Wind hammered the white throat of the corridor in waves so fierce they seemed to bend the stone. Every gust dragged frost across the walls, then vanished beneath a counter–blast of scalding steam, leaving the surface sweating in alternate skins of ice and dew. Kael led the line with the Nullglaive braced like a spear-staff, boots skating across iron grating that trembled above a void of swirling Essentia haze. Each time his heel slipped the grate revealed nothing but grey mist and, somewhere far below, the faint corona of Anchor Six dying in darkness.
Five bronze vanes spanned the corridor floor, each a jaw of interlocking slats controlled by rust-chewed timer wheels. The first wheel clicked from five to four to three; a groan of tortured metal followed; then the slats roared sideways and a polar wind cannoned through, ripping a dead crawler from the grate and hurling it into the abyss. Two seconds later the jaws snapped shut, timer jerking back to five. Steam vents in the ceiling fired randomly, hissing sheets of white fog or geysers of super-heated droplets that cratered the grate wherever they hit.
Elias crouched at the wheel, crack-marbled lens gauging the pattern. "Two-second gap every five!" he shouted, voice skimming the gale. "Slats don't always lock properly—watch the stitching!"
Kael waited for the first closure—slats, click, timer up—then sprinted. Wind dragged tears from his eyes. Thorn followed, Emberguard shield raised like a cliff face; the mule squealed and reared, but Rei lashed its halter and vaulted beside. Liora's surviving point archer rolled through, clipping her bow on a grille yet keeping stride. Gerrin stumbled as frost formed instant rime on his coil, but Veyra's fox mask flickered solid under his elbow to steady him. Last came Varin, rope coiled round his waist, quick fingers already measuring distances.
The second vane opened early. Thorn slammed the shield into the gap, sparks leaping where bronze teeth bit iron. Gerrin blasted a ribbon of super-cooled vapour across the hinge; ice fused metal for half a heartbeat—just long enough for Kael to drag the mule's rear hooves free before bronze snapped shut, shattering the rime into glittering dust.
They regrouped under a vent plate. Breath steamed white; every face glistened with sweat shock-cooled to ice. The third vane's wheel ticked down, but a ceiling jet erupted ahead, disgorging molten droplets that hung like orange beads in the windless pocket before falling. One droplet punched through an archer's sleeve and sizzled on skin; she bit back a scream. Rei reversed a dagger, slashing through the droplet mid-air—half flash-froze, half vaporised. More droplets followed; Liora fired frost arrows, each shaft blossoming into a crystal parasol that split the molten spray. Gerrin's coil spat out its reserve at the grate, frosting rungs the width of his shoulders.
They cleared the third vane, timer hammering shut inches behind Thorn's boot. Fuse sigil flickered in peripheral sight—22 h 43 m—lower than comfort, but Kael forced it aside. Ahead waited the fourth vane, slightly wider, timer wheel jittering between three and four, the bronze rails scarred by ancient cracks.
Thorn wedged Emberguard deep beneath the slats; runes flared, pushing heat back into metal to expand the gap. Gerrin sprayed the hinge again, ice creaking. Rei coaxed the mule forward, murmuring, "Don't you dare panic; nobody else gets to die." The animal shuddered once, then obeyed. Liora's wounded archer stumbled; Kael caught the strap of her quiver, hauled her clear just as the hinge splintered its last bolt. Thorn sprang free, shield rim glancing off Kael's gauntlet; bronze jaws clapped closed with a boom that jarred teeth.
The final vane squatted like a guillotine. Timer disk hung loose, slats twitching madly. Beyond, daylight glared silver-white. Kael felt the seed under his sternum twist—a fresh edge begging to open space—but this blade cut only moments, and time was thinner than wind here.
Varin was already tying rope round Thorn, then around himself. He tested the tension with banker's precision and flashed Kael a grin—freckles bright under frost, fear hidden by arithmetic. "Light weight anchors faster," he said, and before anyone answered he leaped the meter-wide gap, rope streaming.
For a breath the mechanism held. Varin's boots struck the far lip; he hammered a piton through a corroded ring, wrapped rope twice round and called, "Go!"
Kael drove forward. The mule bolted, shielded by Rei's body as she half-dragged, half-skated it across. Gerrin limp-fired the coil's last breath into pitted bars; they hissed but held. Thorn crossed second-last, hauling the wounded archer. Bronze teeth trembled. Wheel twitched. Kael planted and pushed, spine jerking under the rope slack still tugging behind him.
Then the hinge behind Varin shrieked.
Two bolts snapped, flying into the void. The piton bent under Thorn's and the mule's weight. Rope vibrated like a plucked bow-string. Varin's eyes flicked left—metal fatigue measured in half-seconds. Thorn roared, bracing deeper; the mule reared, doubling the load. Rope burned brighter in Varin's palms. Ledger columns unfurled behind his eyelids: mass, torque, failure threshold, survivor value. Balance demanded a single subtraction.
Kael's new slit spat open—silver ice, a promise to cheat physics—but he was one breath late. Varin smiled, small and rueful, as he slid the belt knife edge beneath the rope.
In that slice of halted time Varin watched dust motes swirl, each one a grain of Essentia he would never weigh. He tasted iron from a cut on his tongue. He heard Kael's voice four years younger in a sun-drenched courtyard: Some debts are worth more than coin, cousin. He saw Thorn as a boy covering Kael from stray fistfights, unwavering. He saw Rei red-haired, betting her last allowance on Thorn's odds. He saw Veyra promising him illusions of quiet lakes. He saw Elias, nose bloodied, asking for help balancing kinetic equations. He saw House Ashwin crest stitched into ribbon, silver falcon ready to fly.
Ledger balanced.
Knife met rope. Fibres hissed; tension died. Wind birthed a howl of sudden freedom. Thorn staggered backward; the mule lurched but remained. Varin tipped, coat snapping, red silk ribbon fluttering from his wrist like severed lifeline.
Cold flood-lit his nerves. Weight vanished. Time slowed until even wind seemed ponderous. He fell through a strobe of steam and frost, eyes wide enough to catch every shimmer of Essentia spark spinning past. Above, Kael lunged—silver slit yawning, desperate to bridge dying distance—but the bronze slats jerked open with a roar, and space between cousins became untraversable.
Varin's final breath crystallised. Balance it, he thought, not sure if the words reached lips. The ribbon spiralled after him, crimson against a storm of grey, then dissolved into the white roar underfoot.
In the corridor silence cracked.
Kael's scream tore raw from his chest, echoing down bronze walls. Thorn's bellow followed, deeper, a sound of ripped iron. Gerrin collapsed, clutching coil and sobbing Sena's name with Varin's tangled in grief. Rei's dagger pommel struck the grate once, knuckles white. Veyra's fox mask folded, keening.
"No—move!" Kael rasped, each syllable shredding his throat. "Go!"
He shoved Thorn first—huge shoulders rigid with loss yet obedient to command. Rei dragged the mule; Gerrin struggled but rose when Kael hooked an arm under his. Liora's uninjured archer half-carried her wounded sister. Veyra stumbled, fox mask flickering; Kael steadied her, felt illusions tremble like exhausted heartbeats.
A vent erupted ahead; Gerrin threw the coil's last gout of frost, ice shattering steam to snow. The final metre of grate sagged; Kael tore a short slit, hustled Veyra through while cold sliced his palms. Pain seared up to elbow but he welcomed it—proof of any feeling that was not emptiness.
Sunlight slammed them like a breaking wave. The gale vanished, replaced by vineyard-scent and distant gull-cries. No one cheered; they were too stunned to weep. Kael half-expected Varin to stumble out laughing at their faces. Only the hush told truth.
He turned once. The archway throat remained dark, bronze jaws locked. A tremor rolled along white stone; somewhere deep inside, the last vane clanged shut for the final time. The Gate would not open again today.
Kael bowed his head, gripping ribbonless hilt. Thorn pressed charred shield over heart whispered Varin's name. Rei knelt, touching the grate-scar on her boot. Gerrin stared at coiled frost, eyes hollow. Veyra cradled fox mask, tails limp like dying petals.
"He's not coming through, he's gone," Kael said, broken whisper. He pointed the glaive toward marble stairs yawning down to the pavilion where crowds buzzed in distant anticipation. "There will be blood."
They limped, each footfall heavier than the last yet bound to forward motion.
—
Daric Rhal burst through the arch minutes earlier, pulse clanging in his skull. Wind dropped. Sunlight nearly blinded him after hours of violet gloom. Cracked bronze slats shuddered behind; he swore the Gate would cave before anyone else could follow. Berrin stumbled out next, face bloodless, salvage crate bumping his knee.
They half-fell onto sandstone where clerks in brown smocks waited with stretchers. A steward in black lion livery—Rhal's uncle Gerent—caught his shoulders. "Daric! Where's the rest?"
Rhal tasted bile. "Anchor…specialist Varin Ashwin…they all… Anchor blew." The words shattered like glass. Six dead. Better a lie than truth that named him thief.
A robed dean hurried forward, eyes bright with horror. "Varin Ashwin—gone?"
"Gone." Rhal let tears slip, honest in their selfish origin. "I tried to drag them—Sena Frost-Spire, the archers—they slipped. Thorn… too heavy." He pictured the rope shorn, bronze teeth yawning. He had not cut the line, yet his greed for coil shards had killed them as surely as the wind.
Murmurs rose in the ranks of parents and house envoys packed beneath silk awnings. News of an Ashwin heir's cohort crushed in a Gate would ripple to the Senate. Rhal felt heat bloom despite blood loss: House Malkyre might stand in that gap.
They shepherded him toward the dais—marble ringed by banners, thrumming with attention. He glimpsed storm-wrought Professors, silver-braided Ashwin elders, Eastreach magi in sapphire. Words bubbled like fever. Give them heroism; give them tragedy. He choked out the tale: final surge, collapsing anchor, Rhal clinging to shards while urging comrades to flee. Names he remembered he wrapped in praise; names he had never learned he folded into the phrase "brave souls." The steward's hand on his shoulder weighted each syllable with lion-house gravitas. Applause—the polite, pained kind—rose like incense.
Inside, Rhal trembled. If Kael somehow lived—no, the corridor would have claimed them. He forced damp eyes upward, seeking confirmation in pitying stares.
A courier boy burst from the side entrance, cloak flapping. Voice cracked with terror and relief. "Kael Ashwin and cohort—alive! On the upper landing—coming down now!"
Silence hit like hammerfall. Quills froze; banners sagged mid-breeze. The steward's grip tightened bruising hard. Rhal felt his own pulse vanish, replaced by a hollow expanding cold. He tried to swallow but his throat clamped shut.
The crowd pivoted, eyes sweeping to the head of the grand stair. Shadows limped into view: a colossal shield rim scarred black, a frost-smoked coil sparking, a mule staggering under torn packs, and at the front—Nullglaive shining like a dark moon.
Rhal's knees threatened to buckle. Panic clawed as though the wind corridor had followed him out. His lie shattered in his skull before it reached parchment. He tasted copper—bit his own tongue. The steward hissed something—orders, maybe—but Rhal heard only the pound of blood.
"What—?" The word fluttered from his lips, thin and broken.
Kael Ashwin's gaze speared down the stair—two black stars set in ash-streaked face. Rhal felt exposed, as if every secret clung to his torn cloak. He backed a step; crate clattered; Essentia shards chimed accusation.
The hush deepened, pregnant with coming storm. Rhal could almost hear rope sliding through Varin's hands again, almost see red ribbon spiralling downward.
And then Kael cleared the top step, Nullglaive angled like judgement.