Tears turned to dry sobs and then to a crushing silence. More than anything, Mara wished she could just hug Aallotar and never let go. Anything to ease the ache, both from the transformation and the guilt. Unfortunately, they were chained back to back, arms fully extended to either side so there was no slack for them to tamper with manacles. Mara couldn’t even look into the wildling’s eyes and promise that the attack on her father’s guards had changed nothing. All of that helplessness twisted like a knot of fire in her stomach. The hate still burned in her like a beacon to all thoughts dark and bloody. Her resistance to becoming a kinslayer vanished: her family had thrown them in the dungeon to either rot or perish.

Mara intended to do neither.

“Aallotar,” she said, voice raw from thirst. It was impossible to know how much time had passed chained in this windowless tomb, but it had to be late at night by now. “Talk to me. Please.”

There was no response. If it weren’t for the warmth seeping through fabric into Mara’s crooked back, she might have thought she was just imagining her friend’s presence.

“Aallotar, it wasn’t your fault,” Mara pressed. “You are not the beast.” 

The body against her back stirred. “I am,” Aallotar rasped. Her tears and sobs had left her with only shreds of a voice. “I can’t stop it.” 

“Not yet,” Mara said as soothingly as she could while chained to the point of straining. “Once we break your curse, it will never take over you again. I’m here and I’m not going to leave you. I promised I would break it.” 

“How?” Aallotar said, a sharp edge of desperation in her voice. “We will die down here in the dark.” 

Mara took a deep breath. Aallotar had always been a creature of the wilds, free to roam wherever she wished. Imprisonment was something she couldn’t even have conceived of, and it was Mara’s doing that had introduced her to it. You should have kept her from coming with you, the huntress thought bitterly. One more mistake to add to a long tally of failings. “We’ll find a way out,” she said with all the confidence she could muster. 

There was a soft gurgling sound and a whisper of movement beyond the bars. Mara’s stomach twisted into a knot, turning her head to gaze through cold iron. There was barely enough light coming from a torch down the dungeon’s hall to see a dark liquid seeping into their cell from beneath the bars. The smell of copper, so intimately familiar, meant it could only be blood. 

Aallotar sucked in a deep breath and caught the scent, drawing a keening sound from her throat. No doubt the smell drew her back into the memories of her own savagery. “Mara…” she whispered in ragged tones. “Something is there.” 

Mara closed her eyes for a moment and pulled her focus together, then opened them again. “If you’re here as an executioner, you might as well come in here and show yourself,” she said sharply, pouring in all the air of command she’d seen her father and uncle use. It wasn’t terribly intimidating given that she was chained hand and foot. 

A dry, rasping chuckle was her first answer. “I am here for you,” a deep, resonant voice said, its timbre dark and devoid of any warmth. “But not to kill.” 

“Then why are you here, stranger?” Mara asked, lifting her chin. The answer terrified her, but she refused to show the man any fear. She could see him now, the barest suggestion of a silhouette all but lost in shadows cast by the distant torch. Flickering illuminated his hands as they closed around the bars, both coated in blood. She caught the gleam of claws and shivered slightly in her chains.

“The men of Sjaligr have decided to destroy what they cannot control, what they cannot understand,” the stranger said. “I aim to preserve you, Spell-Breaker, and your companion, from this injustice.” 

“I do not trust him,” Aallotar whispered, her tugs at her chains utterly futile even though she was a good deal stronger than Mara. 

“Would you prefer I leave you here, all alone in the dungeon, dying for a hint of sunlight, a wisp of breeze, a reprieve before execution?” the shadowy figure asked. His claws clicked slightly as he drummed them against the bars. “I do not require your trust. Only your cooperation, else this rescue will be woefully unsuccessful.” 

“We need your help,” Mara said, eyeing the man. His shape was irregular, twisted and bent worse than she was. “Who are you?” 

“You may call me Sammael,” he said with a cool calm. A rattle of keys fitting into the lock and the sharp squeal of metal against metal announced the opening of the door.

For a moment, Mara felt his gaze on her so intensely that her skin crawled. It didn’t feel predatory, but it did give her a feeling of a strange fascination. Still, if she had been willing to bargain with Kalevi, what was one more debt on her soul? She watched as the man shuffled in. 

He walked with a significant limp, form covered in the bandages and rags of a leper. It was a disease even healers with the gift of magic struggled to treat, though some claimed to be able to cure it. Piercing, obsidian eyes stared at them through the gaps in the bandages across his face. Not once did Mara see him blink. Sammael approached casually, spinning the keys on his clawed finger with a soft, almost tuneless whistle. He wiggled his fingers on his other hand thoughtfully, carefully sifting through the keys until he found the one that matched Mara’s binds. “A little click and the fun begins,” he said as he unlocked the manacles. 

Mara fell forward, arms numb and tingling from their held position and the tightness of the cuffs. Sammael caught her to her surprise, filling her nose with a scent unlike any she had encountered before as she fell into ragged cloth. 

Sammael smelled like ash and smoke, but more than that, a harsh acidic scent and the air after a close lightning strike. Mara recoiled back and turned, watching as he unlocked Aallotar’s cuffs too. 

“Why are you doing this?” Mara asked, catching Aallotar before she could fall. She felt better with her arms around her friend, squeezing her into the tight hug she’d wanted to give for hours now.

The bandaged man tilted his head as he looked back at her. “Because I understand you, Spell-Breaker,” he said in his low, rasping way. “You and I are cut from...similar...cloth. To allow that precious gift of yours to be snuffed out by ignorant beasts…” He clucked his tongue and then paused for a moment, listening. “The changing of the guard is not for another hour. I hear an approach. The dead men will be discovered.” 

“Then we have to go now,” Mara said, fumbling to grab Aallotar’s hand. She looked to her friend, whose tattooed visage looked downright terrified of their rescuer. “Aallotar, we have to take this chance. Otherwise we’ll die.” 

The wildling swallowed hard and then nodded. “Will follow,” she croaked. 

“Good,” Sammael said. His hands changed as Mara watched him, gleaming claws retracting back into his bloody, bandaged fingers. “I cannot conceal you as I did myself, so the way I came will not suffice.” 

“There’s an old passage down here that was sealed off. If the tunnel is intact still, it leads out of Sjaligr,” Mara said. “Ritva and Sabine used to play down here. In times of siege it was meant to be an escape, but that hasn’t been a danger for as long as I’ve been alive. If we can unseal it, it might be a way out.” 

“Clever girl,” Sammael said approvingly. “Lead the way.” 

Mara gripped Aallotar’s hand tightly and led the way, even though she desperately wished that she didn’t have their mysterious new friend right behind her. Some part of her kept imagining those claws plunging into her back and ripping out her heart. Stepping over the bodies of the guards, their throats ripped out, cemented the danger in her mind. Still, whatever the reason, Sammael’s rescue meant a second chance at life that she was not going to pass up. 

They wound their way through passages as quickly as they could without raising too much noise. Behind them, Mara heard a sudden clamor. “Guards!” Viljami shouted, an edge of fear in her brother’s voice. 

Good, she thought viciously. He should be afraid.

“Hurry now,” Sammael urged from behind them. “We will have left tracks in blood.” 

Mara nodded and picked up her pace, stopping only when they reached the large steel slab that blocked the passage. This was entirely more reinforced than even the cell doors, designed to be impenetrable with no intention of ever being opened. There weren’t even hinges or a lock. She let out a hiss of frustrated breath. “They did a better job than I thought they did,” she said. “This doesn’t help us!” 

“A wall is just a door with a different kind of key,” Sammael said smoothly, stepping forward. “Stand to the side and close your eyes. The light will be quite painful if you do not.” 

Aallotar wrapped an arm around Mara and pulled her to the opposite side of the steel hatch, watching as Sammael pressed his hand against the dull metal surface. Within seconds, they heard the pings of a sudden heating by the metal, the dull cherry red glow spreading outwards from Sammael’s hand growing hotter and hotter, brighter and brighter. In moments, he was peeling the glowing hot door apart like a set of curtains with his clawed hands, the bandages burning away.

Aallotar turned her face towards Mara. “How can he use magic?” she asked. “You are here.”

Mara felt a cold lump of dread settle into her stomach. “He’s not,” she said softly. There was only one power she had ever heard of besides magic that could work such a feat: sorcery. Their rescuer, whoever or whatever he was, drew his powers from Void. “He’s….” 

“A demon?” Sammael said calmly as he bent the metal with incredible strength. He turned his face towards them, those obsidian eyes seeming somehow sharper, less human. “AND WHAT IF I AM?” The question was harsh and metallic, sending a wave of icy dread down their spines. 

“There they are!” someone called from further down the hall. 

The bandages around Sammael’s face remained immobile, no hint of a smile materializing as he stepped into the passageway through the arch of glowing hot metal. “DEATH OR A DEMON. YOU DECIDE.”  

“We’re not dying here,” Mara said fiercely, pulling Aallotar after her as she followed Samael into the tunnel.

“They will catch us in the tunnel,” the wildling said, her hold on Mara only tightening. 

Sammael turned and extended a hand past them. “RUN,” the demon commanded. “I WILL CLOSE THE WAY.” 

Aallotar and Mara wasted no time at that statement. Together, they ran through the pitch darkness of the tunnel as fast as they could with their hands out in front of them, tripping and stumbling as they went. Behind them came a great rumbling and then a sudden crack, like lightning splitting a mountainside apart. The tunnel collapsed, spewing dust in their direction. The pair didn’t stop until their sides were in agony and the adrenaline ebbed. Mara had no idea how much distance they had actually covered, but all was quiet. 

“Do you think it died?” Aallotar whispered. 

From directly behind her came an answer, cold and inhuman. “IT WOULD REQUIRE MORE THAN THAT TRIFLE TO SLAY ME, WILDLING.” Claws delicately gripped Mara’s shoulder, the fine needle points of its nails barely pressing into her flesh. Sammael possessed a terrifying dexterity and seemed to understand the precise amount of pressure needed to break human skin. “WE HAVE MUCH TO DISCUSS.” The demon raised his other hand, conjuring a weak, flickering bolt of lightning that danced from claw to claw, casting a disturbing light across his face.

“Are you going to kill us?” Mara asked through a jaw stiff from fear. 

“THAT IS NOT MY INTENTION AT THIS TIME, MARA SPELL-BREAKER.” 

“How do you know her name?” Aallotar asked as she pulled at Mara’s hand to tug her away from Sammael. The creature’s grip turned to iron and Mara gasped. 

“I HAVE PAID ATTENTION,” Sammael said. Without inflection, it was impossible to read any emotion, but Mara was willing to hazard that the demon was at least mildly annoyed by the line of questioning. “IT IS NOT AS THOUGH SHE WAS SOME SECRET HELD IN THE DARK PLACES OF THE EARTH.” 

Mara took a deep breath to steady herself. It didn’t work, but she soldiered on ahead anyway. “So what do you want from us?” 

Sammael leaned in closer, obsidian eyes meeting hers. When the demon spoke, the bandages around his face moved, revealing a short muzzle instead of a proper human face. Needle-like teeth filled those jaws, barely visible in the darkness. “YOU ARE AWARE THAT VOID IS COMING TO THE RED MOUNTAINS. YOUR ORACLE FROM THE TROLL WAS RATHER CLEAR ON THAT POINT. I AM A CREATURE OF VOID, YES, BUT NOT ONE WHO BENDS TO THE WHIMS OF THE PRINCES OF IRON. I AM FREE.” The claws tightened slightly, almost painfully, on her shoulder. “I WISH TO REMAIN SO.”

“Kalevi said that Void couldn’t be fought or beaten,” Mara said.

“THE PEOPLE OF THE RED MOUNTAINS WILL BURN IN THE FIRES LAID BY THEIR OWN IGNORANCE AND HUBRIS. FOR YOU, FOR YOUR WILDLING, FOR I, THERE IS ANOTHER PATH.” 

Mara swallowed hard. “I don’t understand.” 

The demon released her. “WHEN THE IMPERIUM COMES, IT WILL DEVASTATE EVEN I, FOR THE PRINCES OF IRON CANNOT TOLERATE WHAT THEY CANNOT CONTROL. I WILL SURVIVE BY IMPARTING MY KNOWLEDGE TO YOU, SPELL-BREAKER. YOU ARE AN EXPRESSION OF VOID, ONE THAT COULD LEARN TO TAP INTO ITS POWER.”

Aallotar’s presence was the only thing that kept Mara from falling over at that. “It’s impossible,” Mara said with a shake of her head. “I’m a living, breathing thing. Even nearing that kind of power would...render me to nothingness.” 

Sammael leaned back slightly, the lightning captured in his claws sending shadows flickering across their faces and his own. “ALL POWER HAS THE CAPACITY TO DESTROY ITS WIELDER. VOID COULD DEVOUR YOU DOWN TO THE VERY ATOMS OF YOUR BEING, YES. A NATURAL RESULT OF IGNORANCE, JUST AS A MAGELING CAN INCINERATE HIMSELF WITH HIS OWN FIRE. I OFFER YOU WISDOM, MARA SPELL-BREAKER. I OFFER YOU KNOWLEDGE. I OFFER YOU POWER.” 

“Mara, be careful,” Aallotar pleaded, still holding the huntress’s hand. “Demons give with one hand and take with both.” 

“Could it break Aallotar’s curse?” Mara said, giving her friend’s hand a squeeze to comfort her. 

“ANYTHING BORN OF CREATION CAN BE UNMADE BY VOID. WITH DEDICATION AND SKILL, EVEN A CURSE AS POWERFUL AS THE ONE BURNING IN HER BLOOD COULD BE EXTINGUISHED LIKE A CANDLE’S FLAME.” Sammael brushed Mara’s hair out of her face with the claws not holding lightning. “I ASK ONLY THAT YOU REMEMBER ALL THAT I TEACH YOU, THAT IT BE PRESERVED. KNOWLEDGE IS MY PURPOSE, MY TREASURE, MY SOUL. IT MUST LIVE ON WHEN I AM NO MORE.” 

“You are a strange demon,” Mara said with a frown. 

“HAVE YOU MET MANY OF MY KIND?” There was still no inflection, but the movement of the jaws and the gleam of those inhuman obsidian eyes seemed to indicate a dry sardonic edge to the words instead of a simple question.

“Only you,” Mara admitted readily.

“ONE DOES NOT LOOK AT A PINE’S SINGULAR NEEDLE AND PRESUME THE FOREST.” The demon turned, moving at his strange, loping gait. It put him a bit faster than a comfortable walking pace for Mara, but easily followed for Aallotar. Together, the two young women followed the creature down the tunnel. “WE WILL DISCUSS MORE WHEN WE HAVE REACHED MY ABODE. THE CLOSER WE STAY TO SJALIGR, THE GREATER THE DANGER OF DISCOVERY.” That cold gaze fixed her with a stare again for a moment, the head turning back towards them without any change to the body’s trajectory. “ARE WE AGREED, SPELL-BREAKER?” 

“If an apprentice is what you seek…”

“IT IS.” 

Mara took a deep breath, that bitterness welling in the pit of her stomach as she thought of all the warnings she had ever been given about demons. For all his probable evil, Sammael was still treating her more like a human than most of her own people had. “Then I am your apprentice.” 

Sammael stopped and turned, bowing his head. “IT IS CUSTOMARY FOR MY KIND TO MARK THEIR THRALLS,” he said, claws taking hold of both of Mara’s shoulders. “YOU ARE NEVER TO ACCEPT THE BRAND OF ANY DEMON, WHATEVER THEY OFFER. THIS IS YOUR FIRST LESSON.” 

Mara felt a wave of relief crash over her when the demon released her without working any kind of sorcery. “You aren’t going to brand me?” 

“NO,” Sammael said with metallic bluntness. “YOU ARE MY APPRENTICE, NOT MY POSSESSION. NOW FOLLOW. WE HAVE SEVERAL HOURS OF TUNNEL AND FOREST YET TO GO.” 

Aallotar looked over at her friend, some of the tension ebbing from her shoulders. “I have never heard of such a thing,” she murmured. “Not from the mage who taught me.” 

“Neither have I,” Mara said, studying the back of their strange rescuer. “But if it can break your curse and protect us against whatever is coming, I’ll gladly play apprentice to a demon.” 

“You do not worry what he might ask?” Aallotar murmured, golden eyes flickering in the inconstant light. 

Mara gave her friend a half-smile. “I didn’t say that,” she admitted quietly.