The lead Infernal colpsed, hands ing around the wound as it spurt blood. Not a shape-ger. That was disappointing on a few different levels.

  His scream made the entire group halt, heads swivelling towards me as I pulled the hammer ba the revolver.

  Firearms were discharged on both sides as I ducked bato the hallway, grabbing Gregory and pulling him in with me. Bullets passed through the empty doorway, ricocheting off the wall and sending splinters flying.

  Gregory yelled, only barely audible over the cacophony

  More than three guns fired, the tinuing drumbeat of gunshots eg as I went bato the ballroom. The fake Bck Fme were rushing forward, only a few of them with guns that were finishing their volleys. Most of them carried trash, old greyhairss and young ohe tattered army uniforms on people who looked like they served two decades or more past. Most of the rest didn’t look ready to shave. That or like they’d never had a det meal in their life, even if the food was cut with t and sawdust like some of the eries apackers did.

  Someone had trawled the desperate and the destitute for an army and had sent them to die.

  Guests were on the ground screaming, some of them not moving at all. Daven was trying to stem a tide of blood gushing out of someone else’s throat. Others were less lucky as a stampede headed towards the stairs, stopping the guards who had e from making their way down.

  Infernals were dropping as well. Some guards fired pistols from the sed floor down into the rush below.

  Not all of them. Some slumped over the railing, but the initial wave of gunfire was over, a few stragglers firing bullets iher dire.

  “This is a distra,” I told Gregory. “There’s nothing this lot were going to do but cause a panid maybe harm a few people down here.”

  He didn’t ask for any crification, already running towards where his father had taken refuge, along with many guards at the top of the stairs. They were already heading deeper ihe sed floor.

  Muards must have e in while I’d been i area. A few were at the bottom of the stairs, dead or dying.

  I rushed towards them, revolver firing once more.

  The lead Infernal, a red-haired d with a bit of stubble, screamed as the bullet went into his bicep. The dagger in his hao the ground, and the others around him dove down as I pulled ba the hammer again.

  My other hand reached into a hidden pocket on my dress, tossing it at the floor. The liquid inside burst alight as soon as it was exposed to the air, spreading as the vial smashed into the floor.

  Not much fire. Enough to buy a precious couple of seds.

  I scooped up a saber from the ground, the dead guard’s blood still on it. It was longer and heavier than I was used to, but it would do.

  Only a little time now. Fleeing guests were already pletely past me, some fleeing from me. Some still tried to make it to the sed story. Others fled into the first-floor doors leading deeper into the estate. The vanguard of the attackers was nearly upon me, a loose, disanized line.

  No training among this lot. The uniform wearers were reloading guns. That would help some. I just o keep myself from being swarmed. As much as it buro be defending some of these people and to kill the ones in front of me, I didn’t have much choice.

  There were two possibilities. One was that this was another Shape-ger trick. More people tricked into doing their dirty work.

  The sed was that they were Bck Fme. That Versalicci was w with the gers or pursuing his own angle.

  Either way would not make me hesitate. I could only try not to kill.

  “Fug traitor!” One of them howled, charging forward with a club.

  “Like this is helping?” I asked, parrying the oning blow.

  My uh the saber was helped by my oppos' ck of petehe fug gers had likely just scooped whatever they could put in the Quarter was willing to take money for this.

  Tensions would be high after the marchs, so they wouldn’t takers.

  My terstrikes struck at the arm, cutting at tendons and f him to drop the club. A musket fired from up above, and his eye exploded as the bullet went through his skull.

  No time to think. Just buy time. Most were scattering through the ballroom, with only a few heading for the stairs. The fighting didn’t go well for them. With the saber I had the reach advantage, and most of them were trained in stabbing unsuspeg oppos in alleyways. A couple more bullets to take out the ones with their own swords.

  I was just buying time, fending off blows before retreating a few steps with every break in the fighting. Taking my swings where I could. Most of those failed to find flesh but it kept them cautious.

  Aunt Diwei charged dowairs, the nearly fifty-year-old moving like a womay years younger as her Dai sheared through the head of an Infernal who couldn’t be older thay. She stopped with the bde halfway through his head, removing it with an effortless motion.

  Magic ons.

  Then she spun around and swung it at me.

  “Could you not?” I yelled as my saber barely intercepted the dao, the impaearly taking the bde out of my hand. “I’m on your bloody side!”

  The magic on bit deep into my saber, slig through the bde and taking the top quarter of it off.

  A fake Bck Fme member tried to take advantage of the distra, rushing with a k me, wiry little arms holding it as her faarled, not even fully grown.

  I blocked their blow and aimed a revolver at her knee. I pulled the trigger, and her knee shattered as the bullet bsted through, and she dropped to the ground.

  Aunt Diwei paid me no mind, heading forward followed by her children. The Hells was her problem?

  Maybe a fifth of the Infernals had gone down. They still outnumbered us all, easily six or seven to one, but they were more cautious now. This wasn’t a cakewalk. People were getting hurt. And I seemed to be the only o going for deaths.

  Run, I thought as I pulled the hammer back, pretending a bullet was in the empty der as I looked among them. Hesitation was there. It just needed a push. Run.

  More screams again, this time from the side.

  I go see the door leading to the kits spewing out more Infernals. Damnations. Of course, the ones in those wagons hadn’t made it to the ballroom faster than Gregory and I. Two angles of attack.

  Three, actually, as windows shattered oher side of the ballroom. I went that way, striking at a half-emerged Infernal moving through the window.

  I took two down, tendons severed, bleeding, but was forced back.

  I locked sabers with my oppo, their off-hand one drawing back to swing at me.

  My tail stabbed with its dagger, a weak, easily parried blow. My oppo looked down, spotted it, aed accly. The sword came down to intercept it, sending the dagger flying from my grasp.

  That was fi is what I wahem to do.

  I lunged forward, knee moving to hit their arm aheir sword from moving. I tched onto their throat with my teeth.

  Yes, Yes, Yes, YES! The Imp yelled inside my head.

  I bit, teeth cutting through skin, through muscle before closing in on each other. The taste of copper flooded my mouth as I pulled back, skin and flesh tearing as poieeth sheared through it. Cartige ched between them. My oppo colpsed, gurgling as blood poured out of the ruin I’d made of her windpipe, eyes wide and pleading.

  I turned my head, ign it as I drove my saber into her chest. Hopefully, I’d hit the heart.

  I spat a mixture of flesh and blood across the floor.

  NOOOO!

  That robably another cow to be eaten.

  Two more on me. I tried to scoop up the dagger with my tail but failed before one swung a short sword at me. My saber parried, and my other hand dropped the revolver, trying to grab a dagger from a cealed pocket on my dress.

  I didn’t reach it in time as the sed Infernal stabbed at me with a dagger. I twisted, and the needle-point dug into my forearm instead of my wrist.

  I gritted my teeth as it sliced, pierg skin and ripping free as I fell back. There were more even behind those two, and only my retreat kept me from being surrounded.

  An inprehensible yell heralded Gregory’s arrival as he charged in, a saber wielded in two hands, striking one of my oppos in the side. The Infernal withdrew, screaming as he turned his attention to the nobleman.

  I stabbed the other ohen tried to follow the two of them as Gregory struggled, even less skilled at this than his oppo.

  He parried a blow sloppily. Gregory’s saber nearly fell from his hands, and another Infernal drove a dagger into his upper arm, blood straining the white sleeves of his shirt.

  His inal oppo cackled.

  I rammed the saber’s hilt guard into their jaw, sending them reeling back as a tooth flew out. It left me open as someone’s hoof shed out, catg me in the shin. Slivers of pain crawled up my leg as I moved tory’s side.

  “Gregory, scorch them,” I hissed as I parried another one.

  “It’ll hurt you,” he protested, trying to stop a sed blow, then yelling as the force wre from his hands.

  They were fog on us now.

  The guards had formed a loose perimeter, the Xangs anch one side while keeping the kit passages sealed. We’d been forced from the stairs to the side, and no one looked particurly ied in risking their necks trying to reach us.

  At least they’d shot the gun-wielders before a sed volley had started.

  An Infernal in a tattered uniform rushed forward, snarling. I parried their first blow, my shortened saber awkward in my hands. A dagger in his sed ha for me and my tail parried. He pressed me, and when I was stuck parrying with my both ons again his lunged forward, mouth opening.

  I tried to grab his head but I missed as teeth sank into my shoulder. I bit my tongue as he bit into my shoulder, teeth slig through my dress and into flesh. My hand spasmed, dropping the saber as teeth stabbed deeper till I felt them scrape bone.

  I screamed, pung owice. He didn’t relent and I could feel tips pung into bones. Something began to crack.

  A gunsh out and suddenly the pressure released and I choked out a sob as he fell dowh tearing at skin and carrying piee with him as he fell.

  “Fug do it!” I yelled at Gregory, scooping up the saber, and then two more were ohey were getting bolder.

  Parrying only worked so long. Swings with the heavy saber were harder for them to stop, and even as more of them joihe attack, I scored several wounding blows.

  Just not enough.

  A club struck my sword hand as I blocked another blow, and I howled as it felt like my fingers shattered. I dropped the bde as another oabbed toward me. I caught it, the middle of it pierg my palm all the way through and f me back even further, right up tory.

  “Now!” He screamed, and I closed my eyes and dropped.

  Not fast enough.

  A sound like an orchestra arose behind me, radiant and loud as it bsted overhead.

  My bad my arm felt like they were melting. I bit my tongue, blood flooding into my mouth to stop a scream as I fell to the ground. The heavenly music faded, mixed with the sound of sizzling flesh as I writhed.

  One of my hands went to a hidden pocket, pulling out a vial I forced to my lips. The pain eased, no longer overwhelming as I breathed, tears streaming down my cheeks from the pain.

  A hand touched my back, and I groaned as pain fshed ae. I tried to moved, only for everything to hurt before I could eve a hoof underh me.

  “Malvia, are you alright?” Gregory asked me, eyes wide. “I’m sorry, I did my best not to hit you.”

  “Potion,” I force out. “Hip pocket, right side.”

  Seds passed in agony before I felt something being pushed against my lips. Someoipped my head bad I gulped down the liquid as it came in. Feeling began to return to me, more with each sed, agony fading in equal measure.

  It was still a full minute before I even began to move.

  “Sorry, I tried not to hit you,” Gregory said, helping me up. “It still hit your back.”

  I looked at my arm, where blue skin had been burnt crimson, and did my best to ignore my pain as I rotated my neck. It seared and hurt, but I’d had worse, even as I g the red, burnt flesh stretg down the backless part of my dress.

  It had probably been worse before the potion. Wasn’t that a happy thought to have. I turned my attention back to the ballroom.

  Only to find no oning rush. No fighting. No Infernals moving at all, instead charred bodies lying about, some of them still moving and twitg about, mixed with an occasional wide-eyed injured but unburnt Infernal lying on the ground. The rest were charred husks.

  I shivered. They’d made their choices, so I could only feel so sympathetic as I looked for any remaining fake Bck Fme.

  I found none.

  I whistled as I let my gaze go over the entire ballroom. Had he hit any of them who’d been above waist height? Do not uimate Gregory Montague, indeed.

  “How long have you been holding that in your pocket?” I asked, bumping him with my uninjured shoulder, an easy grin on my face. “You have anything else in there, perhaps?”

  Seds passed with no response as he looked at the ballroom, seemingly not even notig me.

  The grin faded off my face. I’d said something wrong.

  “There, uh, should be more still ing,” I said less fidently.

  Gunfire from outside. The Watch had finally arrived. Well, never mind then.

  Several nobles were staring at me with a mixture of fusion and fright that was rather nice, especially on those wearing fake horns.

  Aunt Diwei was busy withdrawing her dao from the throat of some poor soul on the ground. Another pocket of the dead, dying, or injured y scattered where she and my cousins had goo work. Now, though, she walked towards me, halting a few feet away.

  “Who are you?” She asked me with a calm but insistent force.

  I gave her a grin, being careful not to open my mouth. Blood-streaked teeth would be too provocative.

  “A guest of the Montagues,” I said. “Noting more.”

  Cousins were cirg: Fang, , and Aing up a loose square around me.

  “You stink of the Diabolic,” Aunt Diwei said, her grip on her sword tightening.

  I didn’t move my head, even as I could hear the tread of my cousins just out of sight. Close.

  “If you wish me to judge for that, you put me in your custody,” I said. “As citizens of the Empire, it is yht. You might be disappointed by the results you get.”

  Aunt Diwei’s mouth tightened, a word ing from it she probably expected no one behind her children to uand. Fubai. Corruption is a word I was too used to her tossing as an accusation when I was young.

  “Not quite,” I said cheerfully. “Iher sense, I’d argue. If you wao surrender, I will, but again, you’ll be disappointed.”

  Screaming started, ing from the upper floors. I turned around, past Fang’s scowling fad ’s more serene expression. The stairs didn’t lead all the , but parts of the third floor were visible. I could see the shadow of something hulking in the mplight up there as the sounds of gunshots resumed.

  “Your talents might be more needed up there-?” Aunt Diwei was already moving past with a sful look, her family right behind them. The Watch was on the move as well, leading to a traffic jam oairs as every single guest suddenly wao be head back dowairs. Diwei started barking orders that no o her family could uand; most of it sisted of various aspersions on the guests' characters.

  Well, this might have beeoo many clues to give, but if she figured it out, there wasn’t much I could do. I wouldn’t be wearing this faorrow anyway.

  Gregory moved closer while I rechecked my arm. The redness was fading, not very fast, but obviously much faster thaing nature take its course.

  “We should head outside,” I said, already moving towards the door.

  It took him a sed to catch up, taken off-guard.

  “Shouldn’t we head upstairs?”

  “The esteemed Diwei Xang, her children, and most of the watch are already heading that way,” I noted. “We will be going for where our prey will be leaving.”

  ***

  Outside the manor was a skirmishing ground. Occasional groups of Infernals were scattered about, trying to find routes out of an ever-increasing cordon of Watch. Only the chaos gave them any opportunity, and most failed to take it.

  I ighat for now, looking up at the manor's third floor and roof.

  “Will they take a window out?” I asked Gregory.

  “They try, but they’d fail. Holy, I’d hoped they’d try to take one in. The rooms don’t have any doors.”

  I chuckled. “Point to your father. That’s one way to keep people off the third floor.”

  Ideally, no windows would do the same, but perhaps there was a trick to trap people in those rooms after they got in? That left our shapegers with oher potential entrance or exit. They could always try to force a wall, but that was gamble, and people teowards the path of least resistance.

  “We’re still heading up then. you climb up a rope?”

  Not that Gregory was bereft of muscles, I thought, eyes lingering on his shoulders. But that didn’t necessarily mean the ability or experience.

  “Pretty well. Hopefully, I set a det enough pace since I imagine you’ll wao go first?”

  Why would he he think that? He ined his head down at me, and I looked down quizzically at my dress-ah right.

  The dress was ruined as well. Bloodstains, cuts in the fabric where it had been cut and stabbed, I was actually lucky that it was still hanging onto me.

  “I’d appreciate it,” I said. “Damnations, this dress is ruined. I’ll have to apologize to your friend, and sorry about wasting your money.”

  “It was money well spent,” Gregory told me with a hint of his usual vigor.

  I smiled. “You seem better?”

  “Better?”

  “You were shaken up some back there,” I said.

  Gregory opened his mouth but was stopped by two members of the Watch running towards us.

  “Tommy, Amna,” I said, waving a greeting befrabbing the grappling hook.

  “Harrow,” Amna said, haltiantly a few steps away, hand on her pistol.

  Not drawing it yet, at least.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Tommy asked, his pistol already drawn. “What are you even doing outside?”

  “Hopefully, wasting my time,” I answered. “If not, taking care of some uninvited guests, in which case I’d appreciate you following us up.”

  I tossed the hook, aiming for the rooftop while the both of them kept wary eyes on me. I suppose threatening to kill Tommy had left some ill will there.

  “Malvia, you have blood essentially coating your ,” Gregory whispered to me.

  I touched my with my fingers, and they returned wet and red. Right, biting the throat out.

  “Time is a wasting,” I said. “As the only person here with a skirt, I hope you all don’t mind if I go up st.”

  ***

  Luckily it didn’t take too long to climb, while the screaming and sound of gunfire tinued inside. Once I reached the top, I noticed some unwanted followers on the rope below us.

  Four Infernals going up the rope I’d left dangling off the hook. Truth be told, I was leaving it there for any further members of the Watch. How many from the Quarter had been paid to join this fool’s errand?

  I sidered calling to the others, only for my mind to go to the floor full of corpses inside.

  I pulled out my knife and then held it out far enough that they could see it before starting to saw through the ropes. They got the message quickly, making it to the ground before I’d finished carving. I sliced through the st of the fibers, letting it drop.

  “Everything alright?” Amna called.

  I gave her a toothy grin that made her pale. Right, blood.

  “Everything is going fine, just making sure no one follow us up,” I said.

  Turning to the rooftop itself, I cpped my hands together. “Well, this is simpler than expected.”

  Two eys dotted the roof, bries thankfully oendi feet from the ground. Large ooo, with s rge enough for us to stand on. Large enough to make an easier climb down as well. Several firepces must be ected to each, and probably heaters. Lamps dotted the rooftop, providing plenty of illumination. Another anti-thief measure?

  I’d expected more, and we’d barely be able to see it. Some good luck for once.

  “There’s two eys, so two pairs,” I said. “Gregory, if you wouldn’t mind going with Tommy? Someone capable of magic should be at either one. Do you need a grapple?”

  “We’ll be fihout. ey’s more craggy than my cousin’s-“

  Whatever part of his cousin’s anatomy Tommy had been about to mention was interrupted by Anna’s elbow to his gut.

  ***

  I got to the top of our ey just in time because, looking down, I could see something moving down there.

  I waved at Amna, still climbing below me, and she dropped, running off towards where Tommy and Gregory were. I reached inside my dress.

  Fitting vials in the hidden pockets had been an issue, even with the number of hidden pockets Aedelia had added, there were limitations, especially on size. So potency was the key, especially with the little mixture I had in my left hand while my right went for the dagger I hadn’t used in the fight in the ballroom.

  As dangerous as it had been, other Infernals didn’t justify venom from ahereal Ghost Asp like Shapegers did. I hoped the tter enjoyed having their veins frozen and their bones incapable of moving. Immense pain as well, but the paralysis was the key part.

  The eime the figures below got closer, while the sounds of fighting also came up, screams, roars, and gunfire.

  The first figure squeezed through, arms grabbing the side of the ey as they pulled themselves up.

  I kicked as soon as their fatered the light.

  I kicked the head as hard as I could with my hoof. It snapped back, a scream of pain ing from them.

  The rest of their body suddenly swelled up, thiing to fill the ey and f itself out, straining the metal-threaded clothes.

  I didn’t give the ger any more time, the dagger in my hand jabbing through the fabrid earning another howl as they tipped backward.

  “Mr. Hawkins,” I said mogly. “The ey? Even six-year-old children in the quarter know while you may take the ey in, but even if there is literally no other way, ake it out.”

  The ger had goi the middle at the blow. Poison probably helped as well. Their upper body hung down the ey. It stretched like the word’s fleshiest accordion until his head touched the roof, stretg out his metal-threaded clothes.

  He tried to move, only for Amna and Tommy to both fire. Their bullets hit him in the ned head, ripping screams of pain out of him as the part of him still in the ey writhed.

  From below the se of the ey, his writhing bottom half obscured yelling from down there. Some irate partner was shrieking for him to move. A golden light suddenly bloomed below, tingling my skin as it swept up the ey.

  Oh, things weren’t going as well for them down there, either.

  Amna and Tommy approached the upper half of Hawkins with bdes in their hands, only for him to begin to ge. A form simir to the docks one, clothes ripping apart as his skin hardened. It molted, shell ses like those on a lobster pushing their way through and ripping apart skin and clothes alike.

  Bone bdes were pushing through the shredded remnants of his hands. Strange. A different form of ging? Maybe a different ger assuming the role of Hawkins.

  “First, they are so difficult to maneuver in, and if you get stuck, you’re done. Your dehydrated corpse will be found by the owhe ime he bothers to get it ed. Sedly, on the subject of ing, the filthiness of these will not just stick to your clothes and make you more easily identified, it tends to get into one’s eyes. As it clearly has for you.”

  The ger roared as the bonebdes filed.

  His torso hadn’t started f the shell yet. Well, I wouldn’t fail to capitalize. I drove my dagger into his unprotected side. It dove deep, pierg the flesh and finding no bone or muscle to slow it down. No blood poured out, either. Well, hopefully, the poison will still find its p his body.

  “I was talking, Mr. Hawkins,” I said as I pulled on the dagger, letting it slice through more of his elongated midse. “I would have thought you’d learned a lesson about uimating me.”

  The wound closed behind the dagger’s path, and flesh tracted in on itself. The ger ulling itself back up here, snarling the eime.

  I unstoppered the vial by the time his torso finished trag. It was a bottle of acid guarao chew through a foot of flesh in thirty seds or less.

  “Let me help you those spot-stained eyes out,” I said before dumping the entire vial onto his face.

  Author's Note: Apologies for this being out te, I thought I had remembered to schedule it on here. I had not.