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“We did. We agreed that if you died here in the Uura Odaarii, I would give you the rod.” He sat down. “Did you really think that a trick of dance would satisfy me? It was a pretty illusion, nothing more.” His face was hard. “Take your friends—I give you their freedom as a reward for your performance—and get out.” The rod flicked once, then vanished into the folds of Dabrak’s robes as his hands dropped into his lap.

Around Ashi, the others fell out of their kneeling postures. Midian gasped and gingerly worked a jaw that had been clamped shut. Near Ashi’s feet, Geth groaned and moved as well, rising slowly to hands and knees. Ashi kept her eyes on Dabrak, though, as if she could burn him with her anger. “You put no conditions on our agreement!” she protested. “I died!”

“You made a pretty show, but you did not die,” Dabrak said harshly. “I know what death looks like, and you’re not dead.”

“But I can’t die here. You said yourself, it’s impossible.”

The ancient emperor sat forward. “Of course, it’s impossible! That’s why I asked. It’s not my fault you agreed.” His lips curled back from his teeth. “This is the Uura Odaarii, you fool. There is no future here. There is no death. Nothing changes!”

Ashi’s hand thrust out to point at him. “You’ve changed,” she snarled without thinking.

Dabrak stared at her in surprise for a moment, then spat. “No, I haven’t.”

“You have!” The truth of what she had just said spread into Ashi. Her hand fell back. “You changed when you used the power of the cavern. It made you wither. If time has no effect in the Uura Odaarii, then you should look the same as you did when you entered. But you don’t. You’re all shriveled up.”

“What are you talking about?” Dabrak thrust out his hands. “I’m not shriveled. I’m strong!”

“Maybe you are,” said Chetiin. “But you’re wearing gloves.”

Dabrak looked at his hands as if seeing them for the first time, then grabbed at the fingers of one glove and pulled it off.

The hand that emerged was like a bundle of crooked twigs with orange skin hanging loose. Dabrak stared at it as though it didn’t belong at the end of his arm. “What is this?” he croaked. The hand crept up to his face, and he gasped as it encountered the wrinkles and folds there. “This is a trick.”

Midian had his arm up to his elbow in his pack. He pulled it out with a flat leather case clutched in his fingers and opened the case to reveal a polished steel shaving mirror. Jumping up onto the side of the chair, he thrust the mirror in front of Dabrak’s face. “Look for yourself!”

Dabrak looked—and screamed. He slapped Midian away. The mirror spun across the cavern. Dabrak stood up, suddenly a strangely ridiculous figure in his loose, flapping clothes. “This isn’t possible! Nothing changes in the Uura Odaarii. Nothing!”

“Maybe it’s your future catching up with you,” Geth said, rising to his feet. His voice was rough and shaky, but the hand that held Wrath was steady.

Dabrak spun around and hurled the rod at him.

Geth snatched the rod out of the air with his free hand. For a moment, he just stared at it in astonishment, then his fingers curled around it and he grinned.

“Yes, take it!” spat Dabrak. “Take what you came for and get out!” He collapsed back on his chair, his body wracked with silent convulsions that might have been sobbing.

No one needed a second invitation. “Twice tak, marhu!” Geth said and ran for the passage that led out of the weird cavern. Ashi followed him, pausing at the edge of the passage to make certain everyone else got out. Chetiin raced past, another torch in his hand to light the way for Geth. Midian, his pack clutched in his arms. Ekhaas and Dagii—Ashi flung herself after them, racing through the narrow twists of the passage. Her frozen torch began to hiss and flare as she ran, and she thought it was possibly the most beautiful sound she had ever heard.

It wasn’t the only sound she heard though. A voice drifted suddenly out of the darkness below. “Wait! Wait, bring it back! Bring the rod back to me!” Dabrak’s voice rose to a roar.