As Mei led Huan away, Dana kicked Cailean Kennedy in the face, giving luzself space to palm the backs of his compatriots’ necks and ram a pulso te essedare into their nervous systems. Both collapsed to the ground, dead.

  “Qezisarm-”

  “‘thumrut!”

  Good, young Gallus’s training with Mei and Lady Pol was paying off. Trusting her to keep the Lo Duca girl busy, Dana squared off against luz blond opponent. Unfortunately, luz had already revealed luz strongest hand; pulso te essedare had its advantages, no lay person could resist it and it required only a Fo mage’s concentration, but, like an ordinary blade, it was most effective at the neck, heart, and spine, vital areas all martial artists knew to protect.

  “They’re dead.” Cailean drew his signature stiletto. “What are you?”

  No sorrow, no anger. Sen Jerome’s training had cut those out of him and replaced them with hard muscle and ruthlessness. However, it hadn’t provided him with the orange jewel tied onto his right arm. What was that?

  Cailean looked over Dana’s shoulder. Lu was an unknown, and he’d trained to fight Qe mages, so he obviously wanted to go join young Gallus’s fight, but she had enough to deal with.

  Time to get his full attention. Dana made a sign, fingers falling. “The Fountain Flows Ever Downwards.”

  The First Prayer to Phons, judged Highest Heresy by Cueller’s misguided, made the cenobite’s lips curl. “Heretic.”

  As he rushed luz, Dana started muttering spells. This was going to hurt.

  Cailean’s first punch slammed into Dana’s side, but instead of cracking ribs, it hit the lattissimus dorsi muscle lu had moved there as reinforcement. Registering and dismissing a strange vibration to the hit, Dana twisted so Cailean’s stiletto sank into luz left tricep instead of luz heart. Almost dizzy from the pain, Dana still managed to twist the other way and tear the weapon out of Cailean’s grip. Ashen-faced and disarmed, the cenobite kicked, knocking luz through a nearby door and into a pile of storage crates.

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  Scrapes, punctures, dislocated right shoulder. It could have been worse, but if those vibrations were what Dana thought they were, lu was in trouble.

  Cailean stepped over the remains of the door, his eyes red with fury. “How are you still casting, heretic?”

  So the orange jewel on the armband was tytumber, and the Sourans had finally discovered its true use, although not yet how to refine it for potency or set it for effect. Good to have something to report.

  Outside the room and down the corridor, more spells were flung.

  “Qemilo!”

  “‘nutamde!”

  “Phons blesses me.” As luz magic sealed wounds and set bone, Dana got back to luz feet. Provoking Cailean wasn’t the best strategy, but it was the only one lu had. Deemed unfit for combat, lu had been taught only one thing: abide. Avoid broken bones, avoid blows to the heart and head, and wait for an opportunity to use a pulso. “Phons always stands by my side.”

  With a roar, the cenobite charged, and Dana’s magic rose to meet him. Lu shifted the lattissimus dorsi to protect the ribs again. Hit. Hit. Lu twisted to take the next two blows on the left deltoids. Hit. Hit. Lu ignored left shoulder dislocation and shifted pectorals downward to, hit, reinforce the abdomen. Now step in and pull the right gluteus maximus to cushion, hit, the knee to the ilium. Hit, hit, hit. That brilliant punch combination had opened up Dana’s chin for a silencing uppercut, but if luz lipomastia, pectorals, and the abdominals were to suddenly shift upwards, then-

  Cailean’s right fist still connected with Dana’s chin, but the ballooning masses on luz chest had caught his arm, making it possible for lu to fall backwards and pull the cenobite off his feet. When Cailean tried to twist free, Dana let him, sending him spinning into the wall and exposing his neck, which lu grabbed and rammed a pulso te essedare into, but the tytumber thrummed, shattering the attack. Although Cailean seized, shuddered, stilled, he lived.

  Groaning, Dana stood up, muttering spells to pop luz shoulder back into place and reset all of luz sore and distended fat and muscles. All that left luz with no stamina to restore the Inge persona, so lu ripped a piece off Cailean’s surcote and wrapped it around luz face.

  Now, what to do with Cailean Kennedy? The cenobite’s stiletto was lost, and Dana couldn’t finish him with a pulso even if lu removed the tytumber. That left strangulation, but that would take time, and the corridor outside was worryingly quiet.

  Young Gallus might need help, and Dwayne needed to know he was in danger.

  And so, Dana left the cenobite alive.