We kicked the door to the Master of Flesh’s Laboratory open.

  "Fenris!" Gutrum roared, his voice cracking with a panic I had never heard from the Lord of Falkenberg. "Fenris, help her!"

  The room smelled of formaldehyde, stale alcohol, and old blood. Dr. Fenris Vulpine was sitting in a chair by the window, staring blankly at a wall. He held a bottle of whiskey loosely in his hand. He looked like a ghost haunting his own life.

  He didn't turn around. "Go away. The doctor is out. Permanently."

  "She is dying!" Gerald shouted, carrying Mary in his arms. He kicked a table of surgical tools over. "Look at her!"

  Gerald laid Mary on the metal examination table. She was convulsing. Black veins were crawling up her neck, pulsing like living worms under her pale skin. She was coughing up blood that hissed and smoked on the metal.

  Fenris sighed. A long, shuddering breath.

  He stood up, limping slightly out of habit, though his leg was cured. He walked over to the table, his eyes dead and hollow.

  He looked at Mary.

  He looked at the black veins.

  He sniffed the air.

  "Milkwright Rot," Fenris diagnosed flatly. "Aether-Sickness. Her Spirit Channels are being rewritten by a Volatile Aether-Source.She’s melting from the inside out."

  "Fix it," Brandan growled, looming over the fox. "You are the Master of Flesh. Fix it!"

  Fenris let out a bitter, dry laugh.

  "Fix it? You want me to fix a Sunburst with a bandage? This isn't a disease, Brandan. It’s math. Her body is a cup. The energy she absorbed is a gallon of acid. The cup is dissolving."

  "Don't give me metaphors!" Olenka snapped, stepping forward and gripping Fenris’s lab coat. "Give me a cure!"

  Fenris looked at Olenka. Then at Mary.

  Mary wasn't screaming. She was gripping the edge of the table, her knuckles white, sweat pouring down her face. She looked at Fenris with those grey, Falken-like eyes.

  "Do it," Mary wheezed. "Whatever it is. Do it."

  Fenris’s eyes narrowed. The doctor in him woke up. Just a little.

  "Wilhelm," Fenris barked. "My scrap bin. In the corner."

  I rushed to the corner. It was a pile of junk. Rusted gears from the Aurean era, broken circuit boards, shards of conductive glass.

  "What do you want?" I asked, digging through the trash. "A scalpel? A clamp?"

  "A Capacitor," Fenris ordered. "That rusted blue coil. Bring it."

  I grabbed the object. It was a Spent Mana-Coil, jagged and sharp, covered in ancient grime.

  "Here," I said, handing it to him. "Now what? Do we channel magic through it?"

  Fenris took the coil. He didn't hook it up to a machine.

  He walked over to Mary.

  "Open your mouth," Fenris said.

  Mary blinked. "What?"

  "Eat it," Fenris commanded.

  The room went silent.

  "Are you insane?" I yelled, grabbing Fenris’s arm. "That is metal! It’s sharp! It’s trash!"

  "It is a grounding rod!" Fenris shouted back, shaking me off with surprising strength. "Her body is overloaded with raw Aether! Biological matter can't hold it! We need to introduce inorganic matter to absorb the excess charge! She needs to become a battery!"

  He looked at Mary.

  "It will hurt. It will tear your gums. It will feel like swallowing a knife. But if you don't eat it, your heart explodes in ten minutes."

  Mary looked at the jagged, rusty coil.

  She looked at her father, Gutrum, who was weeping silently.

  She looked at Gerald and Astrid, who were terrified.

  "Okay," Mary whispered.

  She opened her mouth.

  Fenris placed the coil on her tongue. It was the size of a walnut, but sharp.

  "Chew," Fenris said softly. "Don't swallow it whole. You have to break the seal."

  Mary bit down.

  CRUNCH.

  The sound was sickening. It was the sound of teeth hitting tempered steel.

  Blood red, human blood spilled from her lips, mixing with the black rot.

  Brandan turned away, unable to watch.

  Astrid buried her face in Olenka’s skirts.

  Mary groaned, a low, guttural sound of agony. Her jaw worked.

  Crunch. Crack.

  She chewed the metal. She chewed the glass insulation.

  Tears streamed down her face, but she didn't stop. She didn't spit it out.

  She swallowed.

  We watched her throat convulse as the jagged shards went down.

  "Gah!" Mary gasped, arching her back off the table.

  For a second, nothing happened.

  Then, the black veins on her neck stopped pulsing. They didn't vanish, but they receded slightly. The smoke coming from her mouth stopped.

  I looked at my HUD.

  "It worked," I whispered, horrified. "It bought her twenty-four hours."

  Fenris slumped back against the counter, taking a swig of whiskey.

  "The metal absorbs the radiation," Fenris muttered. "It acts as a heatsink. But the acid dissolves the metal eventually. Once it dissolves... the Rot comes back."

  He looked at me with dead eyes.

  "She has to eat one every day, Wilhelm. A piece of the Old World. Gears. Circuits. Chips. Every. Single. Day."

  I looked at Mary.

  She was lying there, panting, blood dripping from her torn gums. She looked wrecked.

  But she turned her head. She looked at Gutrum.

  "It..." Mary tried to smile. Her teeth were stained red and grey. "It wasn't so bad, Father. Tasted like... old pennies."

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  Gutrum fell to his knees beside the table, burying his face in her hand. "I am sorry. I am so sorry."

  "Don't be," Mary whispered, stroking his hair. "I'm still here. I'm holding the line."

  She looked at me. Her gaze was clear, piercing through the pain.

  "Wilhelm," she rasped.

  "I'm here, Mary," I choked out, stepping closer.

  "Don't tell Melina," Mary whispered. "Don't tell her... I have to eat this. She'll blame herself. She's just... a kid."

  My heart broke.

  She was lying there, waiting to eat scrap metal for the rest of her short life, and she was worried about the girl who did this to her.

  "I won't tell her," I promised, wiping my eyes.

  "We need a supply," Gerald said, his voice hard. He wiped his tears. "We need Aurean tech. Where do we get it?"

  "The Undercroft," I said, my voice turning to iron. "The ancient ruins. The Black Market. I don't care."

  I looked at Fenris.

  "Make a list, Doctor. Whatever she needs. Gold, platinum, uranium. I don't care what it costs. I will buy this city and feed it to her piece by piece if I have to."

  Fenris nodded slowly. "Get me a Gyro-Stabilizer for tomorrow. It goes down smoother."

  I looked at Mary one last time. She was closing her eyes, exhausted, her hand still resting on her father's head.

  The Ice Queen hadn't melted. She had just become something harder.

  I turned and walked out of the room with Brandan. I had to find a Gyro-Stabilizer. And then, I had to find a way to kill the Gods who made a world where kindness tasted like rusted iron.

  The corridors of the Royal Castle were dark, the gothic arches swallowing the light of our torches. It felt less like a palace and more like the belly of a stone beast.

  "The paper, Wilhelm," King Brandan growled, not breaking his stride. His heavy boots hammered against the floor. "Give it to me."

  I reached into my coat and pulled out the Edict of Disinheritance.

  "It is drafted, Your Grace," I said, handing it over. "It strips Volpert of titles, lands, and the succession. It names Vera as the Crown Princess."

  Brandan snatched the scroll. He didn't stop walking. He pressed it against the rough stone wall, bit the cork off a bottle of ink he carried, and dipped his thumb.

  He smeared his thumbprint onto the seal. Then, with a quill, he slashed his signature.

  Brandan Stormsong.

  "Done," he breathed, shoving the scroll back at me. "File it. Make it official."

  "The clock is ticking," I whispered, tucking the scroll away. "In twenty-four hours, Volpert is just a boy with bad manners."

  "Good," Brandan grunted. "Now let's "

  He stopped.

  We were passing the Gallery of Whispers, a secluded section of the castle usually reserved for private meditation.

  But there was no silence here.

  There was a sound. Rhythmic. Wet. Crack. Whimper. Crack. Whimper.

  "What is that?" Brandan whispered. His hand went to the hilt of his sword.

  We moved silently to the archway and looked inside.

  My stomach dropped.

  The Gallery had been converted into a farm. In the center of the room, rows of wooden posts had been erected. Tied to these posts were children. Clayborn children. Dirty, ragged, terrified.

  Standing behind them were adults their parents. They were weeping, shaking, begging. But in their hands, they held whips.

  And sitting on a velvet couch, watching the scene with a glass of wine, were Duke Silas Shadowgrove and his daughter, Kordula.

  "Faster, Number 7," Silas croaked, checking a timepiece. "You are falling behind the quota."

  "Please, My Lord," the Clayborn father sobbed, dropping the whip. "That is my son! I cannot!"

  Kordula Shadowgrove leaned forward. She smiled, eating a grape.

  "If you stop," Kordula purred, "I will give the whip to my father. And he hits much, much harder than you do. Do you want that for little Timmy?"

  The father screamed in despair and raised the whip again. He struck his own child lightly.

  "Harder!" Kordula giggled. "The System doesn't register love-taps! We need suffering!"

  I scanned the room with my Helm of the Ash-Seer. The data made me want to vomit.

  "They are farming them," I whispered, my voice shaking. "They are torturing children because the math is better."

  "Passive income," Silas muttered to himself, marking a ledger. "Why fight monsters in the arena when the peasantry is so... renewable? 144,000 SP a day. Efficiency."

  Brandan didn't say a word. The King didn't calculate.

  He roared.

  It was a sound of pure, primal fury that shook the stained glass windows.

  "ENOUGH!"

  Brandan charged. He didn't draw his sword. He didn't need steel.

  He grabbed the Clayborn father's wrist mid-swing. He ripped the whip from the man's hand and snapped the leather in half with sheer strength.

  He stood between the sobbing father and the bound child. A massive wall of muscle and rage.

  Silas Shadowgrove jumped up, spilling his wine. "Your Grace! We... we were just conducting house business!"

  "House business?" Brandan bellowed, stepping toward them. "You are skinning children in my home!"

  "They are tenants!" Silas squeaked, backing away, his voice trembling. "They signed contracts! It is legal! They pay their rent in Spirit Power! It is the economy!"

  "THE ECONOMY?!" Brandan screamed.

  He grabbed a heavy iron candelabra and hurled it. It smashed into the wall inches from Kordula’s head.

  Kordula didn't flinch. She licked her lips, staring at the angry King. "Oh, Daddy. The Bear is awake. He looks... fun."

  "Get out," Brandan growled. His voice dropped to a terrifying, vibrating bass. "Get out of my sight. If I see either of you near a child again... I will forget the laws. I will forget the Tournament. I will rip your heads off with my bare hands."

  Silas didn’t move. He didn’t run. He stood his ground, a sneer curling his thin lips. He tapped his timepiece with a bony finger.

  "Empty threats, Brandan," Silas hissed, stepping closer rather than backing away. "You are bound by the Tournament Charter. No aggression between Houses outside the Arena. If you touch me... if you lay one finger on a High Duke... the System disqualifies you. You lose the Crown. You lose the gold. You lose everything."

  He leaned in, his face inches from the King’s, smiling with yellow teeth.

  "You are trapped by the rules, Bear. So go ahead. Walk away. And let me finish my harvest."

  Brandan went deadly still. He looked at the weeping children. He looked at Silas’s smug, untouchable face.

  "The rules," Brandan whispered.

  Brandan swiped the notification away with his hand.

  "Fuck the rules."

  He moved faster than a man his size should be able to move. It wasn't a swing; it was a piston. Brandan drove his right fist a fist the size of a loaf of bread, scarred and heavy with rings straight into the center of Silas’s face.

  CRACK.

  It was a wet, sickening sound. The sound of a melon being dropped on concrete. The sound of cartilage turning into powder.

  Silas didn’t just fall. He was lifted off his feet. He spun in the air, a spray of blood and saliva painting a red arc across the grey stone wall. He slammed into the floor hard enough to bounce.

  He lay there, gasping, clutching a nose that was now flattened against his cheekbone. He spat. Three teeth skittered across the floor tiles. Clink. Clink. Clink.

  Kordula didn’t scream. She didn't help him. She stared at the blood pooling under her father’s face, her eyes wide and dilated.

  "Ooh," Kordula whispered, a shiver running through her. "Daddy broke."

  Brandan stepped over the groaning Duke. He loomed over him, his knuckles dripping red.

  "That wasn't an act of war, Silas," Brandan rumbled, his voice shaking the dust from the ceiling. "That was a correction. Next time... I won't use my fist. I'll use the hammer."

  The Shadowgroves slinked away into the shadows, leaving the scent of perfume and cruelty behind.

  As soon as they were gone, the rage drained out of Brandan.

  He turned back to the posts.

  The Clayborn parents were terrified. They dropped to their knees, pressing their heads to the floor. "Mercy, Your Grace! Mercy! We had no choice!"

  Brandan ignored them.

  He went to the child. The boy was maybe seven years old. His back was bleeding. He was shaking so hard his teeth rattled.

  Brandan the giant, the warrior, the man who smashed gates knelt down. His knees cracked on the hard stone. He didn't care.

  He took a dagger and gently cut the ropes binding the boy.

  The boy fell forward.

  Brandan caught him.

  He wrapped his massive fur cloak around the small, dirty, bleeding child. He held him close, shielding him from the world.

  "Shhh," Brandan whispered. His voice was soft. Gentle. "It’s over, lad. It’s over."

  The boy looked up, eyes wide with terror. "Are... are you going to hit me too?"

  Brandan closed his eyes. A single tear tracked through the grime on his face.

  "No," Brandan choked out. "No one is ever going to hit you again. I swear it on my Crown."

  He looked at the parents.

  "Take them," Brandan commanded softly. "Go to the kitchens. Tell the cook the King sent you. Get food. Get warm. And stay there."

  "Thank you," the father wept, grabbing his son from Brandan’s arms. "Thank you, Your Grace."

  They scrambled away, huddled together.

  Brandan remained kneeling on the cold floor. He looked at his hands. Hands made for war.

  "100 SP a minute," Brandan whispered. "That is the price of a child's scream."

  He looked up at me.

  "Wilhelm."

  "I'm here, Brother," I said, my throat tight.

  "Win the Tournament," Brandan said. He stood up, and he looked bigger than before. Not just a King, but a force of nature. "Win the gold. Buy the army."

  He gripped his sword hilt.

  "Because when this is over... I am going to kill Silas Shadowgrove. And I don't care if it costs me my soul."

  I looked at him. The Bear. The Protector.

  "We'll kill them all, Brandan," I promised. "Every last one of them."

  We walked out of the gallery, leaving the whips broken on the floor.