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She started to sing. Quietly, just loud enough that the others could hear her, and not a magical song, but a Dhakaani battle hymn invoking the strength of muut in combat and the glory of atcha in victory. It was an old song, as old as the long and wondrous middle years of Dhakaan, when the emperor’s power spanned a continent. The same song might have echoed in Suud Anshaar. Tasaam Draet might have listened to and been inspired by it.

She felt some of her fear slip away. The others stood straighter and scanned the shadows with eyes that were brighter and more alert. They moved with greater confidence. Even Marrow seemed to beat her tail in time to the song. And when the wail inevitably came again, Ekhaas raised her voice just a little to challenge its power. For a moment, the wail seemed a little less terrifying—even if it did seem to have taken on a more directional quality.

Chetiin pointed across the ruins. “Somewhere over there.”

“I think I felt it through the ground,” said Tenquis.

Ekhaas let the song die away, the better to hear any movement among the stones. Geth’s hand had stolen up to touch his collar of black stones. Faint wisps of vapor escaped between his fingers into the warm night air; he’d said in the past that the collar turned cold to warn of unnatural creatures.

“Geth?” she asked softly.

“Keep moving,” he said.

They moved. The deeper they penetrated into the remains of the fortress, the better preserved the structure seemed to be. Walls, doorways, and pillars remained in place—with the result that their line of sight to the area around them was constantly changing and being cut off. Worse, the surviving corridors were often half-filled with debris. There was no running here. Moving too quickly sent loose stones sliding and might plunge a foot into a crevice. Marrow had real difficulty scrambling up and down the slopes. Heading around one steep heap, Tooth had to catch and brace her with his shoulder. The worg snapped and growled at him. Ekhaas couldn’t tell if it was an expression of gratitude or a warning not to touch her.

Still, they went as fast as they could, sticking close together. Ekhaas took the lead, though she was only guessing the way and hoping she didn’t lead them all into a dead end. With every mound of rubble they climbed or skirted, she half-expected to find her chosen path blocked.

It never was. Ekhaas crawled under a pair of columns that had fallen against each other and stood to find herself facing a high, double-arched doorway with angular Goblin characters carved over it.

TASAAM DRAET GOVERNS SUUD ANSHAAR BY THE WILL OF GIIS PUULTA, MARHU OF DHAKAAN. KNOW MUUT YOU WHO ENTER.

She whirled and called back under the columns, “We’re here! This is the great hall.”

Tenquis was just crawling through. Ekhaas helped him up, then stood out of the way as Marrow came squirming and wriggling through the gap. Chetiin followed, then Tooth. Geth came last, his face drawn hard and taut.

The collar around his neck was white with frost. She drew air between her teeth. “Is it bad?” she asked.

“Bad enough.” He took her arm and pulled her toward the arched doorway. “Get inside. If there’s going to be a fight, I want space around us.”

Beyond the doorway, though, the great hall wasn’t in as good a shape as Ekhaas had hoped when she’d seen it in the distance. The long stone spans that had once supported the ceiling still stood, but in many places the vaults between them had crumbled. Moonlight fell onto more rubble. The walls were cracked and looked as if a hard push would bring them down. Other doors were either choked with fallen stones or opened directly onto the night.

Aside from rubble and moonlight, the hall was completely empty.

Tenquis turned to her. “What now? What are we looking for?”

Ekhaas stared around the devastated hall. “I don’t know. A shrine? Something ostentatious.”

“Under the rubble?”

“Maybe,” said Chetiin, “the shield fragments aren’t here at all. Maybe they are in a vault somewhere.”

“They’re here,” Geth said.

There was a