A storm rolled in upon the next Light. Wind howled so forcefully that glass singers layered boards to protect the dome they grew atop the church. Esor was sealed inside the nave, kneeling before the altar in a church gloomy as Night.

  Corvin approached with his curls ruffled by the stormy winds. “Autumn is always like this here. ?elasdur’s cruel weather makes it the safest port to hide in Disunam?—difficult to enter or exit, even if you know what you’re doing.” He dropped a bottle of wine to his side, brushing Esor’s shoulder with it. “Take it,” said Corvin. He held a pair of goblets crossed between the fingers of his other hand.

  Esor placed the wine next to his lantern.

  “There is a bounty for reporting perversion,” said the Lord Mayor. He produced a velvet bag from his belt.

  “I didn’t report a thing,” Esor said. “I found them by accident.”

  “You called to Samej. The reward is yours,” Corvin said.

  Esor said, “Thank you, my liege,” and he took the purse. His eyes widened at its weight.

  “Such a sum displeases you? Is it not enough?” Corvin set the goblets on the altar and scooped up the wine.

  “On the contrary. The sum is handsome. It should be enough to complete my father’s renovations on our family home. Again, thank you.”

  “They paid you from Malor’s coffers. I’m merely the messenger.”

  Stronger winds blew. The pews trembled and the ivy shivered. Esor huddled within winter robes. “There are no Inquisitors here. What will happen to àstin?”

  “He will remain in the gaol while the Jury of Lords reviews evidence about the depths of his deceit. They will recommend a punishment. As the Patrician ruling over ?elasdur, and Vaseri’s father, Malor will choose the punishment.”

  “Will I see àstin again?”

  The Lord Mayor did not reply, but he didn’t have to.

  “It’s strange,” said Esor after a time, his shoulders sagging, his head bowed. “The Lexin is not the only Spirit of Regret honored here. Every other church I’ve attended celebrates the Spirits of Aspiration.”

  “Some early nations never accepted L?sàlvar supremacy. Their faith was a distortion of the ‘truth’ told by the Church, so they fought conversion to a righteous path. Their distorted bodies showed their sins.”

  “Akin to teti?e, perhaps?” asked Esor.

  “Very much like teti?e,” said Corvin darkly. “Their bodies were caught halfway between those of the Illuminated Beings and those of forest creatures. It’s said they obsessed over the Regrets in search of the All-Mother’s purest truths.” His lip curled looking at them. ?Fools, all of them.?

  “Why do you so resist the Path?” asked Esor.

  “I don’t deny that we live and walk upon Her Divine Body. Neu? Mak Nam?. I know the All-Mother has lived as we do, experiencing the apexes and nadirs of mortal life. This is her greatest failing: Mortals are fallible. Her judgments were subjective. She does not know us, her supposed children, nor does she seem to care for our well-being. Yet Church and Empire force her presumed will upon us all.”

  For once, it was Corvin who had to realize he had spoken too much, and he silenced himself. Esor did not fill the quiet. He may as well have been alone with the altar.

  “For generations, the Path has been used to control,” Corvin concluded. “These Cloud Forest àlvare were no different. They simply controlled through fear instead of hope.”

  “I prefer to think they were comforted by meditating on the regrets,” Esor said. “Who has not raised his voice in anger like Orotenas? Any child will lie to his parents avidly as Eledintat lied to Nam?. To come here and gaze upon the Divines who embody such regrets, knowing the All-Mother herself struggled...”

  “Perhaps they, like the Dwarrow, worshipped Chaos above Order.” ?Perhaps they belonged to Lorkullen.?

  “That thought also occurred to me,” said Esor.

  “Yet still you languish in this drafty place because you feel nearer your god engulfed in her Regrets than nothing at all.”

  “As a superstitious fool would.”

  The Lord Mayor filled the goblets. He handed one to Esor and sprawled across the steps of the church, newly sanded and polished so that the gray wood shined. ?I’ll be engulfed in Regrets with you.? “This week tasks me, Master Esor. Unfolding events have forced my hand.” ?I don’t like what I must do.?

  If Esor could find no relief from his misery in the church, he could find relief drinking with Corvin during a stormy noon that looked like Night. It was like drinking with àstin in some ways. The drinks were excellent, the conversation flowed, and time passed as they drained carafes.

  For once, they spoke nothing of alchemy—or ?elasdur, for that matter. “Pray tell, what are the Dwarrow like?” asked Esor, sliding his scarf from his shoulders, loosening his coat.

  “The bear-folk are demons on the battlefield and heathens in the nest,” said Corvin. “They talk of six genders. Male, as we are, stand opposite to female; the other four lie between or nowhere on the spectrum. Some fathers birth babies from betwixt their thighs while hairy-chested mothers swing warhammers. There is no singular normal in behavior or appearance; the only constant is embodying Chaos.”

  Esor hadn’t known anyone lived like anything besides buck or doe. “How did the noble earth-ones become so corrupted?”

  “The Dwarrow are obsessed with digging deep. Something worse than Chaos seethes beneath the heat of their infernal magma lakes.” Corvin spun stories of the Dwarrow’s sins as Night fell heavy: tales of dread lich fortresses within the recesses of the All-Mother’s marrow, toxins that drove a rational mind to madness, deadly ashelim that could replace an errant Dwarrow with nobody knowing the difference. Corvin spoke of a Dwarrow’s dirty tricks and cruel weapons. “A lad who never lived outside Sibíko cannot imagine the sheer violence of the breed.”

  Esor could imagine it all too well. Between grim news from Heralds and the specters in his dreams, mere mention of their enemies was enough to make his gut clench in anticipation of a falling axe.

  When one carafe emptied, Corvin produced another.

  As they drank, Esor warmed, and he peeled off his vest so he could unbutton his shirtsleeves. His red eyes became dryer. Esor laughed at one point, which encouraged the Lord Mayor to tell increasingly animated stories of his past, detailing mischiefs from College and hunts gone awry. Esor laughed more as the wine emptied. And then he began to droop, eventually.

  Esor fell asleep in the pews of the old church floating on thoughts of àstin.

  Dak emerged from behind a relief of the Regrets. “Are you done yet, Corvin? Get over here.” Corvin slipped his cloak over Esor’s curled form. “They’ve been waiting since Night fell,” Dak added.

  “I know,” Corvin said, prickly.

  “Good, because I thought you were flirting with the help instead of meeting your obligations. Hurry onward. I’ll transport Master Esor to his chambers.”

  “He’ll rest more comfortably in my House’s apartments,” said Corvin. Esor slumbered deeply enough that he did not stir when Corvin lifted him. “You may carry everything else.”

  Dak had no choice but to gather lantern, drinks, coat. “This is a terrible idea,” Dak grumbled, stomping ahead of his liege into the hallway. Corvin walked too slowly when he was drunk. “Every part of this.” He pointed toward the tower. “That.” He pointed at Esor, too lanky to be carried neatly, with limbs sticking in odd directions and his ear creased against Corvin’s chest. “Hexes, especially that.”

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Hmm?” asked Corvin, too busy gazing at Esor’s tipped-back jawline to listen to conversation. “Did you say something, Dak?”

  “Of course not,” muttered the footman.

  ~

  THE NIGHT THEY SIGNED the wedding writ, Vaseri was dressed in bridal finery that honored both írsa’s fisheries and Kovenor’s elk. Shimmering mollusk-violet threads were stitched into a netting over her bodice, the waist pinned with gold shaped into antlers. Her hair was pulled back to expose long ears studded by gems. The wounds from being switched had been tended by healers; lingering redness was concealed by a high back. Vaseri and the Lord Mayor performed the handfasting in Murnloim Wing, attended by few.

  Immediately thereafter, Kuper prepared her for the post-nuptial ceremony by removing bodice and pins and netting.

  There was no cultural tradition calling for Vaseri to be stripped of her cloak, the cloth shredded into strips, her wrists bound together. She was not blindfolded because that was how concubines received their husbands, but because that was how Lord Mayor Corvin received his concubines.

  Vaseri did not speak to Kuper when he quickly, silently guided her to her husband’s bed. He left her sitting upon the foot with her eyes covered.

  Eventually, the bed shifted beside Vaseri, sinking under the Lord Mayor’s weight. “Do you know what happens now?” asked Corvin, his lips brushing the conch of her ear. She nodded. “Of course you do.”

  When she felt pressure upon the clasps of her gown, she leaned back to give him better access. Cool air breathed over her exposed chest. A warm hand cupped her breast, nipple caught between thumb and the meat of Corvin’s palm, and he curled his fingers gently into her flesh.

  “Do you know why I am doing this to you?” he asked.

  She nodded,

  Her shoulder became cold when the gown slithered away. He brushed the hair from her neck, and Vaseri tipped her head to the side.

  “Tell me why,” said Corvin.

  “You will bed me to secure the lineage,” said Vaseri.

  His lips were warm over her pulse point. “I will plant my seed and your traitorous offspring will be transformed by my legacy.” Corvin traced the shape of the syllables to her collarbone, where gooseflesh rose to meet him. “I will plant my seed in you, Vaseri, because you are mine—my wife, my doe—and because this will be only the first child you bear for me.”

  “I know,” said Vaseri.

  “Tell me if breeding you is where I should stop tonight.”

  Her skin was exposed one stretch at a time. Her other breast. Her belly. Her arms. The fresh red scars on her back. Corvin took hold of her wrists’ bindings to stretch them over her head, and she hung halfway off the bed as he exposed the rest of her body.

  The Lord Mayor’s breath traveled warm and moist up her leg. He tasted her jutting ribs. He sucked her aching nipple into his mouth. She tried to lift her hands to his head but he pushed her wrists down again.

  “First things first,” he said.

  The towering rain-sprayed windows of Corvin’s bed chamber watched as he flipped Vaseri onto her belly and mounted her. His hand slipped between her legs. Vaseri’s gasp was lost to the wind. He worked at her for a time without penetration. She shivered and wept for release. He petted long strokes down her spine.

  “You don’t need to have me tied,” Vaseri said. “Let me move. Let me see you. I won’t fight.”

  Corvin whispered against her cheek, his body arched over hers, heavy against her hips. “It’s not about the fight.”

  He secured the lineage by entering her, filling her, and she remained blindfolded all the while. He pinned her hands as he rutted into Vaseri’s body.

  She begged for it the second time.

  She wept for it the third.

  They were not quiet, but neither was the storm.

  ~

  A HIGH, SUSTAINED CHIME roused Esor an Amen in a bedroom down the hall. He had been placed there after drinking himself unconscious and his head remained heavy on the pillow.

  The chime had entered a dream of àlvare and Dwarrow shouting at each other, weapons sheathed but fists lifted. He dreamed that shrill had come from the Heartbox. Now that he was awake, he realized the actual source of chiming was beside him. The wind’s vibration made an elaborate lamp at his bedside vibrate too. Glass sang against glass. He rested a hand on the shade to silence it.

  He was in the same chamber where Kuper prepared him to dine with Corvin, which looked to be maintained by servants as though it were his usual bedroom. Neither dust nor bloodtoad nests sullied confines lit only by smoldering brazier. Black robes of the Kovenor staff were folded on the dresser, as if inviting him to wear them. Esor stood and donned his own jacket.

  Wind was not the only sound in the hall. There was no mistaking the plaintive song of an àlvar, just as bright and urgent as glasswork trembling in the wind. Esor’s cheeks heated when he realized he was hearing sex.

  Lost in unfamiliar halls, he wandered to a cracked door, unseen, and watched through the width of a hand as Corvin moved his body over Vaseri’s. The Lord Mayor rippled with serpentine fluidity, his mouth close to her ear, lips moving as he whispered words that Esor could not imagine. Private words—the soft, dirty things that a lord and his wives exchanged in such moments.

  The specifics of their exchange were expressed in generalities by wordless tones. Those high notes Lady Vaseri cried formed some kind of plea, and the responding harmony several octaves lower from Corvin may have been assent, but there was no distinguishing sentences. Meaning transcended the form.

  Corvin’s strong hand curved between Vaseri’s legs. His antlers bowed near enough the fountain of her hair that it was difficult to tell who wore the rack.

  With a thunderous bellow, he anointed anointed Vaseri’s womb. It spilled from the juncture of their bodies and stained her bridal robes. His voice filled the room a thousandfold, harmonizing with his lover, with himself, sustaining his final note long after the movement ended.

  “We may consider you bred, wife, and finish here,” he growled. He stroked her hair from her neck and kissed it , rumbling like a hungry animal. The tie of her blindfold hung down her shoulder, vivid against ivory skin. She still could not see, yet she turned her cheek toward him, lips yearning.

  “More,” she whispered back, clearly enough for Esor to hear.

  Corvin handled her roughly, stripping the last of the robes from Vaseri’s body and tossing them toward the door.

  His eyes fell upon the crack. Another pair of eyes were watching them.

  Corvin rose from the bed and flung open the door.

  The hallway on the other side was empty. Esor was already gone.

  ~

  ESOR WAS SHARING LUNCHEON with Lady Malenē and her keroterase when Heralds sang strange news. He set down the tongs he used to eat a hot roll and listened. The staff hall fell silent with him.

  Song wafted through the open archways of windows as if the wind had lips and tongue. There were no tapestries to adorn such a humble space. Sounds echoed off the walls to rattle wooden mugs, which hands quickly smothered, and one maid closed the stove at the center of the room to quiet the fire. By the time the staff was quiet enough, the Heralds had transitioned from deaths in other counties through the newest price of tea.

  Climactically, they sang wedding announcements of note. The final wedding was said to be between Lord Mayor Corvin of Great House Kovenor and Lady Vaseri of House írsa. Their marriage contract had already been fulfilled.

  The Heralds stopped and conversation resumed at a dull roar.

  Servants and xilcadis employees alike could eat in the hall by the kitchen, but most normally took luncheon wherever they worked. Stirring gossip had drawn everyone to gather on that Light. There were hundreds of mouths discussing the sudden marriage of the Patrician’s eldest to the Lord Mayor. Few possessed the status for keroterase, so bucks and does alike leaned close to share their theories.

  None of them knew enough to surmise the circumstances except Esor.

  “A wedding,” Esor said, staring at the wall. “Is that a new arrangement?”

  “An old arrangement with changed terms,” said Malenē. “Vaseri is the Lord Mayor’s fourth ?anvens?te. A wife-concubine. He pays for their every need and they bear his heirs. He has taken no true wife to hold charge over his Patriciate in Set.” Malenē sipped her tea and toyed delicately with the handle. “Vaseri’s mother is Levusàlvar, so it’s surprising they settled for less than ?anvens?ko.”

  Esor had never encountered a lord with more than one wife and one concubine. “Four concubines. Isn’t that a lot?”

  “Not for the Magistrate’s heir,” said Malenē. “So long as he possesses coin to maintain them, he may take as many concubines as he wishes. Of course, he may elevate only one spouse to status near his own. It stands to reason he would wait to make this choice.” She studied Esor over the rim of her cup. “A Lord Mayor would never marry Low.”

  “Of course not,” he said, distracted.

  Lady Malenē discouraged him from speaking about the circumstances of the marriage. “You’ll be asked to take àstin’s students as your own. If you are wise, you’ll permit no discussion of his arrest in the classroom.”

  “I never said I was wise,” said Esor.

  “You need only be wise enough to stay alive.” Malenē snapped her fingers. Keroterase encircled her. She left Esor alone at his table.

  After the dramatic arrest and subsequent wedding, Ilare wanted nothing to do with lessons. She sat in the window of Esor’s classroom with a letter from a distant cousin in the countryside, vibrating with the kind of intensity she never showed for alchemical studies.

  “Did you know there is no record of àstin working in any of the ports he claimed?” asked Ilare. “I can only imagine what he thought would happen in ?elasdur. What was he trying to accomplish by seducing the Patrician’s daughter?”

  “Maybe he didn’t have control,” said Esor.

  “Love can be a thoughtless force,” said Samej.

  Ilare snorted indelicately. “They had plenty of time to think about it. Vaseri’s affair with àstin occurred over the course of months! A swift marriage suggests she fell pregnant by Dokàlvar seed. Wedding my brother ensures her offspring will be received as another of Corvin’s heirs.”

  “What if the baby is male and inherits?” asked Esor. “Is there no care for bloodline in House Kovenor?”

  “To the contrary. Every Great House is so obsessed with bloodline that they’ll lie to maintain the illusion of it,” said Samej.

  Ilare agreed. “Half the nobility are born to Low concubines. The other half are so inbred as to be cross-eyed. We’re a muddy pool of tangled bloodlines, we ‘High’ àlvar. If Vaseri’s child ever becomes our àlvilere, he’ll have my blessing to abuse the Great House that arrested his true father.”

  “He might grow to kill the one responsible for àstin’s capture,” said Esor.

  Samej’s brow took a troubled slant. He rested a gloved hand upon Esor’s shoulder. “There was no future for them,” Samej said quietly, “and you would have been punished for conspiracy if you attempted to hide it.”

  “Yes,” Esor said again, “I know.”

  A missive from the Lord Mayor instructed Esor to search what remained of àstin’s belongings. It was difficult when most of the classroom shelves were empty; anything valuable had been seized by House írsa to compensate for damages.

  The rest was in disarray, piled against a wall.

  Esor tried to sort through it. When he found the star charts that àstin used to teach Ismiren and Verim astronomy, he slid them into the waste bin. He sat down heavily to roll the Heartbox in his fingers, alone in the center of a spacious room.