Eirik's first instinct was to ask about the wounds.

  He'd seen them. The gashes across Lord Caelum's torso had been deep enough to expose bone—or at least, that's what the magnified image had shown. Even a cultivator at Glacier realm would need days, perhaps weeks, to recover from injuries of that magnitude.

  Yet here sat the Duke's son, looking as though he'd spent the afternoon reading rather than fighting monsters.

  The question formed on Eirik's lips. Then died there.

  Eirik looked at Velthan. The old man met his gaze with an expression that might have been amusement.

  The blood hadn't been real.

  None of it had been real. Or rather—some of it had been real. The monsters seemed real. The deaths should be real, too. But Lord Caelum's "injuries"? Also the dramatic moment of triumph over near-death?

  Theater.

  The realization settled into Eirik's stomach. He thought about everything he'd witnessed through the Archmage's magnified images. The "perfect" narrative the nobles had commented on.

  How much of what he saw was actually happening?

  The question was deeply unsettling. If Velthan could fabricate wounds that convincing, what else could he fabricate?

  No. That was paranoid thinking. The deaths had to be real. The entirety of the tournament's legitimacy—the Duke's legitimacy for having vouched for its authenticity—would be destroyed if dead contestants weren't actually dead.

  But the boundary between reality and illusion in this place was far thinner than he'd assumed.

  He glanced toward the window, seeking something solid to anchor his thoughts.

  And stopped.

  The sun hung high in the sky. Not the evening light that should have accompanied hours spent watching the Trial and attending the illusory villa afterward.

  Morning light. The same position the sun had occupied when they'd first entered the portal.

  "Time moves differently within the trial grounds."

  Lord Caelum had spoken as if explaining an obvious truth to a slow child.

  "We spent half a day within the portal," Caelum continued. "Yet here, perhaps one hour has passed. Convenient for tournament scheduling."

  Convenient. That was one word for it.

  Eirik looked at the weather through the window. Clear skies, light wind—the exact conditions that had greeted them at the Grand Stairway. As if no time had passed at all.

  What else can they manipulate?

  "You have questions," Archmage Velthan said.

  "Several." Eirik forced himself to focus. "But I suspect you brought me here to answer at least some of them."

  "Indeed." The Archmage moved away from the window. "Duke Thorgrim has officially approved your inclusion in the investigation team I've assembled. You'll be joining us on a matter of considerable importance to the realm."

  "I'm... honored." The words came automatically. "Please convey my gratitude to His Grace."

  But internally, Eirik felt the wrongness of it.

  What did I actually do?

  He'd attended a ceremony. Watched a spectacle. Sat in the back row with Isolde while Lord Caelum performed his carefully choreographed display of prowess. He hadn't demonstrated any particular value rather than beating and drugging the Duke's personal knight.

  Everything felt too convenient.

  He kept his expression behind the mask he'd learned to wear in these political waters.

  "Questions?" the Archmage prompted again.

  "Yes." Eirik straightened. "Investigating what, exactly? And what team?"

  "Ah." Velthan's eyes glinted. "Direct. We'll need that where we're going."

  He moved to a small table, where a map had been laid out—one far more detailed than any Eirik had seen before.

  "Do you recall our conversation about General Abercrombie?"

  "The city he built. The fortress at the edge of the known world."

  "Just so." The Archmage's finger traced a path northward on the map, past Fort Abercrombie, deep into north. "The Sunless City, the General named it. In a moment of despair, most likely—the name suggests he'd abandoned hope of ever seeing his southern lands again."

  "Sunless City," Eirik repeated.

  "Ironically, the city stood stronger after he gave it that name." The Archmage tapped a point on the map. "Here. Deep within what is now Skarl territory. That is our destination."

  Eirik studied the map. The distance was considerable—weeks of travel through some of the most dangerous terrain in the North.

  Then a memory surfaced.

  "Wait." He looked up sharply. "Ser Konrad told me before I accepted the Duke's invitation that the Great Thaw Blizzard sweeps down from the highest peaks in approximately twenty days."

  "Fourteen days now," Lord Caelum said. "By current reckoning."

  "Fourteen days." Eirik's voice hardened. "The Blizzard devastates the Skarl Badlands north of the Icefang Pass for weeks. How are we supposed to reach this city in time? And even if we do, how do we return before being trapped?"

  The Archmage smiled.

  "The Thaw Blizzard will not be a problem," he said, "once we've reached the city and retrieved the artifact."

  "Artifact?"

  "I have a theory." Velthan's voice dropped. "The Thaw Blizzard has swept through those badlands every year for as long as anyone can remember. But before General Abercrombie was a general, the historical records suggest the weather patterns were much more stable."

  "You think the Blizzard is connected to something in the city."

  "I think the Blizzard is a consequence of something that happened when the city fell."

  Eirik absorbed this. "What exactly?"

  The Archmage's eyes lit with the hunger of a scholar approaching the culmination of decades of research.

  "The artifact General Abercrombie used to fend off the pre-Skarl nomads for thirty years. The records are fragmentary, but they speak of a weapon unlike any other." He leaned forward. "Rumor holds that it allows the wielder to command the power of armies. To call upon the spirits of the soldiers and generals who once fought at Abercrombie's side."

  The power of armies.

  "Think about it, Lord Stormcrow." Velthan's voice was soft,. "With something like that in our possession, the Skarls would never threaten the North again. The eternal war along your border, the raids, the endless deaths—all of it, ended."

  Eirik found himself drawn in despite his suspicions. If such an artifact existed...

  "And if we don't retrieve it?" he asked, however. "If the city is too damaged, or the artifact is lost, or any of a dozen other things go wrong? We'll be trapped north of the Pass when the Blizzard hits."

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  "Don't worry." The Archmage's smile returned. "The Duke would not have approved this expedition if I don't have contingency plans."

  "The team," Eirik said. "Who else is involved?"

  "I will lead the expedition, naturally." Velthan straightened. "Lord Caelum will accompany us as the Duke's representative. Ser Konrad serves as personal guard to His Lordship. Additionally, we'll have one hundred of the Duke's elite guard—men specifically selected for survival in extreme conditions."

  One hundred elite soldiers. A peak Glacier realm cultivator. The most powerful mage Eirik had ever encountered. And him.

  Why him?

  The question burned, but he pushed it aside for a more immediate concern.

  "What about my people?"

  "Your people?"

  "My retinue. Isolde, Olaf, Kael, the soldiers who accompanied me to Frostfall. They're waiting at the Silver Stag. If we're moving out immediately—"

  "Your men will receive a note," the Archmage said smoothly. "Explaining that you've been called to ducal business of an indefinite duration. They're free to return to Fort Abercrombie or remain in Frostfall as they see fit."

  "A note." Eirik shook his head. "Can't I at least bring some of my own men? Olaf alone is worth—"

  "No."

  The Duke's son rose from his chair with fluid grace. He crossed the room until he stood before Eirik, close enough that the height difference between them became apparent.

  "Lord Stormcrow." Caelum's blue eyes held no warmth. "I understand you've achieved some renown defending a mountain pass. That is admirable, in its way. But you seem to misunderstand your position."

  "My position?"

  "You are a tenant-lord of Baron Varn. A minor commander of a minor fortress. You have been offered a place on an expedition led by the Archmage of Frostfall, accompanied by the Duke's own son, on a mission personally authorized by His Grace himself." Each word was precisely enunciated. "Yet you stand here questioning the composition of the team?"

  Eirik felt heat rise to his face.

  "You are wasting time." Caelum's expression didn't change. "The expedition leaves within the hour. Every moment spent addressing your concerns is a moment lost. The Archmage has shown you considerable patience, but I have less to spare."

  The silence that followed was heavy.

  Eirik looked to Velthan.

  The Archmage's expression was sympathetic, but his words offered no support. "Lord Caelum raises valid points. The team has been carefully selected. Adding unknown elements at this stage would introduce unnecessary variables."

  He's siding with Caelum. Of course he was. Whatever reasons the Archmage had for wanting Eirik on this expedition, they didn't have Eirik's personal priorities in mind.

  "I need time to think." Eirik tried again. "This is happening very quickly. If I could just—"

  "There is no time." Caelum's voice brooked no argument. "We move within the hour. You're either with us or you're not."

  Eirik's jaw tightened. Everything about this felt wrong. The convenient invitation. The sudden inclusion. The refusal to let him bring anyone he actually trusted. The impossible timeline.

  They're herding me.

  He didn't know what. But the pressure was unmistakable.

  "Perhaps," the Archmage said, his voice taking on a gentler note, "it would help to hear the full scope of what's being offered."

  Velthan moved to stand beside Eirik, putting a hand on his shoulder.

  "The Duke has authorized me to convey the following: if this expedition succeeds, and if you prove valuable to that success, His Grace is prepared to offer rewards beyond gold, land, or reputation."

  Eirik waited.

  "The Duke," the Archmage said, "has authorized the creation of a new military position. High Commander of the Northern Expeditionary Forces. It would be the first of its kind—a role designed specifically for the campaigns we expect to launch once the Skarl threat has been neutralized."

  And they keep the artifact for themselves, Eirik noted silently. That part goes unspoken.

  "You would report directly to the Duke's war council. Command authority over all forces deployed north of the Icefang Pass. Resources, men, fortifications—all at your disposal." Velthan watched Eirik carefully. "Additionally, His Grace is prepared to invest considerable cultivation resources in your development. The same resources that have been used to elevate Lord Caelum to his current level."

  Eirik glanced at the Duke's son.

  Glacier realm. Perhaps beyond. The kind of power that let a man kill apex predators as though swatting flies.

  The offer was staggering. Land, power, resources, and a direct path to becoming one of the most powerful cultivators in the North. Yet he found his suspicion only growing with each word.

  "I have a question," Eirik said.

  "Another one?" Caelum's voice carried an edge.

  "Lord Caelum, as you were so kind to point out, I'm a tenant-lord of a minor barony. A small-time nobody commanding a forgotten fortress. You have a hundred elite soldiers, the realm's most powerful mage, and a cultivator who just killed a Frost Colossus single-handedly." He met the Archmage's gaze directly. "What do you need me for?"

  "Ah, Eirik." The old man actually laughed. "Good. I was beginning to wonder if you'd lost your nerve."

  He moved to the small table and retrieved something from beneath the map.

  The black crystal shard.

  Even shielded by whatever containment the Archmage had placed on it, Eirik felt its presence. Malakor. The memory of that entity's touch—the way it had tried to hollow him out from within—rose unbidden.

  "The Sunless City has been abandoned for nearly a thousand years," Velthan said. "In that time, entities from beyond our understanding have made their homes in those frozen halls."

  He set the crystal down between them.

  "This expedition will encounter such beings. I am certain of it. And when we do, we will need someone who can face them."

  "There are other cultivators," Eirik said. "More powerful ones. "

  "They cannot do what you did."

  The words hung in the air.

  "I've studied the records of your encounter extensively," Velthan continued. "Interviewed every survivor. Analyzed every trace of magical residue your encounter left behind. Do you know what I found?"

  Eirik shook his head.

  "Nothing."

  "Nothing?"

  "The entity you call Malakor should have consumed you. By every theory of demonic interaction I've developed over fifty years of study, you should be dead. Or worse—a puppet wearing your skin while something ancient pulls the strings." The Archmage's voice dropped. "Instead, the creature fled. Fled from you, Lord Stormcrow. A being that could have challenged Lord Caelum himself ran from a cultivator who had barely reached Frost realm."

  Eirik's stomach tightened. "I don't know how I did it."

  "Neither do I." Velthan's admission was surprisingly candid. "These demons behave in ways we don't yet understand. The only explanation I can offer is that they fear something within you. Something in your blood, perhaps, or your soul, or some aspect of your existence that we haven't identified yet. We don't know the extent of it."

  "That's not reassuring."

  "No. But it is useful." The Archmage's eyes glittered. "Whatever sleeps in the Sunless City, you may be the only person in the realm capable of facing them."

  The room fell silent.

  Eirik processed the information. They're afraid, he realized. For all their power, they're afraid of what waits in that city.

  And that fear gave him leverage.

  "Fine," Eirik said. "I understand why you need me. So here's my counteroffer."

  Caelum's eyes narrowed.

  "Olaf and Kael come with me. Additionally, I want my talon soldiers—two dozen men—accompanying me as a personal guard."

  Lord Caelum rose from his chair in a single fluid motion.

  "You're making demands now?" His voice was silk over steel. "After everything that's been offered?"

  "I'm sticking my neck out for this mission," Eirik said. "You've made that abundantly clear. If I'm walking into a city full of demons and monsters, I'd like to be surrounded by men I know something about. Men I trust."

  "Trust." Caelum's lip curled slightly. "An interesting concept from someone who's so experienced in scamming and blackmailing."

  "Lord Caelum." Velthan's voice carried a note of caution.

  But Eirik held his ground. "The Duke's elite soldiers answer to you. The Archmage answers to the Duke. If something goes wrong in that city—really wrong—who's watching my back?"

  The Archmage's expression had grown troubled. "Changing the expedition's composition at this stage would be highly unusual. I would need to seek the Duke's direct approval, and our time window—"

  "You know what?" Eirik stood. "Forget it."

  Both men stared at him.

  "What you've told me—about the demons, about what waits in that city, about things that could challenge even Lord Caelum—that troubles me. Deeply." He moved toward the door. "I want out."

  "You—" Caelum's composure finally cracked. "You cannot be serious."

  "Watch me."

  "I have never—" The Duke's son stepped forward. "I have never witnessed someone of such low stature hackle with men so far above his station. A tenant-lord. A bastard, no less. And you stand here making demands of an Archmage and the Duke's own heir as though you were our equal?"

  Bastard. Funny how the word had grown welcome to Eirik.

  "Lord Caelum." Velthan's hand closed around the young lord's arm. "That's enough."

  Caelum stepped back, his eyes never left Eirik's face.

  The Archmage turned to Eirik.

  "Lord Stormcrow. Eirik." His voice had softened. "This is truly unusual. I understand your position."

  Eirik waited, his hand still on the door.

  "But I need you to think carefully about what you're doing." Velthan moved closer, lowering his voice until only Eirik could hear. "You saw the nobles at the ceremony. You saw how they trembled when the Duke so much as glanced in their direction. These are men who command armies, who hold the lives of thousands in their hands. And they were terrified."

  "I'm not them."

  "No. You're not." The Archmage's eyes held something that might have been admiration. "You have freedom to walk away. The Duke cannot force you to join this expedition. That much is true."

  He paused.

  "But ask yourself this: is that the price you want to pay? By offending that man?"

  Eirik said nothing.

  Velthan leaned closer still.

  "You have strong potential, Lord Eirik. I see it clearly. One day, you will be powerful—perhaps powerful enough to stand among the great lords of the realm. But that power, if it grows unchecked, unaligned, will be feared. It will be smothered by men higher than you, men who see threats in anything they cannot control."

  The Archmage's hand found Eirik's shoulder.

  "The Duke has received letters. Many letters. From the Order, from Baron Varn, from other lords and powers who have taken notice of your... unorthodox methods. They want you removed. Tried. Some have suggested worse."

  Eirik's blood ran cold.

  "I vouched for you," Velthan continued. "I told the Duke about your encounter with Malakor. And His Grace—despite everything he's heard—chose to see something in you worth investing in."

  The old man's grip tightened slightly.

  "I know that bowing to power is never easy. Especially for someone like you. But you have to choose someone, Eirik. If you bow to no one, if you refuse every hand extended to you, then only destruction awaits. Such is the way of the North. Such has it always been."

  He released Eirik's shoulder and stepped back.

  "Let's give Lord Stormcrow an hour," the Archmage said, his voice returning to its normal volume. "Let him think this through. Whatever he decides, we'll accept."

  He turned to Caelum and Ser Konrad.

  "We need to prepare our men. Come."

  Caelum opened his mouth as if to speak. His eyes found Eirik's one last time—and whatever words he'd been about to say died there. He turned and walked through the doorway without looking back.

  Ser Konrad followed.