Chapter 78

sailing out of Trinity on a void-black sea under three suns. Every hand on deck looks over their shoulder at anything shiny.

a council of war over cold porridge. Trollmage's Codex lies open in the middle.

holding his bare wrist, Mingus's head in his lap. Lilla Ulv lies on the table in front of him.

Every eye at the table slowly turns to the ship's polished things: the brass Kettle's bell, the brass lamps, the water barrels, eight steel blades on Rougeina's back, the glass of the lantern.

very still. Her hand goes to the silver ring on her wrist.

coming up from the hold with bowls stacked on her one arm, a pot of stew balanced on her hip. She sets them out on the table: one, two, three… four.

side by side in front of Smurjan's place.

looking at them, then up at her.

staring at the fourth bowl as if it has insulted her.

rising for a moment from Smurjan's shadow, looking at the fourth bowl. He doesn't eat it, though he could.

Calm. Drekk at the wheel in his bell-rope mask. Kompis on watch, sinless, rifle-less, with Lilla Ulv silent at his hip and Mingus asleep on his feet.

at the bow, gleaming in the lantern light. In its brass curve, the reflected deck ripples, like water when a stone goes in.

Out of the bell steps a figure in a white robe, its face hidden behind a mask of polished silver: a perfect mirror, featureless. Out of the water barrel, another. Out of the lantern glass, a third. Out of the blades on Rougeina's back, while she sleeps, a fourth and a fifth.

RANK PLATE ×12: MIRROR-WARD · K-II MARKED · Architect Six's attendants

on his feet.

Vigolas bursts up the ladder, green lightning on both fists, and punches the nearest Ward. The Ward's mirror-mask catches the lightning and throws it back. Vigolas eats his own punch and goes skidding across the deck.

Smurjan opens his third eye and draws the Sightline. A Ward turns its mirror-face toward him, and the crimson line reflects straight back into Smurjan's own forehead. He staggers.

Kompis brings the bucket down on a Ward's mirror-mask, CRACK, and the mask spiders. The Ward staggers. Nothing reflects. There was no power to throw back.

panting, realising.

The crew switches tactics:

Vigolas picks up a barrel and throws it.

Drekk swings his axe by feel, with no power at all, thunk.

Rougeina fights with blades only, no Swap, all dancer's footwork.

Smurjan's open palm, with no Sightline, shatters a mask.

Trollmage sits on one.

The Wards melt back into the reflections they came from: bell, barrel, lantern, blade. Cracked masks drip mercury onto the deck.

sitting on the deck, rubbing his own singed jaw.

looking at the bucket in his hands, then at the crew, all of them bruised and grinning.

The crew asleep again in a pile of blankets near the mast, one person on watch: Rougeina, blades across her knees, every reflective surface on deck covered with sailcloth.

asleep against Smurjan's side, mouth open, snoring. Her one hand curled around the handle of the fourth bowl, which she brought to bed without noticing.

Perfectly still water. In it, the reflection of the Marka, upside down, every mast and rope.

Standing on the reflected deck, inside the water, upside down, is a figure: slight, wiry, a long black braid hanging up toward the surface. It's looking at the reflected Kali, asleep.

on watch, glancing at the water, frowning. She sees the reflected ship. She doesn't see the figure, because there's nothing above the water for it to be the reflection of.

The black-braided figure in the reflection lifts one hand toward the sleeping Kali, almost tenderly. Behind it, where its own reflection should be, there's nothing. It casts no reflection at all.