The main cathedral of Halspus was a t structure, hewed from white marble iuries past, spires reag up to scrap the sky. Six of them at each er of the hexagonal temple stretched upwards, narrowing only at the very end to form points. Otherwise the rest of the temple sat retively slow, a hexagonal block with engravings oside, showing Halspus and his progression from simple farmer to returning life to the bsted ndscape of Anglea by letting the sun shine once more upon it.

  A lot of that process involved dead devils, the ones who had sealed away the sun in the first pce.

  And they would have sealed it away for a thousand more if it wasn’t for that torch-wielding lunatic, The Imp hissed in my head. we just leave now?

  No, I thought idly before remembering the Imp couldn’t hear my thoughts.

  For turies, its magically ented stone had been one of the tallest structures around, only beaten by ically aided mainstays of the city’s skylihat was ging as the Ironworks challehem, but even they weren’t nearing those heights. Only the Imperial Pace was taller, and it still was missing a few towers from the killing of Her Most Profane Majesty.

  I sat at a small cafe at the far end of the rge square the entrance of the cathedral led to, ohat was clearly used t worshipper of Halspus. That meant a lot of angry staff and ers gring my way as I browsed the menu while enjoying a good cup of tea.

  There was uring closer for me. Even across the square it felt like my skin was being picked and pricked at. If I stayed here for aire day. I’d have to pick through my skin and excise the cells corrupted by the divine energies trying to kill me.

  Voltar had stayed out with me across the square, sitting at the table. Dawes was off handling some other task, while Tagashin was currently pretending to be a neer boy selling the Greenwick Times in the middle of the square.

  Hopefully, the usual paperboy had just been paid off instead of subjected to the whims of Tagashin. Then again, I hadn’t talked to her since she’d helped me iunnels against the pair of shape-gers. I wasn’t sure if that ge in behavior had been ge might have been my cussion, altering my perception of what I’d seen.

  “You think there will be any real difficulty catg her?” I asked as I sipped a cup of tea.

  The effects of the drake’s tea weren’t perma, to my relief, but it was slow to fade. The tea in my cup still tasted like a poor, poor substitute for that glorious cup of liquid starlight I’d been given by Valit, but it didn’t taste like mud.

  That liquid starlight had probably been a drug of some kind in hindsight.

  “Doubtful,” Voltar noted. “The Church of Halspus likes its reputatio nid tidy, despite its attempts at agitation. With the ret events at the marches, it will want to make sure that its house is kept nid .”

  I raised an eyebrow. “They were the ones bombed, not the ones doing the bombing. So unless you're implying that they have something else they want hidden from any potential extra attention.”

  Voltar sipped tea as the gears in my head turned. He couldn’t be implying they were more tied into this shape-ger plot than they already were? Not only would that be extremely risky for very little reward in the end. Part of the reason I’d dismissed it when we’d spotted their symbols on those papers. They would be possibly implig themselves in things that would irritate most of the other fas iy, from killing a drake to attag the noble’s party to bombing their own followers.

  I paused, a horrible thought to me.

  The bombings in the Infernal Quarter. urpose had they served? At first I thought it was a ger trick, motivated by whatever made them target the Bck Fme to begin with, then the Fme themselves. Eventually, though, there just wasn’t a viable enough motive for either side to have dohis.

  Just a case of bad timing makihink it art of a plot from pyers who had nothing to do with it. An interse of two schemes makes it appear as if there was one. I’d been thinking about how the Bishop could have arrahe marches, but had pulled a bnk in figuring out what it would help with.

  However, what if it was another party’s scheme entirely? The only factors involved were ohat didn’t o be tied into the scheme of the shape-gers at all. The marg of the churd its followers in the Infernal Quarter.

  If they had set that up themselves…I was only vaguely aware of the trembling of my teacup as my mind traced possibilities. It fit, partially, but what was the motive behind it?

  Finishing his tea, Vently set it down.

  “There is, of course, no evidence of them being responsible for those bombs,” he said quietly. “But there were rumblings about them pushing to recim the churches in the district. Opening them up again.”

  Slowly, precisely so I didn’t drop it to the ground, I put my own teacup ba its saucer.

  “Th-that’s not possible,” I said, barely trolling a tremble. “There are ws to prevent that, ws for a very good reason.”

  The reason beih. The reason being the divine energies of Halspus that kept me far away from the main temple, oher side of the square and still, my skin itched.

  It didn’t eveo be right o us. When we were exposed to that kind of divine energy that a Halspus secrated temple could put out for weeks, months, years on end? The other deities kept the emanations from their temples and the harmful effects of their energies were lower except when used in force.

  Halspus wanted us dead. Halspus had no such reservations.

  “It will not work,” Voltar said reassuringly. “The timing was too tal and with ret developments, they have too many eyes on them. Besides, the Queen seems strangely relut to grant said request.”

  “Ah,” I muttered. “So they’ll help us, to be useful, so she eventually will.”

  “That and many, many other things across the empire,” Voltar replied. “We are just a small part of that. Although the church seems genuinely ed that a shape-ger may have slipped into their ranks. As anyone would be. How is Edward Montague doing?”

  The sudden ge in topic jolted me out of my thinking regarding the churd what it may have done.

  “He’s doing as well as expected,” I said. “The hand-off went well. I visited ter. The trio have as little of an idea as I do about what happeo him.”

  The ‘trio’ were Valit and his two fellow drakes, who I’d entrusted Edward Montague to for now. Not only were they the safest people to shelter him, but I was hoping they would have some insight into the transformative magics that were slowly making the young o a draic humanoid.

  So far, that had been unsuccessful.

  “Hrrm. History would be the first pce to check, if your analysis of maginot turn up a solution.”

  “I am aware,” I replied testily. “However, these kinds of poisonings aren’t on and alterations are varied. But never physical to my recolle. This is new.”

  Not to say physical alterations were impossible, but they should have cropped up by now. Instead, all alterations the cure made had always beeal.

  Any further thought on that was interrupted by our target walking out of the doors to the cathedral.

  Bishop Ellirevans, a high-ranking clerical priest iemple, was a middle-aged woman with a calm smile and a slow walk as she peered at some papers. Making her way across the square to this cafe for a bite to eat while w was a regur occurrence for her. It didn’t appear anyone had warned her that today might be her st time.

  She made it halfway before notig me and Voltar sittio her usual table. She slowed to a halt, face paling as she turned around.

  From the edges of the square, Watch appeared, whistles blowing as boots hit the ground and they moved in. Bishop Strevans whirled about before choosing the cathedral, running back.

  Tagashin got to her before she took a step, her disguise still up as she darted forward. Pulling a rune-inscribed wand from her pockets, she jabbed the bishop in the cheek with it.

  I watched as the bishop frozen, then her flesh moved. Gasps came from all around us as the already shocked cafe guests realized she was one of them.

  “Your theory was correct,” Voltar observed as the bishop’s skin tore and reformed, shapes pressing out before melting bato her skin. She colpsed, legs melting as her fingers disied.

  I nodded, rather proud that it had. We should have tested it on Hawkins first, but Masltein was being stingy with his prisoner.

  “An unstable core of life energy somehow kept stable,” I said. “Whatever regutes it is probably done unsciously, but would probably be very precise. Throw a little extra life energy through, say, a wand keyed through healing, and you throw the entire ba of whack. And also avoid the issues with the paralyzatiohod.”

  People were gawking or running away as Tagashin ducked under a wild attack from the bishop before running further away. The bishop couldn’t follow. Her lower limbs melted together as she tried tain trol over her shifting.

  “They’ll strike soon,” I observed as we watched the struggling flesh attempt to flee, only to find herself surrounded on all sides.

  A neancer from every angle, as well as more priests, es, and even two of those new automatons, rge, fged designs hissing as smoke poured into the air and hammers rotated. Paving stones ched uheir feet as they fhe bishops still ing form.

  Over at the cathedral, the doors inside smmed shut. The church’s higher ups making it clear she was on her own, I imagined.

  “They have to,” I tinued as they began binding up the shape-ger with metal cord. She didn’t resist, or couldn’t. “Things are falling apart. Lord Montague will want his son back. They’ll want Kasyp sileonight I think. It’ll be hurried and rushed.”

  “You sound so certain,” Voltar replied drily. “Reasoning?”

  “Lashing out,” I muttered. “We wounded Montague by taking his heir. Lady Karsin will panic because she must suspect her son will be . And that her people’s ranks are reduced by one more.”

  The number of shape-gers free might already be at single digits now. The only ones left in the world, ohat was swiftly aware of them and learning how to deal with them all ain.

  I would sympathize with that plight, but I could only muster up so much for those who’d taken my life and tried to make a ruin of it.

  “Agreed,” Voltar said. “Ohat fails, we’ll hahe other kidnapping you’ve arranged. Until then, preparations for uests?”

  I smirked as I watched. "Easily arranged."