With agonizing care, Lindon prodded his flagging body into yet another climb.

Yerin stood at the top of the chasm, loose hair flying in her face, panting heavily and leaning on her sheathed sword as a walking stick. Lindon glanced hurriedly around for Elder Whitehall.

“Where did he go?”

She evened her breathing before responding. “Deeper in. Other side of the mountain. He’s bleeding like a butchered hog, but he’ll be coming back.”

Lindon hauled himself out of the chasm, hoping he didn’t look as bad as she did, but knowing that he was probably worse. “You really drove off an elder and six Iron disciples? By yourself?”

She shot a sidelong glance at him. “Five, I did.”

Deret was still lying in the bottom of the chasm, body littering the ground far from his home. Lindon cleared his throat. “You’re incredible. Your master must have been an expert without peer.”

“He was,” Yerin said, her voice distant. She stared into the dawn in silence.

But Lindon was in no mood to wait around. He slipped the extra disciple robes out of his pack, holding them out to her. He was glad he’d brought them; there were plenty of other sets nearby, but the bloodstains would make them somewhat obvious.

“You should put these on,” he said. “If the heavens are kind, there won’t be any other disciples in the woods, but let’s assume there are. Unless they’ve seen your face before, they won’t recognize you in these. I don’t have a badge for you, but…” He looked around at the bleeding disciples. Only one of them was dead, he realized, though the others weren’t far away. The dead boy’s Remnant peeled itself away from his corpse, like a yellow sketch of a skeleton. It glanced back in Lindon’s direction only once before scampering off into the woods.

“I’m sure you can find one,” he finished.

Without a word of protest, Yerin took the clothes and wrapped them around her tattered black robes. His clothes were large enough that she still had room to spare. Once again, his attention was drawn to the thick red coil wrapped around her waist; she didn’t untie it, but it still ended up outside the clothes of the Heaven’s Glory disciple. As though the belt had melted through her clothes.

She slipped an Iron Striker badge over her neck and gestured to herself. “Anything missing?”

Her clothes were too big, she was carrying a sword, and she looked like she’d been living in the woods for two weeks. But from a distance, she’d pass.

“As long as we don’t run into Elder Whitehall on the way out, you’ll make it.” He was more worried about the elder than anything else, as Whitehall had fled in the opposite direction of the valley. If their luck was bad, they might run into him on the road out.

He reached into his big, brown pack, checking that he had everything important: his boundary flags, Suriel’s warm marble, a few other bits and pieces. He wasn’t bringing much, but nothing else would help him on his journey beyond the valley. He was ready. It was time to go.

Lindon’s heart actually lifted at the thought. He was absolutely exhausted, every resource in his body and spirit expended, but he’d made it. He’d won. On the other side of this snow-capped mountain waited a dangerous and infinite world.

Yerin took a deep breath and straightened. “All right,” she said. “Lead the way.”

Lindon had already turned to face the range of mountains past Samara, but he stopped. Turned back. “I know it’s this way, but beyond that, you’ll have to lead us out.”

“Out? I’ve still got a bone to grind with the Heaven’s Glory School.” She gave him a grim smile. “They took my master’s body, and his sword, and his Remnant. If I was soft enough to leave him here, I’d have walked away from this viper’s nest weeks ago. No, I’ve got a few chores left here, and the chief one is you leading me back.”

It was like a bag had tightened over Lindon’s head. Compared to the freedom he’d tasted just a second before, he felt like choking. Like the prison door had been slowly creaking open, only to slam shut. He couldn’t accept it.

“No. No! You swore.” He didn’t know how punishing the oath would be to him, but for someone of Yerin’s power, it would weigh heavily. She might even cripple her future potential by breaking a vow like this.

Yerin raised one finger. “I said I’d shepherd you on the path out, and I will. Once we’re free and clear. But I’m not popping the lid off this barrel yet.”

While he searched for words, she patted him on the shoulder.

“If it eases you any, I’m starting to trust you,” she said. “A little.”

***

Nervously, Lindon had thrown together an appropriate story to explain why he was hobbling in to the school in the early morning with a battered sister disciple, but no one asked for an explanation. One man cursed at the Unsouled for getting in his way, a few passersby expressed sympathy, and a girl reassured them kindly that the Sword Disciple would “see heaven’s punishment come soon.”

No one questioned them further than that. These days, coming home wounded was more common than not.

When Lindon reached his room, he knew he couldn’t stay long, but he was overwhelmed with the desire to simply collapse on the floor. “When Elder Whitehall comes back, this is the first place he’ll check,” Lindon said. His jaw had begun to ache again, and every word sent itchy needles dancing inside his face. “We should be gone before that happens, if that’s agreeable to you. I have an idea where…”

He trailed off as Yerin stumbled past him, clumsily tugging off one shoe as she made her way toward his bed. “We’re not drawing swords in this state,” she said. “We’ll die. Need rest.”

Halfway through taking off the second shoe, she slumped face-first onto the bed. In seconds, she was snoring.

At first, Lindon wondered how she could possibly sleep with the threat of death hanging over them. And she had taken his bed. He slipped off his pack, leaving it next to the door, and reached for her shoe. He had intended to pull it off and put it next to the other, but that was the last thing he remembered.

When he came to, Samara’s ring was in the sky again, and his neck ached from a night spent in an impossible position. He had collapsed on his side, his head jammed up against the side of his bed, Yerin’s fingers dangling in his face.

For a few seconds, he tried to remember how they had gotten here. He recognized Yerin from Suriel’s vision, but the events of the previous day were a blurry haze in his mind.

When the fog cleared and he recalled where he was, fear shot him bolt upright. He had aided an enemy of the Heaven’s Glory School. He’d fought an elder, killed an Iron disciple. Even the Patriarch of the Wei clan would have to pay with his life for such an offense, and here Lindon was sleeping in his room as though nothing had happened. He needed to move. He’d staggered to his feet before he stopped again.

Move where?

He couldn’t leave the valley without Yerin, and he couldn’t go home. His clan would turn him over to Heaven’s Glory for a bent halfsilver chip.

He calmed himself, gathering his thoughts, taking a long look at his situation. Given that Heaven’s Glory would hunt him as soon as Whitehall returned, then Lindon had to treat this place like enemy territory. He and Yerin had stayed here too long already.