Rinerva sat in a silent room.

  Talos didn’t speak.

  Nomi didn’t joke.

  Lillik’zeil didn’t brew.

  Agon was dead.

  The only sound was the scratch of Rinerva’s quill, scrawling details onto maps, and the shuffle of pages as she flipped through tomes of old mutation research. She had no idea what happened while she was gone. Neither Talos nor Nomi would explain why the inn had been trashed, or why Nomi sported fresh bruises on her torso and wrist.

  Talos wasn’t the type to beat his partners. But maybe the stress finally broke him.

  Rinerva watched Lillik’zeil’s hope evaporate the moment she saw Nomi. The fox had been trying to comfort Talos earlier, but now she just sat quietly on his lap, picking at his leather tunic. Rinerva looked down at her work. Her board was out of pieces, and her opponent still had their queen. She had a few options left—maybe seeking out Strigoi, seeing if he had any resources remaining. She could always play herself. In fact, she knew she would have to.

  She had a thousand things to do, and everyone around her was in varying states of a breakdown. Her eyes flicked up from her map, landing first on Talos.

  So many years of history, so many years of loyalty, and she had led him into a deathtrap. Now he sat with the one woman he actually enjoyed being around, unmoving and lost in his own mind. He knew Rinerva better than anyone, and she didn’t even know his favorite color.

  Then to Lillik’zeil. Always ready to advise and offer her talents. She had kept them alive for the two years they’d been travelling together. Despite her misgivings, she had always followed Rinerva. It hurt to think that Lillik’s story might end in madness.

  And finally to Nomi. A woman adored by both of her companions, yet Rinerva never figured out why, beyond a single moment of warmth she’d filed away. Now she wished she’d spent more time deciphering the fox.

  She didn’t want to fail.

  She didn’t want them to die.

  She wouldn’t let them die.

  Rinerva closed her eyes and collected her thoughts, the ones scattered to the corners of her mind. They needed time to heal, to rest and rally. But that wasn’t an option.

  They needed a win. With broken minds, they had to kill the Director and reclaim the show for themselves.

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  The question was how.

  Rinerva let out a slow exhale. Ice crystals danced down the edges of her fingers—not in harsh, jagged shapes, but in a meditative, focused cooling. She started her game, gathering her variables:

  Her own health and sanity were still stable.

  Nomi was probably the closest to sane. If anyone could rally, it was Nomi, she could force herself back together.

  Lillik was a mess; combat was out of the question. Potion work, then. Keep her busy, keep her mind clear.

  Talos was shattered. Whatever he had done had broken him beyond anything Rinerva had seen, and beyond what she could fix. But maybe Nomi could.

  Strigoi was spineless, but had information. He could potentially be used to bait out the Director.

  Whatever hypnosis magic Carmilla was using was powerful, but there had to be limitations. She needed to verify exactly how the Witch was controlling people. And the mutations... They had killed three different types of over-mutated creatures, but hadn’t seen over-mutated bats. There had to be a reason why.

  Rinerva pulled in her next breath.

  She needed Carmilla to think they were broken, to give them time. The Witch's own hubris was her weakness; she wouldn’t ruin the show by kicking them at their lowest.

  Her first step… was to get Nomi back.

  Then she had to rely on the fox to drag Talos back from the brink, while she kept Lillik’zeil from crumbling through work and advising.

  “Nomi.”

  “...What do you want, Rin?” the fox asked, without looking over at her.

  “I want your assistance.”

  “...What?”

  Nomi’s gaze traced Rinerva’s face, confused. She visibly paused when she saw the look in the ice noble’s eyes—glowing with faint mana. Focused. Unbowing.

  “I need your help.”

  Nomi’s eyes narrowed. She hesitated, glancing back at the broken man beneath her, but after a moment she pulled herself off Talos’s lap. She stepped toward the strategy table, standing across from the ice mage. The warrior’s eyes shifted up, before he let them fall back to his hand.

  “...Go ahead.”

  Rinerva’s voice dropped lower. Nomi’s eyes were still narrowed, untrusting and unfocused. But she was present.

  “Talos. He’s lost right now. I need him awake. You’re the only person who can bring him back. You know that, right?”

  The fox nodded cautiously.

  “Then do it. You and I… haven’t got along well. That is a fault of my own making. But I don’t want Talos or Zeil to die here. And I know you don’t want that either,” Rinerva’s eyes held Nomi’s in an unapologetic statement of fact. “I’ve treated you like a weapon for as long as I’ve known you. Now I’m asking for a fox.”

  Rinerva held up her hand. An offer.

  “Help me.”

  Nomi stared down at the hand, she looked tired. Unbelievably so. But the fox wasn’t easy to break. She took the hand, and as soon as she did, Rinerva dragged her closer. Nomi tensed, trying to pull away but Rinerva held her there, whole body rigid while Rinerva whispered in her ears.

  “He loves you. More than anyone. So if you want to keep him, help him remember who exactly Talos the null is.”

  A small scowl pulled across Nomi’s lips, and her ears stopped pressing into the side of her head for the first time in hours.

  “You’re a manipulative bitch, you know that Rin?”

  “I don’t pretend to be anything else.”