Misha shook his head.
"No matter. Take the desk."
Misha began dragging Harry's entire desk down the hall towards the plane.
Maria felt the twin's attention pass over her head. Against the right wall, the coke oven was beginning to make a creaking, hissing noise, creosote leaking in rivulets from behind the door that was supposed to be sealed.
He walked past her and began investigating the enormous vertical farm hanging from the ceiling.
The other twin came back and wandered through the workshop opposite his twin, examining the arc furnaces. They never spoke to each other with words, yet they moved through the room and neither ever reexamined something the other had already spent a moment investigating.
Misha came back again. "We should go."
"Not yet," one said. "We're waiting for one more."
The other nodded and departed. "If he gets back…" Misha trailed off.
"That is for us to worry about," the remaining twin chided. "What else is of interest up here?"
Misha beckoned him towards their quarters. "Ursa keeps records of where the food we sent went."
Again, Maria felt the twin's attention slide over her.
As soon as they passed out of the room, she sprang to her feet and dashed over to the coke oven. She pulled on a mitt and pulled open the oven. She ducked and covered her mouth and nose as the gasses rushed out, normally handled by the filter above the oven. It smelled like rotting eggs and passed gas, accompanied by an unpleasant blast of heat.
"You. Stop." The twin's unpleasant voice rang out. Maria froze. "Who are you?"
"The seamstress." Misha returned with a stack of papers under his arm.
"Was she here when the wizard came up?"
Maria glared at Misha, heart sinking.
Misha nodded.
The twin's lips tightened into a horrible smile. He approached. Maria backed up involuntarily, bumping up against the coke oven. The heat of the open oven seared her back. In her dress, the list of names weighed like an anchor made of dread, bearing her to the ground.
"The wizard would have brought a list of names up here," the twin said. Maria felt the paper crinkle between her back and the lip of the oven. She shuffled her arm back and gripped the ledge of the oven. On top of the stone was unbearably hot.
He took another step forward. "H-he sent them away," Maria stuttered. She grasped the corner of the list between her finger and thumb under her waistband behind her back.
"You're lying," the twin stated, as a matter of fact.
"No!" Maria insisted. Her heart thundered in her chest. "He did! The box on his desk. He puts things in and then they disappear. There was a bag and a sheet. He put them in the mailbox with a letter and left to fight."
Maria envisioned Harry putting the papers in vividly in her mind, so vividly she thought perhaps she could convince herself, so if the twin read her mind, all he would see–
"Does she know anything of interest?" The twin asked Misha. The pilot shook his head.
"How to use the looms, how to weave–"
The moment the twin's focus lapsed, Maria yanked the sheet out and shoved it deep into the oven, sticking her whole arm in heedless of the burns.
"Jierda!" the twin barked. Maria screamed as her arms and legs broke with wet snaps. She collapsed in a heap in front of the oven, the boiling hot creosote dripping into her hair from the lip of the oven above.
"Kausta," he ordered next. A few blackened and gooey ashes clumped out of the oven. Despite the agony, Maria bared her teeth in vicious triumph. The twin's wrathful gaze fell upon her.