The door to the mansion cracked. It had never been warded, but Saul remembered his father once telling him it was carved from the wood of an Escalan deep tree, grown in the depths of the Hidrian oceans. That wood should have held against a blow from a human without enhanced strength, even with a two-handed sword.

  “They’re strong.” Saul stared at the cracked door, hand pressed to the cut on his forearm. Luckily, not a deep cut, but still painful. Another splinter flew as the black blade made a second hole.

  “And they have maker-forged steel.” Irene took the hilt of her sword in both hands. Her large, red bird was perched on the banister of the grand staircase just behind her. “My bet is, they’re art-children.”

  “Art-children?” Olivia frowned. “I thought they all looked like animals.”

  “Most of mine do,” said Saul. “But not all makers respect human form.”

  “Could they be from that new guardian?” Olivia kept her eyes on the door.

  “I won’t rule out anything at this point.” Saul scowled. “He seemed pretty strong when I met him this morning.”

  “Damn it. What is going on here?” said Morrie between panted breaths. His hands rested on his knees. “Why are those people trying to kill us? And what the hell are you all talking about?”

  “There’s too much to explain now.” Olivia turned toward Saul. “Is there somewhere he can hide? That door won’t hold for long.”

  Morrie looked at Saul, eyes wide.

  “I’ve got the armory. He should be safe inside, and I need my weapons anyway.”

  Olivia nodded. “Morrie, go with Saul.”

  “What are you, my mother?” Morrie gritted his teeth. “I want to know what’s going on.”

  “Later. For now, let’s try to keep us all from dying.”

  “Let’s move.” Saul nodded to Morrie. “Upstairs.”

  “We’ll hold them here,” said Irene. “Find a real weapon, Saul.”

  The sword withdrew from another crack in the door. An unnaturally pure blue eye appeared in the crack, framed by the borders of the white mask.

  “Come out, Burton. Surrender the exiles and we will leave you to yourself,” said a high voice through the door.

  Saul began to tremble with unconcealed anger. “You’re Simon’s art-children, aren’t you?”

  “Call me Eagle,” said the voice belonging to the woman in white. “My companion is Crow.”

  “That explains the feathers,” Saul said. “If you want these exiles you’ll have to fight us for them.”

  “Don’t be unreasonable. They have seen too much.”

  Damn right they have, Saul thought.

  “You think I don’t know what Simon wants to do if I turn them over? Death would only be the beginning of their punishment.”

  “Quite so.” A note of amusement sang in Eagle’s cold voice. “Why do you care?”

  “That’s enough talk.” Saul gritted his teeth. “I’ll be here when you break down my door.”

  “Have it your way.” Eagle’s eye vanished from the crack in the door.

  Saul shook his head. “I guess that answers that question.”

  Morrie stood at the base of the grant stairs, eyes locked on the doorway. “Who are they calling exiles?” he said. “Who is Simon?”

  “Simon is the guy who wants to kill you and Olivia. It’s not personal for him, but I have a feeling he’s not gonna give up.” Saul took a deep breath. “Now, go upstairs, first door on the left.” He tossed his ring of keys to Morrie. “Go, and I’ll be right behind you.”

  Morrie scowled at him. “Screw you. I don’t even know your name.”

  “My name is Saul. Go upstairs.”

  The student opened his mouth to protest but did not get the words out.

  Something big hit the door from the other side. The Escalan deep wood buckled on its hinges and the whole house shook. Morrie’s eyes widened and his protest emerged as a gasp of shock. He turned and scurried up the staircase.

  Irene glanced at Saul, face pale, eyes tired. Saul guessed the wound the gern had dealt her was open again, bleeding. She and Olivia would need his help. She nodded to him. Despite everything, a small smile played on her lips. She was most at home with a sword in hand.

  He turned and ran up the stairs after Morrie. The short student got to the maker-forged steel door of the armory and was trying keys from the ring Saul had given him.

  “It’s the big black one,” said Saul as he caught up.

  “Right.” Morrie picked the largest of the keys and turned it in the lock. Saul yanked the heavy door open with one hand, then shoved Morrie ahead of him inside. The sound of breaking glass tinkled from the far end of the upstairs corridor. Shit. Saul knew all too well that was no coincidence. One of Simon’s children had broken a window, but at least that meant only one was downstairs to fight Olivia and Irene.

  They were strong children, but Saul would bet on Irene and Olivia together any day of the week. He slammed the door of the armory behind him. Morrie hit the light switch in the windowless room before Saul could reach it. All around the room stood braces and stands that held weapons ranging from swords to spears to stranger objects. Boxes of stored artifacts occupied the spaces not belonging to weapons.

  Saul snatched a sword with a winged hilt from the mount near the door. The blade was a touch heavy for him, and the wings on the hilt were blue, which he never liked. But the sword would cut and fly and it was close to hand. He slipped the sword belt across his shoulder and sheathed the blade. It felt reassuring at his side, even though the weight was off.

  He glowered around the room. Many art-children could nullify complex machinery, so he had never used a firearm, but another ranged weapon would not go amiss. His eyes fell on a crossbow propped by the wall opposite the door.

  “Where are my friends?” Morrie asked.

  Saul crossed the room and picked up the crossbow, a custom repeater from Hayk. A box-loader of electrified bolts sat beside the weapon on a glass display case that contained a collection of ancient daggers of varying powers and descriptions. Electricity was good against gern, but who knew how good against Simon’s children.

  “I don’t know,” Saul said. “Dead, maybe.”

  “W-Why? We haven’t done anything.”

  “Honestly? No idea.” Saul latched the crossbow’s box loader onto the top of the weapon. He pulled down the lever-action and the first bolt loaded itself into the weapon. The string pulled back slightly.

  The crossbow had a trigger that would launch the bolt from that position, but with the lever, he could pull the string back further to put more force behind the shot.

  He pulled the lever down all the way, counting on the reinforced string to hold the bolt a few seconds. He figured he would need the full velocity to hit any of Simon’s children, given how fast they moved.

  He held the crossbow in both hands and marched back toward the door. There he pushed it open. “Don’t open this for anyone but Olivia,” said Saul.

  Morrie stared at him. “What about you?”

  “I expect I’ll be busy.” Saul glanced over his shoulder at the student. “Don’t touch anything.”

  “What? Wait!”

  Saul stepped into the hall and closed the door behind him. A slender woman in a gray cloak and wearing a pale, wrinkly mask with a hooked beak, stalked toward him down the corridor. A third child made for bad news. Simon could have made any number of these creatures, and their being humanoid made them less noticeable on the street than the more monstrous art-children. Saul raised the crossbow to eye-level and aimed at her.

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “Nice to meet you.” He pulled the trigger.

  The child in gray darted forward. A sword flashed from nowhere into her hand, small and curved. Saul’s bolt missed flew down the hall and then broke one of the remaining panes in the window the child had crashed through at the end of the corridor.

  Shit.

  “No good,” said the gray child in a creaking female voice. She slashed at him with the blade. He tossed the crossbow up, stepped backward, and went for his sword. His wounded right arm bumped the hilt painfully, but at least he avoided the gray child’s strike. He stumbled to the top of the grand staircase. He managed to draw the sword just as the gray child took another slice at him.

  The blade cut open the front of his collar, ruining the coat, but not drawing blood.

  Saul stabbed out with his unwieldy blade. Why had he left this crappy thing by the door? She parried.

  He took a backward step down onto the staircase.

  “No, no, no.” The gray child crouched and then leaped. She flew well over his head and landed on the steps halfway down. He spun to face her and blocked her next blade, only barely. She was fast, like the others.

  At the entryway below, the door cracked and flew off its hinges. The black-clad art-child rushed inside, sword in both hands. The white child sauntered through after. A taser shot sounded below, but

  Olivia must have missed because the two children continued to close with her and Irene.

  Saul clashed back and forth with the gray one on the steps. “White is Eagle. Black is Crow.” He grimaced at the pain in his wounded arm with every block and cut. “What does that make you?”

  “Vulture,” said the creature behind the wrinkled mask. “I pick the bones.”

  Saul’s gaze locked with Vulture’s colorless eyes. They exchanged another series of attacks and blocks. She didn’t get as close as his collar again, but she was far stronger than a human of her size, and between his wound and the damned overly heavy sword, he would not be able to keep this up for long. He stepped back toward the banister.

  “Get to the workshop,” he called to Irene and Olivia. He lowered his voice. “Nat. Darkness.”

  Vulture darted in with her blade, a low blow aimed at opening Saul’s guts. Saul hurled himself over the banister as Nat expanded his shadow behind him. To human eyes, he would go unseen at the epicenter of a cloud of deep shadow.

  He hit the floor eight feet down and his legs protested painfully. His arms wheeled, but he kept his feet. An arrow thunked into the wall just over his head. So they could shoot too. He didn’t look back, already totally blind in Nat’s darkness. He felt his way along the darkened wall toward the entryway, searching for the open hall to the workshop. Footsteps ran past ahead of him and he caught a whiff of the morning’s coffee. Olivia.

  He found the place where the wall ended and rounded it to continue into the ballroom. “Nat, withdraw the darkness.”

  “Of course, Saul.” The darkness dispersed from Saul, allowing the dim light in the curtained ballroom-turned-workshop to reach his eyes.

  Irene leaned against the near wall with one palm. Her other hand held her sword. She was breathing heavily. Though she appeared to have avoided any new wounds, her face was pale and he knew the cut on her collar bone must definitely be bleeding again by now.

  Olivia stood in the middle of the old dance floor, looking around the dimly lit room at the sculpted forms of incomplete art-children Saul had built over the last few months. All attempts to prepare for Apahar, all abandoned. Apahar would not be beaten by raw power, but at that moment Saul wished he had finished at least one of these children.

  One would be useful against Simon’s children, and their swift blades.

  “They’re fast.” He turned to face the doorway he had just entered through. “Be ready.”

  I cut Crow,” said Irene. “He may be the slowest of them.”

  Saul nodded in her direction, then turned to Olivia. She raised her cattle prod in one hand. She lowered her other hand and another weapon dropped into her grip. At first, Saul thought it was another taser, but in the little light that filtered through the shades, he realized it was a pistol, the kind with bullets.

  “When did you start carrying a gun?” he asked.

  Olivia scowled. “Right after we got back. I’m not getting caught by someone like William again.”

  He kept his eyes on the door. “Could be useful.” Very useful if they don’t have nullification abilities, but they would see, one way or the other.

  Hush circled the high ceiling, casting a shadow that left Saul uncomfortable as he considered the ability of the bird to produce fire from his wings. He frowned at the doorway. “Why aren’t they following? They could have been right behind us?”

  “Is there another way into this room?” asked Olivia.

  Saul glanced over his shoulder toward the door that led to the larger kitchen he almost never used, located behind the ballroom and meant for caterers, back when his father had thrown parties here.

  His eyes met Irene’s.

  “The kitchen,” he said.

  “I’m going.” Irene turned toward the back of the house. “Hush, follow.”

  “No fire,” said Saul. “I may not like my father, but this is my house now.”

  “I won’t burn your house down,” said Irene without looking back.

  Let’s hope so. As much as Saul hated his father, he had some memories in this place he did not despise. As children, he and Irene used to race each other around this very room, and back through the kitchen. Their fathers’ had been friends from before they had been born. How anyone even put up with his father baffled Saul, but at least he knew Irene as a result.

  He backed away from the door, his sword held in one hand. Nat wormed his way out of Saul’s collar.

  “It’s getting hot in there,” said the insectile art-child.

  “Right.” Saul shrugged off his torn coat and dropped it onto the floor before him, hoping it might give him an edge in footing when Simon’s children entered the room. Sometimes a momentary advantage was all one needed in a duel.

  His breathing sounded loud in his ears. Sweat mingled with blood on his wounded wrist. Olivia crossed the room to a window farther from the door. Her steps sounded so light they were almost musical on the wood of the dance floor. She shed her outer coat, which made Saul guess she had run out of concealed weapons.

  Saul glanced at her. “Didn’t bring the full kit?”

  “It’s broad daylight. I was working.”

  He nodded. “I just wish you’d been more paranoid today.”

  “Hey, two tasers, a collapsible cattle prod, and a loaded pistol don’t exactly say ‘trusting.’”

  “Good point.”

  A ring of steel echoed behind them from the kitchen where Irene had gone. Crow charged into the workshop, straight at Olivia.

  She took aim and fired. The gun went click. “Crap.”

  “Nullifiers. Throw the gun away.”

  Olivia did not question Saul’s words. She hurled the pistol like a baseball at Crow as he barreled toward her. Nullifiers did not just render handguns ineffective. Ballistic weapons they stopped usually backfired an instant later.

  As the gun flew past Crow’s shoulder, it proved no exception. The pistol exploded as the bullet burst in the chamber. The magazine went off like a string of firecrackers. Metal and plastic shrapnel scythed into Crow’s side. He grunted and staggered. Blood oozed from his collar, shoulder, and arm.

  Eagle stepped into the workshop and turned toward Saul. She took a fencing stance, rapier trained upon him. Her high voice still sounded amused. “You didn’t tell your exile that wouldn’t work?”

  “Foolish.” Crow groaned and straightened his back. “Foolish.” He advanced on Olivia, black blade raised, but slower than before.

  “Is Simon really that arrogant?” Saul smirked with more confidence than he felt. “He thinks he can send you into my house? He should have led you himself.” He didn’t like to bluff with a small hand.

  Not a lot of options left at the moment.

  Eagle stopped her advance on Saul. “What?”

  Crow stalked toward Olivia. She backed away toward the table with the pigeons that stood close to the middle of the room. Saul gripped his sword tighter. “Rult, show them what you can do.”

  The cat child prowled out from under the table past a row of metal rods Saul used for the spines of larger sculptures. His feline eyes fixed on Crow. The black-clad child ignored him. Rult tensed and a rod quivered at his side. Saul had not known all the powers the child would develop from the taph he had sculpted for him in such a hurry back in Mortressa.

  Rult’s close-range taphic force lifted a two-foot metal rod. The cat twitched his head, and the rod shot from his taph’s grip with at least the force of one of Saul’s crossbow bolts. But far more accurate.

  The rod struck Crow in one arm, with the loud crack of a bone breaking. He lurched to one side. Olivia stepped in and thrust her cattle prod at the big art-child. He stepped back, narrowly avoiding the end of her weapon.

  Rult raised another rod and turned toward Eagle. She darted along the wall, putting Saul between herself and Rult. Clever.

  Saul threw himself backward from her so he would fall onto his back on the dance floor, a suicidal action, except that it opened Eagle up to Rult’s throw. And throw he did.

  The metal rod struck her in the center of her mask. She snapped backward and hit the wall. Eagle slumped against the wall and slid to the floor, her mask cracked between the eyes. Saul walked toward her, a frown on his face.

  The mask evaporated into mist as he approached. The face of the red-haired girl appeared in absence of the mask. The white cloak faded into mist, and her sword did the same. The mist dispersed into the air.

  Crow’s neck twitched. His sword hung in one hand while his other arm dangled, broken. He backed away from Olivia, then bolted past Saul and out the door of the workshop. Irene shouted from the kitchen, a triumphant sound.

  Saul got to his feet slowly. Rult crept over to him, holding a third rod in the air with his invisible taphic arm. Olivia chased Crow as far as the door to the workshop but stopped as he thundered out the broken front door.

  She lowered her cattle prod, then walked over to Saul. Irene entered the room from the opposite door. She limped over to where Saul stood over the fallen girl, who had been Eagle up until a few seconds ago.

  The three of them looked down at the girl, who lay with her back to the wall. Her chest rose and fell, so she wasn’t dead, but what had happened? She had been a vicious warrior child up until the moment Rult had hit her, but now all evidence of that was gone except for her identical frame. She wore the same clothes she had at the coffee shop.

  “Cecilia?” Olivia murmured in a shocked tone. She dropped her cattle prod, then fell to her knees beside the unconscious girl. “Cecilia, are you alright?”

  Irene glanced at Saul. “Who is this?”

  “An exile student. I saw her at the coffee shop.”

  “Huh,” said Irene. “How did she get here?”

  “She appeared after Rult hit Eagle.” Saul frowned. “Regardless, she’s here now.” A winter chill crept into the room from the broken doorway at the front of the house.

  Irene scowled. “Vulture fled. Obviously, they thought they couldn’t win after this.”

  Olivia looked up from Cecilia’s slack frame, her eyes worried. “I don’t like it.”

  “Neither do I,” said Saul. He remembered Morrie upstairs in the armory who clearly had a crush on the girl laying on the floor before them. Cold moved down his spine that had nothing to do with the winter outside. Irene sagged, clearly feeling the blood loss. Hush settled onto the table with Saul’s still pigeons.

  “There’s a lot to do,” Saul said. He turned to Irene. “Hang on a little longer. I’m going to try and fix the door. Rult, come with me.”

  Olivia shook her head. “Where’s Morrie?”

  “In the armory, upstairs. I told him to only open the door for you, Olivia.”

  “Alright.” Olivia brushed a hand across her eyes. “Why these kids? They haven’t done anything.”

  “That we know of,” said Irene.

  “So it’s, ‘we,’ now?” Olivia grimaced and stood up. “Cecilia’s breathing. I’ll go let Morrie out.”

  Saul nodded, overwhelmed. This attack raised too many questions.

  Why involve the students?

  Why strike now?

  Where had Eagle gone?

  He had a feeling he would not like any of the answers.