The door that led up from the sewers into the City Watch headquarters was banded with steel and likely protected by Artifact traps, not to mention the pair of beefy summoner watchmen standing guard. They saluted smartly when Lord Hintal approached, but there was no flourish or pomp in it. These men had dented breastplates and one had an unhealed slash across his face, meaning he'd taken enough damage to eat through his deck and leave him wounded. No doubt whatever healing cards the Watch had at its disposal were being stretched to their limits at the moment.

"Everything held at headquarters has been catalogued and accounted for," Basil's dad told me with a stern look as he opened the door. "Things will go hard for anyone with light fingers."

I stopped in my tracks. "All right, you can knock that shit right off, sir. Either you want me to help you or not. If you don't, fine. I'll head back to the Lows and do what I'd planned from the start. But if you do, then quit looking at me like I'm about to pick your pocket. If you're going to demand that I treat you as a superior officer, then by the Twelve, act like one instead of some pissant drunk trying to pick a fight."

He swelled, and even in the dim light of our Sources I could see his face reddening. Good. I shouldn't be the only one getting angry.

"I do not approve of my son's association with you," he said, his voice a growl. "He has been behaving in a manner most rash and ill-considered, and it began when he entered the Rising Stars Tournament."

I checked a sigh. Basil had hinted at family problems, and now I was stuck with them. "How about we get Basil back before we worry about how he's acting, huh? Even if I'm a bad influence, I promise that undead general's worse."

After a long, grinding pause, he gave a terse nod and turned up the stairs. Two steps up, though, he paused, not looking back. "I will strive to act with decorum from here on out, and I ask you to do the same."

I imagined my demons tossing him bodily into the river of shit behind us. It was a pleasant thought. "I'm not gonna steal the silverware, don't worry."

If he sensed my sarcasm, he kept it to himself for once. The stairs opened up into a storeroom with two more guards at the entry, both of them City Watch Souls. Even here in this basement cupboard I could see the kind of organization Lord Hintal ran. Boxes were neatly stacked against the walls with their contents labeled clearly. The floor was swept and the beams overhead were free of cobwebs. I was fairly certain that even if this room had only been opened twice a year before the sewer access suddenly became vital, still the level of cleanliness would have been the same.

A long hallway and another flight of stairs later, we entered a large, double-height room with a balcony overlooking one end. In a lord's manor I'd have called it a ballroom – what sort of fancy piece of shit have I turned into? – but in a building of grim utilitarian stone like this one, I wasn't sure. Desks covered in slips of parchment and all sorts of bric-a-brac squatted in perfect rows to either side; many of them had watchmen hunched over and scribbling or else talking in small huddles while consulting maps.

"Main operations," Lord Hintal grunted at me as his men filed past to do whatever it was that watchmen did when they weren't arresting people. "I'm compiling an engagements map so we can get a sense of the enemy numbers and deployment. Report your sightings in the Lows to Merks over there when you have a chance." He gestured to a harried-looking bald man in an Watch officer's coat toiling over a map large enough to cover his entire desk. "You'll be part of our strike team when the time comes. Help where you can and stay out of the way when you can't."

I gritted my teeth. "And where is 'out of the way," sir?"

He looked around, and his granite face sagged for a moment before firming again almost before I noticed the change. "Basil's desk is unoccupied for the moment. Second from the end of the row on your right." He made as if to grab me by the arm and stopped himself. "Take care to leave his things as you find them. Please."

I nodded and moved to the indicated desk, intensely curious to see this previously-unknown aspect of my friend's life. That one night we'd spent drinking and talking during the Tournament, he'd told me about his work for the Watch – "mostly clerical," he'd said in his precise, modest way – but he'd been strangely hesitant to talk about why he, a noble scion, was holding a job like a merchant's boy, or about what it was like to work for his father. Having now met the man, I could see that he was trying to politely omit the fact that his dad was an ass, but what did all these other men think of my friend? Did they know that the quiet boy in the corner was a better man than any of them?

I sat in his chair. He'd set it where he could look out on the room. Looking up, I could see the balcony just behind; likely that was where the senior officers and possibly Lord Hintal himself had their desks. Basil kept his papers in neat piles with a quill and well-corked ink pot off to one side. Peeking at one of the scraps of parchment lying on top, I saw columns of numbers and accompanying descriptions in a tidy hand that I immediately recognized as his. My heart suddenly clenched. He'd literally pulled me out of the gutter single-handedly. If he hadn't given me back my Sucking Void after that first fight, I'd have been bounced from the competition and fallen into Ticosi's hands right away. He'd helped me defeat the Big Man, forgiven me for nearly betraying him, and guided me through War Camp. Now he was… what, a prisoner? Dead? Turned into a vampire? There was no knowing until Afi found him and reported back, but I itched to do something. I owed him. More than that – he mattered to me. My life would be less without him. I had to save him.

My restless hands pulled open the desk drawers one by one, anxious for any other sign of him. More papers, most held in bundles by twine or arranged in leather folders. The wide center drawer held a pen knife, a couple of loose silver clips, and a single piece of fine paper with Esmi's face sketched in charcoal. Shit, I haven't thought about her either. Twins, let my friends be all right. I had no idea whether Basil had drawn the likeness himself or paid to have it done, but it was very good, evoking both her ready smile and her spark of impetuous anger.

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The likelihood that all of my team had survived the fall of the city seemed small. Two of the elves had fallen even before the breach, and the Twins-damned dwarves had turned tail right at the beginning. Was Gale still fighting? Edaine? What of the returning army that Gerard had gone out to take charge of? My fists clenched impotently, and I dropped the paper back into the drawer before I could crumple it. I'd come so far and won so much, and still I couldn't protect the people that mattered. I have to get stronger.

Speaking of which… the hours since defeating that Epic vampire had been a non-stop race from one spot to the next; I hadn't even had time to take a close look at the deck I'd looted off her body or the Soul card that had slipped from under her tongue. Instead of mooning over the fates of friends I couldn't control, I needed to see what that terrifying fight had earned me. The thick leather belt pouch I'd taken to wearing during War Camp made for a decent sideboard and had plenty of space left over for the spoils of war. I pulled out the thick stack of cards and shuffled through them.

Wights, Skeletons, Aberrant Creations, a few Rare direct damage Spells… it was immediately apparent that this enemy had fielded only Death. My enthusiasm waned just a tad when I realized that. Not that there weren't still some good options to break down for shards to improve my own cards, but I'd hoped to maybe find a bunch of neutral Relics or even an Order card or two in there. There was the one card I'd seen her use that I knew was an automatic include for me:

It was the same as the one already in my deck, right down to the ominous description it bore, except for the fact that it dealt 1 more damage than mine. I wondered at the intricacies of card creation and elevation that could lead to two versions of the same card that differed in such a fundamental way while still being at the same rarity. Maybe a more talented Relicsmith had created this one? Or some prayer had gone wrong while elevating the one I used? There was no knowing now.

I considered running both copies in my deck – it wasn't like I was overflowing with Epics – but something about that felt off to me. I realized that the current iteration of my deck was hitting hard and getting the job done every single time lately. Losing any Souls or Spells, even my little early-match ones, in order to include a third weapon Relic felt like it might unbalance things in a way I didn't like. I'd hang on to the one I was taking out for a while to be sure, but my gut said that two weapons – a single Vampiric Blade and my Hateful Hammer – was the right way to go. I fished out the inferior copy, stuffed it back into my pouch with a whispered word of thanks for the good service it had done me, and put the better one into my Mind Home.

There wasn't a single other card I could use. The vampire had a couple of Epic Death Relics, and of course that monster Legendary, but unless I started cultivating Death those were only good for shard fodder or trade.

Looking at the cards, I realized that, for all that she'd nearly killed me, my opponent hadn't been an expert deck builder. The Chalice worked nicely with Nebuchadnezzar, I supposed, and I was glad she hadn't had it equipped when she'd brought the monster out, but that was really the only synergy that existed in the deck. What's more, the Mask of the Insatiable was about as useful as tits on a doorframe. The only weapon in the deck already had Lifesap, and the +1 Attack was negligible without the weapon equipped at the same time.

The Legendary, moreover, while truly fearsome on the battlefield, would have been a puny thing in the arena with only one's own Souls to sacrifice to it. Compared to the other Legendary cards I'd seen like Hilbrand and Kitsanya, Nebuchadnezzar was quite weak. Not that I was complaining – I'd happily harvest a couple of Legendary shards if I could – but I got the feeling that this vampire had gotten her eyes dazzled by that shiny diamond border and jammed the card into her deck without really considering whether it was the strongest choice.

I'd have to send for my crucible and alchemical salts, or maybe just have Roshum handle the breakdown for me. If a Mythic had taken weeks to dissolve, how long would a Legendary take? I needed those shards now in order if I was to have any hope of taking on the enemy generals and saving Basil.

Kneading the back of my neck to ease my rising stress, I considered the last card of the bunch. "Fortune's balls," I swore.

What had the vampire been thinking, coming at me by herself with a soul ability like that? Had she fought in concert with even a single other vampire and simply hung back and let the other one do the hard work, I'd have been mincemeat. I peered at the face on the card, the one I'd so recently seen up close and personal as I'd smashed it to a pulp. Was there a hint of weariness in those eyes? Had she purposely run cards she didn't need? Had she come at me on her own because she was tired of an endless undeath? Had I seen a glimpse of satisfaction as she died?

I shook my head and stowed the card in my belt pouch. You're making things up to try to make the world make sense. You know better, gutter boy. The world's crazy, and if you're lucky, every now and then it goes crazy for you instead of against you. I rubbed my hands together, trying to still their sudden shaking. My hard-won victory could have – should have – gone much worse for me.

A commotion at the entrance to the main operations floor drew my eye. "Muster!" an officer was shouting as he ran pell-mell into the hall. "All hands muster to the front gate!"

"Hold," thundered Lord Hintal from the balcony over my head. Looking up, I saw him purpling in the face again. Seemed like he did that often. "Report, Under-Captain Jakiss, and then we'll see who's mustering where."

"Large enemy force approaching in pursuit of allies currently under attack," the younger man said, managing somehow to be both succinct and precise despite a terrible urgency. "They're after the Queen."

Hintal's eyes went round. "All hands muster to the gate! Now, now, now!"

I jumped to my feet. I was sitting on a fortune of shards I needed to figure out how to unlock as fast as possible, but the Twins waited for no man. The Queen was alive, and she needed our help. Bastard son or not, I wasn't going to let one more human die in Treledyne if I could do the slightest thing about it.

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