“We need to leave, now!” Uncle Yuri yelled.

  Mikhail couldn’t agree more. The stench of burning hair and flesh filled the cavern, turning his stomach as he hurried with the others away from the macabre funeral pyre. He knew without a doubt who’d done this. Voronina and her father. The last time Mikhail had seen the Alchemist Master, head of Alchemist security, the crazed man had been preparing to brand him as a Dishonoured, cursing him to a life outcast even from the guildless.

  Mikhail gazed around, looking for some clue as to how the Alchemist Guild had razed Ledavsk to the ground. He’d seen and heard of many of the Guild’s powerful weapons, but he’d never heard even a whisper of something that could level a Sentinel base.

  His foot caught, and he stumbled, knee cracking on concrete. Mikhail sucked in a sharp breath and stood. Sovereign Sculptor that hurt. He glared at the offending ground, then cocked his head. He hadn’t tripped on rubble, but on a narrow foot-and-a-half wide groove in the ground. Six inches beyond the groove lay another. Then another. And another. Tracks.

  “Klara,” he said, calling his sister over and pointing. “What do you think made that?”

  Klara studied the track, which soon veered left off the street and ploughed into what had once been a building. “There are two tracks,” Klara said, pointing to the rubble. Indeed, the rubble had been knocked aside, leaving a ten foot wide channel through the debris, a channel flanked by the strange tracks.

  “Whatever created that,” Klara said, “is responsible for Ledavsk.”

  “Stop wasting time,” Yuri said from the front of the procession, now a dozen yards away and moving fast. “We don’t know when they’ll be back.”

  Mikhail and Klara jogged after the group, catching them up. After a minute they left the central circle, once again shrouded in darkness as they entered the corridor at the base of the coil train tunnel.

  They walked in silence for a while, each lost to their own thoughts. What Mikhail couldn’t make sense of was why the Alchemists had destroyed Ledavsk, then abandoned the fort. That left the country vulnerable to the helganas. Certainly helgana only rarely travelled through the gate, and while they were lethal if they caught you, their jaw capable of slicing through even strength extract boosted muscle and bone, they were small and slow. Compared to a dragon.

  It made no sense why the Alchemist’s would allow that loose. It was as though their tactics were prepared by a pair of madmen. That about sums of the Voronin family…

  “They need to be stopped,” a deep voice whispered in the darkness. Yeger.

  “But how?” Mikhail asked. “You’ve all seen how powerful they are. They control the extracts, they control the technology, and they have a secret weapon powerful enough to obliterate a Sentinel fortress. Resisting them is hopeless…” He trailed off, the silence of the others confirmation that he had voiced their fears. “Voronina was right, we should run.”

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  “Run?” Yeger asked, his voice as harsh as the tundra. “I’m carrying my brother’s body and you want to run?”

  “Only hours ago you wanted to run,” Klara said, though her words lacked any bite. It was just a fact.

  Mikhail could almost feel the rage emanating from the dark form of Yeger ahead of him.

  “I was wrong,” Yeger said at last.

  “No, you weren’t,” Mikhail said. “We are going to die if we stay here. What could we do to stop the Alchemists? We have limited weapons, a dwindling supply of extracts, and one airship.”

  “Hey!” Yuri said, “You’re not volunteering Vera for anything.”

  “Enough, everyone,” Klara said, her voice echoing off the stone walls of the tunnel. After a beat she continued, “Mikhail, you’re wrong. We do have something. Something so powerful it destroyed several squads of Alchemist soldiers and left a giant hole in the Guild building.”

  Mikhail shook his head. “Oh no. No way. We are not using her as a weapon.”

  “She already is a weapon,” Klara said. “Just how long do you think it’ll be before the Alchemists make a move against the Warrior Guild too and try capture your mother?”

  “They wouldn’t dare…” Mikhail didn’t believe a word he’d said.

  “Just like they wouldn’t dare strike a Sentinel fortress?” Yeger asked, his voice deadly. “If your mother can stop them, then she will help us.”

  “And just how,” Yuri said from the lead, “are you planning to get to Krepost Lozvinsky?”

  “You’re going to fly us, Uncle,” Klara said.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “You’d let the Sentinels fall just to protect your skin?” Klara asked.

  Yuri laughed, though it lacked humour. “Of course not. I’d let the Sentinels fall to protect my crew. We’re not warriors, we’re traders.”

  “Oh stop giving us that muck,” Klara said, anger lacing her words. “You’re pirates. All of you. I know that’s how my mother died! And you are responsible for her death, Yuri Trubnikov.”

  Tension hung heavy in the air. The group had come to a stop and Mikhail could just see the shadows of Klara and Yuri face to face, his sister towering over the short airship captain.

  “I don’t know what lies your father told you,” Yuri said, his voice cold and harsh, “but your mother died giving birth to you.”

  Oh, this is bad… Mikhail shut his eyes and let out a slow breath.

  “Now,” the Air Trader continued, “I’ll take you lot to Lozvinsky and find Elana then I’m done. For good. I don’t want to ever see you Koskovs again. Any of you, you understand?”

  Silence met his proclamation, dragging on, each second an icy blow to the group’s already shattered moral.

  Finally, Klara broke the silence, her voice a weak croak, “I understand.”

  They continued through the tunnel, no one speaking. A leaden dread settled in Mikhail’s stomach. They were going to find whatever had taken over his mother, and try to convince it to help them.

  Desperation had pushed them to find an unstable and lethal weapon, but what would the cost be? How did they even know that the uzhas in his mother could be trusted?

  He supposed they’d find out soon enough.