"You're a Marcellan?" the Unseen gasped.
"No!" Nophel shouted.
"But did you find love?" Rufus asked. He eased back a little, lessening the pressure of the knife against his throat. "I did. Out there, past the desert. She took me in and loved me as her own son."
"Love," Nophel said, and he thought of Dane's final touch on his ugly face, and the way the Marcellan had taken him from the workhouse, given him a home, protected him. He'd been Nophel's point of contact among the Marcellans-a fat, slash-using monster who had treated the Scope watcher with disdain and disgust, but how must it have been for him? To know that he had employed the Baker's bastard son-his own son-in Hanharan Heights, and to know the terrible tortures that awaited them both if anyone there ever found out? Perhaps the only way to protect him had been to treat him like that. But in the end, when everything was falling apart…
"I can see you're not completely unloved," Rufus said. "I'm not sure anyone ever is."
Nophel lowered the knife, but Rufus stayed close, a harsh red line across his throat.
"I wanted to kill her," Nophel whispered.
"I understand," Rufus said, equally quiet. "But wouldn't you rather just ask her why?" He stepped back from Nophel, and Alexia dashed past him, her sword drawn, hunched down, ready in case Nophel went for her with his knife.
But he dropped the weapon and pressed his hands to his horrible, disfigured face, the fluid from several open sores mixing with his tears. Don't be too harsh on the Baker, Dane-his father-had said. She's not like us.
"Us," he whispered, a single word that included him.
Nophel sensed a flutter of movement in the Bellower chamber, a shout, and then a dying scream. Looking up, he saw Dragarians streaming in, the short Unseen already dead on the ground.
"Wait!" Rufus said, but these were creatures ready for war. Some were wounded and bleeding, others wore hastily tied robes from Scarlet Blades they had killed, and one bore the slashed, blood-soaked remnants of Dane Marcellan's fine robe.
Alexia and the other Unseen went for the Dragarians. Peer seemed confused, looking back and forth between the attackers and Rufus. And Rufus stepped forward, hands held up as if to divert the assault.
They advanced quickly, two of them parrying the tall Unseen's sword and grasping his arms while a third drove a bladed hand through his face. He shook but made no sound as he died. They dropped him and moved on.
"No!" Rufus shouted, louder this time, and the sudden attack paused. The chamber seemed to echo with violence. "They haven't harmed me."
"That's my father's robe," Nophel said. The Dragarian wearing it was a woman, badly chopped so that her skin was hardened into chitinous armor, and she hissed at him. He pushed himself away from the Bellower pod, even then thinking, Just what am I going to do? But he had no chance to do anything. The chunk of a crossbow, a punch in his chest, and he fell, the rising chaos in the chamber suddenly very far away and no longer a part of him.
He saw his father's face as he had seen it only once-smiling for his son. And then darkness.
Everything was happening so quickly that, to Peer, it felt like a dream.
She brought up both hands as the Dragarian came at her. Its blades were raised, its eyes lidded for protection, its head lowered, and it moved sleek as a shadow and fast as starlight. Penler, was her last thought, and then she felt the cool kiss of metal against her throat.
"I said stop!" a voice thundered. She knew something in that voice, but it had changed, become whole, and now it sounded like the voice of…
I don't believe in gods, Peer thought as a hand rested softly on her shoulder. The Dragarians backed away, heads lowered slightly. The hand squeezed.
Peer turned and looked past Rufus. Alexia had approached Nophel hesitantly, sword still in one hand. Her edges blurred, but she remained seen as she knelt by the fallen man. He was breathing hard, one hand cupped around the bolt projecting from his chest but not quite touching it.
The chamber took a breath between deaths, and Peer wondered who would be next.
"Peer," Rufus said softly, and she turned to the tall man. "You've been my only friend."
"I wanted to help you," she said.
"And you did." His eyes flicked around the chamber, taking in the bodies of the two dead Unseen and the several Dragarians backed against the chamber wall. They all looked up but kept their heads bowed. Their god has spoken, Peer thought, and perhaps such power and belief was what it was about. Who needed real gods, if false ones could exert such control?
"I will return with you," he said to the Dragarians, "and no one will try to prevent that."
I'm losing him, Peer thought. He's going. She reached for his arm and he held her hand, squeezing gently.
"Doom hangs over the city," Rufus continued. "As Dragar I return, and my blood is as it was five hundred years ago-rich with the way to Honored Darkness." The few Dragarians muttered, shuffling their feet, glancing at one another. "But we will leave in peace. The city's end-days are here, with no need for us to hasten them. Our domes will close again, our warriors will be recalled, and there will be no more violence. This is no longer our home, and we have no more business here."
Alexia was now standing close to Nophel, glancing around uncertainly. When she caught Peer's eye, Peer nodded down at the short sword she held. The Unseen dropped the blade.
"Do you really believe…?" Peer asked, but Rufus leaned in close and took her in a gentle hug.
"To them, I'm their god," he whispered, "and they'll use whatever is in my blood-whatever was in Dragar's blood-to help them cross the Bonelands. Honored Darkness awaits to the north. I find only honor in their desire that I lead them there."
"But Echo City needs you, Rufus!"
"This is not my home," he said, "and Rufus is not my name."
"Dragar is?"
He only blinked, and the Dragarians fidgeted.
"I don't believe in gods," Peer said. "We need your blood. The Baker needs it, and you can't just turn around and leave with them." She nodded at the chopped warriors, their blades folded and stained with drying blood.
"You'd fight them?" Rufus asked.
"Yes!" Alexia said, and she knelt to pick up her dropped sword.
"No," Rufus said. "No." He walked to Alexia and took the sword from her hand, and she did nothing to prevent him. He glanced down at Nophel, blood from the fallen man's wound spreading on the chamber floor. Then he sliced the sword across his own palm.
The Dragarians gasped, but Rufus stilled them with a glance. He told Alexia to empty her water canteen, then squeezed his wound above the container's neck, wincing, his skin turning pale as blood dripped. For a while it was the only sound in the huge chamber, and then Rufus swayed, and Peer dashed to his side to hold him steady. The Dragarians mumbled at her contact with him.
"This might not be enough," Alexia said, but Peer cut her off with a glare.
"Thank you," Peer said. Rufus nodded at her and let her bind the wound. "But you expected this?" she asked. "Ever since you arrived here?"
"I had…" Rufus said, frowning. "Feelings. And I had to follow them."
"And they led you here?" Alexia asked. But Rufus ignored her, looking only at Peer.
"They called me Man from Sand," he said.
"Who?"
"The people across the desert. Their world is called the Heartlands, and their Heart and Mind sees through me. It knows Echo City now. I hope it will welcome you."
"Tell me more!" Peer said.
"It's not for me to tell you," he said. "And I have to go."
"Please!" Peer said. She was pleading now, struggling to grasp the truth she had been seeking her whole adult life. "It's everything I've ever believed in!"
"Then have faith," Rufus said. He turned and walked to where the Dragarians stood in respectful, awed silence. They parted to ensure their bloodied weapons did not touch him, then followed him from that place without a backward glance.